I am still not sure exactly what Gastric Bypass does other than basically make your stomach smaller. I am not sure what gets reattached to what, and where the rest of the stomach goes that they cut up... I do not know any of it. But I do know that I now have the stomach of an infant child and cannot eat much more than a few bites of anything right now, 35 days later.
So how did I get from a place a few years ago where I swore I would never have any surgery, to last month where I was rolled into the operating room with nothing on but a smock and some silly red socks? Well, I will tell you how it happened...
In July of 2009 I had an accident at work and hurt my right knee. I went directly to the hospital where they took X-Rays and determined that it was not broken, so I was referred to another doctor. That doctor then told me it was probably sprained and that all I needed was some physical therapy. So I did around a month and a half of PT and told the doctor that it really was not helping and that the knee still felt like crap. So then he ordered up an MRI for me, which was at around the 2 month mark after the injury had originally occurred. So I went for the MRI and took the results with me to the local orthopedic surgeon that worker's comp told me to go to.
My doctor's name was, and still is, Scott Powell. When I got there for my first appointment I found it weird to see so much Rock Memorabilia all over the walls of his office. There were photos of Jimi Hendrix, The Eagles, The Doors and many others. I thought it was pretty cool, but then I thought that maybe my doctor may still hitting the hash pipe, and it worried me. I was going to have to really check this guy out online and see what others had to say about him. So I sat down and waited til they called my name and then went in to meet with the good doctor. At the meeting he looked at my MRI results and put them on the wall and pointed to stuff in my knee and told me the bad news, that I had a torn ACL and that it was going to require surgery. I was really devastated to hear this. I had never had surgery before, and was deathly afraid of it. The doctor made another appointment to see me again to discuss my future plans, after I could digest his diagnosis of surgery.
When I got home I could not forget all those rock portraits in his office, so I googled his name to see if there were any malpractice suits. There weren't any that I could find. But my search brought back some other news. Dr. Scott Powell, orthopedic surgeon and team physician of the US Women's National Soccer Team, was also Scott Powell, AKA Santini, founding member of the band Sha Na Na. Surely someone was playing a joke on me, but this was no joke. Apparently Santini quit Sha Na Na in 1981 and went to medical school at Columbia to become an orthopedic surgeon. Now here he was reading my MRI's. Just great.
So I took the time to think about more of what he told me, about how if I didn't have the surgery I would not be able to go back to work, and I realized this was something that was going to have to be done. So I went back to my next appointment to tell him let's do it. Only at this appointment, we discussed how he would feel more comfortable if I weighed less for the surgery, so that afterwards I wasn't putting all that weight back on the knee. I also asked him if I was at a higher risk for the surgery due to my weight and he said yes. After hearing that, I was willing to go along with anything that would have delayed me having to go under the knife. So Dr. Powell told me that he was going to request weight loss surgery through worker's comp. And this is where my life became miserable....
Workers Comp denied his request for my weight loss surgery. For the next two years I had to go to meeting after meeting, doctor after doctor, for second opinions and the such. I had appointments with doctors that had to be made 3-4 months in advance. It was absolutely ridiculous. BUT... FINALLY... 2 years later, workers comp agreed to pay or the bariatric surgery and now there was no turning back for me.
I got word that workers comp would approve the weight loss surgery and my claim adjuster called me and told me that I could find a surgeon on my own if they accepted workers comp as payment. Lucky for me, I had a friend that had put me in touch with her friend, who happened to work for the best bariatric surgeons in Los Angeles, at the Khalili Center. It was almost some kind of divine intervention. So I called and asked her if they accepted workers comp and she said yes, so I went in for a consultation.
Now even though I was going in for the consultation and everything was approved, somewhere in the back of my head none of this was real. It wasn't real because never in a million years would I have thought that I could or would actually go through with the surgery. It just wasn't something that I could ever get my head around, or even envision happening. Somewhere I thought either my knee would magically heal on it's own, maybe I'd win the lottery, or somehow this would all just go away. But it didn't, of course, and the consultation turned into me going for blood work, then heart tests, then stress tests, then all kinds of other tests on my organs and chest. All of a sudden it started to get real. It got so real, that we even had a date for my surgery set now.
It was to be Monday, November 7th at 7am. I told my family in NY at the time and a few very close friends, but that was it. My mom made plans to come out to LA for a week and so did my best friend, who also lives in NY, Marina. I got the directions from my surgeon that I could not eat anything solid for 2 days before the surgery, and that it was only to be clear liquids. With this in mind I decided that I would throw a party at my house called The Last Supper. If I was not going to be able to eat normally again, I figured I may as well go out on top with some of my favorite foods and friends. So it was planned for the Friday night before my surgery. According to plan I would have to stop eating at midnight that night. No problem. So I invited some friends in LA and whoever wanted to come by, I would make sure I had enough food for.
I think it was Thursday before the scheduled surgery, when I received a call from my doctor's office. They were calling with bad news. My surgery on Monday had to be rescheduled for later in the week due to an emergency. I was really mad. Not only had I been psyching myself up for this for a couple of months now, but 3 people were coming to visit and planned their trips around this specific date. What the F were they doing rescheduling me and why! So the earliest they would be able to reschedule would be 3 days later on Thursday at Noon. I had to call my mom and Marina and let them know that the surgery got switched and they had to change their flights and hotel room reservations etc.
The Last Supper on Friday night went off great. I had Italian Bread, marinated mushroooms, fresh Mozzarella flown in from Brooklyn, and i cooked a great sauce with sausage and around 100 meatballs. The pot was overflowing. I had a bigger turnout than I thought I would and I was really happy to see everyone. Many people I had not seen in some time. We should all do that again sometime, as we all said that night! So The Last Supper was done, only now it was no longer the Last Supper. I had 4 more days to eat. Great!
Fast forward to Tuesday I had my last official solid food meal at the Outback Steakhouse. Hey, it was closeby and where else could you get a steak at 11 in the morning? I ordered a Caesar salad with it and a nice soup. An hour later I was done and that was it. The countdown began.
My mom arrived Tuesday night and then Marina arrived on Wednesday night. I thought the last night before the surgery I wouldn't be able to sleep, but at some point in the morning I finally got some shuteye. When I woke up it seemed like everything was going in fast motion. I showered, grabbed the bag that I packed, and my mom was there to drive us all to Cedar Sinai. I tried not to think about what was going on and about to happen, because I knew if i did I may turn around and disappear. I just kind of zoned out. Especially when we got to the hospital. I knew this was it, and knew I was shaking on the inside, scared to death. I could only remember how much I had read about the mortality rates from this kind of surgery and remember seeing somewhere that 1 in 100 patients died during or after this surgery. When we were finally checked in and got to the floor where I had to wait to be admitted, it all started getting too real. I could not sit in the chair in the waiting room and wait to be called. I had to walk around the floor and take my mind off of things. Finally after around 20-30 minutes they called my name and it was time to go.
I walked into the admitting room and they gave me a gown and some silly red socks that had traction on the bottom so you didn't slip on the floors in the hospital. They told me to take everything off and to just have on the gown and the socks. When I was ready the nurse came back and took my vitals. She then inserted an IV into my left forearm. This was getting more real. After that she attached some stuff to my chest. When everything was done she brought my mom, her boyfriend bob, and Marina back in to see me. They were there when my anesthesiologist came in to talk to me. I forget her name, but she was an off the boat Italian woman. I thought what a coincidence, and my mother of course thought this was some kind of sign from God. She explained to me that when I wake up I may have a tube still in my mouth and to work with her and not freak out. I thought she was crazy and told her that if and when I wake up, if there is something on my mouth and down my throat, even if I remembered this conversation then, that there was probably no chance I wouldn't freak out. That said, she went on her way and now the countdown was on til surgery.
Next thing I know I hear my doctors voice waking me up. I didn't feel any tube in my mouth or throat and I was just super excited, even in pain, to be alive. I had made it and it was all over. The weird thing was having to help slide myself off the table and into the bed though right after the surgery, being half out of it. But after that I got wheeled to the recovery room and just couldn't help but think I was alive and my worst fear didn't come true. I was in recovery for around 5 minutes, really feeling out of it, when the nurse came and said I had 2 visitors. I thought she meant my mom and Marina. But 2 great friends of mine, Modes and Rhonda actually were there to see me. I was so out of it and felt bad that they came all the way there and I had just got out of surgery. They only stayed a few minutes, but that meant a lot.
Please take into consideration that I didn't proof read this, so I really don't know if it makes any kind of sense. I just started writing it on a whim tonight and just kept going. I am sure it is rambling and quite boring, so my apologies.
Over the past month or so I has been asked many times about the facebook posts and about my surgery and about what was going on with me and work, and it just got to where I didn't want to talk about much of it very often. I figured I would write something about it one day, and tonight I guess that happened.
If you know someone that is considering having this surgery, and doesn't know if they should or not, or has some questions about it...feel free to send them my way. This is probably the best thing I have ever done for myself besides quitting smoking.
Now guess who has a knee surgery to look forward to next? UGH!
THANKS for sharing Keith! I loved your story! I'm just about to schedule surgery and your story definitely helped me!
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