All Righty, Chi-Chi is just Fat

Normally when you are waiting for blood test results, you are hoping for them to be negative, right? How come I was disappointed when the vet called me to say that Chi-Chi does not have a thyroid problem? I guess I was hoping that was the problem so we could just put her on meds and she would lose the excess pounds. Does that make me a bad surrogate mommy??

Crap. Well, now we just have some work ahead of us. We've been testing out the new food. She loved the wet stuff, but it did not love her. She got the runs from it. We won't be using that food. Just as well though because it was difficult setting up the dog food because they were both eating wet and they were both different formulas. Now if I were the one who fed them, this wouldn't be a problem. My 71 year old dad feeds them in the afternoon and I had to label which one was which. I already prep the food for him and put the correct amount in the bowls, but he could still give the dog the wrong food because once the label was off, they looked the same.

She likes the Purina OM (overwight management). I didn't try the wet OM because of the first attempt with another wet food. I went right for the dry. She ate it. Now we'll see how she does with diet food. I am hoping that it makes a differnce. I am also trying to exercise her more. The two have to have an effect, right? Stay tuned.

Insurance Companies Suck

My husband wants to have this surgery too. We went to the information meeting (see post http://fat-chronicles.blogspot.com/2006/11/informational-meeting.html ) together and he got scared. I knew when he saw how well I was doing that he would want to do it too, and that is exactly what happened. Because he is a school teacher, he wanted to wait until the summer to have the surgery.

He knew the drill as far as all of the tests that you have to do before you see the surgeon and so he started doing all of that in April. He made his appointment with the surgeoun for July 5th. After the meeting, the surgeon will give you a surgery date and then they will secure the authorization for the surgery with the insurance company.

After his meeting, my husband was told that he would not be approved by the insurance company because the insurance company added a new stipulation for approvals last week! In order to be approved for surgery you now had to have 6 months of supervised weight loss with a nutritionist & physician. Our insurance company is Horizon Blue Cross/Blue Shield. They had been the easiest of the insurance companies to get the approval for bariatric surgery.

The insurance companies are trying to dissuade people from having the surgery because it costs them too much money. I think the surgery costs around $35,000 and since it has been so successful in weight loss, people are lining up to get it. The more obstacles the insurance companies put in your way, the less likely people will follow through to have the surgery.

He was so disappointed. He was really counting on having the surgery this summer. He is following up with his new PCP, Dr. Fink, who was going to do all of his post-op routine visits. Dr. Fink is going to set him up with a nutritionist. He is also starting a work-out regime at a gym that is affilaited with the hospital. It has lot better hours than the re-hab hospital gym that he was going to. It is like a regular gym and opens at 5:30 and closes at 9:00 pm. Gym memberships for men are pretty limited. At least women have women only gyms, but men pretty much have things like Gold's Gym or Bally's and they are clubs that you dodn't feel comfortable being at when you are overweight.

Anyway, I say screw the insurance companies. Follow their requisites to the letter so that they will have to pay for your surgery. Make them pay!

8 Month Post-Op Update

I saw Dr. Bypass this morning. I am down 75 pounds, which is great. Only 5 pounds lost in the past two months though. The doctor said that this is what I can now expect as far as weight loss goes now because it is slowing down. I need to really make sure that I am eating the right portions and I am increasing my exercise. It is now going to be more work for me.

This is the point that they start to lose their patients. The doctor said that people start getting too comfortable with their eating and have figured out what they can get away with at this point. I do not want to be one of those who wind up packing the pound back on, so I am going to start writing all of my food consumption into a journal.

I always hated keeping a food diary, but I am committed to doing this. Perhaps I can see patterns on paper that I don't notice in real life. I know Weight Watchers and Nutrisystem wanted you to track yuor food intake and I never was able to do it consistently. Okay, I could do it, but I suppose I chose not to do it consistently.

My hair is not falling out as badly as it was two months ago. I guess that is because the weight loss has slowed down too.

I haven't thrown up lately, which is another good thing, so I guess I am doing something right. I did get a little sick last night because I ate some rice. I really wanted the rice and it just seemed to sit in my chest. I stretched out on the bed for a while and it made me feel better.

Chi-Chi update, a.k.a. the Fat Chihuahua

Chi-Chi also went for her check up in June. It was supposed to be May, but I just couldn't get there then. After being on No-Snacks and dividing up her food to two 1/4 cup portions twice a day, I was expecting her to weigh less. I have to say though, that she did not look smaller to me.

When we were in the waiting room, others who were waiting struck up a conversation with me. "What kind of dog is that?" they asked. I knew what they were really asking though. They thought that she couldn't possibly be a chihuahua because she was so big. When people think chihuahua, they think Paris Hilton's Tinkerbell. You know, that anorexic bitch. And her dog is so skinny too....

Okay, first off. My dogs are both real chihuahuas. The "teacup" or "pocket" type dogs are not real. They were bred down to get them that size. It is dangerous to have them that size because they have lots of breathing issues and get hurt very easily. They are often severely injured by falling off of a couch because they are so fragile. They are not recognized by the American Kennel Club as being chihuahuas. My dogs are the real deal. They are both spayed and so that puts extra weight on them.

Okay, enough of my fat rant. So I tell them that she is a fat chihuahua. They laugh and say that they thought she was a chihuahua, but that she was so big they weren't sure. blah, blah, blah. We finally get to see the vet. She weighs Chi-Chi on the cat scale and her weight was 13.6 pounds. My dog has to be the only dog that can go on a diet and gain weight. I was upset. The vet said that they could run the blood work-up on her to see if she has a thyroid issue. She said it was up to me because the blood tests are very costly. I wanted to go ahead and do it because if it is her thyroid, it would just be a matter of putting her on a medication. If her blood tests come back negative, then we will switch her food to a diet food to see if that helps.

The vet sent me home with a giant bag of various brands of diet dog food. Some wet and some dry so that I can see which ones she likes best before buying any. That was nice of her.

Okay, Chi-Chi also has skin irritations. These come and go. I can't pin it down to a particular time of year. It was pretty bad this winter. Then she will scratch and scratch and make it worse. She has very little hair as it is, so I have to keep her nails short and filed down or she will easily tear her skin due to the scratching. I asked if she had seasonal allergies. Since she wasn't sneezing at all, she thought it was more likely that Chi-Chi had an allergic reaction to food. Great. More food issues. She was going to give me a cream to put on her to soothe the itching.

When I went to pay, the cashier was calculating the bill. Chi-Chi also was getting Advantage for flea prevention. Then the vet came by and gave the cashier the bag of food (free samples) along with the lotion. The cashier looked at the lotion and said, "I am not charging you for this. You are already paying so much" and she just tossed it in the bag without adding it in. I thought that was very nice of her. The bill was $650! Thank goodness I have pet insurance.

Seriously. If you do not have pet insurance, you should really consider it. I wasn't sure it was worth it because my regular office visits are $75, and everything they do is extra. Shots etc. The pet insurance gives you like $15 back for an office visit. So I was thinking that I would be paying more in premiums than what I would be getting back. Until I realized that I wasn't paying the premiums for the routine stuff anyway. In the event of something serious, I did not want to make a decision based on what it was going to cost me. My dog has cancer? Okay, start chemotherapy. That isn't something I would be able to afford unless I had the insurance. Thankfully, none of my dogs have had anything catastrophic like that, but Pinky's surgery was expensive. I was able to recoup 2/3 of what I paid for that. Yep, pet insurance is worth the premium.

Pinky Update~All Good

Oops, sorry it has taken me so long to post this. Thanks for all the emails. Pinky's urine analysis came back great! In fact, it was better this time than last time. The vet asked me if she was drinking a lot of water, but I said that I really didn't see her drinking a lot. As instructed by the vet, I add a lot of water to her food. Then I put in in the microwave for about 13 seconds to get the chill off. She drinks all the water in the food and then eats the food up. I think this is her main source of water these days, so I was worried about it, but the vet says it is fine.

Since she is 10 years old, and Chihuahuas are notorious for having bad teeth, I asked when she would start losing hers. The vet always remarked that he was surprised that she still had all of her teeth every time I had brought her in. He looked in her mouth and said that she already started losing them! Geez, I hadn't even noticed that, but sure enough he was correct. He opened her mouth and two of her bottom teeth are gone! I said that I never saw them on the floor or anything. Guess what? She probably ate them! Yuck.

We started using those tooth wipes instead of brushing her teeth and I can see that they aren't as good as the old toothbrush. As much as she hates it, we will start brushing her teeth again. It definitely gets the tarter off better.