Amy W.

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Its been a week and a half since the beginning of the rest of my life.  I have brief moments of buyers remorse, but they don't last but  few seconds and are insignificant at this point.  

I'm doing remarkably well.  I came back to work after only one week off.  The first day was a little rough on my energy level, but was doable.  I was completely exhausted by the end of the day.  The following day back was 100% better. 

I had my post op visit last Tuesday.  My only complaint was the constipation/gas that collects down in my pelvic region.  It was becoming so uncomfortable and painful at times that it was hard to even sit and sleep at night.   They pulled my drain, told me to start the pureed stage for 2 weeks, and then soft for 2 more weeks.  And follow up in 4 weeks.  

I had quite a bit of anxiety that I was keeping to myself.  I was and am prepared for the life changes this is bringing to me, but I was terrified of any complications that would come from the surgery and complications thereaftaer.  I am very fortunate that everything went well, and no complications have arisen.

The pureed stage is rather boring, but at this point, I'm not complaining about it yet.  I just eat what I have to eat to get in my protein.  Takes a little planning on my part, but not planning before it what got me to this point.

I took the chilli beans out of some chilli the other day, and put them into the food chopper, and pureed them, then added them back into the chilli juice.  Put some shredded cheese on top to melt, and had me some yummy chilli.  I had a few quick thoughts about how some saltines would be good on this right now, but I let the thoughts pass quickly.  

I copied a few recipes for some pureed ideas when I start to get bored with the yogurt, soups, and jellos.  I bought some canned meats the other day that I'm going to pureed and see how they do.  The tuna salad I made was suprising decent, so as long as I can tolerate the consistency, I hope to start getting some more protien in with more pureed meats.

School has started back up.  I was extremely lucky when the snow this past Tuesday cancelled my first round of nursing clinicals.  I would have done it because I just don't have a choice, but I can only imagine how spent I would have been at the end of working 8 hours, and then doing 8 hours of nursing clinicals.  So I have another whole week to rebuild some more energy and start them.

I had to put the scale far under my bed to prevent me from weighing myself everyday.  For the next week or so, it will take to much to have to fish it out from there to want to weigh myself everyday.  I'll have to be a little more creative to think of what to do with it after that.

I made the phone call on my birthday to get an appointment for an evaluation.  It had only been 7 months since my insurance removed the exclusions for weight loss surgery, though I had been wanting it for close to five years.  

After months of appointments, seminars, lab work, and patience;  I called the insurance company today, and I got a verbal that I had been approved.  

I have told myself from the beginning that I was not going to allow myself to be devastated if this didn’t happen.  I forced myself to be lax in scheduling the appointments and making follow up calls.  I couldn’t live my life going to sleep every night thinking about this, only to wake up thinking about it, and thinking about it every waking moment.  I just couldn’t allow myself to do it.  So I did the reverse (at least I tried to fool myself into thinking I was).  When it happens it happens, if it happens at all.

 It had been over a month since Dr. Halpin’s office had submitted the info to the insurance company.  I called the insurance company last week to get a status check, and the kind lady on the phone said that it should have been reviewed by now, and she put it in a expedited file.  I called back 2 days later, and my eyes watered up when she told me I was approved.

 Now I just have to wait for the paper approval to come in the mail in order to schedule it, as Dr. Halpin’s office is requiring it.

 I have myself all worked up over the timing of when to do it.  I don’t expect that I will get scheduled before the next month is up.  I start nursing clinical in 2 weeks.  I believe that she operates on Thursdays, which would give me 6 days before I would have to do a clinical, and I’m not sure if that is reasonable or not.  My clinicals will be mostly just observations at this point, but I will be on my feet for 8 hours, which I’m not quite use to yet. 

  If I wait for a break in school, I would have to wait until July, and I just don’t think I can emotionally do that at this point.  I’ve sent an email to my nursing instructor to get an idea of what I can expect a little more from clinicals and to get her opinion of timing of when to schedule an elective surgery.

 So I wait…which I’ve been doing pretty darn well at for the last 7 months, so I can do it for a few more weeks.