I’m Richard Albistegui-DuBois. I’m a 44-year-old cisgendered man, an academic (I teach human physiology at Palomar College), married for 22 years, two teenage sons. I live in north San Diego county. I’m planning on undergoing a Roux-en-Y gastric bypass surgery this December.
Health info: as of today, I am 5’11” and 300 pounds clothed. That puts me well into serious obesity, in BMI terms. I’ve struggled with being overweight for much of my life, at least since late adolescence. I’ve had two significant attempts at weight loss. About ten years ago, I went from about 283 to about 198 pounds over six months or so through a sustained effort of careful calorie counting and regular exercise (mostly long walking, hiking, and some biking). I felt great…and then came Christmas. Between my sweet tooth, the easy availability of candy, and the social pressure to eat, I completely fell off the wagon, and gained all the weight back over the next year or so. I tried again about a year and a half ago, after being diagnosed with depression and prescribed bupropion, I lost about 40 pounds using the same methods…and gained it back the same way. Curse you, holidays! Since then, I’ve varied up and down around a slow upward trend until last May; since then, I’ve hovered right around 300 pounds.
I was diagnosed with diabetes in May 2017, and prescribed metformin and glipizide. With those, diet, and exercise, my blood sugar was well controlled, but my A1C has been slowly climbing. Most recently (October 2018), it was 6.9%. I am not on insulin, and I am hoping to avoid it; one of the main reasons I am planning on the full bypass as opposed to the sleeve surgery is its better record at reducing diabetes issues. No diabetes-related complications so far.
After being diagnosed with diabetes, I was put on atorvastatin as a prophylactic; since then, my cholesterol and triglycerides have been good. Prior to that, my cholesterol was reasonably good, but my triglycerides have always tended to be high.
My blood pressure is on the high side of normal (tends to be around 130/82). Kidneys and liver are normal, no history of gallbladder disease, occasional kidney stones.
I have severe sleep apnea. I actually was first diagnosed with it quite a while ago (15-20 years), was prescribed a CPAP, didn’t tolerate it well, and had throat surgery. My tonsils, uvula, and part of my soft palate were removed. That fixed the apnea quite nicely–until I gained a lot of weight, at which point the snoring and apnea returned. During the educational program for the bypass surgery, we were required to have an apnea assessment; mine came back as severe apnea. I was prescribed a new CPAP, and the newer masks (specifically, nasal pillows) were much better for me; I’ve been on this CPAP for a few months now.