It Begins!

Why the HELL does the hardest part of starting to write a blog have to finding a name for it!  THEN, finding a NEW name for it that hasn't already been taken?!  Makes me miss the 90's when no one used the internet so screen names were a dime a dozen.

More to the point now...and I will warn you, this blog is VERY personal so I don't give 2 shits about your opinions if they are ANY way negative whatsoever.  You can just shove your big toe in your mouth and kinda schwadle away, or something.

About 3 years ago I reached a point in my life where my health was rapidly declining.  I was diagnosed, officially, with Type 2 diabetes when I was pregnant with Bella (yes Type 2, not gestational.  I was gestational with Aidan, however.)  and I had been on a VERY high dose of several different diabetes medications, both oral and injected.  I was also on meds for high blood pressure and high cholesterol.  I was gaining weight rapidly since they had put me on the short acting insulin before each meal and by that time had almost gained 30 pounds in a matter of 10 months.

The doctors had all talked, and I had talked with all the other of my doctors and I was told unanimously that the insulin was going to make it damn near impossible to lose significant weight to make a difference on my health.  It was a vicious circle.  Insulin helped my blood sugars, packed on pounds, made blood pressure and cholesterol higher to control, made it harder to move around on my joints, gave me a lot of muscle problems, etc.  I would lose a few pounds, but it was so hard with the insulin.  (Just for reference, I had to take between 40-150 units of novolog before each meal) (it's a LOT...trust me).  They all recommended that if I wanted to lose weight, I should look into Surgical options.

I decided I would do some research.  I joined a few groups online, I went to the seminar, spent months attending the support group meetings (2x month), talked in person to upwards of 20-30 people I knew in my life who had gone through one form of the surgery or another, etc.  In the end I decided it wasn't for me.  It wasn't my time.  I didn't want to go through the trauma and risk of surgery when things weren't guaranteed to fix anything.  I was fine being fat.  My husband loved me.  My kids loved me.  I loved me.  And most of all my medications were working at controlling the problems at hand, despite the side effects.

Fast forward to March 2013.  Life hit a road block.  The sleeping trouble I was having hit a major bump.  Although, I don't know if "sleeping trouble" is the right way to put it.  I had NO TROUBLE sleeping.  In fact, I slept all the time.  In FACT, I couldn't stay awake...and that is where the trouble was.  It had been slowly getting worse and worse over the last few years.  Started with just needed more sleep than the average bear.  Then "Don't wake Mama before her 12 hours!" (yes, 12).  Then no driving at night because I'd fall asleep.  Then No driving at night and NEEDED a nap every afternoon.  Etc.  It had progressed to a point where I would just, BAM! Asleep.  Mid conversation, mid driving, mid phone call, mid WWE wrestling match on free beer night, didn't matter.  I feel so bad for my friends and family during this stage.  I promise STILL guys...none of you were boring me!!!  And I thank you ALL for your kindness, understanding, and love when I was going through this stage of life!!!!  I would deny falling asleep...after all, I was still even participating in conversations and knew what they were saying sometimes!  But they promised, I was snoring away.  5 hour energy drinks weren't working, Starbucks wasn't working, nothing.  So I went in to the Doctor and she got me a sleep study done right away.

The sleep study was done in March and it was scary.  The nurse was very kind, but still, someone watching you sleep is awkward, to say the least.  She got me hooked up and let me know that rarely do they do anything with CPAP masks or anything during the study unless someone is REALLY bad off after a good 5-6 hour study without it first so they could collect enough data to support it, usually that would be done at another study if the Doctor feels it's necessary to go on CPAP.  She wished me good night, assured me she wasn't going to be watching me all night ( LOL ) and let me snuggle in for the night.  Or...2 hours.  Because that's when she woke me up.  2 hours later.   She rushed in terrified.  The sleep study showed that I stop breathing more than 50 times an hour.  It also showed that when I fall asleep my Oxygen levels drop to below 60%.  She told me she was too afraid to let me continue without CPAP and put me on it immediately.  That next morning was the most glorious morning of all my life!  I had NEVER felt so refreshed and rejuvenated! (They say that night was the first night I had actually SLEPT in more than about 2 years.  I was never actually falling asleep...just unconscious!)

The next week (they upped the appt to an earlier date than originally scheduled) I went in to talk to the Doctor about my results.  He walked in, picked up my chart and his jaw hit the floor.  He never even got in a "Hello".  The first words that came out of his mouth were "How are you still alive?!"  and he wasn't being funny.  I had never been so terrified in my life.  He asked me my health history and I was told, at 32, that he was very suspect about the fact that I had never had a heart attack and wanted to verify that that was true.  Not "I want to check your heart", but that he didn't believe that I hadn't had a heart attack yet, I must have just not KNOWN I had one.

I had my heart test and I'm free and clear!  No heart attacks,  heart is healthy and good!  But I suck at the multi-tasking job of breathing while I sleep.

This was the moment that stopped time and changed my life forever.

I went in to my PCM and immediately had her put in that referral for Bariatric Surgery (WLS - or Weight Loss Surgery).  My dance card was full.  It was time to clear it off.

By this point I was on:

Oxygen at night for sleep
CPAP
Long acting insulin before each meal (at outrageous amounts)
Short acting insulin in the AM and in the PM (at 80 units each time)
Metformin (a diabetes pill) (a total of 7 500mg pills a day)
Januvia (another diabetes pill) (just one a day)
High blood pressure meds
High Cholesterol meds
Migraine meds

I was having joint and muscle problems, especially in my back and hip region
I had gained almost a total of 80 pounds in 3 years
I was fed up
My husband was TERRIFIED

This is where my journey began.  Way back in March of 2013.  I had made the final and difficult decision that I was, no doubt about it, having WLS.