6/18/2010 Day 1 With LAP-BAND

Weight: 273lbs

Notes: Let's talke about the weight first. When I walked into the hospital yesterday morning I weighed 268 lbs, this morning I weighed 273lbs. I had not eaten a thing during that time so I will attribute this weight to the i.v. drip. I got to the hospital on time yesterday, I had some papers I need to sign and within 20 min I was taken to pre-op holding where I put on the naked butt robe. My darling wife was allowed to come and sit with me while I waited for surgery. They gave me about 6 types of injections prior to the surgery, mostly to keep me from vomiting, but the nasty one was a drug that prevents blood clots. That MoFo of a shot was given to me in my stomach and it burned like hell. When they came to get me the last thing I remember kissing bobo and then seeing all those people in the surgery room. They started with an i.v. drip to put me out and that was it. When I awoke I was in post-op care and it felt like someone was sitting on my chest, lots of pressure with only minor pain to mention. They started dilaudid via i.v and it was happy times after that. Once they wheeled me back to my permanent room I was quite coherent and wanted to get up and walk around. I had to pee and tried but nothing would come out. My mum and my son came to see me and around 5:30-6pm everyone left. I tried to pee again and nothing. I told the nurse and said keep trying, turn the water on in the sink, etc. By 8pm or so I was feeling quite well but the pee was pressure was getting worse. It should be noted that I have a "non-compliant" bladder which means it holds at most (under day to day operations) about 6oz (190 ml) before I get strong urge to pee. Anyhow, the nurse called my primary weight loss surgeon and he suggested that keep walking around the hospital. I did that many times and finally at 10pm when I could not pee at all she called the doc again and said to put in the catheter. I was sorta freaked out because I did not know how much it would hurt and my nurse was a fairly young woman! How embarrassed was I! Anyhoo, when she pushed that cat it in kinda did hurt a bit, I gripped the bed rails quite hard. However, once she got into the bladder there was releif for me. I gave up approx 600 ml, I guess my bladder can stretch when it wants to stretch. From that point on I tried to sleep and I did for a few hours until my nurse came back and said they were moving me from my private room to a room with two other blokes. They had a suicide attempt coming in and this person had the mercer virus. Ummm, yes please get me as far away as possible. This was around midnight, the two blokes were nice enough, we talked, I even brought up the Celtics game (all of you know should know that I hate sports) which I took in. Anynow, by 4am I was tired of the cat and asked to have it removed. It is a weird feeling having a cat in you, I felt like I was continuously peeing and that kept me up. She did not want to take it out but I insisted. Well, when she pulled it out it hurt but not as bad as putting it in. At 7am this morning folks from imaging came to get me, they wanted to take an x-ray to ensure the band was sitting right. Dr. G said it looked perfect and then wheeled me back to my room. The nurse changed out my bandages (4 laparoscopic incision marks now residue on my belly). She then gave me another belly shot of the anti-clotting meds and then said I can leave, this was about 9am and it was at point my family came and got me. As I type this my peeing is working again although it burns like hell when I go, I guess the catheter causes major irritation inside the urethra. Also, my vision has been extremely blurred all day and I am just able to type and read the words I am typing. My appetite all day has bee non-existent but I did manage to force down some broth and ice pops, bobo made a delicious watermelon and icy smoothie and it tasted great. I have to be on a clear liquid only diet until Sunday, this is even worse than my original 10 day liquid diet which allowed me to have protein shakes and yogurt. However, as I mentioned I don’t have much of an appetite so it is all good. I just need to learn how to put my old demons to bed cuz even thought I am not hungry a part of me still wants to eat for sake of eating. My pain today is minimal if at all, I mainly feel my incisions when I get up and down or twist the wrong way. Also, I have major gas inside me which make my stomach feel like it is being twisted, I have some burps every now and again along with some flatulence but it is not that bad. I am hoping to sleep tonight, I just took a dose of the liquid Percodan and although it makes me feel goofy it does help me sleep so I am looking forward to that. With all that said please forgive any and all typos, on top of my normal bad spelling I can just barely make out what I typing.

Peace and good night. L