#one month followup with my psych today!

[mistydeyes]

hollow apologies and avoiding glances

a continuation of this request

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summary: Months after your release from the 141, you try to acclimate to life back on base. Despite time, therapy, and medication, you still are haunted by ghosts that cloud your everyday life.

pairing: Simon "Ghost" Riley x gn!reader (but like not even a pairing at this point lol)

okay real talk here and same psa as before but please do not read if you are not comfortable with ANY OF THIS! it is upsetting in all aspects!!

warnings: torture/violence, mentions of blood, bruises, and cuts, swearing, abusive language, ANGST WITH NO HAPPY ENDING

a/n: HOLY SHIT I didn't think this would take off like it did! thank you all so much for all the love and requests to have a followup to my initial request <3

 💌 @nadinesabre @casualunknownrunaway @originaldeerhottub @justpasssingby @missroro @josieguts @miss-i-ship-it @sicknasty03 @jojoblossom @azwong @shadofireshinobi @caramlizedtomatoes @deltottoro @kenz-ee @teehee-47 @tiredmetalenthusiast @hollowmasque

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You felt the cold tile imprint on your face as Ghost loomed over you. The small shallow cuts on your cheek pooled in a sea of crimson iron on the linoleum flooring. "Please," you choked out for the thousandth time, "I promise you it's not me." Your quiet pleas for respite from the torture were met by the harsh tug at your hair. "And I promise you this won't end until you tell us what you want," he spat in your face. As he violently let you fall back to the ground, you braced yourself for another round of terror.

"Did you hear me, Sergeant?" the therapist's voice echoed in your ears. You blinked as you stared back at her, balancing your trembling hands on the table. "I'm sorry, what was the question?" you asked as you gazed shamefully at the light silver cuts that decorated your forearms. "Have you done anything nice for yourself recently?" she repeated, "go on any walks, read a new book, try a new recipe?" You tried to think of the positives during the last year but none came to mind. "I started gardening," you lied through your teeth and she nodded in respect to your answer. "That's good," she encouraged and you just wanted this to be over. "Is that all for today, Captain?" you quietly asked, "I just want to go back to my quarters." She had a tightlipped smile as she gestured that your time was done. As you got up and gripped the door handle, she had one last comment. "You can't bury yourself in work, you know," she said quietly as you looked at her, "it's not healthy." You shook your head as you entered back into the hallway. "God how fucking pathetic," you whispered, trying to hold back another barrage of tears. The least you could do was go back to your quarters and drown in the minimal comfort of sleep.

As your boots clattered on the linoleum tile, you avoided the prying eyes of your colleagues. Despite your temporary disability leave and passing numerous psych examinations, everyone knew what happened to you. Whispers reached even the highest ranks and you left the sympathy flowers out to die in the trash. You ignored the phone calls and voicemails from your previous team, even denying Laswell visits to your hospital room. When you returned, no one ever uttered a word but their gazes pierced into you whenever you walked out of your room. It was humiliating but was nothing compared to the flashes of terror when you saw the faces of your old team around the base. You had taken a desk position, something far from your skills on the field, but it was all that you could handle for the moment. However, you still brushed paths with them once in a while, walking briskly when you saw their faces emerge from a crowd. Once, Gaz tried to come up to you to offer an apology after you were issued an official one from the military. However, a strong slap to the face and a fast-paced sprint in the opposite direction was all that was needed to tell them to stay away.

"This can end if you tell us where he is," Ghost whispered in your ear. You shook your head violently and bit your lip as your face was met with a hard slap. The pain shot through your body as he followed up with a punch directly to the gut. Your ears rang with static as he gripped your chin in his bloodied, gloved hand. "That's not the answer I want, Eclipse," he said through gritted teeth, holding your face painfully. As your eyes pricked with tears in agony, he released his grip. "You're fucking pathetic," he spat, "a double agent caught so easily." You stopped resisting with words from that moment on. Despite all attempts to reason, the chance of your survival grew ever slimmer and it all depended on the actions of one man.

Your solemn walk back to your room was interrupted by the hard wall of a figure. "I'm sorry," you said looking up but your heart dropped when you saw who you ran into. It wasn't the mask that made you realize who it was but the cold, unforgiving eyes of one, Simon Riley. Out of all the visits and calls you received, you never heard a word from him. He haunted you and in some cynical way, he was a ghost both in namesake and person. As you backed away in sheer terror, you kept repeating a string of apologies and incoherent tearful babbles. He took a step towards you as you stood in absolute fear. "Please, please don't come near me," you whispered, clutching the wall as your legs began to tremble with adrenaline coursing through your veins. "I just want to talk, Y/N," he said with an unsettling amount go kindness in his tone, "I-I didn't realize you were back from leave." With the late word, you could feel something inside you break. It wasn't seeing the rest of the 141 that sent you over the edge, it was the fact that he was staring at you with the same bitter gaze that sent your blood into a fever pitch. Your feelings of terror morphed into ones of anger and absolute fury.

"You didn't realize?" you shouted, not caring about how your voice echoed through the halls, "like you even fucking cared in the first place." His eyes darted around your figure and your tears grew like molten lava on your face. "No amount of apologies or therapy or goddamn medication will ever make me forget about what you put me through," you continued, throwing a frustrated punch directly to his chest, "you fucking broke me, Simon." With that final statement, you could feel all semblance of anger and fear dissolve into emptiness. You had dreamed of an altercation, one where you could finally release all of the frustration and nightmares you had endured. But now with Simon standing in front of you, you felt as minuscule as ever. You never left that empty abyss of a room and no matter how hard you tried, he would still be that horrifying presence looming over you. As he stood there, words never coming to the surface, you pushed past him without a second look. "Try to talk to me again and I'll have a restraining order for you," you spat angrily, "and you can tell the rest of the 141 my stance."

[sheyshen]

mamogram and ultrasound today! both came out more or less clear, only one small bump thing they wanna follow up on in 6 months but they don’t think it’s cancerous so i’m all good! nothing coming up to explain why i have occasional pain but otherwise all DR stuff done for the year!

in the spring i wanna get an appointment with my dentist, optometrist, titty followup, ortho and maybe see if i need that back surgery, and talk to a psych or something to see if i have adhd or autism (because i have suspicions)  :D

[copperbadge]

I have zero experience with Adderall but I wanted to ask if you feel any, I guess, momentum for accomplishing things even when it wears off? One of my major "tasks I can't force myself to start" is my bedtime routine (washing my face, brushing/flossing my teeth, a couple of other steps), so I don't end up falling asleep in my work clothes with my light on sometime between 8 and 10pm, but obviously I wouldn't still want the Adderall to be fully in effect at that point because, well, I need to sleep. Does the relief of having ability to accomplish things while on Adderall give you any kind of boost even when it's wearing off?

Yeah, the bedtime routine can be rough. I used to have a list of all the steps tacked up on my bathroom mirror, so a) I wouldn't forget any and b) they'd seem more manageable since I only had to do one at a time. Ironically, I found the more elaborate I made the routine the less I needed this, so for the last few years it's like a half-hour performance art piece before I crawl into bed. Bananas.

The short version of the answer is "Yes, but not how you think." Here's the longer version, with a few caveats: I have only been taking Adderall for a month, my diagnosis is inattentive-only and mild to begin with, and drug interactions can vary greatly from person to person, so this is my experience, not a universal constant.

For me, the primary impact of the medication isn't more energy; there is some increased mental clarity, but the biggest effect is that I see a task, I think "I should do that", and then instead of going "I can't, I don't feel like I can" for an hour before managing it, or forgetting to do it, I just...go ahead and do it. Sometimes I'll even see a task, go "I can't, it's so unpleasant, I don't want to" and decide not to do it, then find myself doing it anyway without consciously deciding to. Which is awesome but also quite the trip at first.

The effect wears down after about three hours and wears off completely in about five. After it wears off, I don't retain that "okay but I'll just go ahead and do it" sensibility, but I do have more energy than I would normally have at that point in the day, because I haven't spent the last five hours fighting my own brain. Two doses over the course of a full workday leaves me way more energy than I would normally have at the end of the day. So I eat a better dinner, I do more hobbies, I can read or answer email in the evenings. I can work during the day and write in the evening instead of putting off work during the day so that I can write before I get tired.

So it's not that the drug's still doing something, but that the drug basically gives me the equivalent of a free four-hour nap. On top of that, I feel better about myself overall because I did my work and my chores, so usually nothing awful is looming over my head.

Thinking on it, I was also already living in a way that was optimized for this kind of medication, so this is bonus material but may help you out too. I get up very early -- my normal rising time used to be 3, it's now edging closer to 5 -- which allows me morning time to eat an early breakfast, goof around, and do as I please until it's time to get ready for work around 8am for an 8:30 start. At that point I take my medication on an "empty stomach" (at least two hours after eating) and then go straight into the shower, after which I dress, feed the cats, and fix myself a big jug of icewater to keep at my desk. This is timed out so that right as I'm sitting down, the meds kick in and I can answer email, square away anything left over from yesterday's work, and get a jump on the day.

Because I ate breakfast so early I usually eat a snack around 10am, which means when the Adderall is wearing off around 1pm I can take another one on another "empty stomach" and then have a second snack at 2pm. That all sees me through the end of the workday and I have a handful of evening hours for chores, hobbies, etc after which I go to bed early enough (7pm-9pm generally) that I'm not entirely worn out when it's time to start the evening routine.

It's not a perfect system (evening socializing doesn't really happen, and I never really eat a full meal during daylight hours) but it works pretty well for me, and the Adderall slotted right in there very easily.

In any case if you're looking into medication, good luck! I was shocked at how well the meds work for me, and I hope they work as well for you!

[stealth-daddy-corvo-blog]

Weight Loss Surgery: A Cautionary Lapband Tale

I made the choice to get weight loss surgery. When this occurs, I expected the machines at about 305lbs. Our reasons, as any person faced with this decision may agree, were my own. I also made several problems at this time and those I think need addressing. The biggest were: my choice to have the surgery in my hometown and the surgery I chose. I live in a town of 100,000+. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex area is about three hours away. There was an office of physicians in my own community newly released as performing weightloss surgery, but only two: the Lap Band and Gastric Bypass. I investigated both surgeries and had a few ideas about each, but desired to consult with a doctor within this office prior to making my final choice. I did consider the Lap Band could possibly be it for me though as it’s reversible as well as a less significant selection compared to bypass (so far as having my composition cutup and re-planted together and experiencing troubles like the likelihood of seeking gallbladder surgery, “dumping problem,” and malabsorption problems.) My step-sister chose to have a bypass within the metroplex area before I had my method and was delighted being a clam regarding the whole point - I wish I’d followed her lead. I met with the doctor. I had been asked what insurance I had (Federal Blue Cross Blue Shield) and what process I would like. I told them I’d like to examine my choices along with the physician did a brief run-down of every, however the attitude of the visit was very much “Why did you come here if you didn’t know?” I opted for Panel-Band… once I should really have opted for another physician, but the Lap-Band needs frequent followup sessions for fills (adding water in to the group via a slot beneath the skin so that you can maintain the band’s rigidity across the belly and stimulate weight loss.) I wanted in order to get this preservation within my hometown and never travel for three hours each time I must be seen. I was okay with the prospect of slower weight loss since - after spending nearly all of my life in Weight Watchers - I believed gradual weight loss was more prone to similar permanent weight loss. The next time I noticed my physician was your day of the procedure.

I was later told this can be what’s named being a “heartbeat with insurance.” I'd the procedure 01/14/09. There was no psych consult, no diet beforehand, no ending up in a nutritionist or exercise consultant - I was informed “eh, if you don’t enjoy it, consider it out!“. My last stable food and carbonated beverage was 01/12/09. The surgery was a day surgery. I had been put under, the group was inserted, I was taken to recover, gently hit conscious, taken to radiology, designed to do an upper GI and swallow contrast material in order that they can scan me and ensure everything was okay. This made me begin to retch which caused one of my surgical sites to reopen. I bled all over the ground - I still possess the bloodstained clothes. I had been fixed back up and sent home. For the first twenty four hours, I had been sailing. I was still high on whatever they gave me in the hospital in addition to the Twilight sleep spot behind my head that was set there to avoid the inevitable nausea I get after being sedated. Next? I was in hell. I joked about needing a Clockwork Orange Diet - one where I encounter real discomfort or distress at the notion of eating because I figured that’s in what it'd try get me to improve my ways because I love eating THAT much. Well, be mindful what you want for… I vomited constantly. I was more upset than I have previously experienced my life. I got my pain medicine which made it worse. The worst part? I was still ravenously hungry. The Lap Band had no effect whatsoever on that. I needed nothing more than to consume and even the broths and sauces I ate made me throw up. The whole time I was throwing up, I had been terrified I was planning to fall my band (trigger the band to move which might cause the wrong type of constraint - tales I find out about this online said that those who did this couldn’t possibly swallow their own spit afterward.) Band slippage often requires additional surgery to correct and I had been in enough discomfort not to ever want surgery again. I will remember my Mother coming to visit me now and me crying and simply saying something similar to, “What have I accomplished? If you had been even considering this, don’t do it.” My husband called the doctor to report how sick I was to the level we thought something was wrong. They shrugged it off. We called again. The doctor finally admitted maybe it had been my pain medicine. Sure enough, I had codeine sensitivity and things were only a little better after I stopped getting the medicine, BUT instead of offering to replace it with another thing, I had been advised to consider liquid Tylenol… that we gave up on since it didn’t help a little. So just about I did so the vast majority of my recovery with no pain management whatsoever $6. Besides being physically uncomfortable, I had been instantly also up against a very true experience like mental torture. Struggling to rest or get comfy, I resigned myself to the sofa and watched TV throughout the day. You don’t understand how much food there's on TV and soon you can’t have any. My husband could come home from work and that I would just cry. I’d list everything I saw and what everybody ate: a detective show with snacks, a sitcom with delectable cereal being nonchalantly consumed immediately from your box. It was suffering. I don’t honestly remember the post-surgery diet I was on. I believe it had been a week of clear liquids, fourteen days of total (milky), fourteen days of comfortable and regular food as tolerated. I’m not 100% sure though. I was scheduled for my first followup. I believe it was initially I quit the house, wore garments, etc. I still felt like death. I introduced myself inside the surgeon’s office, looking and feeling like death and he said ‘well done.’ I wondered if he was also considering me. A buddy got me out of the house after week two, but I still felt terrible. Basically it was just a sofa vacation, from languishing on my couch to languishing on hers for an evening. I took two weeks removed from work whole. “They” will say you often will go back to work after one, but in the event there were difficulties, I needed extra-time to feel better - boy, am I glad I took that much. Even when I was actually strong enough after Week One, emotionally was another story - I would have gone ballistic on everyone the first time somebody earned a take out hamburger for lunch. I continued going in to see the doctor for band fills. We didn’t examine my treatment solution or just how many floods I might need - initially I didn’t also experience any variation whilst the band tightened. He just kept telling me ahead in. I'll attempt to summarize since I don’t really remember in what order things occurred after this point. The nearly 36 months I'd the group were one of the most unhappy of my life. Our band never fallen or eroded, but I still experienced pain, distress and almost constant nausea. Anytime I am asked today in what I experienced, I reply the group is “medically handled bulimia” - and that I have the ruined esophagus to prove it. Here are some things I hope I'd known: 1. The band doesn’t make sense Your stomach is not a sealed box. It’s similar to a sieve. The whole purpose the Lap-Band is meant to work is because the location of your belly that triggers feelings of fullness which it conveys to your mind is close to the top. The band cinches up your belly to make a tiny pre-belly pouch that you're purported to complete with food that will trick this location into early thoughts of depth. My surgeon told me the whole purpose of eating will be to take pencil eraser-sized attacks and delay UNITS in between each. You ought to get so “bored with eating, you receive up and go do something different instead.” (Yea, tell someone who feels like she is starving to death to sit before food and take pencil eraser-sized bites. That'll surely work.) So tell me this: you often follow this process and pulverize your food to the stage that it moves right through the band and beats the purpose or you take big enough hits that you just do refill your pouch, but are then in pain when you experience each bit of poorly chewed food try to go through your stoma (your new starting from stomach pouch to normal belly. I call it having “food babies.” the 1st time I experienced the feeling of eating something too large to comfortably go through this beginning, it felt like the worst ice cream headache ever. in my stomach!) 2. To the majority of doctors, you are what I had been: a heartbeat with insurance Specialists receive money for performing surgery NOT for aftercare. It is likely that great your doctor will probably LEAVE YOU. Hey, should you get have surgery in Mexico, you most likely won’t get any aftercare in any way! Which leads me to another location fun fact I hope I'd have identified: 3. If your doctor leaves, NO BODY WILL TOUCH YOU. My doctor left town and took his entire office with him inside a year of my surgery. This left my city high and dry. There was no one around who would also go near me. This made it extra fun once I finished up “obstructed” (the group squeezed my belly completely closed for no reason whatsoever - I was struggling to eat or drink something) and in the IM of a week after he pulled up levels. The first reaction of the ER was “go away, we don’t know anything about what you've,” nevertheless it was a three day weekend and that I literally had nowhere else to turn and so I actually had to go them through how to consider liquid out of my band and so I might have some relief. I searched physicians in just a THREE HUNDRED MILE distance and was either rejected like a new individual even though I might produce my operative statement which revealed there were no troubles with my surgery, or was cited a ridiculous “New Patient Fee” of anywhere from several hundred a number of THOUSAND dollars. 4. Your insurance means nothing If you end up within the place used to do, abandoned by your physician with no body else inside your city or out who'll help you, congratulations: you have now entered the world of cash-for-support! It doesn’t matter that I have amazing insurance that taken care of virtually something I needed, with no physician to get my insurance, I was SOL. I resorted to go-between. A silly middleman company that required money up front and contacted a network of services near me (I applied Austin mostly - the quack in Irving hurt me worse looking to give me a fill than I’ve likely actually been injured because location before) to secure a meeting to get me a fill. I had to utilize this support repeatedly to secure fills to get me back-up towards the stage I had been at prior to the ER had taken some out when I was hindered. 5. You are at the band’s mercy Your Lab-Group employs no preset rules. It's also suffering from things completely beyond your handle like atmospheric pressure. I'm greatly a person of practice and might consider the exact same similar Lean Cuisine food to benefit lunch every day. I may have no difficulty whatsoever eating it or -2-3 days-out of five- I would put it up. I was also told inflammation and water retention within my period may and would make the band cinch itself up. The group can be an implanted medical device. Believe meticulously about all of the ads you see on Television: “Call 1-800-fat-sttlmet4u if you've had any of the following… Lawyer Steve will struggle for you!” If something goes wrong with it, you face more unwanted effects or surgery. Our group actually had a recall putout on it not too long after I got it: a little piece used to video the port’s tubing and maintain it from getting kinked up could come undone and cause said kinkage to take place. The very best part: the recall was for artists not already introduced. For me who previously had it? “Don’t worry. Take no action. You’re probably fine.” The worst thing I concerned about was getting obstructed again with no one to assist me. Since my favorite move to make is worry and worry, I instantly thought of among my favorite books/movies: “The Stand.” There was an entire chapter in the book devoted to individuals who might have survived the plague when they hadn’t done x/y/z (ruptured appendix, fell off motorcycle and cracked skull, etc) and gotten killed. I quickly put myself within this type: the entire world ends, I survive, except my stomach squeezes automatically closed and that I starve to death. 6. You may still make all of the wrong choices What no one explained and that I failed to learn in my research about the band is: the group is just a software for weight loss, yes, but it’s an unhealthy one. As your stomach is intact, you can still grow it. The quack I mentioned before in Irving mentioned a patient he was seeing who managed to stretch out his bag to date that the upper GI revealed that his body simply mirrored his intact stomach BELOW the group (one stomach, then lapband, then the other stomach.) There's also something called “soft calorie syndrome,” where your group could possibly be too limited (a situation my physician had me perpetually existing in before he left.) You are physically struggling to create the “right” possibilities as it pertains to food as the right choices hurt. It never ceased to impress me how I was suddenly restricted in this regard after the band. I got to where I'd endless desires for salad since I hadn’t eaten a salad virtually the complete time I had been banded. The greens were a no-no for me and could get caught and irritate me till I threw up. This sort of irritation can also be what could cause potential obstruction since I’d get swollen. You begin making choices that are simple and not right - high calorie, creamy, fatty sauces, milkshakes, icecream - items that are easy-to eat since they fall through the group and don’t cause any pain or discomfort. 7. You can still achieve everything back I guess I knew about this potential, but I didn’t desire to contemplate it. In general, I lost about 70lbs with the band all together. To be honest: because it didn’t impact my hunger whatsoever, all it did was delay the inevitable. Every single food and eating relevant wish was still there, I had been just physically struggling to show it. The month the ER did a partial un-load as a result of congestion? Yea, I gained 20lbs. I dropped it again after I got re-tightened, but it showed me the score. I was probably just about 10 or 15 pounds up when I finally decided to create a change. I joined Weight Watchers for your thousandth time and started counting and following - anything I ought to have done since Day-One with the group. I don’t understand what I had been thinking. I was told lots of things about what the group was allowed to be and there were also a lot of things that I will did that I didn’t. * * * And so I was un-banded (disbanded?) on Dec 6th (RIP Lappy 01/14/09 - 12/06/11) and plumped for the gastric sleeve. I knew that when I didn’t get another form of surgery - for all my exercising and good intentions - without that safetynet, I'd still be back up past 300 in a year.

My experience was the exact opposite of the Lapband in almost any way. I'm amazing and wish I acquired the sleeve to start with and didn’t waste nearly 36 months in anguish, but what’s the cliché? Hindsight is always 20/20. The sleeve was still being polished like a strategy back then and so I may not have been as satisfied with after that it when I am now-so - here’s another one for you - everything happens at its own time as well as for a unique reason, I suppose. I began writing this like a comparison of every knowledge (hence the prolonged URL), but I noticed I had much too much to write so the gastric sleeve will need to have a unique hub later. I do quite definitely know this IS one person’s experience. There are lots of others available who love their Lap-Bands and have had wonderful experience with them. I simply wanted to let you know what happened to me just in case you're making a fat loss surgery decision today an Become familiar with more about Centralia Orthognathic Surgeons

[otaku-sfw-blog]

Weight Loss Surgery: A Cautionary Lap-Band Account

I made the choice to get weight loss surgery. At that time, I tipped the scales at about 305lbs. My reasons, as anybody confronted with this decision may recognize, were my own. I also made many problems at this time and people I believe need addressing. The greatest were: my alternative to really have the surgery within my neighborhood and the surgery I decided. I live in a city of 100,000+. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex area is roughly three hours away. There was an office of doctors within my city just reported as doing weightloss surgery, but just two: the Lapband and Gastric Bypass. I explored both surgeries and had a few ideas about each, but wanted to consult with a doctor within this office prior to making my final choice. I did believe the Lapband would probably be it for me though as it’s reversible as well as a less significant choice compared to the bypass (in terms of having my composition cutup and re-sown together and experiencing difficulties like the chance of requiring gallbladder surgery, “dumping syndrome,” and malabsorption problems.) My step-sister thought we would possess a bypass in the metroplex area before I'd my procedure and was satisfied as being a clam concerning the whole thing - I want I’d followed her lead. I met with a doctor. I had been asked what insurance I'd (National Blue Cross Blue Shield) and what technique I'd like. I told them I’d like to examine my options and the physician did a short run-down of each, but the perspective of the visit was quite definitely “Why did you come here should you didn’t already know?” I opted for Panel-Band… when I should have opted for another physician, but the Lapband involves consistent followup visits for fills (treating liquid into the band with a port under the skin to be able to keep up with the band’s tightness across the stomach and cause weight loss.) I wanted to be able to seek this maintenance in my neighborhood and never travel for three hours everytime I needed to be seen. I was ok with the probability of slower weight loss because - after spending most of my life in Weightwatchers - I understood slow weight loss was more likely to equivalent permanent weight reduction. Next time I found my surgeon was your day of the process.

I was later told this can be what’s named being a “heartbeat with insurance.” I had the procedure 01/14/09. There is no psych consult, no diet beforehand, no ending up in a dietician or exercise expert - I was told “eh, if you don’t enjoy it, take it out!“. My last stable food and carbonated beverage was 01/12/09. The surgery was a day surgery. I was put under, the group was located, I had been taken up to recover, gently hit alert, taken up to radiology, made to do an upper GI and swallow contrast material so they could scan me and be sure everything was okay. This made me begin to retch which caused among my surgical sites to reopen. I bled all over the ground - I still possess the bloodstained socks. I was patched back-up and sent home. For the first twentyfour hours, I had been hanging. I was still high on whatever they gave me in the clinic plus the Twilight sleep patch behind my ear which was placed there to prevent the inevitable sickness I get after being sedated. Next? I was in hell. I always joked about needing a Clockwork Orange Diet - one where I experience real discomfort or distress at the notion of eating since I realized that’s by what it would take to get me to improve my methods because I really like eating THAT much. Well, be careful what you wish for… I vomited constantly. I had been more sick than I've previously experienced my life. I got my pain medicine which managed to get worse. The worst part? I was still ravenously hungry. The Lap-Band had no effect whatsoever on that. I wanted only to consume and even the broths and soups I ate made me provide. The whole time I was throwing up, I had been terrified I was planning to ease my band (trigger the group to maneuver which would cause the wrong sort of constriction - myths I find out about this online stated that individuals who did this couldn’t also swallow their own spit afterward.) Band slippage often requires additional surgery to fix and I had been in enough discomfort not to ever need surgery again. I will remember my Mother visiting visit me at this point and me crying and simply saying something similar to, “What have I done? If you're also considering this, don’t do it.” My husband called the doctor to record how nauseous I had been to the stage we thought something was wrong. They shrugged it off. We called again. A doctor finally admitted maybe it had been my pain medicine. Sure enough, I had codeine awareness and things were a little better after I stopped taking the medication, but rather of presenting to restore it with another thing, I had been advised to take liquid Tylenol… that I gave up on because it didn’t help a bit. So just about I did many my healing without the pain management whatsoever $6. Besides being physically sore, I was instantly also faced with a really true feeling like mental pain. Struggling to rest or get comfy, I resigned myself to the sofa and watched TV all day. You don’t know how much food there's on TV until you can’t have any. My husband would come home from work and that I would just cry. I’d list everything I observed and what everyone ate: a detective show with sandwiches, a show with delectable cereal being nonchalantly eaten right in the field. It was concern. I don’t actually remember the post-surgery diet I had been on. I think it was a week of clear fluids, fourteen days of whole (milky), two weeks of comfortable and regular food as tolerated. I’m not 100% sure though. I had been appointed for my first follow up. I believe this was the first time I quit your house, used garments, etc. I still felt like death. I introduced myself inside the surgeon’s office, looking and feeling like death and he said ‘well done.’ I wondered if he was actually considering me. A pal got me out from the home after week two, but I still felt awful. Basically it was only a chair vacation, from languishing on my chair to languishing on hers for an evening. I took fourteen days removed from work overall. “They” will say you often will go back to work after one, but justincase there were problems, I wanted additional time to feel better - child, am I glad I took that much. Even though I was physically powerful enough after Week-One, mentally was another story - I'd have gone ballistic on everybody the first time somebody earned a take out hamburger for lunch. I continued planning to view the physician for group fills. We didn’t examine my plan for treatment or how many floods I might require - initially I didn’t even feel any difference as the band tightened. He just kept telling me ahead in. I will attempt to sum up since I don’t actually remember in what order things happened after this point. The nearly 36 months I had the group were one of the most miserable of my life. Our band never fallen or eroded, but I still experienced pain, distress and almost constant nausea. Anytime I'm asked today about what I had, I reply that the group is “medically controlled bulimia” - and I possess the deteriorated esophagus to prove it. Here are some things I wish I'd identified: 1. The band doesn’t make sense Your stomach is not a sealed container. It’s more like a sieve. The entire cause the Lapband is supposed to work is basically because the region of your belly that triggers thoughts of volume which it communicates for your head is close to the top. The band cinches up your belly to produce a tiny pre-stomach pouch that you are likely to fill with food that can trick this place into early feelings of depth. My doctor told me the entire aim of eating is to get pencil eraser-sized bites and delay MINUTES inbetween each. You need to get so “bored with eating, you receive up and go do another thing instead.” (Yes, tell somebody who is like she's starving to death to sit down before food and take pencil eraser-sized bites. That will surely work.) So tell me this: you either follow this technique and pulverize your food to the stage that it slips right through the group and defeats the reason or you take large enough attacks that you do fill up your sack, but are then in pain when you experience each piece of poorly chewed food try to go through your stoma (your new starting from stomach pouch to regular belly. I call it having “food babies.” the 1st time I experienced the impression of eating anything too large to comfortably move across this opening, it felt like the worst ice cream headache ever. in my stomach!) 2. To the majority of doctors, you're what I had been: a heartbeat with insurance Specialists get paid for doing surgery NOT for aftercare. Odds are excellent your doctor will probably LEAVE YOU. Hey, if you go have surgery in Mexico, you most likely won’t get any aftercare whatsoever! Leading me to another fun fact I wish I would have identified: 3. If your doctor leaves, NOBODY WILL TOUCH YOU. My surgeon left town and took his whole office with him within a year of my surgery. This left my town high and dry. There was nobody around who would possibly get near me. This managed to get extra fun when I ended up “obstructed” (the band packed my belly completely shut for no reason in any way - I was not able to eat or drink anything) and in the ER a couple of week after he pulled up stakes. The initial result of the ER was “go away, we don’t know anything in what you've,” but it was a three-day weekend and that I practically had nowhere else to show so I really needed to walk them through just how to take liquid from my band therefore I might have some relief. I searched physicians within a 300 MILE radius and was either refused as being a new patient although I might make my surgical report which revealed there have been no troubles with my surgery, or was quoted a silly “New Individual Fee” of anywhere from several hundred to many THOUSAND dollars. 4. Your insurance means nothing If you end up in the situation used to do, abandoned by your surgeon with no body else in your town or out who'll enable you to, congratulations: you have now joined the entire world of cash-for-support! It doesn’t subject that I've incredible insurance that paid for more or less something I needed, without any doctor to get my insurance, I was SOL. I resorted to go-between. A silly intermediary company that required money in advance and then reached a network of vendors near me (I applied Austin mainly - the quack in Irving hurt me worse attempting to give me a fill than I’ve likely ever been injured because situation before) to secure a meeting to have me a fill. I'd to utilize this service many times to secure fills to get me back-up to the stage I had been at prior to the ER had taken some out after I was hindered. 5. You are in the band’s mercy Your Lab-Group employs no preset rules. It's also suffering from things entirely outside your handle like atmospheric pressure. I am quite definitely a person of pattern and may take the same identical Lean Cuisine dinner to work with lunch everyday. I might have no difficulty whatsoever eating it or -2 to 3 days-out of five- I might throw it up. I was also told inflammation and water retention during my time could and could make the band cinch itself up. The band can be an implanted medical device. Believe very carefully about every one of the ads you see on Television: “Call 1-800-fat-sttlmet4u if you have had any of the following… Attorney Steve will fight for you!” If anything goes wrong withit, you face more negative effects or surgery. My group actually had a recall put out on it not too long after I got it: a little part used to clip the port’s tubing and maintain it from getting kinked up may come undone and cause stated kinkage to happen. The best part: the recall was for rings not already inserted. For me who previously had it? “Don’t worry. Take no action. You’re probably fine.” The worst thing I concerned about was getting obstructed again with no one to assist me. Since my favorite action to take is fear and anxiety, I immediately thought of among my favorite books/movies: “The Stand.” there is a whole chapter within the book devoted to people who would have survived the plague when they hadn’t done x/y/z (ruptured appendix, fell off bicycle and cracked head, etc) and gotten killed. I quickly put myself in this category: the entire world ends, I survive, except my stomach pushes spontaneously closed and I starve to death. 6. You can still make most of the wrong choices What no one explained and I didn't learn in my own research regarding the group is: the band is a resource for weight reduction, yes, but it’s a poor one. Since your belly is intact, you can still expand it. The quack I mentioned before in Irving described a patient he was seeing who was able to extend his sack to date an upper GI revealed that his body only reflected his intact stomach BELOW the band (one stomach, then lapband, then the other stomach.) There is also something called “soft nutrient syndrome,” where your group might actually be too small (a state my doctor had me constantly present in before he left.) You are physically struggling to make the “right” alternatives in regards to food as the right choices hurt. It never stopped to surprise me how I was suddenly confined within this value after the band. I got to where I'd endless cravings for salad because I hadn’t consumed a salad virtually the whole time I had been banded. The vegetables were a nono for me and could get trapped and irritate me till I put up. This kind of irritation can also be what might cause potential congestion because I’d get swollen. You start making choices which can be easy rather than right - high-calorie, creamy, fatty sauces, milkshakes, icecream - things that are easy to eat because they slip through the band and don’t cause any pain or discomfort. 7. You can still obtain all of it back I assume I knew about that potential, but I didn’t desire to think about it. Overall, I lost about 70lbs using the band all together. The truth is: since it didn’t impact my hunger whatsoever, all it did was delay the inevitable. Each food and eating relevant need was still there, I had been only physically unable to show it. The month the ER did a partial un-load because of obstruction? Yea, I gained 20lbs. I dropped it again after I got re-tightened, however it showed me the score. I was probably just about 10 or 15 pounds up after I finally decided to produce a change. I joined Weight Watchers for your thousandth time and started checking and tracking - anything I ought to have done since Day-One with the band. I don’t know what I was thinking. I was told a great deal of things about exactly what the group was said to be and there were also a great deal of things that I ought to have done that I didn’t. * * * And so I was un-banded (disbanded?) on Dec 6th (RIP Lappy 01/14/09 - 12/06/11) and opted for the gastric sleeve. I realized that when I didn’t get another form of surgery - for all my training and good intentions - without that back-up, I would be backup past 300 in a year.

My experience was the exact opposite of the Lap Band in pretty much every way. I'm amazing and wish I got the sleeve to begin with and didn’t waste nearly 3 years in distress, but what’s the cliché? Hindsight is always 20/20. The sleeve was still being processed being a strategy back then and so I may not have already been as happy with it then as I am now-so - here’s a different one for you - everything happens at its own time and for its purpose, I guess. I began writing this being a comparison of each experience (thus the extended URL), but I realized I had way too much to write hence the gastric sleeve must have its own heart later. I do greatly admit this IS JUST one person’s experience. There are plenty of other folks available who love their Lap-Bands and have had great experience with them. I just wanted to tell you what happened tome justincase you're building a weight loss surgery decision right now an Get to know more about Centralia Orthognathic Surgery Surgeons

[softk1ller-blog]

Weight Loss Surgery: A Cautionary Lap Band History

I made the decision to possess weight loss surgery. When this occurs, I tipped the machines at about 305lbs. Our reasons, as any person confronted with this decision will agree, were my own. I also made several problems now and the ones I do believe need addressing. The largest were: my option to have the surgery in my own hometown along with the surgery I chose. I reside in a city of 100,000+. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex area is approximately three hours away. There is an office of physicians in my own area newly announced as performing weightloss surgery, but just two: the Lap-Band and Gastric Bypass. I investigated both operations and had some ideas about each, but wished to consult a doctor in this office before making my final choice. Used to do believe the Lapband would probably be it for me though as it’s reversible as well as a less severe selection as opposed to bypass (as far as having my composition cut-up and re-planted together and experiencing complications like the likelihood of seeking gallbladder surgery, “dumping problem,” and malabsorption problems.) My step sister thought we would possess a bypass inside the metroplex area right before I had my technique and was happy like a clam about the whole thing - I hope I’d followed her lead. I met with the physician. I had been asked what insurance I had (Federal Blue Cross Blue Shield) and what treatment I'd like. I told them I’d like to discuss my choices as well as the doctor did a quick run down of each, but the attitude of the visit was greatly “Why did you come here if you didn’t already know?” I opted for Panel-Band… when I really should have chosen another doctor, but the Lapband involves regular followup appointments for floods (treating fluid to the band using a port underneath the skin in order to keep up with the band’s rigidity around the belly and cause weight loss.) I needed to be able to seek this maintenance in my own neighborhood and not travel for three hours each time I must be seen. I had been ok using the prospect of slower weight loss because - after spending nearly all of my living in Weightwatchers - I realized gradual weight loss was more likely to similar permanent weight reduction. The very next time I found my doctor was the day of the task.

I was later told this can be what’s called being a “heartbeat with insurance.” I had the procedure 01/14/09. There was no psych consult, no diet beforehand, no meeting with a nutritionist or exercise specialist - I was told “eh, should you don’t want it, take it out!“. My last solid food and carbonated beverage was 01/12/09. The surgery was a day surgery. I was put under, the group was placed, I was taken to recover, lightly hit conscious, taken up to radiology, designed to do an upper GI and swallow contrast material so they can scan me and ensure everything was ok. This made me start to retch which caused one of my medical sites to reopen. I bled all around the ground - I still possess the bloodstained socks. I was patched back-up and sent home. For your first twenty-four hours, I had been floating. I was still high on whatever they gave me in the clinic as well as the Twilight sleep plot behind my ear that was placed there to stop the inevitable sickness I get after being sedated. After that? I had been in hell. I always joked about requiring a Clockwork Orange Diet - one where I encounter real discomfort or discomfort at the concept of eating since I realized that’s by what it'd try get me to improve my methods since I enjoy eating THAT much. Well, be careful what you would like for… I vomited constantly. I was more nauseous than I've ever been in my life. I got my pain medicine which made it worse. The worst part? I was still ravenously hungry. The Lap-Band had no effect whatsoever on that. I wanted nothing more than to consume and also the broths and sauces I ate made me provide. The whole time I had been throwing up, I had been terrified I had been going to get my group (cause the band to maneuver which would cause the wrong sort of constriction - stories I learn about this online stated that people that did this couldn’t also swallow their own throw afterward.) Band slippage often requires additional surgery to improve and I was already in enough pain not to actually want surgery again. I can remember my Mom coming to visit me now and me crying and just saying something similar to, “What have I completed? If you were actually considering this, don’t do it.” My husband called the doctor to record how sick I was to the level we thought something was wrong. They shrugged it off. We called again. The doctor finally mentioned perhaps it had been my pain medication. Affirmed, I'd codeine sensitivity and factors were somewhat better after I stopped taking the medication, BUT instead of giving to displace it with another thing, I had been instructed to consider liquid Tylenol… that we gave up on as it didn’t help a little. So pretty much I did the majority of my recovery with no pain management whatsoever $6. Besides being physically uncomfortable, I was suddenly also confronted with a very true sensation like mental pain. Unable to rest or get comfy, I resigned myself to the sofa and watched TV throughout the day. You don’t understand how much food there is on TV until you can’t have any. My husband could come home from work and I would just cry. I’d list everything I saw and what everyone ate: a detective show with sandwiches, a show with delectable cereal being nonchalantly enjoyed right in the field. It was suffering. I don’t actually remember the post-surgery diet I had been on. I believe it was per week of clear liquids, two weeks of total (milky), two weeks of smooth after which regular food as tolerated. I’m not 100% sure though. I was appointed for my first followup. I believe this was initially I quit the house, used clothes, etc. I still felt like death. I offered myself in the surgeon’s office, searching and feeling like death and he said ‘well done.’ I wondered if he was perhaps considering me. A friend got me out of the property after week two, but I still felt awful. Basically it was merely a couch vacation, from languishing on my sofa to languishing on hers for an evening. I took fourteen days off from work total. “They” will say you can probably go back to work after one, but in the event there were problems, I wanted extra-time to feel better - child, am I glad I got that much. Even when I had been physically powerful enough after Week-One, emotionally was another story - I would have gone ballistic on everyone the first time somebody earned a takeout burger for lunch. I continued moving in to find out the physician for group fills. We didn’t discuss my treatment plan or just how many fills I might require - initially I didn’t also feel any difference as the band tightened. He just kept telling me to return in. I'll try and sum up since I don’t really remember in what order things occurred next point. The nearly 36 months I had the band were essentially the most miserable of my life. Our band never fallen or eroded, but I still experienced pain, distress and almost constant vomiting. Anytime I'm asked today by what I had, I answer the group is “medically handled bulimia” - and that I possess the ruined esophagus to prove it. Below are a few things I wish I had identified: 1. The band doesn’t make sense Your stomach isn't a sealed container. It’s more like a sieve. The entire cause the Lap-Band is supposed to work is basically because the region of your belly that triggers feelings of volume which it declares for your head is near the top. The band cinches up your stomach to make a little pre-stomach pouch that you're supposed to complete with food that will trick this area into early thoughts of volume. My surgeon explained the whole purpose of eating will be to get pencil eraser-sized bites and delay MINUTES in between each. You should get so “bored with eating, you obtain up and go do something different instead.” (Yes, tell a person who feels as though she is starving to death to sit facing food and get pencil eraser-sized bites. That will surely work.) So tell me this: you either follow this approach and pulverize your food to the point that it falls straight through the group and defeats the reason or you take big enough attacks which you do fill up your sack, but are then in anguish when you feel each little bit of poorly chewed food try to move across your stoma (your beginning from stomach pouch to regular belly. I call it having “food babies.” the initial time I experienced the sensation of eating anything too big to easily go through this opening, it felt like the worst ice cream headache ever. in my stomach!) 2. To the majority of doctors, you're what I had been: a heartbeat with insurance Surgeons get paid for performing surgery NOT for aftercare. Odds are excellent your physician will probably KEEP YOU. Hello, if you get have surgery in Mexico, you almost certainly won’t get any aftercare whatsoever! That leads me to another fun fact I wish I'd have known: 3. If your physician leaves, NO BODY WILL TOUCH YOU. My doctor left town and got his whole office with him inside a year of my surgery. This left my town high and dry. There was no one around who would even get near me. This made it extra fun after I wound up “obstructed” (the band squeezed my stomach completely shut for no reason in any way - I had been struggling to eat or drink something) as well as in the ER about a week after he pulled up stakes. The original reaction of the ER was “go away, we don’t learn anything about what you've,” but it was a three-day weekend and that I practically had nowhere else to show so I really needed to walk them through just how to take water from my group therefore I would have some relief. I looked physicians inside a THREE HUNDRED MILE radius and was both declined like a new individual although I may create my surgical document which revealed there have been no difficulties with my surgery, or was offered a silly “New Individual Fee” of anywhere from several hundred a number of THOUSAND dollars. 4. Your insurance means nothing If you end up within the location I did so, forgotten by your doctor and with no body else inside your town or out who will help you, congratulations: you've now joined the planet of cash-for-service! It doesn’t matter that I've outstanding insurance that taken care of virtually anything I needed, without doctor to take my insurance, I had been SOL. I turned to gobetween. A ridiculous intermediary service that necessary money at the start and then reached a network of vendors near me (I used Austin primarily - the quack in Irving hurt me worse trying to give me a fill than I’ve possibly actually been injured in that position before) to secure a meeting to get me a fill. I'd to use this support several times to secure fills to have me back-up towards the stage I was at before the ER had taken some out after I was hindered. 5. You're at the band’s mercy Your Lab-Group follows no preset rules. It's also affected by issues completely outside of your handle like atmospheric pressure. I'm quite definitely a person of habit and may take the same similar Lean Cuisine meal to work with lunch each day. I may have no difficulty whatsoever eating it or -2-3 days out of five- I might throw it up. I was also told swelling and water retention during my period can and could create the group cinch itself up. The group can be an implanted medical device. Think cautiously about every one of the advertisements you notice on Television: “Call 1800-fat-sttlmet4u if you've had the following… Lawyer Steve can struggle for you!” If something goes wrong with it, you encounter more sideeffects or surgery. My band actually had a recall create on it not too much time after I got it: just a little piece used to show the port’s tubing and keep it from getting kinked up can come undone and cause said kinkage to take place. The very best part: the recall was for companies not already placed. For me who already had it? “Don’t worry. Take no action. You’re probably fine.” The worst thing I concerned about was getting obstructed again without any one to assist me. Since my favorite move to make is worry and stress, I immediately thought of among my personal favorite books/videos: “The Stand.” There was a whole page within the book dedicated to individuals who would have survived the problem whenever they hadn’t done x/b/z (ruptured appendix, fell off motorcycle and broken skull, etc) and gotten killed. I immediately put myself in this type: the planet ends, I endure, except my stomach squeezes spontaneously shut and I starve to death. 6. You can still make all of the wrong choices What no one explained and I failed to uncover within my research about the group is: the group can be a tool for fat loss, yes, but it’s an unhealthy one. Since your stomach is intact, you can still extend it. The quack I discussed earlier in Irving mentioned an individual he was seeing who managed to extend his pouch to date that the upper GI revealed that his bag only reflected his intact stomach BELOW the group (one stomach, then lapband, then the other stomach.) There's also something called “soft calorie problem,” where your band may actually be too limited (a situation my surgeon had me perpetually existing in before he left.) You are physically struggling to make the “right” choices in regards to food because the right choices hurt. It never ceased to impress me how I was instantly confined in this regard after the band. I got to where I'd endless desires for salad since I hadn’t consumed a salad pretty much the complete time I was banded. The vegetables were a no no for me and might get caught and irritate me until I put up. This type of discomfort is also what could cause potential obstruction since I’d get swollen. You start making choices which are easy and never right - high-calorie, creamy, fatty soups, milkshakes, ice cream - items that are simple to eat because they fall through the band and don’t cause any pain or discomfort. 7. You can still gain it all back I guess I knew about this potential, but I didn’t wish to consider it. In general, I dropped about 70lbs with the group all together. To be honest: as it didn’t impact my hunger whatsoever, all it did was delay the expected. Each food and eating relevant motivation was still there, I had been just physically unable to express it. The month the ER did a partial un-load because of obstruction? Yes, I gained 20lbs. I lost it again after I got re-tightened, but it showed me the score. I was probably no more than 10 or 15 pounds up after I finally chose to produce a change. I joined Weightwatchers for the thousandth time and started counting and following - something I ought to have done since Day-One using the band. I don’t know what I had been thinking. I was told a lot of reasons for exactly what the band was allowed to be and there were also a lot of items that I will did that I didn’t. * * * And so I was un-banded (disbanded?) on Dec 6th (RIP Lappy 01/14/09 - 12/06/11) and opted for the gastric sleeve. I realized that when I didn’t get another kind of surgery - for all my training and good intentions - without that safety net, I'd be backup past 300 in per year.

Our experience was the exact opposite of the Lap Band in pretty much every way. I'm wonderful and hope I obtained the sleeve to start with and didn’t waste nearly three years in anguish, but what’s the cliché? Hindsight is always 20/20. The sleeve was still being polished being a process back then and so I might not have already been as satisfied with it then as I am now-so - here’s another one for you - everything happens at its own time as well as for a unique purpose, I suppose. I started out writing this like a comparison of every experience (hence the lengthy URL), but I realized I had way too much to publish hence the gastric sleeve will need to have its heart later. I really do very much know this IS SIMPLY one person’s experience. There are plenty of other people outthere who appreciate their Lap Bands and have had fantastic experience using them. I just wished to let you know what happened tome in case you're building a weight reduction surgery decision right now an Become familiar with more about Centralia Orthognathic Surgery Surgeons