November 18th is the forth day after surgery

I am trying to play catch up because today is actually the 6th. day after surgery, but I need to go back and explain then it will all make sense.
Remember on the last blog I was saying how good I felt, well today all I do is sleep and drink these two beauties.

However, you have to remember that I can't be like everyone else and just pick this puppy up and gulp it down, even when Im so thirsty. This is what I have to use.

You know these things especially if you had or have children. The only difference is I have to squeeze it together and tighten my lips around it, while I take a sip as not to let any air in while I drink. The only way I can do this so it doesn't hurt me is to drink this amount in three sips, So you can see how long it takes to get 8 oz. down.
After every sip I have to wait a few while my stomach on up to throat area do there gurgling and everything went down good. If I take too big of a sip you can had terrible heart burn to the list.
After Dontae and I take a nap, I will finish up to today.

Day three ,

This is the blog that I will show one embarrassing picture of myself. But not until I write my post.
Today is the hardest for me as of right now. Pain wise... Some questions you might want to be asking is, "how can you survive on a clear liquid diet?" Well you can for a couple of days, I probably could go for  days because I haven't felt hungry yet. The last time I ate was 5:30pm on the 13th.
The other thing I want to tell you is the anesthesia is completely worn off , so I am relying on pain meds  Oxy every 6 hours and Valium a hour before or after, Tylenol. Part of the reason that I am in the pain I am into today, Is hubby forgot to set his alarm to give me my night time meds, so when I woke up this morning. HOLY COW was I in pain. Even the shoulder pain they said I would have but haven't. So slowly but surely we are getting me caught up. The nurse just called and told me to keep the pain more under control is to take the oxy every two hours. The only thing with that is, I would be sleeping even more then I do now. and I wouldn't be getting any exercise. So I am going to play that one by ear for now.
Have to tell you what a wonderful husband I have, there is no way I could be doing this without him. After I ate my Popsicle, a few minutes later he brought me my tooth brush with tooth paste on it and water and a towel. He knew that I just couldn't get to the bathroom as of yet. And the fact that he probably couldn't stand looking at my red teeth for the Popsicle. lol
Now all of you reading this, I am going so far out of my comfort zone, that I am amazed I can even post this picture. I am because I have already had a couple of people reach out to me about there life, and want to talk to someone that is going through the same thing or just thinking about.
Here goes. No worries, the bottom let is not infected, just a good size bruise. That is the one that bothers me the worse, because that is the one they pulled my stomach through.

Surgery

 DISCLAIMER,,,, I am on pain meds, just remember that when you are reading this.LOL

So what I said in my last post of eating only 40grams of Carbs per day, to shrink my liver.
Come to find out I lost 6lbs. So I can say I was stoked . Then they put me in a little gown and did a workup on me.

Eviva Cener,  it is like no other.  The first time walking through the door, I  knew this was the place,
I walked into Eviva, they treat me so nice. My name was called and back I went to get ready for my surgery. I had been told many times with putting a tube down my throat and two more going to my stomach, I would endure pain, but because of my hernia it might just hurt the same or more. That I would have a terrible sore throat and hardly be able to swallow, even an ounce of water. I had been preparing for this for a long time.  After surgery, my throat was so horse I was so parched, so they gave me a sip of water and could hear my voice getting back to normal.Well, just as I was done drinking the little ounce of water I noticed my throat did not hurt one bit. Oh boy, talk about being so so happy, Cause that's the worst.
  In to bed I went, which is my recliner, I won't be able to be lying down for some time. We are keeping my pain under control, I am walking laps up and down the hallway. not to mention sleeping a lot.I am sure when the anestthetic  wears off ,and I am only on pain meds, that I will feel different and possibly in more pain..
Now look what my special nurse gave me,

Pre-Op

Not to happy with my technical skills. I made a video to catch you all up because I am preparing for my surgery, and I thought it would be much faster. Well it won't post. Of course it won't lolol. Soooo
I will catch you up. Two weeks prior to my surgery I need to be on a low carb diet no more then 40 grams a day for a full two weeks. Some of you I am sure do this type of diet already, but I found 40 grams to not to be very much. I also did not realize what all has carbs in it. So that was an eye opener for me. So I stuck with protein.  Tonight was the last night of my two weeks and I did great. The reason for the low carb diet is because when they go in, they need to move my liver out of the way, they said kinda flip it up, so they can continue to cut out my stomach. So the low carbs shrink the liver. IKR!!!!!! LOL maybe all of you knew that already, but I am learning new things right and left. 
With the liver shrunk, it guarantees that they can do the entire surgery laposcopically. Spelled wrong again, I think I will have to learn to spell this darn word. 
Tonight ALL food stopped at 6:00PM, all liquids stop at midnight. Tomorrow morning at 6:30AM I need to take a pill that cost me $102.00.  It just happens to be a pill that chemo patients take for nausea. I asked them if there was a cheaper pill, and they said this certain pill is the one they want me to have, because it takes away the severe nausea that I guess people get right after surgery. I may not get it, but I also don't want to find out. Could you imagine being sick and throwing up after that surgery. Oh hell no. 
We will head down to Edmonds tomorrow about 6:45AM I believe my surgery is at 8:45AM.
Oh one of the instructions was to CLEAN out your belly button. LMAO... What?????? They told me that the one incision is right close to the belly button, and they don't want whatever is in there to cause an infection. LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL Yes I am still laughing about it.  Who doesn't clean out their belly button? Well I guess if you have an outie you wouldn't have too. Cause there was the day that I did have an outie. LOL But not anymore, so yes I clean it. And yes it will be sparkly for the nurses tomorrow.  I just don't know why that cracks me up.
I will spend one night. If I didn't have a C Pap machine then I would of came right home, and it would of saved me $1200.00 from my bank account. Oh well, better safe then sorry. And heck they told me that I would probably be off the C Pap with in two months.  Whoo Yaw!!!!!!
Markie will stay in a near by hotel and be back to pick me up at 5:00AM. They tell me my first ounce of water to drink after surgery could take two hours. You see its stuff like that, that they have you see a physiologist for so many visits, and  will encourage me to see one after. Which I believe is very important. You really need to learn skills to get you through some of the things I will be experiencing.
Yes, I have been through many steps to get to this day, I have learned so much and so much about myself. That I couldn't be more thrilled that my day has come. I have been praying about this for so long that I am not worried one bit, I am not scared, I am only excited to begin my new future. One that can do more with Dontae and go more places with Dontae and will be able to go on walks again. My dreams are endless. I want to be around for my Boo for all long as God grants me.
Ok, my friends, please pray for my Dr. to have God lead him every step of the way during my surgery, and pray that I will have little pain, no nausea and that everything will go perfect. 
Just so ya know, it is ok to leave comments.

Now What?

All the work I have done, all the preparation just to be told "its not happening". Then I remember a conversation I had with a friend who told me that she was not going through the insurance because of too many hoops to jump through. So she decided to self pay.
 On the internet I go to educate myself even more.
This is when I found Eviva  (formally Puget Sound Bariatric), They even have an office in Bellingham. Wooo Hoooo!!! This is where a beautiful relationship begins. So I take my information that I  have learned to my husband.  I told him a lot of things and then told him the price of the bariatric sleeve, $17,000.00.  And the most beautiful husband in the world said to me
"Honey you can't put a price tag on your health, well being and quality of life."  All I could do at that moment is look at him. Because as bad as I want this surgery taking money from my family just seemed so selfish. He held out his arms for a hug. Well needless to say I melted. Because if I, for one second would of felt from him that this would be a hardship, I would of shut down this conversation faster then how I started it.  We don't have a car payment, so this is my car payment. LOL
Ok, lets jump ahead. Since I had done ALL the requirements with the UW, my situation was a little different as well, but Eviva was so compassionate, understanding and professional, they were able to all my pre rec's from the UW. I had to have a couple more blood tests, and a bod pod. (look up bod pod, very cool)
After everything checked out, I finally get my surgery date. Its been almost a year since starting this, and now its here. 
I am posting a picture of exactly what is being done. It is all done laprascopically (I know that is spelled wrong) so recovery time is only resting for one week. However, in doing my upper endoscopy, they found I have a hiatal hernia.  They need to fix this during surgery, so my pain level is going to be mostly from this, and might add on a little more recovery time. But the Dr. said my age has some to do with it. I just think it sounds crazy, how all this works.
So once that is taken care of, they will be cutting out most of my stomach, they staple the remaining stomach closed. Then they pull out my stomach through one of the small incisions on my tummy. IKR!!!!! My tummy will now be the size of a banana. 
This now will be my new reality for the rest of my life.