Day 2................Like A Surgeon

Hello readers,
    Thanks for coming. 
  One of the big questions on your mind has to be, "Steve, what is a Gastric Sleeve anyway?" Well from the picture you see here, it's not pretty.
(Aren't you glad I didn't use an actual picture of the surgery, Blech!)

Well , so they remove most (75 to 80%) of your existing stomach, and staple the rest into a narrow tube like "sleeve", Ah, yes.  Once removed there are so many rules to go by, like:
 1. eat and drink slowly: 1 ounce (2 Tablespoons) over 10 minutes or longer.
2. Chew each bite at least 25 times. ( try this one I dare you)
3. ALL beverages must be non carbonated.
4. Avoid alcoholic beverages.
5. Drink beverages 30 minutes before or after eating ONLY!
    and about 20 more I will not bore you with.

So maybe your asking yourself, "why would anyone do this? Is this just another need to look good?" Well NO a big emphatic NO.  This is to live, to stay out of a wheelchair, to walk more than 25 feet without pain and being winded. This to be frank, is about staying alive.

  I'll give you a taste of my medical history soon enough, for now I don't want to give you too much data to process. Lets just go with the flow.
 So I met with my Surgeon a few days ago, lets call him Dr. M.  SO Dr. M and I had a heart to heart , about what to expect, what he would do in  the surgery ( see above, 5 holes, staples etc.) , and how long my recovery would be. My recovery should be 1 day/night in the hospital (Saint Elizabeth's in Brighton to be exact) then home, with doing nothing for at least a week and maybe working from home  part time for  a short time there after and then ok to go back to work.  Not too bad.
 So Dr. M. has me weighed, and yes I weighed in at 360 pounds.  Which is horrible I know, but for me, not upsetting since I was 408 about a year ago. So I'm feeling pretty good, and then Dr. M tells me my goal weight.
Taa Daa, time for the other  shoe to drop! The magic number of my goal is 
170 pounds.
Yes that means my total weight loss is expected to be, 190 pounds. Should I succeed, and I will do my best to do so,  I will lose more than I end up weighing.  I weighed 170 in 5th grade.
  Now at first I am scared as all get out, but then I think  to myself that this is not something I am doing lightly, this is, LIFE.
 
  I would like to leave you today with this. I was talking to my boss, we can call him Mr. J, well we were talking and he said something that really hit me. I mentioned how when people see huge obstacles before them, like when your running and seeing a small hill and you think, " oh it's just a small hill, I can make it." Then they go right for it.  But if they see a huge mountain before them, they tend to see it as insurmountable and just turn around.
  Well Mr. J turns to me, and says, " not me, when I see a small hill, I'm thinking, this is nothing, anyone can do this, but when I see that big mountain, that's when I go for it, and I take the mountain head on."
Well this surgery and life change, is my mountain.  With enough strength, and especially support, I'm going to take it head on.
See you tomorrow readers.

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