Confusion

The title of this post refers to both Little T and me. On the way home from school yesterday, I was saying to T that our house would look a little different now because we'd taken down the tree :(, the ornaments and so on and put all the Christmas decorations away until next year. He didn't answer so I wasn't sure what he made of it until he came into the house and stopped cold.

He looked all around the house, looked at me in bewilderment, and then looked all around again.

"Yes, we put all the Christmas things away until next year," I explained again.

T gave me a look that let me know exactly what he thought of that. It should be Christmas all year! It took him a few minutes to settle down and take off his coat and hat.

Kennan showed up shortly afterwards. He wanted to see T before Linda came to get him for the weekend. We played together for about a half hour and then T signed he was hungry. As I was making him macaroni and cheese, Linda showed up...early.

"Tomas, go open the door for Mommy?" Kennan asked and Tomas said very clearly, "Uh-UH!" So I went to the door.

She'd brought her neighbor/boyfriend James and his daughter Dorothy but had left them to wait in the car. She seemed to be in a hurry but resigned herself to waiting until after T was done eating.

After he was done eating, he wanted to play again and didn't want to have anything to do with leaving with Linda. We were coaxing him along and I felt really bad for him. I guess everyone just assumed they could trade him back and forth without any explanation at all.

"You need to go with Mommy now," Kennan was saying, and Tomas gave him a wounded look and began to cry. "Uh-uh!" he kept saying. Even after they got him to put his hat and coat on, he wouldn't leave. He locked our door instead.

Finally he agreed to go if Kennan walked him to the car. This all took almost a half hour.

After they were gone, we suggested that Kennan try explaining to Tomas what was going on...that he was going to live with Daddy but that Mommy wanted to see him too and two times a month he'd be going to stay overnight at Mommy's. I think he'd understand all that. He might not like it but I think it would clear up T's confusion.

As for me, well, the more I learn about weight loss surgery the more confused I'm becoming about which is the most appropriate for me. I've almost entirely ruled out the lapband because I wouldn't lose very much and it wouldn't put my diabetes into remission.

The duodenal switch scared me at first because it involves removing part of the stomach and the gall bladder, resectioning the intestines in a couple of places and you lose weight by malabsorption of food which means for the rest of your life you need all kinds of vitamins and supplements. On the other hand, you can lose almost 100% of your excess weight and you're sure to go into remission with diabetes.
The doctor I consulted with thought that would be too aggressive a procedure for me and I willingly agreed until I began learning more about the bypass.

With the bypass, the doctor sections off most of your stomach except for a little pouch about the size of an egg. The doctor has to make a stoma for the pouch, which empties food directly into the small intestine. With the switch, the doctor makes a new smaller whole stomach that can hold 6-8 oz at a time. With the bypass, you can get "dumping", a very unpleasant situation sugar gets into the intestines and makes you very sick, nauseous, heart racing and other unpleasantries. That doesn't happen with the switch.

With the bypass you have to stop drinking liquids a half hour before or after you eat a meal. That doesn't happen with the switch.

With the bypass, you can't take NSAIDs like aspirin or motrin (I take a lot of that for my arthritis). With the switch you can.

With the bypass, if you don't chew your food to a mush consistency, it can get stuck somewhere and you have to drink meat tenderizer and water to flush (or vomit) it out. That doesn't happen with the switch.

I am so confused and have so many things to think about now. On the Obesity Help website, many of the people having the switch post about the advantages of their surgery over the bypass.

At the support meeting we went to earlier this month, TB went to a duodenal switch subgroup and was telling them that I was trying to decide between a lapband and the bypass and several asked him, "Why not the switch? It's better."

It seems the more I learn, the more confused I become. :P