The MakeMeThinner Support Forum

[dlr2424]

It's not some trivial matter of how I'll look in the wedding dress I'll be wearing in a little less than 4 months... it's about LIFE, and about improving the quality and duration of it.

This losing weight stuff in a very food-oriented society is not easy but together we will get there. Take Shape For Life is the key – we are doing this for LIFE not for a month or for just one special photography session or for the wedding day but for LIFE and Medifast makes it possible to do just that.

Nancy....Thank You for writing that post.....You are SO RIGHT....THIS IS FOR LIFE
and thank God for TSFL..that we have the support to travel this journey together.....
Donna...dlr2424

[raederle]

Speaking of life, do you have news on Spidey, Nancy? Cuz he's missing from my life and I'm the worse for it! Hope he's okay... I think of him and miss him every time I come here (and that's a lot... ).

[Nancy]

Raederle ~

Yup, of course I know about Gerald. Just chatted w/ him cyberly this week.

He was very ill – he could have died had he not gotten to the hospital when he did. The wound is healing but because of its nature, he is on a vacuum pump to suck out the skanky stuff and he wears the vac in a sling as a traveling buddy when he walks about his manse. Imagine carrying an Orek about all day! I wonder if he has named his vacuum like Tom Hanks named the soccer ball ‘Wilson’ in The Castaway.

The weight of Hoover, the Little Sucker created some problems in his neck and back – perhaps a pinched nerve; however he did not KNOW it was a pinched nerve. Since he experienced numbness in that part of his bod, he thought perhaps he was experiencing a stroke! Off to the hospital in an escorted white vehicle with a whirligig on the top and flashers front and back…he came home after tests indicated he was just pinched, not stroked.

He is recovering, busy as can be – imagine being gone from his computer and business for such a long time! He is on a modified MF meal plan as he needs some extra protein as he heals from the multiple surgeries. His weight is going south and as soon as he is well, he and family are headed south, too – to ST. Croix!

Please continue to pray for GeeGee’s recovery and think Thinny Thoughts of our dancin’ friend in red tights!

[raederle]

Thank you for the update! I'm so glad he's healing well! Yikes-- I sure can't imagine carrying around a Hoover. Poor guy-- after losing 100 pounds he "gains" it all back temporarily in the form of a sludge sucker! At least that weight will detach itself with a lot less effort when it's done its job for Spidey!

Broadcasting thinny and healing and happy thoughts to Spidey... Come in Spidey...

[Mrsshrinkinglady]

Gerald,
I am thinking of you and keeping you in my prayers.
You have overcome so much and kicked adversity's behind all over the place! I know you will beat this as well!
Keep strong my friend and know that you are thought of often.
Mary

[LongWay2go]

Hello everyone and a special hello to Raederle because Nancy forwarded me your get well card a month ago and I never thanked you for it! I'm so sorry!

I am doing well and struggling to just maintain right now while I heal. The doctors insist I eat a high carb / calorie / protein diet because it helps the healing process - and that process is going very well! Although I am still on the vac (the little sucker!) it won't be much longer and I am very impatient to get back to a "normal" life and back out in public. Since there has been some interest in my lil vac's name, I have thoughtfully decided to call him "Vic the Vac". Well, that's not what I call him, but the rest of you can! I usually call him something a little more explicit, especially when I stand up to go somewhere, forget he's attached and get painfully jerked back to his side!

I don't know how much longer I will be toting Vic about. Originally the visiting nurse thought it wouldn't be a month but that came and went. My NEW surgeon (the original one disowned me!) says it is working so well that he wants me to stay on it until the very end instead of switching to a normal "wet to dry" dressing. So Vic is with me for a while longer. Although I despise him and his constant "farts" (that people blame on me!) I do know he is doing his job and doing it very well.

==HEALTH ALERT==

I sent out the following email to everyone in my address book on Wednesday:

They just did a Health Alert segment on Good Morning America about a flesh eating bacteria spreading across the US. This is important folks! They said 30% of the people who get it DIE. A little girl in NY died from it this week.

You know that is what I had and I nearly did die. The symptoms are fever, possible chills, pain that does not respond to pain killers, possible redness of the skin. Hello? Exactly my symptoms!

Please tell everyone you know about this and ask them to tell everyone they know. This is not a hoax or urban legend. This is what I had and am still recovering from. Please pass along the symptoms and urge everyone to seek emergency treatment immediately if they suffer these symptoms. The surgeon in the ER told me that if I had waited another day to come in I might not have lived - and I nearly didn't as it was. I waited 4 days before I went in, thinking I had a flu bug and possibly a skin infection. This is nothing to play around with or take your chances. This is real and life-threatening. Please pass this information along to everyone you know and feel free to use my name and email if anyone is skeptical. You know me - I'm real - and it happened to me!!! I'm still carrying around a wound vac and a hole in my body to prove it.

==Back to now==

As a response to that email I was sent a link to the National Necrotizing Fasciitis Foundation's website. They have tons of information there including symptoms to watch for and the conditions under which you can get this disease. You will find their website at: http://www.nnff.org/nnff_what.htm

This page is "safe" to view but be warned, there are stories there from people who have had this and some of the photos are VERY graphic and disturbing. Nevertheless, if you have the stomach to view them and read the stories you will have a very good understanding of what I have endured.

My original surgery was so urgent that it was done in the ER with a local anesthetic because the surgeon did not feel I would "make it" if I had to wait for traditional surgery. So he shot my belly full of novacain or whatever they use and did the initial surgery right there with me awake, watching and even helping hold back the skin while he cut away inside me. It was not fun nor pretty and when it was over he commented that I must have one very high tolerance for pain because he expected me to be screaming the entire time and I never made a peep.

The original "hole" was as big as a softball. No, not the kind of softball you play with a bat but the kind of soft ball you may have used in elementary school when you played dodge ball. Now it is smaller than a deck of cards and won't be much longer before it is gone, gone, gone!

So given all that and the tremendous workload I have in owning a software company, I hope you'll all forgive me for my absence and understand that it may be a while before I can begin regular posting again.

In the meantime, I want to welcome all the newbies and thank everyone for your overwhelming support and love one more time! I'll be back before you know it!

~Gerald aka Spidey

[raederle]

No worries, Spidey!!! I knew you had a few other things to worry about these past few months...

I'm so glad to hear from you-- you "sound" much better, and things seem to be healing up very nicely, thanks to Vic! You must be completely swamped right now in trying to get back on your feet, keep your company up and running, maintain your weight, and plan a sometime-soon trip to St Croix... Stay strong! We'll be waitin' right here for ya, when you make your full-blown return to the board. Can't wait!

PS-- thanks, too, for the warning about this infection; it sounds *very* scary, and the symptoms are definitely things I would have ignored, too, probably until it was too late. Thanks to you, we will all be careful here and will keep a watchful eye on ourselves and our loved ones. If only you hadn't been the one we all took a lesson from! Feel better soon, sweetie.

[Guest]

It's a dirty job but someone had to do it!

Maybe it's a "good thing" it was me it happened to. After all, I DID survive! According to the website, once you've had a flesh eating virus and they get rid of it, you can never get it again. It was a huge relief to me to read that because I was understandably worried about it coming back!

~Spidey

[24KaratGold]

Spidey, it is so good to see you here. We've been so worried about you! I'm glad to hear that you are recovering -- what a scary thing! We'll continue to keep you in thoughts and prayers, and look forward to when you can be back among us more regularly. We'll keep the light on.

So does this set the St. Croix plans back?

[itsgonnaworkthistime]

Spidey,

I am so happy to hear from you. We have all kept you in our prayers, and are ecstatic that you are doing well.

That was a nasty thing you went through, I cannot believe your first surgery was when you were awake....that would have freaked me out quite a bit.

Take care, get your business in order...and we will be waiting here for you!

Maura

[LongWay2go]

Good news! The nurse was here this morning to change the sponge and dressing. She thinks there is a slight possibility the doctor may take me off the vac on Tuesday when I see him but more likely that I'll be on it for another week or two AT MOST!!!

Yeah, Vic the Vac is going away soon!

~Spidey

[kassilou]

How wonderful! You will really be doin' the Spidey dance then!!

[Nancy]

Free at last!

Free at last!

Woo hoo! Good News!

[24KaratGold]

Wonder how Spidey is doing? I miss seeing him around here!

[Nancy]

He's doing great!

The wound vaccuum was removed yesterday. He is making plans for his trip to St. Croix.

His business is really perkin' right now so he is busier than a Medifast Barista at a Take Shape for Life convention! He’ll be around soon.