Hello all! I'm no longer in the "waiting period" and had a successful "sleeve" surgery done on August 18, 2016. My insurance required a six month supervised diet as well as seeing a psychologist. I started the entire process back in October 2015 with my first seminar. November I met with the dietician to get everything set up. Finished my six month diet at the end of April. I saw the psyche in April as well. I was hoping for a May surgery, but of course the insurance company likes to play games. First, the letter from my primary physician wasn't good enough. They wrote they recommended the diet because it would be beneficial to my health. The insurance kicked it back because they didn't also say "it would improve my quality of life." Got that letter sent in, then waited two weeks. Another week goes by, I call my insurance provider and they tell me they cannot give me an approval without a surgery date. The surgeon won't give a date without prior approval. I finally had enough and my surgeon's office told me to just give them a date of the 19th. I called the insurance up, letter of approval arrived within 3 days.

As for my experience with the surgery, all has gone well. I was required to be on a liquid diet for three days prior to surgery in which time I lost 10 lbs. I weighed 279 the day of surgery on 08/18 and on 09/18 I weighed in at 257 lbs. So all in all, 32 lbs. down in just over a month.

I have followed all of the eating recommendations. The hardest part in the first month is twofold: Getting enough liquids (64 ounces) and getting enough protein (85 grams). Once you are able to start introducing foods like chicken and lunch meat in, getting the protein is much easier. Next week, I'll start my "week 6" meals in which I can add hamburger, salad greens and a few other items to give me a more diverse selection. I eat 3 meals a day, around 1/2 to 3/4 cup each as well as a small snack like a cheese stick. My average caloric intake daily is under 800. I don't get hunger pains like I used to and I would say about 50% of the time, I'm not that hungry when mealtime comes. Usually lunch is the only time that I am starting to feel hungry. I haven't experienced any "dumping syndrome" and (knock on wood) I have not thrown up one single time. This past weekend, I was at my oldest daughter's band invitational for most of the day Saturday. Those pulled pork nachos looked tempting so I gave it a try. I ate about four or five small bites of the pork and about 4 or five chips with cheese. No problems.

I attribute a lot of my success to my surgeon Darin Minkin at Des Peres Hospital in St. Louis, MO. Excellent man with excellent staff. Choose your surgeon wisely. There are numerous places that offer the surgery now, but I wanted someone with years of experience to do my surgery. Best of luck to all of you!