Before my surgery, we had braced for the worst. We were prepared for me to be nauseous on and off for a few months and to have a major recovery. Now I sit here 2 weeks and one day post surgery, and we’re wondering how I’m doing so incredibly well. I’m heeding all the advice I’d read… Eat slow, chew everything to mush, don’t drink while eating, watch your sugars, etc.

To date, (other than my hydrocodone nausea day), I haven’t had nausea. People mentioned “dumping”…I somehow have also avoided that. I’m still being really careful, but somehow I feel just fine. My energy and strength is regaining everyday. I do take a nap everyday right now and have to sit down and just chill a lot more. But I’m up to doing laundry, running some errands, etc.

After all the fear and anxiety going into the surgery, it’s nice to be 2 weeks out and quickly healing. Just need to remember to take it easy and focus on eating.

When we mentioned my surgery to friends and coworkers, people are just shocked about this surgery. I got responses like: “How will you eat?”, “Can you live without a stomach?”, “You can’t afford to lose that much weight.”,”Will you have to be on a feeding tube forever?”, and my favorite “You just blew my mind!”

With so much unknown before this surgery, I’d like to mention you just start eating slow, small portions very frequently. Actually the diet they recommend is similar to healthy diet/life recommendations: eat 5-6 small meals that are healthy.

The reality is, not too crazy. You have your lifeline post surgery, your “j-tube”. In medical speak, it’s a tube feeding your ‘formula’ straight to your jujenum (think start of your small intestines). If you have trouble eating all your calorie needs for the day, no big deal. Just pop open a can and it keeps you fully nourished. But no, it’s not long term. You just wean yourself off of it over time, regularly monitoring your weight. As you get stronger and slowly eat more calories, you reduce how much you put in your feeding tube.

I think my biggest challenge going into this is my high metabolism and low weight. I was only able to gain 6-7 lbs going into this and I lost 5 in the hospital. I’ve never been overweight and have always maintained a 5 lb range with marathon running and my diet. The dietitians assumed I need 1500 calories/day, but I know I usually consume more like 2000 calories/day. So far, I’ve been able to hold my weight with the 1500 calories through the feeding tube and 500-1300 calories orally. And we’ll see if I do good enough to run the Houston half marathon in January since I did register for it already! (I’ll call that my optimism.)

So I’ll keep you posted how it goes. Not too bad so far. Am tired again, so will sign off with another Goodnight!