Wanting to Introduce myself....

[Guest guest]

Just wanted to say a huge howdy to all.. I found out about this list

thru JR Rushton.

I am Mags and my surgery was a little over a year ago... on August

21, 2002. As of August 21, 2003, I have dropped 176 lbs.

I know.. some foreshadowing is in order with me. But for the few who

have heard my story, please bear with me.

August 21, 2002, I went in for what I thought was going to be a Lap

RNY with my surgeon, Dr Noel out of University of Penn. I

went in at 5'6 and 480 lbs. I would wake up in recovery hearing the

three words that no one who goes in for Lap Surgery wants to

hear: " Major Open Surgery " coming from a recovery nurse.

I was ok with the Open incision. I just wanted to know and understand

why I went this way, and it took me a full day to get the exact

reason for this. I was all out of position in the abdominal area, and

there was no knowledge of this prior to my surgery. (All of my tests

I took showed everything in order.)

At three weeks post, I developed a wound infection. I would battle

this for 5 months.

As of this current time, I am battling gallstones, and am looking at

a removal as of September 25th, but with a switch in my insurance

from state assistance to Aetna, I don't know if this will hold up. I

will be giving a call to my surgeon's assistant and talking with her

about it, because I know I need the removal, but can't seem to get

the cooperation from Aetna on getting my coverage with my mother's

policy, because of being disabled and my mother being my supporter.

I think the nicest change since my surgery has been the fact that I

have remained infection free for 7 months now. Before my surgery, I

was infected every 6 to 8 weeks with celulitis in the legs, because I

have something known as Lower Extremity Venous Stasis Disease, and

this is what makes me disabled to this day. (I can't get the handle

on the pain in the legs still, plus if I stand just a little too

long, or walk a little too much, the legs turn severe purple, and

this is a year after WLS, because this condition is caused by being

Morbidly Obese.)

I do have a website of my own thru Geocities in which I started after

I had my consult and was waiting for insurance approval. I will post

it at the end.

Some of you who belong to Spotlight Health may also know me, as I

post and chat on there as Disneyfreak. (Among other names. LOL)

I think this is long enough for now, so I will stop. Again.. my

website is below.

Mags

Website: http://www.geocities.com/mags021574/