Well, I'm back, a few pounds down, I was away for a while, ended up in the hospital for 8 days the day after Christmas, my gallbladder went whacko, and shut down my liver, so no I have a nice 12 inch scar across my belly I've been working out pretty regularly, and hubby bought me a puter yesterday, so not only am I back, but I'm back stylin :-D no more of that silly webtv... even though we are connecting it to keep as a backup... I haven't done any measurments, but I KNOW I'm smaller, because I was able to go into the store this week, and buy jeans, with a button and zipper, not pull on elastics... granted, they're still a size 26, but that's down from a 32 :-D Anyway, now that I have puter, I have contact info in my profile, if anyone would like to get in touch with me... I'm making this my start page, so there's no excuse for me not to pop in every day :-D

Hi PNG, its great to see you again. I hope you come back soon!! I'm glad to hear that you are losing inches and pounds. Great news. Was the surgery an emergency that they had to leave you with such a big scar? I though usually the incision was smaller. Did you ask if they could take some flab with it? I'm only joking, I did when I was having the c-section when I had Drake, I ask the dr if she could do some liposuction on my belly while she was down that way.

Hi PNG! Welcome back! So happy to hear your okay now..that must have been quite a time for you! Looks like your determined and WOOHOO with losing!!! You must be excited!

Jen: The incision was so big because I had stones in my bile duct that were blocking off my liver and they couldn't get the job done with the scope... I lost a total of 10 pounds in the hospital, which I've kept off so far, even though it was from starvation when I lost it originally..lol, out of 8 days, they let me eat one...the day I left. The kitchen really went out of their way to make me a good vegan meal, at least... I left the hospital with a recipe :-D
So, how is that baby doing? I think you had him right before I lost touch in here... or was that someone else?

Jenniffer : :-) Thanks... I'm lovin the fact taht I can actually wear jeans again... I promised myself no more of the elastic waisted weak in the butt seam stretch jeans :-D

ok, off to look in on the rest of these threads... I didn't have mail notification turned on, and we already have a diff board set as home... so I didn't make it in... (BAD Jaime) :-D

PNG
just wanted to say hope you're healing
fast and feeling better. So glad to
see you're back in action.

{{{{{PNG}}}}}} sorry about the gall stones but glad you are back and doing better.

Phat Nubian Goddess (did I get that right?) welcome back. I always remember your moniker....a great one.

Glad you are doing well and recuperating from your surgery.

yep nikolas, that's me :-) you had it right, only I mangled goddess into Gawdess :-) Thanks all... even my doctor is amazed at how soon I bounced up from my surgery, he says I was up and around before most people who have the surgery done with the scope, and I had a major, 4 hour operation... hehe, I'm not as much of a wuss as I thought I was :-)

Hi PNG, yup that was me with the baby, his name is Drake, was born Sept 14, weighed 9lbs 4 oz, now weighs almost 18 lbs. He is a really great little guy. He's been sleeping through the night for about 2 months now, has been eating cereal and veggies for a few weeks, started rolling over at the end of January and now he won't stop!! I rescue him about a 100 times everyday. I could go on and on, he really is the center of my universe.

I had a c-section with Drake and was up and about really fast too. The dr let me go after 3 days even though most stay in for 5. The baby was fine so there was no reason to keep my in. Did your incision heal quickly? I had a bit of drainage for about 3 weeks but otherwise it was fine.

Jen, my incision healed very fast, but I came home with a tube in my stomach, in my bile duct, had it for about 4 weeks, since I had to have work done in there to clear out the stones, so that's the worst looking scar, it's small, but it's kinda raised and bubbly looking. I left the hospital 4 days post-op, but I'm a stubborn one when it comes to pain and healing, taught to get up and go, and ignore the pain, I was on my feet within 12 hours, and walking the halls within 24... the doctor gave me full permission and a recommendation to use my treadmill as soon as I got home, so I've been on it pretty close to daily since... well, we got some errands to run before the baby gets home... so, I'll check in later :-)

Dear PNG:
The scar tissue will dissolve quite a bit
after time. I had ovarian tumor surgery
several years ago, and the tumor was
larger than they expected, so they had
to take the whole ovary. Well, I filled
up with fluid and after I got home, my
stomach burst open and spilled out all
the fluid. I was rushed back to the
hospital, and they had to re-suture
the opening closed. I got an infection
and they had to cut open the wound.
Well, anyway... it took almost 4 months
for the opening to heal closed and the
resulting scar was so awful and bumpy
and red and across my whole stomach
and very very wide. It has taken
several years to reduce in size and not
look so awful and red anymore. But
my whole tummy near the scar is still
numb...the feeling did not return.
Like they say...time heals all wounds.

OMG Susan... I guess that was before they started inserting drainage tubes to keep the fluid from building up... poor thing, and I thought I had it bad because I had two tubes in my belly! The drain tube came out before I came home, and the t-tube that was in my bile duct is the one that I had for so long, and that scarred real bad... my belly is numb, on the right side, from my incision down past my navel, and all around the numb area it's super sensitive... Johnny gets mad at me when I call it my Frankenstien belly...hehe