Terry Poperszky

I started my pre-op diet one month ago today (banded 1/7/13 )and I am down 30 pounds, I have lost a a shirt size and two pants sizes and have not been happier since I married my beautiful wife almost 15 years ago.

This is the fun part, my Dr. pretty much told me to get used to starting the day with Protein shakes since the band is normally tighter in the mornings. All of his staff are banded, and they all drink them in the morning. With this said, I am in the mushie phase and I got 102 grams of protein yesterday from eggs, cottage cheese, skim milk and chile verde (pork). And no, I am not a veteran but it isn't going to be that hard on solids

If you are on full liquids, than protein shakes are the answer.

I still don't understand my body and why it does the things it does. I have slowly been building up my daily calories as I work through the mushie stage, my goal is 1300 a day. Well for some reason yesterday I just had the urge to graze, and the only way I kept my net calories at 1300 was to exercise. I wanted to eat all day long. Now today, I am having a hard time getting down 900 calories, I simply have not been hungry all day long. Add 550 calories of exercise on top and MFP is going to yell at me Same foods, no emotional upsets, but my body is behaving totally different. It will be interesting to step on the scale tomorrow morning and see what other surprises my body has in store for me. This is one of the reason that while I am a firm believer in the burn more calories than you consume weight loss formula, I also believe that this is a "big picture" paradigm and only really works over the long term.

Tell me about it, I drove past the MUP that I usually train on and it had a good 6 inches of snow and it was still coming down.

chasing the snow blower around for an hour... I think that Dante was on to something when he wrote that the inner rings of hell were made of ice.

During pre-op and after being banded, I had a lot of nervous energy, but the energy didn't have a lot of depth, so was quickly expended.

Three - NSV = Non Scale Victory.

Thanks Maddy, oh and while I do not know everything about women, you don't know my beautiful wife and if you think she waits until she has PMS to speak her mind, you need to think again.

I haven't had one since being banded, but I do get them regularly and I have a hard time imagining that there will be a problem. My port at least is simply not that sensitive.

Are you referring to the ticker at the bottom of some of our posts?

Well, I am glad you clarified that you only want to know how the women on the board handle their periods. I am sure that the men on the board have totally different techniques... Sorry Tina, I just couldn't resist.

This is how I play computer games now, I built a treadmill desk, and I hook up my laptop start a game and start walking. It catches my attention like nothing else and the before you know it I have been walking for an hour.

You aren't doing anything wrong. Different people react to the surgery different ways, just hand in there and stay hydrated. BTW, I had a hiatal hernia repaired as well, and I don't believe that is adding to your pain.

I was banded on 1/7/13 and one of the things that my instructions talked about was that during the "Healing Phase" of my eating, many patients stop losing or actually gain weight. With this in mind I have been very careful to log all my food and count calories Even thought my NUT said that calorie counting wasn't necessary, she told me to shoot for between 1300 - 1500. So, this morning I was able to go back to one of my pre-band rituals of Saturday morning breakfast with a friend, but I was scared because I was flying solo, no scale, no measuring cups, just me and "Mistress Band". So, the result? I ordered two eggs and hash browns, I pre-cut all my food to the proper size, and tried to focus on the conversation and my eating. Pretty soon I hit a soft stop (hiccup) and then each bite I started asking myself why I was taking that bite. When the answer because "Because it tastes so good" I put my fork down and moved the plate out of reach. At that point, I was satisfied, not full, but satisfied and it looking at my plate, I realized that I had eaten about the same as I would have if I had pre-measured it. Maybe one day, I will be able to move rely totally on listening to my body and my band, but until then, I will log and count.

They are so obvious now, because the band is putting the physical hunger into the background. They were always there, but where hiding behind your physical hunger. Now that their mask has been pull off, they stand there in their ugliness and we have to start admitting to ourselves why we were really eating. I can't count the number of times in the last couple weeks that I have thought to myself "OMG, how much was I really putting into my body???" Keep your eye on the prize, and find different coping skills that will serve you rather than control you.

My surgeon told me to get used to drinking a Protein shake in the morning because the band will be so much tiger (and it is). Most of his staff have been banded, and in talking to them that is all they start their morning with. This is my morning ritual: 5:30 - 9:00 8 oz skim mik, 16 oz coffee, 11 oz Protein Shake, .5 c steel cut oats. I start with the skim milk, because it gets my metabolism out of the night time fasting mode.

If I only ate when I was physically hungry, I would not have gotten the band. emotional hunger, habit hunger, reward hunger, boredom hunger are what put the fat on me. There is article on the site http://www.lapbandta...to-swallow-r110 maybe you can gan some insights from it on how to handle it.

Look at vegetable protein

1. For me GB is too invasive. Getting the band was a big step, I wasn't willing to re-route my internal plumbing and the associated malabsorbtion issues. 2. Sleeve is too new to know long term effectiveness. My PCP suggest GB or LB, but wouldn't suggest Sleeve because of that. 3. LB has the least complications, is the least invasive. My surgeon was able to produce stats from over 900 procedures that he performed. 4. I know someone who had GB and has stretched their pouch out so much that they could out eat me, un-banded. Plus they told about something called "dumping" which I wanted no part in.

I was really hungry when I got home tonight, so I grabbed 1/2 cup of baked Beans and ate it so I wouldn't be tempted to snack while I cooked. So, 45 minutes later, dinner is ready and Mistress Band has just informed me that those beans were my dinner, and I WILL NOT be eating anything else for a while. She suggested that I head down to the treadmill and walk a couple miles while the rest of my family eats their dinner. Such is the life of the banded...

Well, it is an annual event so like I said, if not this year than next. There is a 40 mile baby version of the ride that would still give me something to shoot for this year with out killing myself. Thanks for the input.

I am afraid will not be able to consume enough calories to build the muscle necessary for the event. I am on track to loose 30 pounds my first month, with that type of weight loss, it seems counter intuitive to add another 1K of exercise a day. As for gaining, right now that really isn't a fear unless I start eating butter with a spoon, I am just now starting to get 1300 calories a day in and my BMR is 2600. Before the band, it didn't matter how much exercise, I could out eat it. But Road Cycling is a thin persons game.