The Day Before Surgery

In less than 24 hours I'll be at the hospital getting prepped for surgery! I can hardly believe it's time already!

I finished all my shopping for post-op supplies this morning.

OH...about the calcium...the calcium I bought and posted in my previous blog (the chocolate chew kind)...yeah I won't really be able to actually use that I guess. I wasn't aware that there was a difference between calcium CARBONATE and calcium CITRATE. The chocolate chew kind are carbonate which I can't have because it does something w/stomach acid that surgery patients don't want. I'm not 100% sure but there ya go. So I bought this liquid calcium citrate today, blueberry flavor...BLECH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OMG I have no idea how I'll be able to take this. In fact I doubt I will be able to. It is so insanely disgusting. Thankfully my wonderful friend Victoria (who had gastric bypass) is going to share some of her chewable calcium citrate tablets with me, and she said they're good. So if I like them I'll buy some of those, but oh my goodness. I'll post the name/brand w/a pic later so you all know to STAY AWAY!!

Anyway, I had to drink a full bottle of magnesium citrate (nothing to do w/calcium citrate) which is a laxative. I've never had to take those before so I didn't quite know what to expect. Started out bad because I swallowed down the wrong tube and spent about half an hour coughing up acidic liquid. That was the worst pain I've ever felt in my throat. Here are some funny pics of my face when drinking it...it doesn't taste pleasant at all!

So for breakfast I had a protein bar. For lunch all I was allowed to have was a bowl of soup, I chose tomato. Then I was supposed to have a clear liquid dinner (like broth) but I forgot and by the time I remembered it was too late for me to eat anything. I had to stop eating by 9pm. I can't have anything to drink after midnight. I'm already STARVING and I won't get much sleep since I'm all excited for tomorrow, so I'm going to be a grouch tomorrow.

My schedule for the next few days is as follows:
Thursday
7am-wake up
7:45am-on the road to the hospital
9:30am-arrive at the hospital and start getting pre-op prep done
11:30am-SURGERY!!!
12:30pm-out of surgery and moved to the recovery room
2:30pm-Kristopher (husband) and my mommy can come in and see me
3:00pm-start walking around constantly
8:00pm- visiting hours over :( alone for the night (by my request, hubby snores!)
FRIDAY
12:00am-FINALLY able to lay down to rest/sleep (yes...at midnight!)
5:30am-get woken up for testing (yep, you read that correctly...I get 5 1/2 hours of REST, not necessarily sleep)
7:30am-probably get released from the hospital, then go to the hotel and take a NAP!
11:00am-head out, need to walk around a lot, if I feel up to it probably head to Scottsdale Fashion Center to get in plenty of walking and look at clothes I'll buy when I can finally fit them!
8:00pm-bed time!
SATURDAY
8:00am-wake up/get dressed
9:00am-check out of hotel
11:00am-Nephew's b-day party at Peter Piper Pizza (yeah...talk about facing your first hurdle!)
2:00pm-HOME AND NAP!!!!
SUNDAY
Back to work :(

Probably more than you NEEDED to know, but just in case you wanted to :)

OK well wish me luck (pretty much everyone already has) and I'll check in with you either tomorrow night when I'm not as drugged up or the next day!

Ahhhhhhhhh!

One week from today is my surgery date! YAY!

I've been finding that my behavior is a bit unusual lately. You know how pregnant women "nest" before they have their baby? I think I'm kind of doing the same thing. I'm not entirely sure why, but oh well :)

I've been cleaning a lot more lately. I think that's my subconscious knowing that I don't want to come home from the hospital to a dirty house. I'll be a new person when I come home, why would I want to come home to the same old messes?

I've also been pampering myself more. This is probably my subconscious way of helping me relax and take it easy so I'm not so stressed out before surgery. Everyone says that they way you go in to surgery is the way you come out. I want to come out peaceful and at ease, not tense and wound up.

So I bought these face masks at Walgreens to try. They are not the normal kind where you smear on some green stuff (although I have that too) but rather a very soft, felt like fabric that's soaked in whatever kind of rejuvenating liquid you choose. It has cut outs for your eyes, nose, and mouth. You just wash your face then slap it on. It feels GREAT! However I couldn't get mine to stay on because I kept laughing at myself in the mirror :) I really think this would work better for someone who was laying down because it does kind of slide a bit when you're sitting up. But it did feel wonderful and my skin feels very refreshed. And the best part is...when it's done, you just take it off! No peeling, no scrubbing. YAY!

What's for lunch?

Another WLS patient and fellow blogger (theworldaccordingtoeggface) gave me a great recommendation to try Naked Nuggets. Ok seriously...wow! I LOVE these nuggets probably more than I love most breaded nuggets.

As you can see they're kind of shaped like McDonald's chicken nuggets, but obviously they are so much better for you.

Interested in trying them? You can get them at Costco in the frozen section.

As you can see, these little babies are PACKED with protein (25), making them a great post-op addition. However, you may also notice the sodium (19% yikes!) so these aren't an every day food, they're a sometimes food. However, one full serving is 7 nuggets and post-ops may not be able to eat 7 of them in one meal. My advice...save them for when you need something FAST and you don't have time to cook up a chicken breast. These are GREAT chopped up in salads or just on there on. You can microwave them for 1 minute, flip them, 45 seconds more and they're done!

Here was my lunch for the day: Naked nuggets, 1/2 a foldit flat bread w/fat free refried beans and low fat cheese, baby carrots, a nectarine, and a sugar free 90 cal chocolate pudding. Again, this is PRE-op size, not post-op size yet.

ONE MORE WEEK!!!

Post-Op Essentials

This last weekend I went shopping for some things I'll need after my surgery. Granted, not all of these are REQUIRED, but I've heard from various lap-banders that these really help.

A travel pillow: these are perfect size (for me anyway) to hold over my stomach to protect my post-op wounds from my seat belt in the car. For most people, the lap strap of their seat belt hits 2 of the incisions, so I was told this is a must for any car rides for at least a week after surgery.


A heating pad: In surgery, they pump your body full of gas to separate your internal organs making it easier to access your stomach. After surgery, that gas is trapped in your body and most people say it ends up in your upper left shoulder. Heating pads are #1 recommended to ease that discomfort.

Chewable Gas-X: Mostly for the same reason as above...they pump your body full of gas, it has to go somewhere.

A Pedometer: Walking is a HUGE part of recovery. A mere 4 hours after surgery the nurses will be pulling me out of bed every 2 hours until midnight making me walk for a while. While it's not expected immediately after surgery, the goal is to get to 10,000 steps per day. I would never be able to keep track myself.

Child size plates: This is more of a mental assist than anything. It can be really depressing looking at a normal sized dinner plate with a little blob of food on it. But looking at a small plate that is filled with food isn't so bad. I also got the kind that have compartments so that I can separate my proteins, veggies, fruits, etc into their correct portions. Protein goes in the biggest compartment.

Child size utensils: Well if I have the plates I may as well have the set. No, just kidding. This is to help with bite sizes. It's easy to take way too big of a bite of food on a normal size fork or spoon. This could cause problems if that food bite is too big that it can't fit through the opening of my stomach pouch. So naturally, the smaller the fork or spoon, the smaller the bite will be. Lap-band patients are only supposed to take bites the size of a dime.

Burt's Bees Res-Q ointment: For the incisions it is recommended to use vitamin E to help heal and sooth the wounds. I couldn't find any vitamin E oil so I found this. It's vitamin E and lavender. I'll post a follow up after surgery to let you know if/how well this works on the wounds.

Disney Princess Tattoo Band-aids: Because every girl wants to feel like a princess when she has owies. Enough said.

Magnesium Citrate: Ok well this one is required. The day before surgery I have to drink this to "clean out" my system. Eww...not looking forward to this at all.

Calcium Chews: Calcium is needed to prevent osteoporosis. It's also needed for nerve transmission and regulation of the heart muscle function. If you can't tell...that's copied from my surgeon's book, lol.

Chewable multi-vitamin: Due to the fact that lap-band patients eat less than the normal serving sizes, we also consume less of the important vitamins and minerals from our food. Multi-vitamins will be a life long addition to my diet. They also have to be chewable because most multi-vitamins are large and could easily get stuck in the pouch opening. They'd dissolve eventually, but I'd rather chew and be done than be in total agony for the hour it will take to dissolve. A key note when you're looking for your chewable multi-vitamin, it HAS to have at least 22 different vitamins and minerals. You can't get the gummy bear vitamins for kids because they only have like 15...trust me, I checked. Even the adult gummy vitamins only have 17 or 18. You need at least 22.

Snow Cone/Slushy maker: Yay! This is not at all required, this is just for my own personal enjoyment :) One thing I'll be allowed to have immediately post-op is sugar free Popsicles, but I don't really love those. So I figured I'd make my own sugar free snow cones! I bought some sugar free torani syrup flavors (am waiting on strawberry, grr!) to keep them sugar free. I will post a follow up blog to let you know how well this works and if I think it was worth the $30 I spent on it :)

Everything I bought was from Target, so it's not hard to find it all in one stop. I know a lot of other pre-op patients are confused at what all to get and where to find it. Let me know if you have any questions, I'll help :)

T minus 10 days and counting...

Wow...it's coming up! Tomorrow is my pre-op consultation with the surgeon. This will be the first time I actually meet her. So far I've only met with nurses and other assistants. At the pre-op consultation she'll go over all of the labs and tests I've had done recently. She'll basically just be making sure that my body will be able to handle surgery. She'll also see how I'm doing w/my 10% weight loss goal. I was pretty sick yesterday and spent most of the day in the bathroom with my head in the toilet so I was able to drop a good 10 lbs! I'm sure I'll gain that back in no time, but hey...it's nice to see it on the scale.

Yummy Food Finds

When I was at Costco last weekend, they had a demo for these Turkey Burgers. I'd always wanted to try them, but have always been hesitant because I'm a devoted beef girl. It's a lifestyle choice. But I decided I may as well try one from the demo without committing to an entire pack.

YUM! I was really surprised how good it was (and check out the protein!!). And the sweet little old demo lady was just pan frying them and serving them w/o anything on them. So I got a pack.
My first attempt was a turkey burger with melted mozzarella cheese on top on a whole wheat bun. DO NOT TRY THAT. Mozzarella and turkey are not a good flavor combination at all. That was gross.

So I decided to stick with the classics and just pretend it was a beef patty and try my luck that way. SCORE.

My first experiment was just a good ol' fashioned hamburger. I had already overloaded on carbs for the day, so I wanted to try something less carby and found these:

They're Flatout brand flat breads. These specific kind are the Fold its, they're two smaller circles connected in the middle, great for making sandwich style foods instead of the typical wrap. And they just happened to be prefect size to fit the very generous turkey burger patty on.

A tad high on the sodium side, but the fiber and protein are pretty great. And the low carbs are even better!

So I pan fried my turkey patty, put some light mayo, low sugar ketchup, and a bit of yellow mustard on my flat bread, and then I melted a low fat cheddar cheese stick on top of the patty. Viola!! A healthy cheese burger!!

I am still training my taste buds to like that healthy grain-y taste that comes w/all stone ground healthy carb type foods. But with the cheese and mustard and ketchup, you really don't taste the grain-y taste. And coming from a devoted beef eater, I could not really tell that I was eating a healthy turkey burger over a fatty beef burger.



My entire lunch was so good! I had my turkey cheese burger, a cup of cooked spinach w/a tiny bit of light butter, a 1/2 cup of unsweetened apple sauce w/cinnamon sprinkled on top, and a bag of cheddar bunnies (organic wheat crackers equivalent to gold fish crackers). I did not eat the almonds because I ran out of time. Only 20 minutes to eat...NO LONGER! :)

Now keep in mind the portions shown above are PRE-BAND and will NOT be typical once I have had surgery. I'd say maybe 1/3 of that.

Enjoy! :)

Pre-Op Class

As I struggled to drag my butt out of bed at 5 am today, I decided I really didn't need to go to the pre-op class. But, as I would not be allowed to have my surgery if I did not go...I went against my will.

About 30 minutes into the class, I realized that I could teach this class better than any of the speakers. Since I am in the behavior modification therapy I've been learning these things in serious depth and I know it all like the back of my hand. The different speakers were just going over the bare minimum and were setting a lot of RULES but not explaining the logic behind the rules or WHY you have to follow them. If I had been hearing those things for the very first time I'd have no motivation to follow them either.

If anyone has any questions about ANYTHING, like WHY you should only eat every 5 hours, and WHY you shouldn't drink 30 minutes before, during, or 30 minutes after you eat. And these are all great nutritional values for anyone trying to lose weight, not just surgery patients. If anyone reading this is pre-surgery and was told that they may need to do the behavior modification, I know that sounds sucky at first, but it really is the BEST thing I could have done, really!

Anyway, so I spent 6 hours and 15 minutes listening to things I already knew, but I still sort of had fun. The best part was the GOODY BAGS!!!


We got big totes from Realize (that's a brand of band):


And a REALLY NICE binder full of all our paperwork and things we'll need to know. I love stuff like this :)



This is called an incentive spirometer...you take a deep breath and then exhale all the air out of your lungs, and then you put that hose thingy in your mouth and inhale until the big blue disk goes up as high as it can. I got it all the way to the top!! The nurse called me an over achiever :)


This pic shows some vitamin pack samples at the top (hard to see), then a certificate for their health shop for a discount on vitamins, supplements, etc., then I got a purple Scottsdale Bariatric pen, and the BEST part of the goody bag is a gift certificate to the SPA for a FREE one hour treatment, my choice!

And I got this really nice water bottle :)

Not a bad haul for one day's work :) I love getting "stuff" for free.

Now I'm all set until next week on Tuesday for my pre-op appointment with the surgeon herself :)

14 DAYS AND COUNTING....