Canticles of the Unhomed
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Steps to Surgery -- Optifast Day Two
I am having gastric bypass surgery.
For the purpose of exposition:
I weigh approx 220 kg. Up till now that number has been a horrible secret that I have resisted sharing even with myself. Before now, only Miranda has known that number, and my doctors of course.
For the past year and a half I have been part of the Weight Wise Program at the Royal Alex Hospital. The program is a rigorous weight loss therapy which includes sessions with a psychologist, dietician, a MD, an occupational therapist, and a surgeon. All these professionals are specialists in obesity/bariatrics. As well, I attend regular classes on nutrition, exercise and how to manage hunger, cravings, etc. The patients in the program are a tight-knit supportive group, a dimension that I have not been able to experience due to my schedule. However, the interactions that I have had with the professionals have been amazing. They are extremely supportive, and they get to know you personally and actually become some of your greatest cheerleaders. It is an amazing experience to have this team of highly trained and experienced specialists actually treat you like a person with individual and specific concerns rather than just a number. You see these people so often and intensely that the connection is much more profound than just the normal doctor/patient dynamic. For the first time in my life I actually look forward to having conversations with my doctor because I know Renuca actually knows me and genuinely wants me to succeed. Or how my RN Carol goes WAY above and beyond for me and is always really happy to see me and will often stop to chat even when I'm not there to see her.
The main thrust of this program is to resist the fad diets (Atkins, Body by Vi (visalus), P90X, etc) and to teach that obesity is a chronic disease that regardless of how much weight you lose, you will have for the rest of your life, and so you need to make lasting lifestyle changes that you will be able to maintain for the rest of your life. Essentially, they teach you that the things that you are doing right now for losing weight you need to be able to do when you're 75. They focus a lot on education, and equipping for small, achievable changes and goals.
However, the intended culmination of the program is bariatric surgery. This surgery as been clinically proven to virtually eliminate diabetes, high blood pressure, sleep apnea, and a large number of comorbidities of obesity. However, I am not a diabetic, I don't have high blood pressure, though I do have sleep apnea. In fact, my doctors tell me that I have NONE of the comorbidities of obesity. (A comorbidity is any disease or disorder that is a side-effect of another disease or disorder) I am obese, but my good and bad cholesterols are perfect, my blood pressure is perfect, my liver and kidney functions are perfect, I am not at risk of diabetes (I have been tested several times because there is diabetes in my immediate family - my resting glucose is 3.2 mmol/L) and several ECG's and stress tests have proven that my heart is good and not under abnormal stress. In fact, my doctor has said that other than being overweight I am as healthy as a healthy skinny person, and that I am actually healthier than the average "skinny" person. (For the sake of fully disclosure, I am slightly anemic, but Renuca pointed out on Friday that seems to be correcting. I also have lymphodema in my legs and have recently had a bad brush with cellulitis, but neither of those conditions are endemic to obesity and are just as prevalent in people with a BMI of <40) This says something about our culture's skewed and negative attitudes and education about obesity, but more on that in another post.
My doctors have been telling me that I would be an excellent candidate for gastric bypass surgery, and Miranda and I have decided to go ahead with it. The benefits FAR, FAR, FAR outweigh the risk. In the space of 2-3 years I will reasonably lose about 120 kg - that's 265 lbs. That's not even a best case scenario. However, living with gastric bypass is not easy and will require MASSIVE lifestyle changes. But more on that in a different post.
As prelude to surgery, my doctors have placed me on a liquid Optifast diet in order to lose enough weight to increase the safety of the surgery. So, for the next 12 weeks I will be living off of NOTHING except 5 protein shakes a day. (Although I can consume any zero-calorie food - diet pop, crystal light, etc) They expect that I will lose about 5-10 pounds a week. I will be seeing the doctor every week and be getting blood work every week as well. They want to monitor me very closely during this procedure because the optifast procedure is very intensive.
So during this process I have decided to blog my day to day interactions with the optifast, weight loss in general, and some of the things that I have learned about weight loss in general.
Today is day two. I would have started on day one but I didn't get the idea until today.
I am finding that the shakes are incredibly filling. They are mostly protein, so that will make me feel full, so hunger pain should not be a problem, but I find that I am craving food just for the act of chewing and the feeling of eating solid food, and this is only after one day. I am trying to tap the discipline that I learned at the monastery, but that if proving difficult. Yesterday the trial was the leftover pizza in the fridge. A number of people suggested that I throw it out, but I don't want to live like that. I don't want to be afraid of food. Its just as well. Magnus and Miranda ate it, so now its gone. Today, Magnus and I are going to the Super Flea Market and they have minidonuts. That will be my trial for today.
The taste is the other negative. If you have ever had Ensure or Boost then you will be more or less familiar with the overall flavour, although the optifast is much thicker. The chocolate is not too bad, but the vanilla is just weird. Its really thick and sweet, and only tastes like vanilla in only the broadest, most artificial sense. I find that I need to chase it immediately with water or crystal light just to cope with it. Keeping that in mind I am trying to get through the vanilla as quickly as possible, so for the next three days, I will be just doing the vanilla.
:: written by Matt Thompson, 11:49 AM
1 Comments:
Magnus?
Cool.
I'll be following these posts...
Cool.
I'll be following these posts...
