Kristina J.

Well if I am wrong when I die I hope I am judged by the way I lived my life and not for the fact I didn’t worship one of the 1000's of gods that have been worshiped since man came to be.

How can you be sure the god you worship is the one true god and not the god other religions or cultures worshiped?

The bible talks about giant sea creatures (Leviathan), Dragons, Unicorns, A talking snake and donkey, a talking bush, horses with heads of lions (200 horses man), etc. I could go on. Do you believe all this to be true? They are all in the bible.


Other things the bible forbids but still I see many Christians doing so:

-Scaring their skin (tattoos) I see many people with cross tattoos
-Trimming your hear on your head or beard
-palm reading or reading your horoscope is a sin
-If your kid back talks you, you should kill them
-No working in Sundays
-Women should not talk and should stay quit in church and in home
-Eating sea food (shrimp, crab, lobster) is a no no
-Woman who are not a virgins when married shall be put to death
-Slavery is fine
-No divorce



So I guess most Christian just look past all this stuff. I guess you can go say 5 Hail Mary’s and all will be forgiven.

This is why I don’t follow religion at all.

I am not trying to start a forum war I am just to post why I don’t believe and why more and more people are leaving religions.

WLS surgery talk... anyone? anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

it seems ironic to me that people arguing and bickering gets a moderator to step in, but someone can post something so controversial that has nothing to do with weight loss surgery and its allowed.
I will not be forwarding and I will be "praying" that this thread gets deleted.

This really is not the place for religion or politics.

WTF is this?

So proud of you Lawrence!!! You are always such a source of inspiration for me, both physically and mentally!! Nice work friend!!! You look so handsome!!!! :-)

Having ANY surgery is a leap of faith: have you ever really read the consent forms you sign in the US? It can scare the isht out of you. Since the consent forms in MX are in Spanish, I'm guessing that's why Dr. Aceves spent some time going over that. But is it really anything you don't already know going in?
I can totally respect an individual decision to not have the surgery. But please don't make it about this forum, particular posts, or the folks posting here. It's up to each of us to take responsibility for getting our needs met and living with our choices.

I am not saying the OP did this...
Having been on this forum for over 2 years, it's been interesting to see how many people now jump into having VSG without much thought. This happens much more than it did a couple of years ago, it's obvious by the posts people make. It seems they think this is a quick fix and bc it's easier for some to go to Mexico and get this done without going through all the hoops they just do it without much thought. It's really a shame that this happens. This is a life changing surgery, life long changes need to be made.
Personally, I started with insurance and went through ALL of the pre op testing required by US doctors. Towards the end of my 3 month diet my insurance requirements changed and I decided to look into going to Mexico. I am very happy with my decision but it's not for everyone.

Maybe I'm a special case but I needed the 6 month supervised diet, psych eval and all the insurance drama. It convinced me that I was ready to change my life and I truly wanted VSG.

Some people just aren't ready. I can respect that. As far as wanting a stranger to call you and reassure you it's going to be ok? I just don't get that. This is why for good reason there are psych evals and waiting periods before this major elective surgery.

Here's my "band vet" take on LapBands! lol
Bands can work well if you find your "sweet spot" with fills. I did with my first band and lost 80 of the 100 I wanted to lose. But like a lot of people, despite my success, I ended up with complications in time (2.5 years out for me). I had a removal because my erosions from my slip were so bad. Over the year I was without the band, I gained back all 80 I had lost, plus another 20. I never put in the real effort to change my eating habits or deal with my head, so once restriction was gone, so was all of my success!
When I was rebanded in 2006 (unfortunately for me, still a pre-sleeve popularity time), I had a different size and brand of LapBand. It was supposed to be "better" or "more effective" and "safer." I didn't have complications with that one for almost 5 years, but never came close to finding my "sweet spot" either. I would either throw up everything regularly, or have what felt like zero restriction, no matter how many adjustments I got. It was insanely frustrating. Eventually my over eating/tight band, led to chronic prolapse and dilation. I emptied healed (3 months) and slowly refilled 3 times. But after all of that, almost a year later and at my highest weight (probably ever), I decided that I wanted my band out! I didn't even realize I could revise at the time, but through researching a self pay doctor to remove my band, I learned about the sleeve.
I know you and I have talked about this before nursebarbie, but I do believe that part of the failure of my 2nd band was my fault, as well as the regain in between. Yes, it is absolutely a flawed system that fails more people than it helps. And yes, my band likely would have failed to some degree no matter what I did. BUT, I was 18 when my band was placed. I wasn't educated about WLS the way I should have been, and didn't understand the many aspects that need to come together for its success. I expected it to be the magic solution that a lot of people (wrongly) assume all WLS is. I didn't make the changes I should have. I didn't change my lifestyle. I did the same things and even ate the same things, just less of them. I didn't add exercise or learn about nutrition or the way our body processes different foods. I never tracked food (or even thought of it). I kept the junk food in my life which meant that when I needed/wanted that fix, I loaded up on slider foods. And when I couldn't get that sweet spot, and all I could eat were sliders, I didn't go back to my doctor and try and really address my issues the way I should have. I was naive and scared that I would be adjusted down even more, and that less restriction would make things even worse. Even though the reality is that with a lapband, sometimes people actually need less restriction to avoid major complications and even just to be more successful. I always wonder how my path would have been different if I hadn't been so fearful of losing some of that (too tight) restriction. I believe it still wouldn't have been what I needed, but looking back, I'm still curious what might have been different had I not had that fear and just fully trusted in what my surgeon suggested.
Instead, I stayed too tight. I found myself borderline bulimic. I was eating awful foods and justifying eating more, because I was getting stuck and throwing up half of my meal so often. And even worse, it WORKED! I would go with this awful mentality for a few months and drop weight eating crap foods as I wished and "lucking out" because I got stuck and puked so often. Eventually the slider foods would lead me to gain it all back of course, but I followed a yo-yo weight pattern the entire time I had that second band.
Again, I share plenty of blame with the band itself. That evil little thing made truly healthy eating, darn near impossible!! Lean dense Protein? F that. I might as well have just throw it in the toilet and saved myself from playing middle man. Fruits and veggies?! Nope!! No way. Maybe if I cooked the hell out of the veggies and put enough butter on them that they'd slide down, sure. But raw veggies? Fruits in anything other than cooked form like jams, cobblers and pies?! All instantly stuck.
But when it came down to it, I relied purely on that flawed system to be some magic cure. I wasn't proactive and didn't make life changes along with it. So I really do believe that it's a shared failure!!
While I would NEVER recommend the band to anyone, I also don't regret my time with it. It showed me my own flaws and helped me to know what I was really going to need to do to make my sleeve work for me. It kept me from jumping into another WLS uneducated, with rose colored glasses on. This sleeve can be easy sometimes and other times, its hard as hell. I pushed myself to implement those life changes BEFORE my revision. After my band was emptied, I lost half of my total (63lbs), before I even had my revision surgery. I changed my diet to the foods I had avoided for fear or being "stuck" for the last 10 years. I felt like a new person just without Fluid in my band. I know that long term, I would still have faced problems with volume eating (my real base problem), but I was able to stay motivated, knowing "help was on the way."
The sleeve has helped me take that new lifestyle and be successful in reaching over halfway to my goal. And there are still days, post revision, when I want to load up on carbs and crap, and I very easily could, justifying that its ok, because I'll eat so much less of it. But I don't. And part of why I don't, is because of my experience with my band, and learning the hard way that restriction really is just part of a successful equation!!!

Right?! Just couldn't help myself!! Lol
But seriously, the LapBand is the devil. I know tons of people with Lapbands through my 10 years with it. There are two kinds of banded patients, those who've had complications and those who WILL have complications!! Lol Talk about thinking something is a flawed system! Haha Lapband is an evil little B!!! Lol

Funniest comment ever...

My LapBand slipped and it's all Obama's fault!!!!

Here's my "band vet" take on LapBands! lol
Bands can work well if you find your "sweet spot" with fills. I did with my first band and lost 80 of the 100 I wanted to lose. But like a lot of people, despite my success, I ended up with complications in time (2.5 years out for me). I had a removal because my erosions from my slip were so bad. Over the year I was without the band, I gained back all 80 I had lost, plus another 20. I never put in the real effort to change my eating habits or deal with my head, so once restriction was gone, so was all of my success!
When I was rebanded in 2006 (unfortunately for me, still a pre-sleeve popularity time), I had a different size and brand of LapBand. It was supposed to be "better" or "more effective" and "safer." I didn't have complications with that one for almost 5 years, but never came close to finding my "sweet spot" either. I would either throw up everything regularly, or have what felt like zero restriction, no matter how many adjustments I got. It was insanely frustrating. Eventually my over eating/tight band, led to chronic prolapse and dilation. I emptied healed (3 months) and slowly refilled 3 times. But after all of that, almost a year later and at my highest weight (probably ever), I decided that I wanted my band out! I didn't even realize I could revise at the time, but through researching a self pay doctor to remove my band, I learned about the sleeve.
I know you and I have talked about this before nursebarbie, but I do believe that part of the failure of my 2nd band was my fault, as well as the regain in between. Yes, it is absolutely a flawed system that fails more people than it helps. And yes, my band likely would have failed to some degree no matter what I did. BUT, I was 18 when my band was placed. I wasn't educated about WLS the way I should have been, and didn't understand the many aspects that need to come together for its success. I expected it to be the magic solution that a lot of people (wrongly) assume all WLS is. I didn't make the changes I should have. I didn't change my lifestyle. I did the same things and even ate the same things, just less of them. I didn't add exercise or learn about nutrition or the way our body processes different foods. I never tracked food (or even thought of it). I kept the junk food in my life which meant that when I needed/wanted that fix, I loaded up on slider foods. And when I couldn't get that sweet spot, and all I could eat were sliders, I didn't go back to my doctor and try and really address my issues the way I should have. I was naive and scared that I would be adjusted down even more, and that less restriction would make things even worse. Even though the reality is that with a lapband, sometimes people actually need less restriction to avoid major complications and even just to be more successful. I always wonder how my path would have been different if I hadn't been so fearful of losing some of that (too tight) restriction. I believe it still wouldn't have been what I needed, but looking back, I'm still curious what might have been different had I not had that fear and just fully trusted in what my surgeon suggested.
Instead, I stayed too tight. I found myself borderline bulimic. I was eating awful foods and justifying eating more, because I was getting stuck and throwing up half of my meal so often. And even worse, it WORKED! I would go with this awful mentality for a few months and drop weight eating crap foods as I wished and "lucking out" because I got stuck and puked so often. Eventually the slider foods would lead me to gain it all back of course, but I followed a yo-yo weight pattern the entire time I had that second band.
Again, I share plenty of blame with the band itself. That evil little thing made truly healthy eating, darn near impossible!! Lean dense Protein? F that. I might as well have just throw it in the toilet and saved myself from playing middle man. Fruits and veggies?! Nope!! No way. Maybe if I cooked the hell out of the veggies and put enough butter on them that they'd slide down, sure. But raw veggies? Fruits in anything other than cooked form like jams, cobblers and pies?! All instantly stuck.
But when it came down to it, I relied purely on that flawed system to be some magic cure. I wasn't proactive and didn't make life changes along with it. So I really do believe that it's a shared failure!!
While I would NEVER recommend the band to anyone, I also don't regret my time with it. It showed me my own flaws and helped me to know what I was really going to need to do to make my sleeve work for me. It kept me from jumping into another WLS uneducated, with rose colored glasses on. This sleeve can be easy sometimes and other times, its hard as hell. I pushed myself to implement those life changes BEFORE my revision. After my band was emptied, I lost half of my total (63lbs), before I even had my revision surgery. I changed my diet to the foods I had avoided for fear or being "stuck" for the last 10 years. I felt like a new person just without Fluid in my band. I know that long term, I would still have faced problems with volume eating (my real base problem), but I was able to stay motivated, knowing "help was on the way."
The sleeve has helped me take that new lifestyle and be successful in reaching over halfway to my goal. And there are still days, post revision, when I want to load up on carbs and crap, and I very easily could, justifying that its ok, because I'll eat so much less of it. But I don't. And part of why I don't, is because of my experience with my band, and learning the hard way that restriction really is just part of a successful equation!!!

I for one thank you for that long post, it really is insightful for those of us that have not had the band. I'm sure it also rings true for the ones that have had the misfortune of having one.

Here's my "band vet" take on LapBands! lol
Bands can work well if you find your "sweet spot" with fills. I did with my first band and lost 80 of the 100 I wanted to lose. But like a lot of people, despite my success, I ended up with complications in time (2.5 years out for me). I had a removal because my erosions from my slip were so bad. Over the year I was without the band, I gained back all 80 I had lost, plus another 20. I never put in the real effort to change my eating habits or deal with my head, so once restriction was gone, so was all of my success!
When I was rebanded in 2006 (unfortunately for me, still a pre-sleeve popularity time), I had a different size and brand of LapBand. It was supposed to be "better" or "more effective" and "safer." I didn't have complications with that one for almost 5 years, but never came close to finding my "sweet spot" either. I would either throw up everything regularly, or have what felt like zero restriction, no matter how many adjustments I got. It was insanely frustrating. Eventually my over eating/tight band, led to chronic prolapse and dilation. I emptied healed (3 months) and slowly refilled 3 times. But after all of that, almost a year later and at my highest weight (probably ever), I decided that I wanted my band out! I didn't even realize I could revise at the time, but through researching a self pay doctor to remove my band, I learned about the sleeve.
I know you and I have talked about this before nursebarbie, but I do believe that part of the failure of my 2nd band was my fault, as well as the regain in between. Yes, it is absolutely a flawed system that fails more people than it helps. And yes, my band likely would have failed to some degree no matter what I did. BUT, I was 18 when my band was placed. I wasn't educated about WLS the way I should have been, and didn't understand the many aspects that need to come together for its success. I expected it to be the magic solution that a lot of people (wrongly) assume all WLS is. I didn't make the changes I should have. I didn't change my lifestyle. I did the same things and even ate the same things, just less of them. I didn't add exercise or learn about nutrition or the way our body processes different foods. I never tracked food (or even thought of it). I kept the junk food in my life which meant that when I needed/wanted that fix, I loaded up on slider foods. And when I couldn't get that sweet spot, and all I could eat were sliders, I didn't go back to my doctor and try and really address my issues the way I should have. I was naive and scared that I would be adjusted down even more, and that less restriction would make things even worse. Even though the reality is that with a lapband, sometimes people actually need less restriction to avoid major complications and even just to be more successful. I always wonder how my path would have been different if I hadn't been so fearful of losing some of that (too tight) restriction. I believe it still wouldn't have been what I needed, but looking back, I'm still curious what might have been different had I not had that fear and just fully trusted in what my surgeon suggested.
Instead, I stayed too tight. I found myself borderline bulimic. I was eating awful foods and justifying eating more, because I was getting stuck and throwing up half of my meal so often. And even worse, it WORKED! I would go with this awful mentality for a few months and drop weight eating crap foods as I wished and "lucking out" because I got stuck and puked so often. Eventually the slider foods would lead me to gain it all back of course, but I followed a yo-yo weight pattern the entire time I had that second band.
Again, I share plenty of blame with the band itself. That evil little thing made truly healthy eating, darn near impossible!! Lean dense Protein? F that. I might as well have just throw it in the toilet and saved myself from playing middle man. Fruits and veggies?! Nope!! No way. Maybe if I cooked the hell out of the veggies and put enough butter on them that they'd slide down, sure. But raw veggies? Fruits in anything other than cooked form like jams, cobblers and pies?! All instantly stuck.
But when it came down to it, I relied purely on that flawed system to be some magic cure. I wasn't proactive and didn't make life changes along with it. So I really do believe that it's a shared failure!!
While I would NEVER recommend the band to anyone, I also don't regret my time with it. It showed me my own flaws and helped me to know what I was really going to need to do to make my sleeve work for me. It kept me from jumping into another WLS uneducated, with rose colored glasses on. This sleeve can be easy sometimes and other times, its hard as hell. I pushed myself to implement those life changes BEFORE my revision. After my band was emptied, I lost half of my total (63lbs), before I even had my revision surgery. I changed my diet to the foods I had avoided for fear or being "stuck" for the last 10 years. I felt like a new person just without Fluid in my band. I know that long term, I would still have faced problems with volume eating (my real base problem), but I was able to stay motivated, knowing "help was on the way."
The sleeve has helped me take that new lifestyle and be successful in reaching over halfway to my goal. And there are still days, post revision, when I want to load up on carbs and crap, and I very easily could, justifying that its ok, because I'll eat so much less of it. But I don't. And part of why I don't, is because of my experience with my band, and learning the hard way that restriction really is just part of a successful equation!!!

Paul, I love your posts, both here and in the Facebook group. As a 10 year lapband vet (and recent revision), I've been down that road and see people headed there themselves and I cringe. I know exactly where that train leads and I refuse to enable. I refuse to act like those mind sets and habits aren't detrimental to any WLS. I HAD those mindsets and I kept those habits through 10 years with my band. I wasn't part of an online community then, and I didn't have the "A*holes" telling me to knock it off and do MY part to make surgery work for me. I had "supportive friends" who told me to "listen to my body" and encouraged me that I was eating "so much less" of those bad foods, so it wasn't a big deal. I am part of a community this time around, and I am so thankful for the A*holes. The ones who refused to let me do this without hearing all the darkest parts and who would smack bad foods out of my hand if I fell back to those habits now. It's a*holes like you who made me understand where I went wrong and what I had to do this time, to be successful. At only 2.5 months out, I'm nowhere near a sleeve vet, but I suppose I am a "WLS vet" and now I'm an a*hole myself, when needed. I wish someone had been for me the first time around. Who knows how things could be different for me now. Took me a while to get here, but I couldn't be more thankful to the a*holes like you!!!

Here's my "band vet" take on LapBands! lol
Bands can work well if you find your "sweet spot" with fills. I did with my first band and lost 80 of the 100 I wanted to lose. But like a lot of people, despite my success, I ended up with complications in time (2.5 years out for me). I had a removal because my erosions from my slip were so bad. Over the year I was without the band, I gained back all 80 I had lost, plus another 20. I never put in the real effort to change my eating habits or deal with my head, so once restriction was gone, so was all of my success!
When I was rebanded in 2006 (unfortunately for me, still a pre-sleeve popularity time), I had a different size and brand of LapBand. It was supposed to be "better" or "more effective" and "safer." I didn't have complications with that one for almost 5 years, but never came close to finding my "sweet spot" either. I would either throw up everything regularly, or have what felt like zero restriction, no matter how many adjustments I got. It was insanely frustrating. Eventually my over eating/tight band, led to chronic prolapse and dilation. I emptied healed (3 months) and slowly refilled 3 times. But after all of that, almost a year later and at my highest weight (probably ever), I decided that I wanted my band out! I didn't even realize I could revise at the time, but through researching a self pay doctor to remove my band, I learned about the sleeve.
I know you and I have talked about this before nursebarbie, but I do believe that part of the failure of my 2nd band was my fault, as well as the regain in between. Yes, it is absolutely a flawed system that fails more people than it helps. And yes, my band likely would have failed to some degree no matter what I did. BUT, I was 18 when my band was placed. I wasn't educated about WLS the way I should have been, and didn't understand the many aspects that need to come together for its success. I expected it to be the magic solution that a lot of people (wrongly) assume all WLS is. I didn't make the changes I should have. I didn't change my lifestyle. I did the same things and even ate the same things, just less of them. I didn't add exercise or learn about nutrition or the way our body processes different foods. I never tracked food (or even thought of it). I kept the junk food in my life which meant that when I needed/wanted that fix, I loaded up on slider foods. And when I couldn't get that sweet spot, and all I could eat were sliders, I didn't go back to my doctor and try and really address my issues the way I should have. I was naive and scared that I would be adjusted down even more, and that less restriction would make things even worse. Even though the reality is that with a lapband, sometimes people actually need less restriction to avoid major complications and even just to be more successful. I always wonder how my path would have been different if I hadn't been so fearful of losing some of that (too tight) restriction. I believe it still wouldn't have been what I needed, but looking back, I'm still curious what might have been different had I not had that fear and just fully trusted in what my surgeon suggested.
Instead, I stayed too tight. I found myself borderline bulimic. I was eating awful foods and justifying eating more, because I was getting stuck and throwing up half of my meal so often. And even worse, it WORKED! I would go with this awful mentality for a few months and drop weight eating crap foods as I wished and "lucking out" because I got stuck and puked so often. Eventually the slider foods would lead me to gain it all back of course, but I followed a yo-yo weight pattern the entire time I had that second band.
Again, I share plenty of blame with the band itself. That evil little thing made truly healthy eating, darn near impossible!! Lean dense Protein? F that. I might as well have just throw it in the toilet and saved myself from playing middle man. Fruits and veggies?! Nope!! No way. Maybe if I cooked the hell out of the veggies and put enough butter on them that they'd slide down, sure. But raw veggies? Fruits in anything other than cooked form like jams, cobblers and pies?! All instantly stuck.
But when it came down to it, I relied purely on that flawed system to be some magic cure. I wasn't proactive and didn't make life changes along with it. So I really do believe that it's a shared failure!!
While I would NEVER recommend the band to anyone, I also don't regret my time with it. It showed me my own flaws and helped me to know what I was really going to need to do to make my sleeve work for me. It kept me from jumping into another WLS uneducated, with rose colored glasses on. This sleeve can be easy sometimes and other times, its hard as hell. I pushed myself to implement those life changes BEFORE my revision. After my band was emptied, I lost half of my total (63lbs), before I even had my revision surgery. I changed my diet to the foods I had avoided for fear or being "stuck" for the last 10 years. I felt like a new person just without Fluid in my band. I know that long term, I would still have faced problems with volume eating (my real base problem), but I was able to stay motivated, knowing "help was on the way."
The sleeve has helped me take that new lifestyle and be successful in reaching over halfway to my goal. And there are still days, post revision, when I want to load up on carbs and crap, and I very easily could, justifying that its ok, because I'll eat so much less of it. But I don't. And part of why I don't, is because of my experience with my band, and learning the hard way that restriction really is just part of a successful equation!!!

Right?! Just couldn't help myself!! Lol
But seriously, the LapBand is the devil. I know tons of people with Lapbands through my 10 years with it. There are two kinds of banded patients, those who've had complications and those who WILL have complications!! Lol Talk about thinking something is a flawed system! Haha Lapband is an evil little B!!! Lol

My LapBand slipped and it's all Obama's fault!!!!

I'm a nurse also, and most nurses and doctors that I know are for it.