start of journey (waiting for insurance approval)

hi everybody
im new to the site; had my first apt past thursday and right now waiting on approval from my insurance and then i have to get clearance from a bunch of doctors. I am on a emotional roller coaster. surgery is all im thinking about. One day im determined then the next unsure basket case :)
im sure all of u can relate to me in some way. pls any thoughts and advise would ease my pain
thanks
nj

All 100% normal feelings.  I would guess most pre-ops have felt exactly like you do.  I started in November, 2010 with a visit to the surgeon's office.  I then was given exactly what I needed to do.  It consisted of 6 monthly visits with my PCP discussing diet, 3 visits with a nutritionist, colonoscopy, mammeogram, pap, EKG, psych eval, several visits with the surgeon.  I think that is most of it.

After that was all done and I passed all examinations, it was submitted to insurance, and I was approved in 2 days.  We then set up surgery for 9/19. 

Prior to surgery, I had to be on a low carb high protein diet for 2 weeks and I lost 10 lbs.

I was very lucky and had a complication free surgery and recovery, and I returned to work in a week.

Surgeon expected me to be at 175 at one year after surgery, and I reached 165 at six months, so it has been very successful.  At my 9 month check up, I was at 99.5 lb loss, and 1.5 lbs away from goal.

I am not sure what you are looking for, but hopefully this gives you some idea of what happens prior to surgery.  I well tell you this is the best thing I have ever done for myself and would do it again tomorrow.

wow, your results sound astounding, good job. i hope i will be just as successful.. it really is the fear of unknown i guess and it is a major surgery.. so its hard not to think of everything that can go wrong. but i cant wait, and am very excited.
thank u for all the good insight!

You would not be normal if you didn't think of all that could go wrong because, as you said, it is a major life-altering surgery.  Some people have a rougher time of it than I did. 

The best thing you can do is make sure follow the recommendations of your surgical team. 

Good luck to you and keep us posted on how it all goes.