Hello from Hospital!

Look at me! I am a pre-opper now!

Still at Winchester Hospital in Mass. Everyone here is wonderful.

Surgery went very well. The surgeon said I was classic textbook case and it went smooth. He could tell that I had not eaten anything during my 2 week liquid pre op because my liver was nice and shrunk! lol I also had no bleeding in my stomach.

Pain after the surgery was well...different. Found out I have many new allergies to pain meds and nausea meds. So while I was in recovery it took them a long time to figure out what I could take. Once we got that under control I felt better.

Surgery was at 1:30, I was up to my room by 6. Q stayed until a little after ten pm so he could help me get up and walk. Let me tell you...walking is the key to feeling better! I was given small amounts of water. That went smooth so I graduated to sf jello.

Carmex and Burt's bee's lip stuff has been a godsend. With the oxygen and other crap they do to you...you get so freeking dry!

Super glad I brought big comfy pj bottoms. My legs were freezing. Morphine button equals your best friend!
I have been walking a lot. Nurses and staff are so friendly here. They all come in and clap after the first time you pee without your catheter. It was a momentous event!

Throat not sure from tubing. Never felt it go in, never felt it come out. I could not feel catheter going in or out either.

My parents and my sister came to visit yesterday. My sister was so grossed by the drain. Oh, you can't feel that either lol.

All in all it has been a really good experience here.
I am excited now to get home!

Thank you so much to everyone for the support notes and texting me...even if  send back texts that make so sense because I am hopped up on Morphinem.
xoxo
Dragonfly

Old Friends...New Friends

OHHHH...the countdown begins!

I am excited...I am nervous. I am so many emotions going on right now.

Bags are packed, and I think I am ready to go. Saying bye to the kiddos tomorrow is going to be difficult when I drop them off at their dad's, but he said to call them whenever I needed to talk to them.

What I am really excited about is the friends I am making through this. I know it may sound silly to those of you who are not going through it...but the people on the boards and the forums are amazing! It's another form of support and I am so grateful to them.

I am addicted to the forums. I love them because I know everyone on there is going through the same thing. Different surgery? Maybe. Same type of emotions? Definitely!

By reading the posts on the forums I feel more secure in my decisions. I know I can asked honest to goodness dumb questions and I will get answers.

I am also greatful for the friends and family who have given me so much love. My very best childhood friend is now back in my life...and it makes me so happy. He has been such a big part of life growing up that I can't imagine life without him. S & J....can't live without you or Q either. Thank you so much everyone.

So wish me luck! Not sure if I will be able to post before I go in. I will try to keep you updated when I am in there.

xoxo
Dragonfly

Hairy Meatball?

The Power of Laughter

Day 9 of pre op diet is going better than the rest.

Yesterday I had my HUGE pre op appointment at the hospital. I love my cute little hospital. I got to meet all the staff on that was working on the floor I will be on. I meet with the anesthesiologist as well. Why are all anesthesiologists smoking hot!?!? No matter what the surgery is I have had, they are GORGEOUS. And, these guys always see us with no make up…looking our worst J

They also did an EKG, chest X-Ray, blood pressure and blood work. Let’s talk about how much blood work sucks when you are on a liquid diet! After she took the 8 or 9 little tubes out of me…the world started to spin. And of course, I cannot have a cookie or juice to help feel better. It took me forever before I could leave there.

When I got home, I had to kick back in bed for hours. I just couldn’t stop with the dizzies. I finally called the surgeon’s office. The nurse there said I needed to hydrate myself with as much water as I could get down. Finally felt better around 6pm. Blood was drawn at 10 am! Nice recovery on that one…NOT!

I am getting all my protein down and then some. I still walk around with a little bit of a floaty feeling that no matter what passes. It sucks being so lightheaded.

I finally got the nerve to have Q tell his parents that I am having surgery. That was a tough one on me. Now that his parents know, I felt comfortable telling some of Q’s cousins that did not know. One of his cousins and his girlfriend both had the same surgery I am having and it was so nice to talk to him about it. I am hoping he can help Q through some of the more emotional parts and help him with what to expect.

So off to the funny parts of my day. Thank god for my minion at work. The comic relief that comes from that girl is amazing.  This is TMI so stop reading if you don’t want to hear…The rest of you perverts…continue on lol.

We were talking about the changes that happen to your body when you loose weight and she was like “your thingy (pointing at my crotch) is going to look different! That looses weight too!” I was cracking up at this point. Minion has lost a lot of weight due to an illness she has so she was telling me what looked different on her first. PS she is fine and is getting much healthier. No need to worry about Minion.

She then said to me “My cooch looked like a meatball before I lost weight! I used to call it a meatball smothered in hair!”

Ah god…I just about fell off my chair laughing. Thank goodness for my Minion at work to make me laugh and take my mind off of the fact that I am floating in my chair due to non eating. 

Thank you Q

Friday...Meltdown...Sucked.

But having Q made the difference. After his shirt got done soaking up all my snots and tears he took me to Barnes and Noble.

I'm that geeky kid that needs to absorb everything around me, and especially about the things that are going on with me. I really hadn't done that yet besides reading forums and other blogs.

Q help me find books that had recipes for "life after WLS". Each recipe had a time frame on when you could eat this...example 2-4 weeks after or 6-8.

I would eat 99% of the food prepared. The books also went over lots of tips and tricks. They used lots of descriptive words that helped me visualize portions and bite sizes.

By the time I got home I felt 10 times better. Thank god for that man and his patience with me.

I showed the books to S Saturday night and she read them with me. It was amazing how much it helped her understand what I am going through and what I am going to need when I get home.

So thank you Q for that extra support I really needed Friday. You are my hero. I love you.

Day 6 starts today

I can't believe day 6 of the liquid pre-op diet is here.

Friday was rough. When I got home from work, Q hugged me and I lost it. I just sat there crying. I was SO hungry. I was scared too. The 45 minute ride home from work was not fun while being light headed. I was worried the whole time. Thank goddess I chat with J the whole time I'm driving home on my bluetooth.

Anxiety for the upcoming weekend had really taken hold too. How was I supposed to get through this weekend making food for my family and not go insane? Or cheat?

Also, our middle son "M" had his first ever friend party at Chuck E Cheese Sunday.

Saturday went by easier that I thought it would. While Q took the boys to their swim lessons I cleaned up, and did some errands. That took my mind off things for a while. I made a shake and make them sandwiches and was doing really good. Not hungry. Had some SF Jello. I was doing REALLY GOOD!

Lucky me...S came down for the night. Having her there was great. We chatted, loaded up our nook's and played kinect with Q and the boys. Only tough part of the night was watching all of them chomp down on pizza and bread sticks :( The smell was a little overwhelming and I some how managed to sit at the table with all of them and drink my protein shake.

Sunday and "M"'s bday party came and went. I was so busy trying to keep 7 year olds organized that I really didn't even notice food. Chuck E Cheese smells like dirty feet and sweat to me, so maybe that helped! lol

"J" came down for a much needed visit last night out of the blue. I severely underestimated the power of friendship through this process. Hours slip by while we chat taking my mind off of whats going on. We also ironed out all my "babysitting of me" schedule for the week I come home. Having that set took 20 pounds off my shoulders. She is also going to come help me scrub the crap out of my house on the 23rd so that when I come home from the hospital I have a nice clean house.

I am also down 10 pounds. I have to admit it was scary. From Wednesday to Friday I had lost 6-7 pounds. The rest came off over the weekend. It was shocking to see the scale move.

So after today, only 8 more days to go. I can do this!

If you don't feed you don't love?

Day one of pre-op liquid diet is done and in the books. I made it through one and i can make it through the rest. Surgery is right around the corner!

Q and I were chatting the other night about celebrating going forward. Being on the liquid pre-op diet comes during my youngest son's birthday and Easter. So no birthday cake, and NO yummy food at my parents. This  year is going to be quite different. Most family celebrations center around food in any home in America. This has to change dramatically for weight loss surgery peeps!

To have some background on me and my life, I came from a family obsessed with food. Now, they wouldn't say that any of them were obsessed with food, but they are.  All family functions revolve around getting our feed on. My Dad always cooked dinner. Mom has her few dishes she is great at, but Dad is the gourmet. He adores pork fat and lives off bacon. Emeril is his idol.

Growing up we had all kinds of different foods with tons of flavor. It made me love being in the kitchen and learned to love cooking. I love to cook, I love to eat.


A typical family gathering of us just getting together for a simple family dinner involves cheese and crackers, homemade popcorn dripping in butter and salt, some type of sausage, a hot dip and chips, a cold dip and chips.And that is all before Dad fire's up the bbq or smoker for something meaty that is going to make you drop to your knees and weep.

Dessert, who has room for dessert? Obviously this family does! There is always a sweet treat. Brownie's cheesecake, cupcakes, cookies. Food in my family=love. Feed me and that means you care.

So if I don't put my feed bag on I'm not loved? No, I think not. But now is the time in my life where I need to learn how to express my love for my family and my friends through healthy living, and eating. I need to learn how to celebrate without food.

My mother is having a hard time grasping why I am doing the surgery. I sometimes think she has it in her head that if I just tried harder to loose the weight, that I could. Sorry Mom! Been there, been doing that. It's not working.

The other day she asked me when I was getting a grill. Then she said "Oh, are you sure you want to do this surgery? It's such a waste of a good cook!"  Really? Because having gastric bypass involves removal of hands and taste buds? It removes that part of my brain that knows how to be a good cook? lol

I explained to her that I will be able to eat at some point. Is it hard now? Yes. Absolutely. But just because I cannot eat like I used to doesn't mean I can't learn to cook healthy flavorful meals. I will eat less. I will look and feel better. Oi, Mom's sometimes....lol

Day 1 of 2 week liquid diet!!!!!!

Ok, so far day one hasn't been that bad. I am surprised that I don't have a whopping headache yet.

I think I am more mentally prepared for this two week bout than I thought I would be. I thought I would be running around this last week, cramming my face with favorite foods and going to my favorite restaurants. 3 months ago, this would have been true, but today, I feel good about the process. I am not craving the same types of foods I did 3 months ago.

I say this now, but by next Wednesday I think I am probably going to be on the war path!

I think this all has to do with how my surgeon set me up. Three months ago he had me start replacing one meal a day with one protein shake. Then last month it was two shakes a day, one healthy meal.

I have felt my appetite get smaller and smaller. I think what the surgeon did has prepared me well for these two weeks. I hope it has prepared me. I think as long as I keep a positive attitude I will be fine. It also helped that I did tons of research on different types of protein shakes and what flavor combos worked for other people.

So here is to, two weeks of liquid fooooooood. Let's see how I fare tomorrow, lol.

What a dream!

So last night was the first time I have dreamt about my surgery. It felt so real. When I was trying to wake up I couldn't figure out if I was in the hospital or my bedroom!

I think what made it so real was that there was nothing "off" or weird about the dream until the end.

It started out with Q and my Mom bringing me to the hospital. I said bye to them and the hospital staff started to get me ready. Even the stuff in the hospital room in my dream was the same name of the hospital I am going to.

In my dream I don't see them do the surgery, but I do see myself waking up in recovery. Q is there holding my hand and I am crying. Don't know why, but I am.

Then no one is there with me. This is where the dream takes a turn for the weird. Instead of being wheeled to my room, some Angie Harmon look alike receptionist comes over, tells me to get my stuff and she is going to walk me to my room. I was confused in the dream, but remember the surgeon telling me I had to walk a lot...but this soon? lol.

Instead of bringing me to my room, she dumps me in the middle of the hospital cafeteria! Turns out she is some crazy lady that boycotts WLS surgery and is trying to do me harm!

I start freaking out and try to find my way to my room. You would think by now, the recovery team would figure out one of their patients had escaped! NOT the case. Instead I am running around an impossibly huge hospital trying to find my room. At this time, I feel no pain because I am dragging around a morphine pump with me and if I feel pain, I just hit the button. :)

Finally, I remember my mom's cell phone number. For some reason it was really important for me to press "9" before dialing out. In my morphined out stupor I can't dial. So I sit at the phone booth (still in the hospital) and laugh at it. It some how dials my mom's phone. I give her my coordinates (yes I say coordinates in the dream) and she rescues me.

The Angie Harmon look alike is arrested. I some how end up back in my room and recover nicely. The rest of the dream from when I get into my room goes back to normal.

Then I wake up in pain, or at least I think I'm in pain. I guess I am still sleeping. Obviously I am still sleeping, duh...there is no reason I should be in pain awake!

When I finally get myself awake enough from my dream its 1am! ARGH! I feel like I have been in this dream for days! Needless to say, sleeping the rest of the morning was difficult. I tossed and turned.

Am I too immersed in "WLS" world right now? This was one crazy dream, and it felt so real. I think today needs to be a day for me to relax, read, and step back.

Getting work ready for me to leave.

I have to share an image from my commute to work yesterday. If it wasn't a sign that I am ready for this surgery, I don't know what is. My fellow commuters in other vehicles surrounding me must have finally realized that one of their own had lost their mine after watching me laugh my butt off over this. Reality is, I'm over tired.

No one at work truly understands what I am having done. Maybe that is my fault for being VAGUE...ok EXTREMELY VAGUE about what is going on. The only people who know some of it are my minion and my partner there.  
All they know is that I am going away for 2 weeks and I'm going to come back looking different and I'm going to loose a lot of weight. LOL. If they can't put the pieces together then....they are on their own.

Handling the stress of work, the surgery and juggling siggy other and kids have been a lot lately. We all deal with stress differently in my household and none of us seem to be helping each other. Last night Q and I went to a quiet dinner and finally talked about everything that is bothering us (no kids around) and made some good concrete plans on how to deal with this stress going forward.

This is my last weekend of eating solid foods for a while. Starting on the 13th, I go on a pure liquid diet for 2 weeks. Surgery is right around the corner!

So until I make dinner I am going to poke around other WLS sites and see what they are doing. I hope to have more posts up this week.

Hope everyone has a great rest of their weekend!

Welcome to me...

What does the modern woman do when faced with life changing and altering events? They BLOG! With a push of support from my very wonderful significant other....here I am. He will be now called "Q" in any posts to spare the poor man's identity. It's bad enough he has to deal with crazy me.

***Warning*** This blog will be an honest and upfront place for me to reveal my innermost thoughts and feelings on everything I am going through. It is in no way, shape or form a way for me to hurt my friends and family. They are my opinions and feelings. You don't like it...don't read it. :)  (Isn't everything nicer with a smiley face at the end of it?)

The cannonball name? Well, let’s just say that is an inside joke between some good friends, and this theory. Sometimes you have to just dive in, but I prefer to just CANNONBALL! I kind of just blast through life. Why do it any other way?
So you are probably wondering what this "life changing" event is that has me purging my soul to the anonymous people of the world wide web? Gastric Bypass, specifically Roux en Y Laparoscopic Bariatric Surgery.

Get that picture you have of me out of your head now that I have said that. I'm not what you think. There is a stigma with the word “obese” and it is not always a good one. I am clean, not lazy, and I do try hard at staying healthy. That is why this is so MIND BOGGLING that I am doing this. I am what you call a "light weight" in the Weight Loss Surgery World.

How did my weight start packing itself on? I was a curvy 8…happy with my body. When did it go downhill? Since the birth of my second son...my weight has been an issue. I have tried every single thing you can think of. I had tried tons of fad diets. These may work for some people, but they DID not work for me. And I stuck with them. Here are some of the few:

Weight Watcher
LA Weightloss
SlimFast
Southbeach
The Juice Diet
Some nasty supplement of grass diet
and my last and final attempt was with Get in Shape for Women.

That is when I knew there was something wrong with me. I was getting the snot beaten out of me 3 days a week. Each day consisted of 30 minutes of cardio and 30 minutes of strength in different areas of the body. That coupled with nutritional support was supposed to work. It didn't. I followed it to a "T". The man who ran it even came to my house to poke around my cabinets to see that I wasn't cheating. It was defeating.
After that fiasco I went to my Dr. They ran me through a gauntlet of tests. First I had PCOS...next I had a blood sugar disorder...next it was my hormones? I was all over the place and had no answers. Doctors had no answers for me.

Fast Forward to 1 year later. The dreaded yearly physical. (insert scary music here) We had just moved into our home and I had changed over to a new Dr. in the area. I came prepared with a list! I was hopeful this new Doctor would try something new or have that magic answer!  Of course my weight was the last thing on the list, lol.

Here comes the part where it would have been easier if he just clubbed me with his clipboard. "Have you considered weight loss surgery?" he says to me as we are finishing up. Let's just say it’s a good thing they took my blood pressure before he dropped that one on me.

Truth is I hadn't though of it. I’m not that big! At least I don’t think I am? Do I have some warped image of myself that others don’t see? I can still tie my shoes! Why do I need to consider weight loss surgery???
But obviously I have now...so here is where I am today. I have done all the necessary appointments and have been cleared by my surgeon and insurance to go through with the surgery. I am booked for April 27th. I’ll tell you more about my Surgeon and the process in another blog…another day. This was just meant for the basics.

I am hoping with these posts that 1, they help me stay sane and 2, they help someone else out there who may need a laugh, or know that they are not alone.

I also want to send a big thank you to Q,J,S,K,M and T. You know who you are and what you mean to me. Plain and simple. Without your support, I know I couldn’t do this.

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy my blog.