whippledaddy

A person is who they are on the INSIDE. A MAN loves a woman for who she is. No matter how the outside changes, he will love her, because she is still there, on the inside. It is so heartening to hear these stories that you gals really do realize that a man who loves you for you, is a rare and special thing. And a woman who loves her man that way is equally as rare. My life kind of sucks, right now, but I sure got a good woman, one whom I love whether she is thick, or thin, or well, or sick as she is now. This is a great thread.

don't know if I could survive another feminine remedy, Donali. Especially if it involves candles and Kenny G music.

It shrunk from all the water.

Hello!!!!!!!!!!! Glad to see you're back. We missed you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

People taking baths together. Others looking for underwear, while you're wearing it! Oh my, what has this place come to? I hope it never changes.

Today is the third day in a row of a nagging headache. I don't usually have headaches. It took me three days to realize what was going on. The pain starts in my shoulders and neck, and comes up and around the back of my head. Oh, yeah, that's right, a stress headache. In a twisted kind of way I take a stress headache as an NSV. I never used to get them. And I bet I wouldn't have one now if I could go to my kitchen and graze. I can simulate grazing, but it's only a nibble. I can't reach that mindless state of carb and fat laden fullness any more. So, I must find a way to cope. I've lost my drug. This headache is a sort of withdrawal. I don't like the headache, but I am amused by it. So, here I am, trying to keep busy, trying to dispel the stress another way. I'll be up late if anyone wants to talk.

If you accidentally drink bathwater, that bubble bath stuff sure does take care of some other band problems, if ya know what I mean. No, my headaches better. I think. Yeah. It's better. Yup. Real good. I am headache free. Yes.

A woman is sleeping on the sofa, with her mouth wide open. Her husband tiptoes up to her and drops two aspirin in her mouth. She wakens and splutters "Ugh! What was that?" "Aspirin" He answers. "Why did you put aspirin in my mouth?" she asks. "For your headache, dear" Hubby states. "But I don't have a headache" She contends. "Finally!"

Hmmmmmm............... Do they make Hulk thongs for guys? One look at that and nobody would need surgery to lose weight. Might put 'em off there feed forever! But, what if I put on a thong, and can't find it later? Uggggh.

I stayed with my wife as she lost 271 pounds. Was I frightened? You bet. But I took a vow, I meant it then, and I mean it now. We've been through some trying times in our sixteen years together, the last four perhaps the most trying. Now she's standing by me as I lose weight. She feels the same way about her vows. We've both been married before. We took those vows seriously, too. We didn't seek the divorce. In each case, our spouse dumped us. People marry for all the wrong reasons. They have no incentive to marry for the right ones. Everything in our society is disposable, and our word, once given will not be held by law. If you make bad financial choices, you can file bankruptcy. What is that but a kind of divorce from your obligations? There are times it's necessary, I've been close myself, and if I ever have to, I will. And if you marry poorly the law lets you get out of your promises. But the vows of marriage are made to your spouse, your Higher Power, and, most importantly, to yourself. And where is love? Everyone asks. What about love? Where was it when we got married? Where could it go? There have been many times when I did not love my wife. But I have always been in love with my wife. Times when I was so angry and defeated that all I wanted to do was quit. But I had given my word, and, though I sure didn't love her in those moments, I was in love with her through it all. And what's wrong with that? For better or worse. I promised. Should I go back on that? Richer or poorer, should I rationalize my pronouncement? In sickness and in health, should I say that I didn't realize just how bad it could get, taking care of someone this sick? There's another phrase, and I think it should be added to the marriage vows in these modern times. "Through thick and thin". For, you see, I love her, and herself is all she can ever be. I hope you don't let the statistics color how you feel. I hope you don't let them affect you or your marriage. Your spouse may need some special attention. He may start feeling threatened. He may feel you are getting far too desireable to others. Don't let him succumb to his insecurities. He can PM me, or email me if you like. I've been there, I'll talk to him. As you lose, you will get happier, easier to live with, more energetic for your mate. That should please him, especially the latter. Just my two cents. I think the greatest counselling in the world is to make a firm comittment to LISTEN to each other. The Dalai Lama once asked "After a journey of a thousand miles, you encounter an enemy. Of what must you be sure?" "That you did not make the journey"

Help!!!!!!!!!! I got this thread all mixed up with the Water Challenge thread and drank all the bathwater. Sorry Donali.

Headache's much better. And I feel so soft!

Ahhhh......Ummmmm........Whippledaddy looks around redfaced. Shifts in his chair. Stares at the computer screen. Is it hot in here?

We grew up poor. Our Christmases were never about the presents, there was no giant windfall of brightly wrapped gifts under our scruffy little tree. But it's lights, though few, shone with angelic brilliance, and what little fruit it did bear, meager as it was, seemed to be the bounty of kings. This was because of my Mother, a woman who knew how to keep Christmas, and how to keep it well. All of Santa's gifts to me were hand made. Some were just for fun, but most were practical, and just what I needed at the time. He always knew when I needed more warm socks and gloves. And he seemed to manifest a muffler just as my old one wore out. Now as I look back I realize just how poor my parents were. My heart goes out to them for the sacrifices they made to give me a good life, and to make me feel loved, and to show and tell me that I was special. Mother was a magician. She could turn a few hard earned dollars into a royal feast, trade some time and sweat in for presents for her sons and husband. She loved to give, but she knew the real gifts of Christmas didn't come in boxes, however brightly adorned. She knew how to bestow those gifts on a little boy in the country, how to give them so that he unwrapped the truth in them. Each year, just before my bedtime on Christmas Eve, she would put on her coat, and bid me to put on mine. And we would step out our front door, and she would give me the first gift of the Season, and, in so doing, pass on to me a tradition I carry on to this very day, some forty odd years later. Outside, in Michigan's bitter nighttime, she would stand, leaning slightly forward, eyes cast upward at the sky. I would speak, and a kind, yet work worn, hand would lift a single finger to her lips: "Shhh". Then I, too, would take her stance of listening. That first night I must have looked at her like she was crazy, standing in her snow bound front yard in the middle of the night, listening to something I could not hear. She looked back at me and said "Can't you hear it?" I strained harder. We stood there shivering and listening, and hearing nothing in the physical sense. But I heard it. At first it was faint, as subtle as the beating of my own heart. It was silence. It was profound silence. It was the silence of Christmas Eve. No cars were traveling the streets and roads, there was no reason then, no stores open, no crazed search for the last minute gift. It was silence screaming in my ear the sure and sound knowledge that all was well. "What do you hear?" She asked. There were no words for a little boy to use to explain just what it was. I heard no birds singing, I heard no engines running, I heard no trains, or planes, or the drone of the nearby factories. Yet I knew she expected an answer: "Magic" I replied. No clumsy words of mine can tell you what you hear on that Silent Night each year. But every Christmas Eve, just before I go to bed, I step outside, and shivering and shuddering I look Heavenward, and lean out just a bit, and strain my ear to hear the nothingness. It takes longer to hear it now. I am further from childhood each year, and everyone knows magic can be heard easiest by children. Also there are always cars roaring, trucks rumbling, people talking. The twenty four hour gas station on the corner sends out waves of light and noise. Christmas Eve isn't enough reason to close any more, and it's just enough of a reason to venture out for the last minute gift. But it's there, the stillness of this night. Just beyond the human ear, just beyond our noise and light, is the Silent Night. Finally I hear the silence, the magic that only this night brings. And, I remember the woman who bore me, gave me life, and passed on her quiet wisdom to me, (and a joy in Christmas that can't be bought or sold). I stand alone to listen now, as I have for the last twenty years. At least no one looking could see anyone beside me. I don't feel alone. Not at all. And as I remember why I'm out there, shivering in my front yard, I smile through my tears.

A husband comes home from work to find his wife standing in the front hallway, totally nude, admiring her body in the mirror. "What are you doing?" he asked. "Well, when I was at the doctor's today he told me I have a great body for a woman my age." The husband smiled and slapped her on the bottom. "He didn't say anything about that big ass of yours?" She continued to look in the mirror. "No, dear, you weren't mentioned at all."

When Life is good you are at goal. Congratulations! I know we all love you right back. We'll keep an eye out for you here, and I'll email. I understand just how hard it can be to delete the PM's.

Nancy, I too, in my life have noticed how many obese people had abuse, or otherwise abnormally stressfull childhoods. I'm convinced that as the years go by, and as science stops laughing at fat jokes, and studying as the disease it is, they will find a correlation between childhood abuse and obesity. And the food insecurity thing is interesting, too. I was sixteen and working in my first restaurant before I realized that, to the world around me, a meal consisted of protien, starch and veggies. We often had fried mush, or pancakes, or some other high carb dinner.

I read these posts, and I cry, as I nod my head, alone at the computer. Here I am, as expertly descibed in the posts of others as in my own. No matter how we differ, we have each lived a bit of each other's lives. We have journeyed in each other's moccasins. For, whether you are boy, or girl. Tall or short, from the East, West, North, South, or the great Middle. Other countries, other continents. No matter who or what you are, or where you hail from, prejudice and cruelty is the same. We can lose the weight. We've proven it, time and again. Fat is the symptom. How we deal with food is the disease. Why we eat, not what or how, or even how much, is the problem. Food is my drug of choice. Always has been. I eat to ease the pain of a heart broken by the cruel words of a friend. I eat to Celebrate even the smallest of life's victories. You know why there is so much food during the Holidays? 'Cause if we didn't eat to comfort ourselves the stress would make our heads explode. I want to eat right now. I'm full. My band won't let me eat much. But I feel it. An urge to masticate and ingest edible materials. There is no hunger save the uncertain yearning of a troubled heart. Two things save me from going on a refrigerator clearing feeding frenzy. 1: The band. The wonderful band. It is my silicone parent who says, "You've had enough, now honey" 2. My LapBandTalk brothers and sisters. The greatest, most supportive, caring and truly understanding family in the world. Thank you for being you. You have saved my life. Today I am off my diabetic medicine. Today my knees didn't hurt. Today I wore a pair of pants hung at the back of the closet long ago. Today my step was a little lighter, as was my heart. When I came here I didn't know if I wanted WLS or not. And, if I did, I sure didnt' know which one to pick. Thank you. You didn't sell me on the Band, you sold me on the people, this place, the support system that it constitutes. So, because of you all, my relationship with food has changed. For, though the siren of gormandry calls me, even if I fail in my fight, and answer that call, my tool inside keeps the damage to a minimum. It gives me a chance to regroup for the morrow. To fall back and try again with new light of day. Food still calls. It tears at me all the time. But when I do eat, I feel full sooner. I feel full longer. I seem to crave protiens and veggies over sweets...........most of the time. So I know it will always be there. Somewhere at the back of my consciousness, like an old lover whose memory just won't fade. But I finally have help. I can do this. And so can you.

My only regret is that I didn't do it earlier. Of course I've never had cause to regret anything I have ever done. My only regrets are the chances NOT taken.

I need to vent, and this is the only place I could think of. Attention Health Care Providers. If you wonder why people sometimes seem unreasonable or edgy, maybe this will give you some insight. Monday, 9:10 PM: Patty falls, bumping her head and using her arms to break her fall. Bad idea with the right arm. Re-injures and flares up RSD. Ambulance comes as she is unable to get up even with my help. Ambulance worker, after having been briefed by me on her tunneled epidural catheter steps on same while lifting her onto stretcher, pulling it out of it's spot in her spine. Hospital takes x-rays of cervical spine to see if catheter is dislodged. No one at hospital can tell. She is sent home about 2:00 AM. I stay up with her and tend to her pain, giving her toradol shots and back rubs. I go to work that morning. Tuesday 7:30 PM. I arrive home from work only to find her in terrible pain. I call our home nurse's answering service. Recieve a call back in about an hour. Wrong nurse. Call answering service back. Recieve a call back in about a half an hour. Wrong nurse again. I give up on visiting nurse, and call the hospital. Ask who's on call for our family doc. Hospital won't page them as they don't think it's an emergency. Call family doc at home, ask him to call the stuck up switchboard person at hospital and tell them it IS an emergency. He does. They call the doc on call, Patty gets some meds to get her through until morning. Go to sleep in chair at 11:00 PM. Wake up at 1:00 AM, give Patty toradol shot, massage. Stay up rest of night. 8:00 AM up and call doctors at Cleveland Clinic for evaluation on her catheter, is it displaced? Only I get a recording telling me they don't open until 8:00 AM. Call back at eight fifteen, and eight thirty, and eight forty five. Call the main number and complain. Am told that the office hadn't taken their phone off of Night Answer. 9:00 AM call doctors office in Cleveland again, told doc can't be reached but will call back. 10:30 AM call doctor's office in Cleveland again, am told that I should have been called an hour ago by the home nurse who is on the way to our house. She should have already been there already as it is only a forty minute drive. 11:30 AM put in call to Home care company asking when ETA of nurse is, am promised a call back. Nurse calls, says she'll be here about 1:00PM. She has to locate a babysitter first. Nurse comes and assesses situation with catheter. She doesn't think it's displaced. Then she looks at it again and thinks it is. Calls family doc and asks that an anesthesiologist read the x-rays of her neck from Monday night. She leaves. 2:30 PM, we call doc's office and ask if the films have been read yet. Are told that they have been, and although they can't tell for sure we should go on the assumption that the catheter has moved. Must be tended to as quickly as possible as it could cause nerve damage. Ask doc to call the Walk In Clinic and order pain meds IM. He says he will do so immediately. We get in the car and go to the clinic, stopping at the bank to draw out cash for tomorrow's rocket run to Cleveland. We use the cell phone to make appt with pain doc in Cleveland while enroute to clinic. 3:00PM, arrive at the Walk In Clinic for pain shot. Doc hasn't called yet. Clinic calls Doc and gets order. Now clinic must send out for drugs as narcs aren't kept on premises. 4:30 PM Patty finally gets a pain shot. Now we have to get home, pack bags, and get ready to drive the three hundred miles to Cleveland tomorrow. If all those medical professionals could have pulled their collective thumbs out of their butts long enough to CALL BACK when promised, we could have gone down today, and back tomorrow. Now Patty has to endure an extra day of pain, and an extra day of possible nerve damage. And I must take yet another personal day at work. And, each phone call I had to explain what a tunnelled epidural catheter was, and each phone call I had to explain what RSD was, and each time I had to tell the whole story of the fall and ambulance trip. Everyone has all info on computer, and charts, and no desire to read or use those tools. Well, haven't had good sleep in several nights, gotta get up and drive tomorrow, three hundred miles. Should go to bed. Thanks, I feel better. Had to shout this out of my system. Sometimes I wonder how any of our systems work, they've gotten so large, so clumsy. Sorry that it had nothing to do with the band. Now that I'm over being mad, I'd like to just sit down, forget about being macho for a moment and just cry until I dehydrated. G'night.

Well, my Mom was, at least, a good cook. She passed on those cooking skills to me, and I built on them. So there has been good with the bad. And my parents were usually loving and supportive, I didn't know then just how poor we were. She did wonders with very little, and the food wasn't the nightmare you had to eat. So I got the uneaten leftovers when I wouldn't eat the crust of the bread, or wouldn't eat my veggies. I now understand they couldn't waste any food, or anything else. All of my clothes were home made, and they looked it. My sneakers were patched. I didn't even see the kids on assistance with patched sneakers! My parents were the type of people who, when they had to file bankruptcy, paid the bills anyway. And, wow, this thread really is great isn't it? It's opening so many doors for me to contemplate this part of my life. Edwin always wore white shirts and black pants. My mom always made me wear white shirts and black pants. I've always worked in food service where you are expected to wear..............white shirt and black pants. That's even my uniform at the prison. White shirt and black pants. I refuse to wear either on my day off. Wanna know what really decided me on the LapBand? I looked in the mirror at my heaviest (366) and saw Edwin. I knew I had to fight back. I didn't want to die this way, and I sure as Hell didn't want to die as an Edwin clone! My Mom wasn't crazy, thank God. It's a tribute to your strength that you are so together. Mom was from a different time, with a different mindset. This is the same woman who taught me to enjoy Christmas without spending one cent. This is the woman who always cheered me on in everything I tried. Everyone fails sooner or later. My Mom failed to listen when I tried to tell her about my babysitters. But if she had listened............... she would have gone ballistic. Mary Ann and Edwin wouldn't have seen the light of the very next day. But I, too, stood out at school. And not in a good way. I was fat, and my Momma dressed me funny. I was nerdy. I was in the "brain" clique. I was a target. A large, hard to miss one, at that. I learned to fight. I worked at very physical labor, so when I beat even the jocks, they left me alone. I didn't get respect, though. They were just afraid of being beaten up. It took me a long time to learn that the only person I needed to get respect from.........was myself. I agree. My food obsessions and compulsions will always be with me. I hope that they will become like the drone of a fan, or the sounds the fridge makes, I hear them, but don't listen. I know they will always be droning at the back of my mind. They are there now. Cajoling. Begging. Wheedling. Demanding. I have met the enemy (And like Pogo) I realize that he is me. Somewhere, crouching in the dark, tired of hurting, and afraid of hurting more, is a small nine year old boy. He's pleading with me to just give them all what they want. Eat it. Eat it all. Don't gag, or choke, or puke. Just get it down, quick as possible. For a time he'll feel safe. The food has been dealt with. But wait, there's more food, food that hasn't been eaten. Food in the pantry, food in the fridge. He wants to get it all eaten, so the fear will end. I hate a full refrigerator. I love an empty pantry. A can of peas, is all I want in there. No chicken noodle soup. If it ain't there I don't need to eat it. But, of course the stores have more. And they don't run out. If this post sounds a little crazy, it's because it's about a crazy subject. But it's healing. I'll dig deeper. If I can get to the little boy I'll tell him about a story I wrote. A story about two baby sitters, and how they tortured a boy about food. Used painful sex to punish him when he didn't eat. Then they got old, and they went to a nursing home to live. And who took care of them? Why that little boy, all grown up. He fed them every day. And he smiled as he did. And when mealtime came their eyes filled with fear. And they promised not to do those things to anyone, ever again. Maybe that story will calm the little boy, and he can let the man he became live a better life.

Thanks Pat. I know. And when I take the time to remind myself, good things happen!

She's home! She's in no pain 'cause they got her on enough Morphine to stun a Beluga Whale! But it is only temporary, until Dr. B in Cleveland can re-evaluate her position and make his next move. If it can be done, he will do it. Yeah, I get kind of tired of some of the people in health care. But, they're not really bad people, they're just in the mindset of doing a job. If you don't maintain some impersonality in Health Care then your emotions will eat you alive, you'll burn out, and you'll be replaced by a real troglodyte. I get tired of the unreturned calls, people who don't listen to what you're saying, people who do procedure and common sense be damned. Case in point: at the hospital they insisted on putting the little wrist band thingy on Patty's right arm. It's the right arm that has the RSD. Principal symptom of RSD is intractable pain of the entire limb, starting at the skin. I asked the lady "If her right arm was covered with third degree burns would you still insist on putting the band on it?" "NO" she replied. Patiently I said "When you have RSD that's what your skin feels like all the time. Like you had a third degree burn. Can't you please move the band to the left hand? Are you here to ease pain, or promote it?" I got through, and because she was a GOOD person and didn't want to add to someone's pain she moved the band to Patty's unaffected limb. That was in the city. Here in the sticks we hire whoever applies, 'cause there ain't no competition. You get the cream with the dross. And you hire them both, because there are slots to fill, and a warm body is a warm body. But I do agree on documentation. I may need it someday. I hope not. But if it ever does get too bad, they will find me a formidable enemy. Don't mess with my lady love. Thanks all for your well wishes. I've been on the road for ten hours, and finished my house work for the day. Gonna go to bed soon.

Wow, what a great thread. The minute I read it, I just knew I had to post. But............I hadn't even thought about my "relationship" with food. But, of course, that's exactly what it is. A relationship. And there are all kinds of relationships. Some are one way, some are wholesome and nurturing. Some are obsessive. Some are compulsive. Food is on my mind most of the time. More than work, more than play. More than sex. My largest hurdle is the unclean plate. My Mom would make us clean our plates. If we didn't then the plate got put back in the fridge and came out at the next meal. If all that was left was two bites of bread crust, and it had turned green from going in and out of the refrigerator, it still got set in front of you instead of everyone else's dinner until you ate it. Technicolor fuzz and all. My Mom didn't know it, but my baby sitter and her brother liked to play games with little Ryan. Mom hired them five nights out of seven. Mary Ann made me the same supper for three years. Toast and grape jelly, with chicken noodle Soup. If I didn't eat it all I was "punished". Said punishment always consisted of me removing all my clothes, then painful things happened. Are your imaginations good enough that I don't have to explain further? I hope so, 'cause I don't really want to go into detail. Not right now. Not here. Some nights Edwin would help his baby sister Mary Ann baby sit me. Edwin didn't make me eat chicken noodle soup, or toast and jelly. Edwin was an expert at getting me to eat other things. Disgusting things. Some I remember, some I don't. Both of these people were very fat. Edwin always wore a white shirt, and black pants. He must have gone six hundred pounds. I have a memory of one night. A night when I couldn't eat what he gave me. He was sitting on a stool in their kitchen, a place that was always dark, no matter how many lights were on. He was sweating, his shirt was untucked, and his pants were undone. He was breathing heavily. "If you tell, no one will believe you. There aren't any marks." They tell kids today about not being touched where your bathing suit covers. Now I can't remember what happened, but I remember that if I had been wearing a bathing suit, everything it covered would have hurt. Now, I didn't tell this for you all to feel sorry for me. Others have been abused, and much worse. I tell this to see if you agree with me. My biggest problem with food is that I absolutely feel that I must clean my plate. I find it so difficult to leave anything on my plate. My Mom, my two sadistic babysitters, made me clean the plate. I never experienced anything positive about not eating it all. Now, I must eat it all. Lately I have let the band help me a little. I have to eat slower, and this gives me time to think. Never before have I eaten slowly enough to let myself think. I think about what was done to me. I get angry. I get defiant. And I leave at least a bite on my plate and throw it away. I don't do it every time. I'm really struggling with eating slowly. For little Ryan, slow was bad. Slow could get you hurt. Eat fast. Don't taste, don't feel, eat fast. This is my way of beating it. This is my way of changing my relationship with food. Of course, I could take what Edwin did to me and go on Fear Factor. "Yeah, I'll eat the plate of lizard brains, no problem. Gimme a cup of Gorilla spit to wash it down." "Hi, I'm food. And what's eating me is Ryan."

How to impress a woman: Be caring and thoughtful. Share your feelings, and be aware of hers. Listen carefully, never criticise, just be there. Buy her flowers for no reason. Be sensitive, and sincere. Always compliment her on her appearance. Give her foot and shoulder massages. How to impress a man: Show up naked. Bring beer.