Ten things for Thursday

1. I am so excited to finish school and become a court reporter. I think it's an interesting field and my days/cases can/will be interesting. Also, I feel special that I know this foreign "language" that blows everyone's minds.

2. My favorite color is red.

3. My favorite flower is Sunflower. Yes, I know my Kansas is showing.

4. I was born and raised in Wichita, Kansas and I moved to Tempe, Arizona almost three years ago.

5. I am the youngest of four. I have 6 nephews and 4 nieces (plus, one more to determined on June 21!)

6. One of my nieces passed away almost two years ago and I always told her that on her 18th birthday, I'd go sky diving with her so in August 2016, I'm going sky diving even though I am terrified of heights.

7. As a child I loved horses and bunnies but it turned out I was very allergic to them.

8. When I was young, I was setting the table for my Mom for Sunday dinner and I was carrying a stack of plates and stepped on our dog's tail and when he jumped, I dropped all the plates. I cut my finger so badly that if it was any deeper, I would have lost the top knuckle portion of my left pointer finger. Now, I have a scar in the shape of the christian fish symbol.

9. I always brush my teeth when I shower because I don't feel completely clean if I still have morning breath.

10. I am so happy to have started this blog and reached out to future and current lap-banders. I am grateful for the support and advice you guys give to me!

Stress release

Can I just say, thank goodness for my AMAZING Mother?? She is my rock and has been supportive of me in everything that I've ever wanted to do with my life. She and I talked the other day and she gave me a little more insight into the process of the "financial things" that are going on. I'm not going to get into too many details about it here because it's boring but just knowing what the steps are and what is being done helps me to feel WAY less stressed about the surgery. She even has a plan B and C! Now, it's not so much of an 'IF' the money comes through but 'WHEN' the money comes through. Phew, that's a load of my shoulders.

So after that conversation with my Mom, I am definitely getting excited!! I even started stocking up on things that I am going to need.

Also, I have decided that I need straws for my after-surgery phase, I'm not entirely sure why I decided that they are very important but I have. So, this weekend while stocking up and running errands I checked stores for straws and only found the crappy bendy kind. I want straight ones. So now, everytime I go to QT for a pop, I grab a handful and stick them in my purse. I figure by the end of June, I'll be plenty stocked! :D

I really only have two main concerns about surgery

1. The pre-op diet: I have been instructed to replace two meals a day with protein shakes and to have one healthy meal a day. (4-6 oz of lean protein, veggies and 1 cup of fruit. Plus, of course, water.) I am worried that I am going to be hungry all the time. Two weeks is a long time to be hungry, but really it will be more like hanger (anger+hunger). How did you guys deal with the pre-op diet? I know that I will just buckle down and do it, but does anyone have tips or suggestions?? :)

2. I love Diet Pepsi. Like, a lot. I know, I know, it's terrible, and horrible, and addictive, and makes you crave more sweets, and has aspartame... I know. But I love it. I can't help it. I can and will cut it out for the two weeks prior to surgery and I've been told that I can have it after surgery (a few weeks) as long as I let it go flat (Ew!) because burping with the band doesn't really happen. So, my question is, who else in the banded community is a pop lover and have you given it up or just drink it flat?



And on a random note:
This is my niece, Brinkley. My sister sent me this video today and it melted my heart. I know I'm a little partial since she is family and all but it made my day.

Another night gone.

Well, I have spent the entire night binge reading blogs about lap band surgery. I love reading about their successes and honesty when things weren't ideal or they might have cheated a little. It gives me hope that post-surgery I don't have to reform myself into this perfect eating/exercising machine. Do I need to make major changes and adjustments? Absolutely! But there is no reason to hold the pressure of perfection on myself. It seems silly even just thinking about it now.

We are playing the waiting game to hear from the bank about the loan. I'm praying it comes through.

I am so excited for this change in my life. I feel like I spend all of my free time thinking about the surgery, the changes that will happen after the surgery, wondering how fast the weight will come off after, if people will even notice, how much the liquid phase and mush phase post-surgery is going to suck, how much pain I'm going to be in and for how long... The list pretty much never ends. I've kind of stopped talking to my friends about it because I don't want to annoy them with all of these hypothetical questions about a surgery that I still have no money for. Gah, I wish the bank would come back with an answer already.

I don't really have too mush else to say. Summer school has officially started this week and I am already feeling buried in homework. Only 34 more days to go! And, yes, I started counting down the first week. It's that torturous.

How to tell the world?

Do I just tell everyone? Do I shout it from the rooftops? Or do I keep it to myself because this is a personal journey? That is exactly the crossroads that I am at right now. I'm not necessarily a private person. I am very honest and truthful. It's not like if you look at me that you can't tell that I am unhealthy. I could definitely use any and all support and love that I receive from friends and family during this new chapter of my life.

Truly the only thing keeping me from mentioning this on Facebook yet is that when I talked to my teacher about missing a few classes, she didn't give me a definitive answer. She said, "Well let's take it week by week and see where we are in a month." How does that work? You get to decide if having surgery is a valid reason to miss class depending on your mood? I did not tell her what my surgery is for and because of hippa laws, she can't ask. If I bring in a note from a surgeon saying I am having surgery and need (blank) days to recover and she decides to excuse those absences then it doesn't matter what I was having surgery for. Yes, this is an elective surgery but it is to improve my health and I'm not arguing by any means that this is medically my only option for loosing weight. All I am saying is, if she is excusing the absences for surgery then it is none of her business what the surgery is for. I would feel 100% better about this if she gave a definitive answer either way. My plan is to just come to class every day until surgery and then only miss, hopefully, Thursday (day of surgery), and be able to be back at it on Monday.

Well, that turned into the quite the rant, sorry about that.

And I didn't even come up with an answer for my question.

I think I am going to post a link to this blog on my Facebook so that people that want to stay updated can read about it here and my Facebook page doesn't turn into a commercial for Lap-Band.. Hahaha.

I will post a link.

Eventually.


**EDIT: Mom booked her flight for the 17th so everything is set for surgery!!! Everything except for hearing back about the loan. I know Mom is anxious to hear back about it too.

Surgery Scheduled!

June 20th is the magical day. Although, I'm sure nothing about that day will be magical... Ha! Surgery is officially set and the pre-op appointment is set for June 11 at 1:30. The second Thursday of June is support group that the are encouraging me to go to, so I will. That's the 13th. My pre-op diet will start the 6th. It will consist of protein drinks for breakfast and dinner and a small serving of white meat with 2 cups veggies and 1 cup of fruit for lunch. The diet will help to get rid of as much fatty tissue around my liver as possible before surgery.

My summer semester started today and I mentioned that I am going to have to miss some days for surgery and they seemed to be understanding but I will see how it goes when it gets closer to the actual date of surgery. The teachers are so hot and cold about this kind of stuff.

My Mom tried to talk to Allegiant about changing her itinerary for her June trip so that she can be here for surgery and they wouldn't work with her in person. So she is going to call sometime this week to see what they can work out. She is thinking that she will come in on the 17th and spend some time with other family in the area and then be back in Tempe on Wednesday night before surgery!

I am weirdly not nervous at all. We are kind moving forward with all of this having faith that everything financially will come together because all of the kinks haven't been worked out of that yet. Here is to praying that everything works out. It will, if it's the right next step in my life.

Quick Update

Financial things are still in the process. Talked to Mom a little bit about it and she expressed concern that it wasn't coming together as easily as she has initially hoped for. As it turns out, pulling out of her IRA account would make her pay taxes and fees of around $3000 so we are back to processing some new ideas to come up with the money up front on our own. With that being said, we have come up with a tentative date of surgery. June 20th. My Mom has round trip tickets to fly in June 21st to visit family and see my niece off on her mission. So we are thinking she could either pay the fee to change her itinerary or just buy a separate one-way flight for the 19th, whatever is cheapest. That way she can be here for surgery and a few days after for recovery and then she will road trip with the rest of the family to Utah to drop off my niece.

I think I have spent at least an hour or more everyday reading different forums and articles on the Internet about lap band, both the positive and negatives. The patient advocate at the Doctor's office wants me to start going to the support group. It's only once a month so I think I can manage that, I mean, this is only a life changing decision and all.

I feel a little nervous about telling the world about it. So far it's only been close friends and family that I've mentioned it to. I don't want to be told that this is going to make me sick and miserable or that I'm too lazy to the lose the weight on my own. I know everyone has their opinions about it but I only want people that can be supportive of my decision and trust that I have been researching and educating myself involved in this process. I've read about the bad side effects, the people who want it out because they feel it didn't help and everything else. I even read an article about a man whose wife went in to have lap band and died a few days later. I know the statistics. I know the risks. I also know what it's like to be morbidly obese, uncomfortable in my own skin and to get out of breath from cleaning their bathroom.

I'm nervous that people will be mean or rude. I suppose if they are, then they were no friend of mine.

Anyway, I guess those are my thoughts for the day. Off to work!

The next step

Well, things are progressing quickly! I talked to my sister (Kristy) today to find out the best next step to make. She assigned me several tasks to do because I was starting to feel overwhelmed by all the things that needed to happen. I knew I was at a stand still because I was not approved for the Care Credit card to pay for the surgery so I was stuck. I read the Lap-band book cover to cover. I've looked into all kinds of side effects, long term lasting effects and every other thing that I can think of. I knew I wanted to do the surgery, even though the idea of it scares the crap out of me (still).

Task one: Make a proposal to Mom. If the surgery was going to happen, I needed to get the help of my Mom. I sat down at the computer and typed it out, read it over, retyped, read it over again, realized that I was very nervous to send this email and sent it before I deleted it.

Task two: Make appointment to get blood work order completed. Easy enough. I went online, set it up for tomorrow and voila! Done.

Task three: Find out the next step financially from the patient advocate and how to get financing through the office. I attempted and ended up playing phone tag with her for the rest of the day and never did get a hold of her but I'm sure I will hear from her tomorrow morning.

After I got these finished up my Mom was calling me, time to find out. Mom and I had a long talk about how this is a huge commitment and that this was not a gift. It was a loan, a loan that would be paid back as soon as I had the money to do so. Both of which I knew and have already been processing. In the end, the conversation ended with her saying she needs tomorrow to talk to her financial guy and see what she can move around so we can avoid paying 14.9% interest on the loan from the doctor's office.

Once we get the money situation figured out and secured, the next step will be to schedule the surgery!! Whew, what a whirlwind the last week has been!

Lap band surgery?

I don't always eat healthy and I don't exercise and I never, in the past, enjoyed exercising. Well, maybe not so much, "not enjoyed" but just haven't done. Yes, I know it's horrible and I ate every single pound onto my self. I have slowly gained weight ever since I can remember being image aware. By the time I was even aware of what other people looked like I was already bigger than most girls I knew. I was self-conscious and wanted to change it but could never commit to it. I have tried almost every diet out there. I have tried NutriSystem, HerbaLife, HealtheTrim, LA Weight Loss, Weight Watchers, Atkins and many others. I had success with most of these to an extent but then I would hit that 6th-7th week, start plateauing and quit. EVERY. TIME. At which point I would pity eat, then self-loathing eat and finally not-caring eat. This has been the pattern of my eating/health my entire life. At some point during high school I found a good group of friends, a boyfriend and had a normal life. I didn't get made fun of or teased about my weight, at least not to my face, and just adjusted the the fact that I was always going to be a little fat.

The past two years of my life had been the hardest years of my life. Before July 1, 2011, I had never had a death in the family as close as my niece  My paternal grandparents both passed when I was still very young and adjusted fairly quickly. Whitney's death hit me like a ton of bricks, as well as most of my family, too. After her death I felt and harbored a lot of misplaced guilt and pain in my life. The simplest things in life, like showering or getting dressed, seemed like daunting tasks. I think it got to a point, however, that I realized that I needed to stop crying and I quickly found out that when I ate McDonald's or Taco Bell, I felt a little better. Of course, I only felt better for a moment and then the loathing would begin. Let's just say it was a forever cycle in a self-destructive fog and before I realized it and the fog finally lifted I found myself to be pushing 300 pounds. In the last 10 months, I again started the eat healthy campaign for myself and started with a diet called Xyngular, which I did for a few months and grew so tired of the food, I would go all day without eating just to avoid the stupid eye of round steak and veggies that I was allowed. After a few days of not eating much, I broke and ate almost anything that my fat kid heart desired. I also signed up for the Color Run which was a 5k that I did complete, mostly walking because I was not in the physical shape that I had been hoping to be in (because of my own slacking) and I did a few personal training sessions. Even with all of these efforts, I didn't get the results that I was hoping for.

I had a very long conversation with my sister and Mom about these issues and the topic of weight loss surgery came up. My sister had Gastric Bypass quite a while ago and had amazing results but I never thought it was really an option for me. However, there are many different types and many less invasive procedures now that did catch my attention. So about 4 months ago, the idea was planted in my head. After talking to Kristy (sister), the first thing we knew I would need to do was to get a check up and blood work panel from my doctor. The idea was kind of left at that and dropped by me because the idea of surgery terrifies me and the thought that I am fat enough to think of a weight loss surgery as a viable option made me hate myself more than before and also because I am a professional procrastinator and I wasn't looking forward to a doctor's appointment that was bound to end with being told how close to diabetes I am and that I had high blood pressure, or high cholesterol and that I needed to loose weight yesterday.

After a few months of pestering, Kristy (sister) got her way and I set up an appointment.

I was told that I was borderline diabetic with a little bit of high cholesterol but nothing that weight loss wouldn't fix right away. The most surprising thing that I left the doctor's office with that afternoon was a diagnosis of PCOS (Polycystic ovary syndrome) and a prescription for Metformin which I was told was this miracle hormone pill that will balance all of my issues, help me loose weight and fix all my other problems. Amazing, right? Wrong. I took it for about a week and then upped it to twice a day, like I was prescribed and all of the side effects kicked in. I felt jittery, foggy, tired, shaky and mood swings. If I didn't eat the second I felt myself getting hungry, I was sick to my stomach for hours. So, naturally, I quit taking it, making my hormones unbalanced again, making it very difficult to loose weight again. So here I am, in the cycle again of loosing 10 pounds, gaining 10 pounds. I swear, I have been loosing and gaining back the same 15-20 pounds for years now. 

Now, skip ahead a little bit to last week. I am on break from school last week and this week so I had free time and have spent the majority of last week researching the lap band procedure. I set up an appointment with True Results in Scottsdale for Monday morning (today.) 

So today I went to just find out more and see what insurance says about it. Insurance, of course, said no, which didn't surprise me so I was on to find out what kind on financing options I had. I was a little surprised to find out the total cost of surgery, anesthesia and 1 year of post op appointments is only $9,988. I had a much higher number in my head! The doctor's office has a credit care system that I can apply for and it will cover the cost completely and leave with me 60 payments of $234/month. If I get rejected from their credit program, which also wouldn't surprise me because I don't have a great history, they will finance me for $5,500 and then I am left to come up with the other $4,388 cash before surgery. Then I will have 36 payments of $190.39/month. They offered me to take the next step while there and since I had the time and it was covered by insurance, I went ahead and did it. I got an EKG and pulmonary function test. Both came back with good results and I am on to the next step which is taking all of this information in, thinking over finances/talking to parents, and getting a blood panel done. 

If this ends up going through, I will use this blog to talk about my experiences and my thoughts as I experience them.