Did a MN thread change your life?

[JudgeRindersMinder]

This is the one that changed mine!
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/AMA/4370850-10-Weeks-post-gastric-sleeve-weight-loss-surgery-AMA

I did as the OP did and went to Turkey for a gastric sleeve in November. I’m now 8.5 stones down (still a way to go) and my life has improved immeasurably. I’m off the antidepressants I’d been on for 19 years, blood pressure is now normal and I’m just generally in a better place.

What’s yours?

8.5 stones in 5 months? That’s what I weigh! You’ve lost a whole me! That’s fantastic. No wonder you feel great.

I don’t know anything about gastric sleeves, but have you had to have a liquid diet or do you just eat small portions of food?

Is the sleeve permanent or will it be removed later?

Thank you @LaraDeSalle as you’ll gather I was dangerously overweight! I just eat toddler size portions of normal food. It being called sleeve is actually quite misleading as about 80% of your stomach is removed. Drastic I know, but it’s what I needed to do.

Hmm … Not an isolated thread but the body of threads / posts on particular school choices were what brought me to MN more than a decade ago. They really added to the thinking and investigating we were already doing, so, altogether probably have helped with a huge change in one part of our family life.

More generally, the entirety of my MN reading and conversation has effectively dragged me into the 21st c. I’d probably be clinging on to numerous outdated attitudes and behaviours without it.

I hope the newish Mature Study and Retraining board

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mature_students

will be instrumental in changing countless women’s lives for the better.

@JudgeRindersMinder

Thank you *@LaraDeSalle* as you’ll gather I was dangerously overweight! I just eat toddler size portions of normal food. It being called sleeve is actually quite misleading as about 80% of your stomach is removed. Drastic I know, but it’s what I needed to do.

Drastic, but incredible and you now have a new life. I only eat small portions. I eat what I want but not a lot of it. You still get the taste and enjoyment of food but it’s so much healthier.

No one thread..but reading many over the years helped me to LTB. MN helped enormously.

@RainbowToes

No one thread..but reading many over the years helped me to LTB. MN helped enormously.

I’m so glad to hear that, I hope life’s treating you well

Yes I had a large breast lump and had said to GP in June last year and GP had just dismissed it over e-mail saying would almost certainly be nothing and I wanted to believe that but at back of mind was a niggle.

Then in October there was a thread from a lady with a very similar sounding breast lump asking if she should go to A&E as getting nowhere via GP and thought that sounds like mine will see what happens. Eventually she got seen and it was a fairly big cancer requiring surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and years of hormone meds. That triggered me to go back to GP in early November and get a referral and mine was the same, a 5cm cubed cancer that had gone to a lymph node by time picked up and needing 2 lots of surgery, chemo, radio and 10 years hormone tablets and 2 operations more later. Its been really awful but if it had been even later it could well have been stage 4 with an average life expectancy of 3 years and incurable. Its still not great and will be having chemotherapy throughout my daughter's GCSEs but at least now have something like a 90% chance of surviving 5 years and 70-something of 10 years.

@JudgeRindersMinder

This is the one that changed mine! www.mumsnet.com/Talk/AMA/4370850-10-Weeks-post-gastric-sleeve-weight-loss-surgery-AMA

I did as the OP did and went to Turkey for a gastric sleeve in November. I’m now 8.5 stones down (still a way to go) and my life has improved immeasurably. I’m off the antidepressants I’d been on for 19 years, blood pressure is now normal and I’m just generally in a better place.

What’s yours?

Did you gonro the one the op mentioned. Please can you PM me the details.

For me it was the Stately Homes threads. It prompted me to get counselling and change the dynamic with my family. This gave me the headspace to sort out other areas of my life.

Not one single thread but all together. I am (undiagnosed) autistic, and I upset or alienate other women without meaning to.

Mumsnet has been a revaluation to me in terms of what people get upset about and why, and which I now know to avoid. Things that would never have occurred to me. It's helped a lot.

Revelation not revaluation

Yes the £10 a day threads, I now work full time from home whatever hours I want across the week and earn more than I did before. I also love my job.

Well done OP, 8.5 stone is a fantastic achievement

Yes, the trans widows threads. Knowing I was right, my eyes and ears and brain were working. Coming to understand that I was in a seriously abusive relationship, that I wasn't "mental" or "useless" or a terrible person for knowing, a waste of skin etc, that stopped me from killing myself.

I'll have to name change again now!

Thank absolutely for Mumsnet and all the glorious women who post here.

I’ve said this before, but yes, having the real life experiences and actual studies of likely outcomes of different birth approaches up there on the boards was really helpful - plus it hadn’t actually occurred to me that I was within my rights to refuse induction for my baby when he was overdue, and get a scheduled C section instead, as per NICE guidelines.

The knowledge Mumsnet gave me was hugely empowering. It gave me the confidence to fight for the section (against considerable resistance from the hospital, who interestingly were citing policy and not health concerns) which was amazing and I had a very positive birth, a healthy baby and no damage at all to either of us. I am so grateful to all the women who posted and helped me without even knowing they were doing so.

@Turningpurple I’ve sent you a PM
@Silkierabbit thank GOD you kept pushing! Hoping you have a fast and full recovery

Ok mine was about 15 years ago. It was started by someone who had twins in ICU and was told by the consultant that there was no need to sterilise baby bottles.

I think the poster was called RTkangamummy and basically she gave the method that was sound. It was to do with very hot water and air drying I think.

Also one by nappyaddict (I think) about preparing formula safely. It was to do with putting the powder in boiling water then cooking with cold (pre boiled) water.

Both these posters saved my sanity.

As I said theses were years ago so I'm not giving the same advice now, just grateful for the tips back then.

*cooling

The ante natal thread I joined when I got pregnant the first time. We all migrated onto Facebook where we've become the best of friends, have occasional meet ups, have group chats that ping daily. I found my people on mumsnet.

Mine was learning to realised over 100s of threads that my opinion and first thoughts might not always be the right one. I .so much more open minded and considered before taking "a side".

More than one actually.

The NPD/EA support threads back in the day helped me see my relationship was unhealthy and leave.

Then one about organisation struggles alerted me to the fact I might have ADHD. Diagnosis and treatment for this has absolutely changed my life.

I remember the sterilisation thread gastro :) don't think it would hit quite the same these days but it was v sensible, I agreed with it too.

Yes my ex h decided to emigrate and not tell me till he was boarding the plane leaving me with the whole of the mortgage on the house. £230k of it.

I had some really good advice and without it I would have probably ended up bankrupt.

Yes, it helped me get my thoughts straight about my marriage and LTB. I'll be forever grateful.
Also it helped me to understand I'm not a bigot just because I don't believe that people can change sex. But that's not life changing, just saved my sanity

I didn't post about it at the time but the relationships board got me through leaving my abuser when I was a late teen.

Yes it did, my own thread about my kidney failure. It was joined by some amazing women at different stages of the journey who helped me to see there could be a future for me at a time when I really felt there was not. Now I am further along and surviving, I am hopefully doing the same for others.