About 5 years ago I lost 80 lbs. Keeping it off has been a brutal daily struggle with hunger. Every minute of every day is a battle with hunger and food. I have noticed that every morning as I am awakening, I am dreaming about, and semi-thinking about food, and it just gets worse as the day moves onward.
I have an appointment with my doctor on Thursday. I am going to ask him about this.
To those who will post about their magic diet or combination of food, I just tell you now that:
1) I have already tried it.
2) People who are normally thin aren't on magic combinations of food or weird diets.
First I do need to disclose my surgery was to correct a previous botched surgery to correct emergency surgery needed because my duodenal ulcer perforated. At the time of the first surgery I weighed 105 lbs.
The second surgery (June ‘06) was done to correct the first surgery. They performed a rouen-Y (commonly known as bariatric surgery), vagotomy where they only cut it halfway as well as tightening of the esophagus directly above where it feeds into the stomach. When I went into surgery this time I weighed 106 lbs.
Your life will consist of thinking about food almost continuously because in order to get some of the nutrients your body needs, you'll need to eat 6 small meals a day. A vagotomy isn't going to help you with your feelings of hunger and thoughts about food.
Most gastro patients who go in for weight loss have more stomach removed than I did. I only had 25% removed instead of the 2/3rd’s they originally anticipated.
I realize I started out with my weight being proportionate to my height so a couple of the symptoms I've experienced won't be one’s you can expect to experience.
You will however have to take more vitamins than normal people because your body won't be able to digest and use
nutrients found in foods. I give myself weekly injections of B-12. After every meal I'm supposed to lay down for a minimum time frame of 15 minutes in order to help relieve the pressure food puts on my digestive tract.
From what was explained to me, the vagus nerve is part of the internal organs which help with acid reflux. They cut mine halfway because of the horrendous amounts of acid being released into my stomach which was causing the acids to literally eat away at my stomach. The acid reflux also caused a condition known as Barrett's esophagus. Mine was level 3 which is pre-cancerous.
I am in no way saying your experience will parallel mine, I am simply relating what has been my experience.
I no longer have acid indigestion.
I have constant nausea and phenegran is my newest best friend and has been ever since I had the surgery in June, 2006.
Even though I no longer have acid indigestion I must take 2 prescription drugs which deal specifically with the production of acid.
Be prepared for extreme flatulence pain.
Be prepared for a condition called dumping where if you eat even just a little too much you'll have fun with a condition called dumping. This simply means that food will run right through you and you'd better be pretty close to a toilet.
The cutting of the vagus nerve won't keep you from your struggle with hunger. With all of the side effects which have for all intents and purposes left me homebound, I still think about food. If anything it's worse than it was before simply because I now have to watch every morsel I eat. Before I only thought about food when it was really time to eat.
See, because they performed this operation on a normal weighted person I have to struggle to keep weight on. I've had to be hospitalized and fed by tube as well as still eating. To the outside world I can look as if I'm anorexic which is the furthest thing from the truth. Very often I have to quit eating my meal even though my mouth is still enjoying the taste and texture of the food. If I don't quit though I'll pay for it dearly.
Before you take such a drastic measure please consult with at least two more doctors to see what their thoughts are on doing a complete vagotomy. It's not reversible.
I’m waiting to hear more about this.
I read about it several years ago.