PSaadallah

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I am finally settling into a routine for vitamins, protein, etc.  Weight loss is slower over the last few weeks, but still losing!  I had a bad two weeks with carbs - particularly potato chips - and I am paying the price with digestive issues!  Working hard to get back to good protein and low carbs, but of course I have now awakened the evil carb cravings monster.  And I've been lazy about exercise all week, using a head cold as my excuse.  How easy to fall back into old habits!!  Moving forward; don't look back.

Tomorrow I might crave a lot of foods I can't eat, but today I'm happy with the small meals of protein and I enjoy them.

Tomorrow I might want eat half of what I'm cooking for the ladies at church, but today it's enough to see them enjoy it.

Tomorrow I might have the urge to snack at night after everyone goes to bed, but today I'll just have another cup of hot tea.

Tomorrow everything I eat might give me some digestive trouble, but today everything went through just fine!

My surgery is now less than a month away, and it's soooo hard to wait.  I'm so afraid something will happen to delay the surgery.  I'm becoming a bit of a hypochondriac; imagining myself developing conditions that would prevent my surgery.  The surgery looms as both a frightening event with all that DS entails on the body, and also an incredible opportunity to finally change my health and my body in a positive way.  Nothing to do but wait!  

My long round of pre-op appointments and tests begin on December 4.  I know I have a lot to learn before the surgery, and I'm eager to get it all moving forward.

Twenty-six days to go!

It's all proceeding faster than I had expected!  I had my first consultation with my surgeon, Dr. David Kim, on October 10; sleep study on October 11.  The insurance approval came through on October 31, and the next day I had a surgery date scheduled.  Now I'm looking forward to December 18 with excitement, fear and optimism.  I had never seriously considered weight loss surgery, primarily because I knew so many people who had surgery and gained most or all of their weight back.  My surgeon explained Duodenal Switch surgery and why he thought it was my best option.  I had originally thought about the Vertical Sleeve procedure, but he ruled that out because I had extensive scarring from my spleen surgery 25 years ago.

I've done lots of research since that first visit, and I find very few people who've had DS who have experienced weight regain.  Most are completely satisfied with their procedure, years later, even those few who had complications.  I find it a bit scary to think of having my intestines re-arranged, but this may be the only way I'm ever going to lose the weight and get my health on track.

I have been overweight since I was a child.  There are very few days in my life that I don't obsess about my weight.  I've tried virtually every diet or scam out there to get the weight off.  Many small, temporary, successes - but overall nothing but increased weight year after year.  All that work, all those diets, all the time and money spent trying to lose, and it simply did not work.  At age 47, I have finally reached the conclusion that I am not going to be able to do this the "old-fashioned" way.  As my primary care doctor put it - "your body is resisting this change, you're going to have to do something drastic."  Well, this is certainly drastic!

Lots of pre-op tests to go through before the big day, and I have to explain to my family that my husband and I will not be traveling home for Christmas, but I'm starting to think that this going to work.