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Heavy in the Heartland

A blog by HeavyHeartland in General

  • Entries

    22

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About this blog

My Journey to and through Lapband Surgery

Entries in this blog

Fill Three for Me

The last time I saw my doctor, I got yelled at (figuratively) for not measuring my food. Measuring food is such a non-natural thing. It's so tough to go out to dinner, order a nice meal, and then whip out a measuring cup. How embarassing. More embarassing, however, would be going back to the doctor's office without the information they are requesting.   The doctor told me for my next fill, it is imperative that they know how much I can eat. I should measure this by eating 1/4 cup of meat, 1/4

ReFill

After over a month at 4.5cc in my 14cc band, I had fill #2 a couple of days ago. They added 2 more cc's of fluid, bringing me to 6.5cc.   I showed up to my doctor's appointment pretty mad and frustrated. Right now, it seems like I went through this surgery for nothing. Although I've lost a little over 50 pounds, none of it can be attributed to the lapband surgery. The majority of my weight loss came from the strict liquid diet I was on for several weeks. When you go from eating fast food and b

Nothing

I was supposed to go back and have my band filled tighter three weeks ago. Unfortunately, I had to travel out of town that week, and I've been in meetings the past two weeks which has prevented me from getting out of the office. I'm scheduled for a fill the week after next.   With a 14cc band and a 4.5cc fill, I can feel absolutely no restriction. In fact, over the past few weeks, I've started eating things that should be clogging up my band, and they're not. All the things that my wife (who i

No Restriction. At All.

I got my first fill last week and I feel ... nothing. I mean, I can eat almost as much as I could before the surgery. Not quite, but almost. My wife and I went to Golden Corral for lunch the other day and I had a huge salad, a bowl of soup, and a plate full of veggies and Chicken. The types of food I ate weren't terrible, but all this talk of only eating 2oz of meat? Not yet. I almost wish I could experience PB or clogging just so I would know what it felt like.   I'm currently at 4.5 on a 14c

Dr. Fill

Yesterday, January 16th, I had my first band fill.   Over the past two weeks, I've put on five pounds.The doctor asked how that happened; I told him it was pretty easy. "I switched back to real food and I quick walking!" He wasn't thrilled with that answer. He asked how much restriction I was feeling and I told him none. It's true. Over the past couple of weeks I've been able to eat everything I've tried.   In my 14cc band, I got a 4.5cc fill to start with. I can feel a bit of restriction no

Holding Pattern

For about three months in the mid 1990s, my doctor put me on Fen-Phen, the miracle weight loss drug. For me, the drugs curbed my appetite and helped me rapidly lose weight. My guess is, the pills were 50% appetite supressant and 50% speed. The only reason I mention Fen-Phen is, I was losing weight without trying. I continued to eat fast food and buffets several times a week and I still lost weight. Then a bunch of people reported heart problems and the drug was pulled off the market. Bye bye, Fe

Two Weeks/Four Weeks

Last week I went to my "2 Week Follow Up Appointment" , which for some reason, they scheduled four weeks after my surgery. The first thing you do is weigh you, and the nurse was shocked to see I'd lost 50 pounds. Then I told her it had really been four weeks. She was still happy about the weight loss, but less scared.   Once I was back in the room another nurse came in and checked my surgical scars. "These look great for only two weeks!" she said. Actually, it's been four weeks, I explained to

Christmas Mush

Every year for Christmas, my wife and I invite our families over for Christmas Eve and we all exchange presents, talk, but most importantly, eat. That last word made me really nervous this year for a few of reasons. One, the week of Christmas, I was still on mushy food. Two, I know I'm not supposed to be eating sweets (even if they're mushy). And three, I don't want to ruin other people's holidays just because I can't eat, you know? I'm the one who had lapband surgery, not them.   And you know

Death by Shrimp

Last night was my mother-in-law's 60th birthday party, which they had at a local steak house. As I am just starting my fourth week (soft foods) so I knew steak was out. The restaurant's menu was really limited -- although in their defense, it IS a steak house. Pretty much my options were steak, steak, and more steak. They had no soup (my primary choice when eating out right now) and no mashed potatoes (my backup plan). Near the bottom of the menu I found their very small seafood selection; shrim

Rush the Mush

Last week was supposed to be pureed foods, but I ended up doing liquids most of the week before moving to mushies a few days early. Let's face it, getting pureed food is pretty difficult while travelling on the road, but mushies are a little easier to come by. While probably not the greatest choices, I had some mashed potatoes from KFC and an order of pintos and cheese (mushed beans with cheese on top) from Taco Bell. And man oh man did they taste good compared to the steady stream of protein dr

Spending Week 3 on the road

I'm on the road this week for work. I'm also on Week 3 of my post-op diet. Weeks 1 and 2 were liquids only -- Week 3 was supposed to be "pureed foods." After two weeks of protein drinks, Jell-O and pudding I was really looking forward to pureed foods, but it turns out, it's pretty hard to eat pureed foods while you're on the road. Have you ever tried ordering baby food or mashed bananas from a drive-thru? Not simple.   I stopped in a convenient store during my road trip in search of something

Tired of Sweets

My doctor put me on a four-week post-op diet. Weeks 1 and 2 are a liquid only diet. Week 3 consists of pureed foods, and Week 4 consists of soft foods. Although technically the end of my second week isn't until next Tuesday, I'm shaving a couple of days off the two week period and calling Sunday the last day of Week 2. I'll be starting Week 3 on Monday.   The New Dimensions protein variety packs contain seven packs. Six of them are what I'd call desserts: vanilla, strawberry, chocolate, hot ch

Stupid Shoulder Pain

I'm on day six of recovery. I have almost no stomach pain at all. My stiches and incisions don't bother me in the least. What I AM experiencing, however, is extremely painful shoulder pain.   According to Google and the myriad of websites I've read over the past few days, shoulder pain is a very common side effect of any type of laproscopic surgery. Apparently during laproscopic surgery, doctors "balloon" their patients full of carbon dioxide gas in order to give themselves more working room.

Recovery: Days 1-3

I had lapband surgery on Monday. Today's Thursday, so I thought I would type up a few notes about how I've been feeling and how recovery has gone so far. The reason for these entries are two-fold; one, in a year from now I'm looking forward to going back and reading some of these older entries, and two, for anyone considering the surgery or about to have it, I thought I would share what I've gone through you you'll know what to expect.   Day 1, Post-Op (Tuesday)   It's been 25 years since I'

Surgery Summary

I made it! My lapband surgery was a success, and I'm alive and doing well. Thanks to everyone who offered me even the slightest amount of support during this time. The phone calls, e-mails and blog comments were all very kind. Thank you all very much.   My adventure began Monday morning with a 7:15am check-in at the hospital. I had blood work (poorly) drawn by a girl barely old enough to drive. From there it was off to the surgery check-in room, where I was soon met by my wife, and shortly aft

Tomorrow

Well, tomorrow's the big day. In (looking at the clock) sixteen hours I will be checking into the hospital.   Of course, like anyone going in for elective surgery, I'm having second thoughts. I've done so well on the pre-op diet (-20 lbs) that it's easy to think, "well gosh, maybe I can just keep eating like this and losing weight!" The reality (as we all know) is, that's pretty unlikely. Plus, even though I'm losing weight, I'm starving, and we all know diets where you feel hungry never last

Day Two of Liquids

Yesterday I started phase two of the pre-op diet -- liquids.   I am currently having six shakes a day. I'm having meal replacements for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and meal suppliments around 10am, 3pm, and 9pm. The meal replacements have 27g of protein, and the meal suppliments have 23g. That puts me well over my daily goal of 115g of protein. It also puts me at just under 1,000 calories a day.   How do I feel? To be honest -- bored. To me, meals were such an integral part of the day. For

Surprise!

Yesterday was full of surprises!   The first surprise came when the doctor's office called late yesterday afternoon and wanted to know if it would be possible to bump my surgery up a day, from Tuesday, December 4th to Monday, December 3rd. I said sure.   Then they dropped the other hammer on me. "That means your liquid diet starts tomorrow morning."   It's funny how your perspective changes. Before I started the pre-op diet, I was dying to have a few good meals. Now that I'm moving to liq

The Five Stages of Grief

Today, on day four of my 10-day pre-op diet, I found myself pretty content after lunch. I wasn't stuffed, but I didn't have the hunger pangs like I've had the past couple of days. (In all fairness, I'm currently eating somewhere between 1/3 and 1/4 of the amount of calories I was eating before.) And so, right after lunch, I got this crazy idea in my head.   I could do this forever.   Yeah, that's it! Who needs surgery? I could just stay on this diet forever, do some exercise, and lose the we

Secrets -- Talking about Surgery

December 4th, I'm having lapband surgery. Sshhh, don't tell anyone. It's a secret.   There seems to be a lot of different thoughts as to whether you should announce you are having lapband surgery or not. I'm a weird type of guy. I love blogging and talking about my life to the world, but when it comes to really personal thoughts, I tend to keep those to myself. When I made the committment to have lapband surgery, for six weeks, the only person I told was my wife. It was only after people began

10 Day Diet Observation

During last week's diet consultation I was handed a piece of paper that detailed what I was allowed to eat during my pre-operation 10-day diet. A few ounces of meat here, a helping of vegetables there ... it all sounded okay until I realized the list covered what I was allowed to eat for an entire day -- I thought it was just for one meal! Okay, I didn't really think that, but prior to this diet I'm sure there have been many meals during which I have eaten more than I'm eating now in an entire d

Well, here I am ...

As I begin my 10-day pre-op diet before Lapband Surgery, I find myself thinking, "how did I get to this point?" I mean, it seems like most of the people around can either control what they eat, or can eat whatever they want and not gain weight. Why am I blessed with the ability to gain weight simply by looking at pictures of food, much less shoving it into my mouth?   Throughout my childhood I was always heavy, but never obese. As a little kid I can remember always demanding to be one of the '

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