So, I had my pre-op clearance at 7:30 yesterday morning. I had to fast for my blood tests, but, all in all, it wasn't bad. I went to the hospital, they took my blood pressure, weight, and did an EKG. After that, they asked me about my medical history, and made sure that all my medications were correct. After that, I met with the hospitalist, who will also be in charge of my case while I'm in the hospital. He asked me some questions about my medications, and my history, and then said I was cleared for surgery. After that, I did my urine test (to make sure that I don't have nicotine in my urine), and blood draw.
The poor nurse couldn't get my veins to cooperate. She did three sticks, and two search and destroys before deciding that she was going to send me to the lab. The lab got me in one stick. I had to call the office twice this morning though to let them know that I'd be a little late. If I hadn't had to go to the lab, I'd have been fine. They were okay with it, since they knew that I was at my testing. I did end up making it to class though.
Class was... long. It was good though. We went over the diet again, and the vitamins again. It was more of a refresher than anything, but it was good to hear again. I got my "bariatric bible," a white binder that is like 120+ pages of information that will be my life. They also gave us a goody bag of bariatric stuff. Our clinical social worker came in and chatted with us a bit about the mental aspect of surgery, in the fact that we will most likely have a grieving process (I already had mine, since I've been a good girl, and went straight on the post-op diet at class 1) for our affair with food, and maybe some body image issues (again, I've already got those... I'm in a size 20 pants now [started at 26/28], and I'm down 80#, but sometimes I look in the mirror and just see fat), and gave us two books to read to help. The first book is: The Emotional First Aid Kit. The second book is: Life is Hard, Food is Easy. I intend on getting both books, but since I just had to drop almost $200 on things I'll need after surgery, the books are going to have to wait.
What did I need to buy, you ask? Well, firstly, I stopped in the hospital Walgreens after class, and picked up a bunch of different flavors of Nectar powder. A lot of people in my surgeon's support group say that they have trouble finding protein shakes that work for them. I've got several different kinds and flavors at home now that I can play with to see what's going to work. Nectar is nice because they have different fruit flavors, other than just your normal chocolate, vanilla, strawberry. I have several RTD (Ready-to-Drink) Premier chocolate shakes at home, and even a few of the Premier Clear shakes as well. In my aforementioned goody bag, I received a pouch of Unjury chocolate powder. They also had an unflavored pouch of Beneprotein powder in there. In addition to all that, I still have the majority of my jug of vanilla Premier protein powder that I use to cook with. So, I'm set for protein for now, I think. I do still want to get a thing of either Genepro (Sorry, I can't seem to find the actual site for Genepro) unflavored powder that I can add to things to get my protein up as well.
So, the protein powder was around $20 (I got 9 pouches). After that, I ran over to Sam's club to buy 2 oz. portion cups. Portion cups are going to be very important to me post-op in that they're going to help me not get too full, and make myself sick. So, Sam's club, as we found out, sells the most cups for the best price... 2500 cups for around $25, and 2500 lids for around $25. That makes them around $0.02 for a cup and a lid. Not bad. Finally, last night, I had to buy my vitamins that I'll need post-op.
Bariatric Vitamins are literally the easiest way to go. I found out yesterday that for the rest of my life, I will only be able to take a pill the size of a tic-tac. Have you ever seen a picture of calcium citrate pills? I have a couple of different kinds at home right now...
The little pill is about the size of the tic-tac that is required... it's my allergy medication. The two large pills are the calcium citrate pills. O.O
The Bariatric Pills that came recommended by my program are called Celebrate. They have lots of different options for bariatric patients, and most are chewable or drinkable. The ones that I chose are chewable. The multi comes in two flavors, mango and pineapple orange. I don't like mango, so, I chose the pineapple orange. 4 chewables contain ALL the vitamins that I'm required to have, OTHER than my iron, which I can do in one separate chewable, which is berry flavored. The iron comes in a bunch of different sizes, but, we're required to have 45-60 mg, so, I chose the berry, which is the 60 mg. The only catch with the bariatric vitamins? If you put the multis on reorder, they're around $67 for 90 days of vitamins. If you put the iron on reorder, it's around $31 for 90 days. So, no. They're not cheap. But, considering if you look at it, it's just over $1/day, it's not all that bad. We'll be saving that alone in food. However, as I said, this is for the rest of my life. But for what I'm gaining, in my opinion, that's a small price to pay.
Sorry that this post was so long. I had a lot to say. I'll probably update again pre-op, but if not, I'll see you on the loser's bench!
~♥~
Lady D
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