The beginning of the journey

Hello everyone!!!

I had the Gastric sleeve surgery done at 21 years old. My operation was performed on January 4th, 2012. I was 237 pounds, the highest weight I have ever had,  and after three weeks and three days post-op, I know weigh 215 punds, 22 pounds less. It is currently January 28th, 2012, 7:21 pm and I am trying to figure out how on earth did it occur to me to write a blog. The truth is I have never done this before and the most "blogging" I've ever done has been Facebook, which is not much, so please go easy on me. So, history...

According to my parents, I was always a skinny child, at least until I was three years old. I suffered from chronic asthma, which meant I was in and out of the hospital, and that was on a good day. Otherwise, it was usually inside the hospital for a day or two. As a result of my condition, I was administered various regular dosis of steroids, the treatment at the time - I had no idea how it helped but supposedly it did. My mother had given me every dominican home remedy for asthma in existence, and i mean everything, to give you a preview, I even ate snake meat, but I don't remember any of that. My parents shipped me off to my grandma's in DR when I was three because NY temperature was a bit harsh on my health. My grandma also gave me every home remedy possible but at the same time she was very keen on keeping me extra well fed. She used to say that fat kids were the pretty kids and well she started to get me fat during the year I spent with her. I also stopped having asthma attacks. I was chubby all throughout my childhood. At the age of 12, I reached a weight of 193 pounds and I was put on a diet with a nutritionist. I lost 24 pounds with that nutritionist in 4 months. However, that same year, i got stones in my gallbladder, and after the surgery and my gallbladder was removed, I gained the weight back. I maintained myself for a few years in the 190's and then at 20 yrs old, my GYN told me to take contraceptives to regulate my cycle and I gained 20 pounds in 3 months.

After that it was really hard to loose weight because of my hormonal imbalance and anything made me gain more weight. I ended up at 230 pounds when i decided to do the operation, my BMI was 39.5, and i was a good candidate. I started investigating in October of 2011 whether it was better to have the operation in the States or in DR and It was determined that in DR was more convenient because it was half the money and better attentions.

The day of my operation I weighed 233 punds and the operation lasted 3 hours. I spent 2 days in the hospital under constant anesthesia, so there was no pain. I had a device that pumped anesthesia into my system for the 2 days stay at the hospital. During that time I ate nothing, only drank water the last day, 1 ounce every 15 minutes and that was the beginning of the first stage.