116/70 - that was my blood pressure going into bypass surgery. The nurse asked me what was wrong. There was nothing wrong. I knew I had made the right decision by having this surgery. Here's the timeline:
500am - drop kids off
600am - arrive at hospital
615am - begin pre-op work
730 - funny meds pumped and we are off (I felt really good)
735 - mask placed on my face and I am out.....
Sometime a few hours later........
.........begin to wake up and yell at Brent to leave and let me sleep (Ooops)
100 - arrive at private suite (this is my spring break after all)
300 - take the first of a few walks equaling 3 miles
Over the next couple of days I spend my time swabbing my mouth with a little foam brush. There is no drinking or eating until Tuesday evening. So, every so often I swab my mouth with ice water careful not to swallow. I must admit though that with the scratchy throat the breathing tube left I may have let a tiny bit of water trickle down. Just a smidgeon. I received my first meal Tuesday evening: 4 ounces of sugar free vanilla pudding and 4 ounces of crystal light. It took me about 3 hours to finish this first meal. The next meal arrives at 10 pm and it is 4 ounces of sugar free vanilla yogurt. I took two bites and let the rest sit there. There is a pattern forming here as I toss the breakfast too after a few bites. I am not advocating that people do this -in fact I am breaking the nutrition rules by doing so, but I swore to you all an honest reflection of this process.
Any person who has a gastric bypass is not supposed to leave the hospital without having walked a total of one mile. I, of course, am insane so I walked three. On one of my walks I am stopped by another young woman who asks me how in the world I am able to walk. I told her that the most important thing that I could stress coming out of this surgery was to be positive and stay motivated, so I was walking through the pain. She shut the door on me when I went on a later walk. I saw her at our first follow up appointment and she looked like death and smelled of smoke. I feel for her.
Ok, back to the food...... I said I was not able to eat all of the food and I am still experiencing difficulty. Contrary to my mother's belief, the point of having a gastric bypass is not to never eat again, but to fix the physiology and aid in maintaining a healthy eating lifestyle. It is imperative to eat a high protein diet in order to heal appropriately and to retrain the stomach. The other piece of this is to not eat foods that will bloat the stomach so that the incision areas can heal and not tear. Tearing would be tragic and gross. So, everyday I am trying to get all of my food in so that I can continue to heal and improve. It just sucks, but is a finite amount of time when put into perspective.
The big question is..... "How much weight have you lost?" Well, I am obsessed with this and have had to stop weighing myself. I was literally driving myself nuts, so as of the last time I checked I have lost 24 pounds. I had surgery three weeks ago. I guess I somehow convinced myself that I would drop boat loads of weight every week, so I have been down on myself a bit. I know in my head that the current loss is great and that losing too much at once can have tragic consequences. So, I am okay with the loss that I have had. Although not always easy, this is what I mean by staying positive and motivated. Even I sometimes need to be reminded to push through the pain or mental blocks to keep moving.
Please ask me questions about this process. There is so much I can touch on, but want to make it relevant.
