03/01/11: Yikes

What a crazy weekend!

Friday afternoon...I knew I was in trouble.  NOTHING went down on Friday.  Water was questionable.  By the time I realized I was in trouble (about 4pm) it was too late to do anything about it.  I vowed to myself to work hard on water over the weekend and prayed that "Lady" would relax.

Saturday was no better.  We actually went to Dallas this weekend for our niece's baptism.  Or rather, Fort Worth.  We ran around the Dallas/FW metroplex on Saturday with a bit of time spent in Grapevine's downtown area as well as a stop at Chefpoint Cafe for lunch.  Saturday night was dinner at BIL-SIL's house as all the rest of the out-of-towner's (everyone else) arrived Sat evening.

So, for starters, breakfast at BIL-SIL's house - scrambled eggs and bacon.  No go.

We then got dressed and ready and by the time we were leaving, it was lunch time - Chefpoint Cafe.  This place is a place my hubby and I saw on Diner's Drive-in's and Dives a couple years ago.  My hubby called his brother to see if he'd ever heard of it and the response was "yeah, it's just around the corner from me".  So what is it?  It's a guy that owns a gas station and has a four star menu/cafe inside.  The owner is actually a Nigerian immigrant and when he got to the US, he asked for a loan to start an upscale restaurant.  He was told no because "he didn't have any restaurant experience" but they would be happy to give him the funds to start up a gas station.  So he did.  And as part of his "convenience store" there's this upscale cafe with an amazing menu.

Yeah, I couldn't eat any of it.  I tried a few bites of my hubby's crab cakes and it all came back up.

I kept on the fluids but...yeah, not much went down.  For every 3oz's I drank, 2oz's would come back up.

Dinner was more of the same.  My SIL made a homemade goat cheese lasagna which was fantastic.  It came back up, too.

In an effort to get something in, Saturday night I had a little thing of Activia Light.  I so hate light/fake foods but I wanted/needed something and thought  yogurt had the best chance of anything in getting through.  I will never eat that stuff again - at least not the Light.  It was so incredibly fake!  Anywho, I'm not sure how much went down as I was choking on it in my sleep all night Saturday night.

Fun times!

Sunday I didn't even try breakfast.  I did have a few bites of fajitas at the party following our niece's baptism.  Yep - back up.  Once on the road and headed for home, we stopped at Collins Street Bakery and I got a bowl of soup.  I was able to get that down.

So, Monday morning, alarm goes off.  I know that the place where I had my surgery doesn't really open until 8 for fills but that they do open at 6 for surgery.  So at 7:30, I called for an appt.  I said I have not been able to eat for four days and I needed an unfill.  I was basically told, just whenever you get here we'll squeeze you in.  So I showered and got ready and we headed out.

I got there at 9 and was finally seen at 11.  I'm so very glad they could get me in.

I actually wanted to go back to this place in spite of what I think of my "surgeon" because I wanted the fluoroscopy - which is standard with every fill.  I knew I wouldn't be seeing my surgeon and I like 2 of the RNP's there a lot.

Anywho, they did the initial image and sure enough - completely closed off.  I mean, not even a pinprick hole.  Nothing was going through.  The RNP I saw yesterday was the one I did my "unweightloss" program with and it was great to see her - haven't seen her in nearly a year.  She said "let's start with 1cc and see where we need to go from there".  I was actually going to ask for 1cc to be removed - somehow, it felt like it was "that big" of a problem.

So she took the 1cc out and they took another picture.  Everything was flowing fine in that image and she proclaimed "now that should be perfect restriction".  This RNP is banded herself - so she probably knows such things firsthand!

I am telling myself that for yesterday and today I can eat whatever the hell I want and as much as I want of it - not forcing anything in.  But if I want a 1/4 cup of almonds instead of 1tbsp, fine, eat em.  Tomorrow I put the reigns back on.  It was interesting watching myself yesterday and even today, so far - I am still making great choices even though I've given myself license to do whatever the hell I want.

Anywho, the whole thing has me thinking.  This crazy headache, this allergic reaction, all of it - is it from being too tight for too long?

Here's how it all played out.

Dec 4th - I got a fill.  I was about two weeks out from having the D&C and was able to eat a horse - and I was.  So I got a fill of 0.5cc's which put me at a whopping 4.7cc's in a 10cc band (sarcasm).

Month of December - I was fine.  I couldn't eat salad but other than that, I could eat normal, reasonable amounts.  Raw veggies were too hard for the effort but cooked veggies were fine...but other than a few nuances like that, no real restrictions - save the salad which just would not go through.  Even bread, if eaten slowly and chewed well, would still go through.

Month of January - hormones from hell kicked in.  I started to notice that I was reversing.  Before, I was hungriest in the evening and not hungry at all for breakfast time.  In January, that flip-flopped.  Before, I was tightest around (.) time and loosest around ovulation.  In January, that flip-flopped.  I also noticed my serving sizes dropped but I still felt like I was eating plenty.  January, around about the time that serving sizes dropped, is also when the headache started.

(See where I'm going with this yet?)

Now, in January, one thing to point out - leading up to ovulation time - very very tight.  Very restricted, very small servings, very easily wound up regurgitating everything.  For four to five days prior to ovulation - dinner was almost impossible to eat - most all of it came back up - but the rest of the meals were fine.  Then I ovulated and the hormones flopped from estrogen dominant to progesterone dominant.  The band relaxed and I was almost able to eat a horse.  I actually went out to dinner with hubby one night and, upon discovering I could eat it all, tested it even further to learn I could swallow a potato chunk with just one chew - and it went through.  At that point, I scheduled myself a fill appt.

Ok, so now, lets look at February.  At that time that I started my (.), well, the band tightened up.  But not drastically so, initially.  But Lady stayed closed for awhile.  The tighter Lady got...the worse the headache got...the worse my "allergic reaction" got.  It all culminated with this weekend - when I was unable to get anything in.  Problem is - I ovulated middle of last week.  Which means that, if I was replicating last month, I should be wide open by now, the headache should be gone by now - and the allergic reaction, something that has always ebbed and flowed since it started, should be ebbing right now.

And none of it was ebbing/relaxing.  It was all just getting worse!

So, unfill it is.  I'll be curious to see if the allergic reaction calms down now or if the headaches lessen.

Here's why I think they might.

If I had a pinprick hole for food/fluids to go through - and not much was going through, well, that's a headache right there.  Not enough nutrients equals not feeling good - which usually starts with a headache, eh?

Let's take that one further.  If all food could do was literally sit in the stoma, well, food isn't meant to sit there.  It is meant to move through - albeit slowly, it is meant to move.  And in my case, it was sitting there for, sometimes, hours before letting me know it needed to come back up.

I will just be curious to see.

Based on 24 hours of freedom being returned, I can say, I feel 150% better than this time yesterday - and there is still more room for improvement.  The headache is not gone but it is less than it has been for awhile.

So, I think I was too tight for too long.  I was able to eat and so I wasn't stressing it.  But I wasn't able to eat enough.

Truth is, it probably is partially the band being too tight - and also partially the incredibly whacky hormones.  To me, the hormones caused this whole thing.  What they took out yesterday undoes the fill from December 4th as well as the rest of the fill from June.  My fill level today is what it was six weeks after surgery.  That's insane.

They scheduled me to come back in a month so that we can revisit fills if needed without me struggling to get an appt in a month if I find I'm then starving.  Somehow, I doubt I will be.  And even if I am - my mindset now is that I'll use exercise to "fill me up" - just like I did over the summer.  I never ever ever want to repeat "letting the band do all the work".  I want absolutely no foods on my do not eat list.  I want to rely on myself to know that I don't need to eat carbs with dinner because our smoothie for breakfast already has plenty.  I did this once, the whole willpower thing - and given my journey with the band so far - that's been my favorite era.  The era when my band was a subtle reminder - but it didn't rule me.

In other news, my Derm called yesterday and the biopsies are showing an allergic reaction.  Now the question is what is causing it.  I pray it's not the band.  I really don't want to lose it.  I really don't want surgery again.  I really just want to move forward with my life and get this incision dealt with!  I am really really hoping that this unfill can help this whole situation!  If this issue is where food sits - and not materials - then an unfill should help!  From what I know and research I've done, it's improbable that it's materials - so I'm praying that the unfill helps!

Sheesh.  1 whole cc...my mind just can't wrap around that.  It'd be one thing if I recently got a fill of 1cc...but 0.5 was from December (three months ago) and the other 0.5 was from June (nine months ago).  How finicky our bodies can be!