Recovery...

Quick disclaimer this post may be a little medically graphic in some areas.

I have to admit this has been a harder recovery than I expected.  I am feeling a lot better and especially  because of still being on an all liquid diet I am currently dropping weight like a rock I am only 10 days since surgery and I have lost 15 pounds.

I am still feeling quite a bit of pain, especially just to the left of my belly button when ever I try to move too much.  The surgeon said that is normal because they did quite a bit of rearranging in that area.

In general my recovery is going pretty much textbook, with one exception.  They put in what they call a Gastric feeding tube or g-tube in to the remnant part of my stomach.  In general they don't put these in for everyone, mostly just for those that use cpap at night for sleep apnea. At night the tube is hooked up to a collection bag and some fluid is drained off.  The neat thing about this g tube is that it goes to your remnant stomach which is technically for the time being still functioning and connected to the intestines.  So if you are running behind on water or protein intake .you can actually inject water or  liquid protein into the stomach thru the g-tube.

Well, Wednesday night we were trying to flush out the tube with water and it felt like it didn't go into the stomach. so Thursday morning we went back to the hospital and they clipped the stitch holding the tube in place saying this sometimes cleared it up.  I went home and we tried flushing the tube again it felt weird again and this time overnight all the watter leaked out thru the hole for the g tube and another hole that had a pain medication going into it.  And the tube for the g tube had come out by about a foot. so we went back to the surgeons office ( the visit the previous day had been to the emergency room).  They took a look at the g tube and decided to keep it in place where it was (a foot out) but we are not using it any more.  Since then we have just been taping it in place, cleaning around it, and otherwise leaving it alone.

While at the surgeons office the nurse did take out the tube that had been dripping pain meds in around the incisions. This took me down to 5 incisions healing and 2 tubes.

We also found out at the surgeons office that I am allergic to some medical adhesive.  We had been using a translucent plastic tape and that caused a really bad rash.  We have since tried a few others and I get a little bit of a reaction from them and my tummy is getting pretty raw just from repetitive changing of bandages and re-taping.

I came home still on oxygen and was on it for right at a week, the oxygen tube going into my nose just about drove me nuts, and even after I got rid of it I still felt like I still had it at times.

I have been going for frequent walks to get some exercise, sometimes it's out around the neighborhood other times when it is too cold it is just pacing back and forth in my living room and dining room.  My cats loved chasing the oxygen hose as I paced in the house.

I find I am not really liking sleeping at night.  I can't sleep on my side yet because it hurts the incisions so I end up on my back all night and my butt that had already been hurting from the hospital bed still hurts from laying on my back all night. On top of that I don't know if it is because I have lost some weight in my face or what the cause is but my cpap mask is not fitting well and is causing a sore spot on the bridge of my nose.

Yesterday was a big day for me. Everyone who had gastric bypass last week had a class about nutrition and the next phase of our diet (there were six of us) and an appointment with the nurse in the surgeons office where she removed one of my drains (JP 'suction' drain), this was one of the strangest things I have ever felt the end of the drain looked like some sort of cloth mesh that was used fur sucking up fluids this was about 8 inches long and then about a foot of hose. The mesh was laid along the incisions collecting fluid. The nurse had me breath in deep and exhale slowly and pulled out the drain I felt it snaking its way around my innards to the exit and then I felt nauseous and crampy for about 5-10 seconds then it was over. So now 6 incisions or holes healing and only one hose still in place.

The great thing about yesterday was that I hadn't had any thing solid to eat since the Saturday before surgery and yesterday we got to go to the next phase of the diet, this includes 5 soft foods that I can now eat, those 5 foods are re-fried beans, low calorie yogurt, Egg Beaters, Cottage Cheese (low fat, small curd), and sugar free pudding.  I can have one ounce every 2 hours along with my hourly ounce of protein and 4 ounces an hour of other liquids.

They want you to only try two new foods a day until you are sure you can tolerate them, then you can mix them as desired if you want.  My first food was the re-fried beans.

Believe me when I tell you that after not eating real food for a week and a half an ounce of re-fried beans never tasted so good, they were delicious.

I have now tried the re-fried beans, the egg beaters and some Greek yogurt (better for you, more protein) and so far so good, no reactions or issues although I did feel my pouch telling me I was full for the first time this morning.

So for the most part I am feeling pretty good now, I still have some pain on occasion (especially when I move too much) and coughing or sneezing is pretty excruciating and I still feel fatigued.

 I am thinking I will have another post or at least some pictures next week some time as I will probably hit my next 20 pound check-mark. Until then thanks for reading and of course thanks for the thoughts and prayers.

Surgery Day...

...was finally here.

This is probably gonna be a long one, just so you know.  I will try and make it not to graphic.

Monday February 13, 2012, our day started at 4:00 a.m., I had already gone 48 hours on the liquid diet and was feeling a little runned down.

We got to the hospital at 5:30 and waited in the waiting room for them to come get me and get this fun started.

Once they took me back they weighed me (surgery day weight 381lbs) and took me to a prep area.  The nurse tried to get an I/V going in me, but me being related to my mom and grandma I am a bit of a tricky stick and she eventually had to bring in somone from the "I/V team" they finally got an I/V st up in the top of my hand.

They gave me some Fragmen (an anti coagulation drug) and a patch behind my ear to help with nausea.

They went over my medical history probably 5 times, seemed every one i spoke to (surgeon, Assistant, anestiologist, nurses) needed to cover it one last time.  They also called back my wife and parents  to see me before taking me to surgery and to see if they had any questions and to let them know what to expect from here on.

They then took me to the operating room introduced me to everyone in the room and moved me to the table and put me on oxygen.........
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(Most people say that from that point they don't remember much of the rest of the day, I was not that lucky.)
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........my first memory was of them rolling me out of the operating room and into the recovery room,  it was an absolutely terifying few minutes.  I remember very clearly knowing exactly what was going on and why. I was in SEVERE pain My abdomen felt like it was on fire, my neck was throbbing with pain, both on the right side whre they had put in the central line in my jugular but also on the left side for some reason.  I also felt when I first woke up like I was gonna hyperventilate, I couldn;t get enough air because of the pain but my body was screammin gfor more.  I also felt like I was trapped on the bed.

I ended up spending about an hour longer in recovery than most because it took longer to get the pain under control. but then they finally rolled me up to my room where my family was waiting for me.

Most of the rest of Monday was spent with my wife and parents setting in the room with me talking while I faded in out of sleep. This being interupted every few hours by having to get up and go for a short walk (yes, I had to get up and walk that first day) and then spending a half hour or so sitting up in a chair before going back to bed.

One of the worst parts of the day was that I had cotton mouth really bad from being intubated during the surgery and really wanted a big drink of water but until they were sure I had no leaks all I could "eat" was one ounce of ice chips per hour, this sucked.

I had been sleeping off and on all day but it hadn't been real restful so I had been looking forward to putting on my cpap mask on and getting a decent night's sleep.  No luck, they don't want you wearing the cpap mask that first night, and my night was not exactly restful.  I am not a "back sleeper", yet that is the only position I could lay in and all the time sitting at an incline to keep my abdomen from hurting had left me with a throbbing tailbone.

Tuesday I felt somewhat better. The day started with having to go and have an upper GI study to make sure I didn't have any leaks.  I had to drink some nasty contrast stuff and make sure it all went thru the pouch alright.  Everything went perfectly, no leaks.

I ended up going for six walks down to the end of the hall and back and felt progressively better with each walk.

April had planned to work this day because she was saving time up for when Evren comes but she ended up calling in because of what ended up being hip bursitis and spent the entire day at the hospital.  My parents had stayed in a nearby hotel overnight and came up to stay with me longer,  my in-laws came up to see me as well. My friend Marie who had her surgery a few weeks earlier came to see me as well. I had a good day visiting with everyone when I wasn't napping or walking or taking one ounce shots of liquid

Tuesday night they had to do a sleep study but that was ok with me because I got to wear my cpap mask.  I slept far better that second night.

Wednesday was mostly just a waiting game. I had to get clearance form several departments then had to get approval to go home.  I finally got to go home about 2:30 in the afternoon.

So my Surgery day weight was 381, I took one of my comparison pictures the day before, I an also using it as my 40 pounds lost shot since that point is just another 6 pounds down at 375 (i slightly revised my starting weight up 3 pounds to 415 just to simplify things) I took several other pictures in the preceeding days of me and how I fit into my life, I will take some more later just for comparison.We took several pictures while in the hospital as well, They are posted on their own picture page here (look for "Hospital stay pictures"), take a look and enjoy.

Sorry it took a few days to get this posted, I am sure you can understand but I haven't been much in a writing mood the last few days.  I will try and have a post up for the first few days after getting home int the next few days.

As always, of course, thanks for reading and thanks for your prayers and support.

Coming down the final stretch...

Most of my posts have been pretty long, I find I tend to get a little verbose when doing this (that and I have gotten lazy at times and had a lot to cover when finally getting around to posting something new).  This one is shorter and I am expecting that over the next few months my posts will be more frequent and somewhat shorter.

My last work week before surgery is finally over, and man it was a slow one.  Gotta say thanks to my TAC family for all the well wishes today.  I am really looking forward to coming back and showing y'all how much I will have lost after just a month.

I have to go on a clear liquid diet starting tomorrow evening so I have been splurging this evening.  Right now I am enjoying some Dryers Vanilla Bean ice cream, its good stuff, and although I know I will take some heat from some saying it was a horrible choice those that know me well will not be surprised at all to learn that my last real food meal for the foreseeable future was an extra value meal at Mcdonalds.  Yes I have seen "Supersize Me", yes I know it is bad for me but on this last day of normal food I don't care.

I came across another gastric bypass related blog, and the cool thing is it is by a woman that had the same surgeon as me and just had her surgery a few weeks ago.  It is really neat to have someone that is going thru the same things I will be going thru in just a few days. I plan on trying to learn as much as I can from her experiences.  Her name is Marie Silverstein and I have put a link to her blog here on my site, I wold highly recommend giving it a read, she is a good writer and has a good story.

So, here I am coming down to the final stretch.  People keep asking me "Are you scared?", of course I am a little nervous.  However I can honestly say my excitement far outweighs my nervousness right now. I have put in a lot of hard work already and have done massive amount of research on this and now there are very few choices in my life that I have been more certain about.

That being said I still appreciate all the prayers and well wishes.

Thanks again for reading.

Just a bit excited...

To say I am excited would be an understatement.  I have previously mentioned I have been looking into gastric surgery for 10 years now and for a variety of reasons it has never happened.  Now here i am only nine days away from my surgery.  Yes I am somewhat nervous but definitely more excited than nervous.

The fact that my surgery is so close and approaching quick has really began to sink in during  the last week and I am sure it will hit me even more this week.  I ordered and received my post-surgery multi-vitamins and sub-lingual b-12 pills.  We have started cleaning out the fridge and pantry of food I wont be able to eat and that April won't eat.

We also started buying some of the food I will be eating the first week or so, lots of jello, protein shakes, and broth.  We still have some other stuff to buy but we have it planned out and we will be ready for everything by next weekend.

I had my pre-op appointments (my very last appointments before surgery, yay!).  The first one was basically pre-op testing, getting blood and urine samples, and another EKG just to make sure the ticker is good.  Second was an appointment with my surgeon where we covered my medical history again, made sure I knew what I needed to do and bring the days before and of surgery (clear liquid diet, bring my cpap machine, etc)  We also revised his view on what my goal weight should be, he said between 210 and 200 pound goal weight, which seeing as I started this journey with my heaviest weight being 420 I will be loosing at least half of me.  My surgeon also said I can expect to loose my first 100 pounds in 4 months.  That means I should be down by 70 to 80 pounds by the time Evren is born.

My surgeon also wanted to make sure I was planning on taking lots of pictures.  I told him about doing this blog , he thought that was really cool and wanted the link so he could read it too (Hi Dr. Snyder, welcome to my blog!).  I think that is pretty cool.

I had mentioned that during the Holidays I had gained back some of the weight I had lost during the first few months of the 6 month diet.  Well I have lost some of  the weight that I gained back and should be back down to just under 380 by surgery.  While I am doing better at sticking to my diet and I have completely cut out all pop from my diet, I am also taking some time to enjoy some favorites for the last time.

My wonderful wife had me put together a sort of pre-surgery "bucket list" of restaurants back around Christmas and then each weekend we have tried to hit some of those restaurants tomorrow after church we are hitting what will probably end up being the last one off that list.  We are going to The Cheesecake Factory, not sure if we will hit the Downtown one or the Park Meadows one but I am sure it will be good.

I am going to be getting some more pictures posted in the next couple of weeks of how I fit into my current life and of course one last of my front and side comparison shot for comparison.  I will let y'all know as they are posted.

So now we are down to it and it is just a matter of waiting this last week, if the last few weeks are any indication this coming week is going to crawl by.

I have found that a lot of people I did not expect are actually following my blog, which is awesome.  I would like to get a better idea of who all is following so if y'all don't mind I would appreciate it if y'all could sign up as followers of my blog, thanks.

As always thanks to reading and thanks for all the prayers, I really appreciate it.

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." Philippians 4:13