I am eating solid foods again, which I must say has been a very nice change of pace.  Presently it is mostly prepared items so my sodium intake is a bit more than I would care for, however I do not have the time or rather determination to be bothered with cooking.  With so many other things clawing for my attention one less chore to be bothered with can be blissful.

Lately I have been dealing with heartburn.  It is part of the daily routine and comes and goes as it pleases.  At this point I figure I may have to see about getting a prescription for a proton pump (sorry it is late and my brain is running at a reduced capacity, but I believe that is the right terms I am looking for), inhibitor to reduce the stomach acid.  I may inquire with CIBO and see if this is the right course of action.  I did have a doctor appointment schedule for Wednesday, however I cancelled it this morning as I was not feeling well and figured I may still be sick by then.  Plus the main reason why I scheduled the appointment didn’t pan out (I’ll explain below).

The sipping of liquids was the hardest thing I have had to deal with besides the heartburn.  Prior to surgery I was a chugger.  Sipping simply did not satisfy my thirst.  However lately I have noticed that I can take a few mouthfuls now without feeling like I have overdone it.  A lady who I have spoken with who had her surgery 5 months ago said she could chug down half a bottle of water without any problems on an empty stomach.  From time to time I would like to know that if I wanted too I could chug down something.  I watched her latest vlog entry on YouTube and she says she is drinking pop (soda) again.  It is usually when I am at the movies when I have wished I could have some diet pop, but then I think of what my stomach might do if I did so it completely deters me from the craving.

I’m considering doing a vlog on YouTube.  That would be a weekly thing and I am hoping to keep this blog up on a 2-3 day basis.  I have made notes of my feelings since the surgery in a notebook, but at the present I think those thoughts will remain on paper on as I don’t have the time to put them on the computer for others to see.

Now going back to the my mention of the doctor appointment.  Initially I booked it because I was hoping to get a doctor’s note to help expedite a move to a new apartment.  My friend Jennie said that a doctor’s note is like a golden ticket for the disabled.  She thought if I had one I could get into a subsidized (rent geared to income) unit in an apartment building in North Oshawa that I want to move into.  After she made some calls on my behalf it seemed that even that might not help or at least it might not expedite the process.  There was a 1 bedroom unit available in one of the buildings, however I was not quick enough and someone else took it.  I’m hoping come January they’ll have a February vacancy.  It is a much newer building, which is why I am so keen to move there.  Plus my friend Adam lives in the building next door.  I just need a change of scenery and a fresh start.

Anyway I’ll leave it at this.  I hope that the ladies back at Euclid who stumbled across this blog still check to see if I update it.

If you feel like emailing me I can be reached at: j.e.f.f.y.1.1.9.2.0.0.4 [AT] g.m.a.i.l. [COM]  (take out all the periods).

Cheers!

After the shower I took the time to get dressed and packed up my things before waiting for the ambulance crew to pick me up and take me to the main campus.

The driver decided to take the street route figuring the I-90 was going to be bumper to bumper…turns out he made the a mistake, ha ha.  We arrived at 8am and I was quickly met by my mom who had been doing some paperwork for me, and then I was taken to a room to get into a gown.

After some vitals were taken and a bunch of questions were asked I was eventually wheeled over to another area to have my mid-line (IV) inserted.  It was a rather painless experience.  I was then greeted by the various members of the surgical team and given the chance to ask any questions I had.

Eventually they had me using a vaporizer to inhale something that would numb the back of throat as they were going to intubate me before putting me under.  When I was wheeled into the operating room after saying goodbye to my mom, I felt my throat was still not numb enough after the first attempt where I felt like I was going to choke.  They numbed it up some more and the last thing I recall was seeing 10:52am on the clock and the crappy feeling of them intubating me.

Next thing I know I am being woken up in the operating room.  I saw that it was now 1:52pm, so I had been out for 3 hours.  I was wheeled to the recovery room and then hooked up to oxygen, and they had my vitals on the monitors behind me.  I was told to breath to keep my blood-oxygen levels up.  Each time it got low something would beep and the nurse would come over and tell me to take deep breaths.  This was a bit of a struggle because I was sleepy, in some discomfort, and without my CPAP machine it was more of a struggle to take deep breaths.

It was a few hours before I was finally wheeled upstairs to my room…and the nurses wanted ME to shimmy myself from the stretcher to my bed.  What the (pardon my French), fuck were they thinking?!  I just had surgery and they wanted me to lug my 700lbs self rather than being bothered to use the inflation device under me to slide me across.  I mean if I could have physically done this task without feeling like my insides were being torn apart I would have.

The rest of the night was sort of groggy.  I was in and out of it with my mom telling me what friends and family had been saying all day.  Once my CPAP was brought up I immediately put it on and felt so much more peaceful.  My mom left shortly after (I think), and I tried to get some sleep in between being woken up for vitals, etc.

The surgery was not as bad as I had expected, and really I did not use my pain pump as much as I probably should have.  I was not in severe pain…and really if I could have just slept straight through the night I would not have noticed it as much.

Basically this post will stand as a reminder to me to add in the days that are missing.  For now though I’ll continue on with some new posts for the days closer to the surgery.

Cheers!

After I was woken up at 12:30am I decided to get up and go on the computer for a bit.  I basically checked fantasy sports stuff and then watched another Black Adder episode.

It was around 2:30am that I decided to go back to bed.  I was told not to drink anything after 2am, so I stopped drinking water at 1:30am.  I was then woken up a few more times until finally at 8am the technician came in to do my ultrasound.  I was so glad that she could come to me after yesterday’s fiasco.

After the ultrasound I got up and fiddled around on the computer.  The two doctors who would come in and visit me and give me a bit of an update on things came in to let me know that I would be transferred to Euclid at some point today.  Shortly after they left the guy (head honcho…who’s name alludes me, but I know it starts with a G), who I met yesterday came to tell me that I would be going to Euclid and just wanted to how I was.

Just past noon the ambulance crew showed up and they strapped me into the stretched.  I felt sorry for them when they had to get me into the ambulance as they had 7 guys all lifting me to make sure I was evenly supported.  After a bumpy 15 minute ride over to Euclid they got me up to the 6th floor and into my room.

Right away I noticed the choppy waters of Lake Erie.  That view sure beat the one of a building roof and other parts of the Cleveland Clinic at the main campus room.

I was quickly approached by several nursing staff and other employees whom were all very friendly and comforting.

Vitals were taken and of course my blood pressure was up.  I believe it was around 194/92 give or take a few.  I’m sure it will be down later on when they take it.

The one young chap who is a nursing assistant went through my stuff to account for everything so that they had a record of my belongings.  He then was kind enough do some cable switching so that I then had all the premium channels on the television, otherwise I only would have had a few channels unless I paid $6 a day for them.  I thought that was really nice of him.

Other than that thus far my time here has been very comforting.

Eventually a porter showed up to take me to my first test of the day.  The wheelchair I had was very sluggish and I felt really sorry for the chap as he seemed very frail.  I got up to walk up a ramp at one point to help him out.  We eventually made it to the test location and he left.

The first test was rather simple.  Take a few normal breaths, then when told take a really quick deep breath in followed by a fast exhale and then continue slowly exhaling until told to inhale.  It appeared I did well and then I sat and waited for the next porter to show up and take me to my next destination.

The second porter was much bulkier and while the chair was sluggish he seemed to be having an easier time of things.  When we got to the elevators though I could see he was sweating, out and breath and then he apologized that he was struggling a bit as he was diabetic and his blood sugars were low.  I felt guilty all day knowing that any porters I would get would have a hard time of getting me to and from places.

He dropped me off in a waiting area as I was going to have an echo done on my heart.  A 13″ LCD television was placed in front of me and I sat there watching TBS.  It was a rather lengthy wait, just over an hour I believe before I was taken to get my echo done.  The girl I had was extremely nice and very comforting.

After the test was completed I was rolled back to the waiting area and sat watching television again.  I ended up having a nice little chat with another lady who lived 50 miles from Cleveland and about the Canadian and American healthcare systems, which was interesting.

Shortly after that two porters came and they seemed to have an easier time getting me back to my room where I quickly had an unexpected appointment from another psychologist re: the binge eating group they thought might be beneficial for me to attend.

Afterwards I got a visit from the heart doctors who asked a bunch of questions and filed out.  One stayed behind to listen to my heart and lungs and then he said that they shouldn’t need to go a stress test, which was such a relief to me.

The rest of the evening was spent on the computer before I eventually went to bed early.

(Somethings might be out of order as I was just overwhelmed with seeing people…and once you get behind on blogging you have to rely on memory…which mine is not always so memorable, lol.)

When we arrived there we waited a few minutes while someone went to retrieve a bariatric wheelchair.  Tom (from CIBO), was the one who had the duty of pushing me around.  I’m sure his legs got a really good workout yesterday from that.

When we got up to the 6th floor we were told that the desk would not be open until 8am even though we were told to be here for 7:30am.  We sat in the waiting room and eventually a Tom found a lady who took up down the the lab to get blood drawn.  Problem was when we got down there they had no idea what blood tests had to be done so we spent 30-45 minutes waiting down there while calls and pages were made to try and figure out what tests had to be done.  Come 8:15am with no response yet we went back upstairs as I had other appointments.

The visit with the nutritionist went well.  She was very friendly and we went over some of my eating history and she then went over what I could expect as I progressed through the diet they have for post-op patients.  I was then taken to get weighed and I was shocked when it showed that I was down to 676lbs!  Last time I had weighed about 2-3 months prior I was 732lbs, so I had lost 56lbs!

After that I was sat in the waiting room for a couple minutes before being called in to get ready for my endoscopy.  I was directed to lay in a bed and the two nurses began hooking me up to a blood pressure machine and then inserting an IV port to provide with a sedative.  After about 20-30 minutes of waiting I was finally wheeled into the room for the endoscopy.  They sprayed my throat with with a general anaesthetic which wasn’t so bad.  I was then given a another sedative and then the test began.  It didn’t start off that bad, but eventually I began to feel the gag reflexes kicking in.  At one point I was overcome with almost uncontrolled gagging that seemed fairly violent to me.  I felt a suction hose being put into my mouth to make sure anything that might have come up (I had an empty stomach anyway), was not pooling in my mouth.  I then heard one of the assistants telling me to relax, stay calm and to take deep breathes through my nose.  When the test was over I was very relieved.  I spent a bit of time in the recovery room as I came out of the sedative very quickly.  I was then take to my room.  About 45 minutes later my mom and Tom popped in.  I guess no one bothered to tell them I was done according to them.

Some pictures were taken as Laura from CityTV News had requested we have some for the news story that we did some filming for last week before I left for Cleveland.  Shortly thereafter I had another appointment and so my mom and Tom left for their hotel.

Dinner turned out to be chicken broth with some orange jell-o, cranberry cocktail juice and tea (which I do not drink).  Honestly I would have preferred the protein shakes I was on at home, however I am now on a clear liquid diet.

Around 9:30pm after I got an injection from a very nice, young nurse who I believe might have been Russian, the respiratory technician showed up to fix it so that the BiPap machine they brought up would act like a CPAP machine.  After he left I put on my mask and it was lights out.  I was just exhausted after being up for 31 hours straight.

I was awoken three times during the night to get my vitals checked and also a fourth time to have blood drawn.

Overall day one was not too bad, but the lack of sleep really made it feel very long and drawn out.