Many of you might recognize me from my speaking and writing on
the business of outpatient surgery. After serving as the assistant direc-
tor of surgery at a 12-room Level 2 trauma center operating room, I
launched a surgery center consulting firm in the greater Atlanta area,
helping surgeons develop and manage surgery centers for the last 21
years.
But I've been trapped in an unhealthy body that's made me unhappy
because it's keeping me from doing the things I love, like gardening,
going on medical mission trips and just being around people. I want to
shed the pounds and the stigma of the over-sized. I want to feel good
and I want to feel good about me. I want to rid my body of Type 2 dia-
betes, hypertension, fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis. I want to
smile when nobody's watching.
One egg drop soup, please
I'm writing this 4 days after my 2-hour robotic sleeve gastrectomy at
Northside Hospital in Atlanta, Ga. After cutting around the edges of
my stomach, the surgeon left me with a sleeve or a tubular pouch that
resembles, if you'll pardon the food reference, a banana. It doesn't
hold much, as I would soon find out the hard way.
The surgery went great. I was walking that same day and was dis-
charged after one overnight in the hospital, where I received the finest
of nursing care.
The area around my 5 small laparoscopic incisions is a little sore
and a little swollen, but nothing my script for a week's worth of 5mg
oxycodone can't handle.
Yesterday was not a good day. It wasn't pain from the incision,
though. I overdid it with the fluid intake. We instinctively gulp when
we drink, but you must learn to sip when you get your sleeve, nice
and slow, less than an ounce every few minutes. Overdo it, as I did,
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