Cazzy

great work

I think that theres a fine balance between eating enough to feed your body and not enough to lose weight. It does sound like u dont eat enough which must be hard for you if your band is very tight. If you do a lot of exercise on a small amount of food it can actually prevent you losing weight, we all have an optimum amount that we can eat and do our exercise which enables us to lose weight, the trick is to keep going til you know what that magic amount is. For me protien shakes should be supplements to your food, they shouldnt really replace it. I would definitely speak to your Doc or Nutritionist, some people do feel more restiction of a morning but really you should always be able to drink Water without it having trouble going down. good luck

I have trouble eating anything bread related too so i dont and if i eat cheese its 1 teaspoon of grated parmesan, which satisfies me on the cheese need as its a strong flavour. If you go on a long journey take your food with you, take snacks with you, that way you dont have to rely on whats available roadside

does seem an unusual problem i wracked my brains and came up with with 2 suggestions, either try drinking the protien shake from a bottle with a sport cap ( u know the bottles with nozzles on) as that way your nose will have very little interaction with the drink, or try a small drop of something like almond oil vanilla essence near your nose and mask the smell with another, Quite often vaseline/or similar is used near the nose to mask the smell of dead bodies in mortuaries so thought it may work just to mask the smell b4 you drink it ..I hope u are able to find a solution

I am very pleased with my weight loss and have worked hard to get it, but its been worth every effort. I am on the homeward stretch now and the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter

Leslie Sansone is a good work out for walking exercise at home. Dont dismiss sitting exercises, you can do dumbells and restance training while watching tv, why not sit and burn some calories .

100% happy with the band.

good news ..keep up the good work now

I was sad to read of your loss but encouraged to see that you are not prepared to suffer the same fate. You wont be giving up food you will just be eating differently. I think a fair few of us have been heavy nearly all our lives but as we get older the weight piles on and our bodies dont deal with it so well. There are so many reasons why the weight loss for everyone is different. As with all things relating to humans we are all different and our bodies deal with food in different ways, we all know people who can eat what the hell they want and never put on an ounce, or someone like me who could gain weight just by looking at food. Willpower is a part of this weight loss journey and sometimes we will need a lot of it. For me it was more about determination, i was determined that if i underwent surgery it wouldnt be for nothing, i was determined to get as fit as i could again and take back my life, which was slowing ebbing away both physically and emotionally. My willpower kicks in when i go food shopping, theres no medals for having unhealthy food in the house and not eating it, as against just not buying it. When i first started it felt like i had mount everest to climb, i felt almost envious of people who had half the weight to lose that i did, but with the right surgeon, the right support and the right mind set things began to change and suddenly that mountain i had to climb actaully seemed possible. I really hope that you can get the surgery you want and wish you well for the future

my fills also take only a minute or two at the most too, my surgeon does the fills .. I have 7cc's in a 14 cc band going in for a further small fill in a week. They did inform me that if you lose a lot of weight the band becomes loser as u lose fat internally from around the stomach. I tend to go for a fill after around each 40 lbs lost more than just relying on appetite/food intake indicators. The surgeon also makes me eat a yoghurt after the fill to make certain that i can eat it without any problems.

good news and good luck

good luck nicole let us know howw u get on

I can remember being told by the doctor after my band was fitted that quite often u can put a few pounds back on till u start getting your fills, i didnt because i restricted what i was eating, but it evidently is a common occurance that u might regain your appetite till u get your fills going. My port is also on my sternum, i really dont mind it there at all but since losing the weight i have it sticks out a little now but i dont really take much notice of it now. I had read some posts that if its in the stomach and u lose a lot of weight and wear something tight u can see it so maybe the sternum isnt such a bad site to have for a port. You are still healing tho so please be careful, common sense and moderation are the key to healing properly. good luck on your journey

totally agree my regime is very similar to yours, my metaboolism is a slow one too so calories in and burned are important to me to lose weight. I could do with some of your height tho I am only 5'4 hence my BMI started very high

I started off at 400lbs but kept to 1000/1100 calories a day since i was able to eat solid food, we all have different requirements based on how quickly/much our bodies metabolise food and what we are burning off. My Doctor also advised me to eat around 1200 calories a day. There is a standard formula for working out calorie requirements and for most people that works fine but not everyone fits into neat little boxes. As long as your nutritional needs are being met, like protiens, carbs and fats and starches and you drink plenty of water and exercise the weight does come off, if u do adjust the amount of calories you eat then do it slowly try a week or 2 at 100 calories less a day and see if that helps, but as always discuss any changes with your nutritionist/dietician I wish you well on your journey.

good luck on your journey

I think given the amount of people on this forum who have had a bad experience from the 1-800-GET-THIN centre it may well be that your experience of the band is more due to the doctors and their after care service than the band itself. Reading a lot of the posts here many people do have success with the lap band, but it isnt for everyone, all we can do is give it our best shot. Im sure everyone will sympathise with your story and wish you well in the future.

good luck with the band 100% happy with the band 182lbs lost in 12 months so far ..

I know a lot of people advise not weighing in daily but i do and i record my weight on a weekly basis, if i havent lost any weight or have remained the same i am fine if i have put on a 1lb overnight i work extra hard the next day to get it off. Being diabetic I was used to monitoring my sugar after each meal so i could see what food affected my sugar levels, i see my scales as a similar tool, i see what food doesnt help me lose wieght and i adjust my food accordingly. After a year of weighing every day i am used to the fluctuations in weight each day so it doesnt affect me at all now but i can really understand why some would get upset or disappointed weighing in on a daily basis. The trick is to weigh yourself at the same time always. We all cope with things differently and no one way is the right way.. and life would be pretty boring if it was

Thanks Stacy, I certainly dont feel 'inspirational' I have to say its almost a full time job having to lose so much weight and each day i have to push myself to exercise and keep moving, but the motivation is my health and happiness, it is over 20 yrs since i weighed what i do now and when i reach my goal it will have been 30 yrs since i weighed it. I started off really slow doing exercises sitting down, i would use dumbells and resistance bands just watching tv, when u weigh as much as i did when u first start this journey its just so hard to even stand for long periods let alone do exercises, i couldnt sit on a exercise bike as it was just too uncomfortable, now i use it all the time, my exercise bike , my strength training and my healthy diet have enabled me to lose all this weight and am hoping it will continue to do so till my goal weight is achieved. Its been exactly one year since i first started my pre-op diet and i havent looked back since, my goal was to get my life back and slowly it returns both emotionally and physically. So always keep plugging away and keep battling on, you cant let fat be the victor !

nice to see other 'soupies' out there

good luck for tomorrow

I always eat soup before my main meal of the day , i find it helps a lot in curbing the initial hunger pangs and it doesnt seem to affect me in getting food stuck etc, if i was to drink any liquid during a meal it would get stuck so i dont. If u are still on mushy food then u can liquidise your own home made soup in place of a meal, but the main thing is that u dont overload the pouch with too much of anything whilst its all healing, so until u are on regular food i would make soup, if its a thick main meal type one or liquidised food/mushy food your meal. Not sure if thats helpful for you. Weight Watchers tomato soup is low in calories only 71 and carbs and taste really good, the other flavours are really not so good . We are all different and i know i am not the norm but i make home made veg soup ( cauliflour, broccoli, courgette and peas ) for lunch every day with crispbread and have a ww tomato soup before evening meal and it works for me but i live in the Uk and the advice we get here from nutritionists is sometimes different from the US Banded Jan 2011 180lbs lost since Oct 2010.

Sounds like the same formula i use too, fish, chicken, seafood lots of veg, fruit and sugar free jelly and exercise .

I was banded in Jan 2011 and maybe have thrown up 15 times since then at most, i am reliant on my memory, as what makes me sick doesnt get eaten again unless i can see another cause like i was very hungry and just ate too fast or didnt chew my food enough. My best friend is a sharp knife i cut up all my food really small, i do not eat bread or bread products at all, and tend to avoid things like cold chicken as that is a big no no for me. What i do eat a lot of is Soup, homemade vegetable soup or tomato soup from weight watchers. If you do throw up then give your band /stomach time to recover, going onto liquids/soft food for the rest of the day is good advice. Eventually you get to know your band and what u can and cant do with it, i had to change my whole approach to food and what i was able to eat where other people just ate smaller portions of 'normal' food. Food can get stuck more often after a band fill so be cautious after a fill for a few days and hopefully things will improve. Be pateint we all lose weight at different rates just keep at it and eventually u will be ok. Just make sure u are burning more calories than you are eating I have lost over 170lbs so far by monitoring closely everything i eat, the band is a tool for weight loss and not the whole answer and i really hope things improve for you .