davidpelletier

My story and associated questions: In February of 2013, I was around 295 pounds and I began my process at that time for a Band surgery. I dropped about twenty pounds over the pre-authorization items and meetings, and then actually had my surgery in August. Over the next year or two, I dropped about 80 pounds in total....but here's the catch. I also had a growth in my family in the way of identical twin boys (children 2 and 3). Three kids are fairly demanding and I wound up getting stuck at meal times more often than not. It was highly unpleasant, fairly painful, and ended up not being helpful to my wife when it knocked me out of commission. When we then found out we were going to have a fourth child, we talked it through and I went through the removal of the band in mid 2016. Fast forward three plus years, and I'm right back to 295. I'm 100% certain we're done growing our family, and I'd like to be done growing my waistline too. I'm contemplating going for a sleeve and wondering if anyone around has had both, or can point me to resources that compare the two. I'm just starting to take this step, so I've done little to no research on this yet, but remember this being a very helpful community back when I was pursuing the band. I look forward to any advice that is available or resources that my be helpful. Additionally, if this topic belongs elsewhere, let me know and I'll move it there. Thanks in advance. ~David.

Name: David Pelletier Goal weight for December 31st: 215 Weight on December 1st: 221.8 Age: 34 City/State: Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for December: Stay on track. Exercise goal for December: Get back to exercising...if I get time Personal goal for December: Get more then three hours of sleep, if the twins let me. Date banded: 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet: ~33 pre-op, ~40 post-op 12/8 Checking in at 222.6. Still not exercising. Still not sleeping much. Just surviving and supporting my family as best I can through our transition.

Name: David Pelletier Goal weight for December 31st: 215 Weight on December 1st: 221.8 Age: 34 City/State: Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for December: Stay on track. Exercise goal for December: Get back to exercising...if I get time Personal goal for December: Get more then three hours of sleep, if the twins let me. Date banded: 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet: ~33 pre-op, ~40 post-op

Name, real or screen~ David Goal weight for November 30th~ 220 Weight on November 1st~ 229.4 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for November~ Need to reboot and get back on track Exercise goal for November - Continue running when I get back into a schedule Personal goal for November~ Bond with my boys (http://bit.ly/1almdKc) Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ 31 pre banding; 35 post banding, Favorite Thanksgiving Activity~ When everyone in my family goes shopping....and I stay home in a quiet house. 11/8 - Checking in at 225.8. Still not on a schedule, so running is out. Boys are doing great! 11/15 - 224.4. Starting to get into a schedule and managed to get three runs in this week. Restarted counting calories and think I'll get my first fill soon. 11/22 - 223.4 Another pound, and got my first fill this week....don't think i'll get to 220 with Thanksgiving coming up, but I'm still losing! 11/30 - 221.8 Didn't hit my goal but I still won!

Where are you looking to have the procedure done and with whom? My surgery coordinator said that everything would be taken care of for my procedure...and I trusted her. There's been some hiccups, and I've received bills that were unexpected, but things are working out okay at this point and I have had most of them "forgiven" at this point. I will say that it has contributed heavily to my soured opinion of the practice and I've considered looking for someone else to go to for long-term follow-ups. With everything else going on for me though, I'll just keep grudgingly going and figure it out some other time when time lets me.

Name, real or screen~ David Goal weight for November 30th~ 220 Weight on November 1st~ 229.4 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for November~ Need to reboot and get back on track Exercise goal for November - Continue running when I get back into a schedule Personal goal for November~ Bond with my boys (http://bit.ly/1almdKc) Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ 31 pre banding; 35 post banding, Favorite Thanksgiving Activity~ When everyone in my family goes shopping....and I stay home in a quiet house. 11/8 - Checking in at 225.8. Still not on a schedule, so running is out. Boys are doing great! 11/15 - 224.4. Starting to get into a schedule and managed to get three runs in this week. Restarted counting calories and think I'll get my first fill soon. 11/22 - 223.4 Another pound, and got my first fill this week....don't think i'll get to 220 with Thanksgiving coming up, but I'm still losing!

I didn't intentionally gain weight, but my story works like this. I started down the path and had a three month wait period. I started at 295 in March 2013, putting my BMI around 41 or so. When I went back for my second visit with my nutritionist, I had already tried to adopt all of the post op eating patterns I would need and started exercising as much as I could. I had lost enough weight at this point to drop my BMI to 37 or so. I did have sleep apnea, so I had a co-morbidity, but my nutritionist and surgery coordinator basically said, "while it's great you're losing weight, if you loose too much more, insurance won't cover you." At that point, I stopped following the post op diet. I stopped exercising. I started eating worse. Basically, I undid everything I tried to do. For my third and final visit, I had actually put on about five more pounds since my second visit. So, while I didn't try to gain weight, I made sure I didn't loose any more, because I did want insurance to foot the bill. After that visit, I tried to get more on task again and (even with an insurance setback) before surgery, I lost about 30 lbs in total. Not exactly what you were asking, but that's about as close as I can get.

Name, real or screen~ David Goal weight for November 30th~ 220 Weight on November 1st~ 229.4 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for November~ Need to reboot and get back on track Exercise goal for November - Continue running when I get back into a schedule Personal goal for November~ Bond with my boys (http://bit.ly/1almdKc) Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ 31 pre banding; 35 post banding, Favorite Thanksgiving Activity~ When everyone in my family goes shopping....and I stay home in a quiet house. 11/8 - Checking in at 225.8. Still not on a schedule, so running is out. Boys are doing great! 11/15 - 224.4. Starting to get into a schedule and managed to get three runs in this week. Restarted counting calories and think I'll get my first fill soon. ~David.

Name, real or screen~ David Goal weight for November 30th~ 220 Weight on November 1st~ 229.4 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for November~ Need to reboot and get back on track Exercise goal for November - Continue running when I get back into a schedule Personal goal for November~ Bond with my boys (http://bit.ly/1almdKc) Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ 31 pre banding; 35 post banding, Favorite Thanksgiving Activity~ When everyone in my family goes shopping....and I stay home in a quiet house. 11/8 - Checking in at 225.8. Still not on a schedule, so running is out. Boys are doing great! ~David.

For me: - Pictures are great....but I'm a numbers guy, so they're only so good. My wife keeps saying that I look great, but I don't stand there and look in a mirror, so pictures are the only thing I see myself in. - I wish I had done measurements as some people will mention. But the one measurement that I regret not having is my body fat percentage. You can obtain one of those little devices that measure your body fat percentage (they're like $25 or less on Amazon). I would love to have seen that number trend as I began losing the weight and began working out a bit more. - Clothes and accessories (hello old belt that is now huge!) are a great indicator. ~David.

Name, real or screen~ David Goal weight for November 30th~ 220 Weight on November 1st~ 229.4 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for November~ Need to reboot and get back on track Exercise goal for November - Continue running when I get back into a schedule Personal goal for November~ Bond with my boys (http://bit.ly/1almdKc) Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ 31 pre banding; 35 post banding, Favorite Thanksgiving Activity~ When everyone in my family goes shopping....and I stay home in a quiet house.

As an update, my new little ones came this week on Tuesday at 38 weeks. Noah Thomas - 10:07 am. 19 inches long and 6 lbs. 8 oz. Mason Patrick - 10:08 am. 20 inches long and 6 lbs. 0.5 oz Mom and boys (and dad and brother) are all doing well. Living in the little hospital bubble at the moment and looking forward to getting home and getting into a schedule of some sort. (I can't post a picture here, but here's a link to one in my dropbox...this should work) https://www.dropbox.com/s/emsy3g9ag27f1v3/2013-10-29%2016.30.31.jpg ~David.

10/1 Name, real or screen~ David Pelletier Goal weight for October 31st~ 220 Weight on October 1st~ 229.6 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for October~ Keep at it. Exercise goal for October~ 5 times a week Personal goal for October~ Spend some times with my son before the twins arrive. Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ pre-op:31, post-op:35 10/8 Checking in at 229.6. Was an up and down week. Doing well on all three goals as well! 10/15 227 this AM 10/22 Another up and down week....checking in again at 227 on the nose. Doing well on all of my goals. Ended up for the month 230.8. Rough week trying to stay on track coming and going in and out of the hospital. Will reboot and refocus for next month. ~David.

If you do, make sure you post reviews! I personally have the Fitbit One, and do enjoy it (as I've posted here a time or three). I like the easy syncing with my phone and the dash boarding to see my levels of activity.....couple that with the integration to myfitnesspal and it's a sound investment in my book. If the Force was available when I was in the market, I'm not sure what I'd have done. ~David.

for eating out, my Dr. actually gave me a card to keep in my wallet basically explaining that I have a band and to let me order whatever I want. I've only used it once, and the server was confused and called the manager over. He apologized for the server, got me my meal and comp'd it too. ~David.

You are in what a vast majority of people on here term "bandster hell". It's normal from what I gather and those of us that DON'T experience this are more of the oddity. I'm sorry you're hungry. Stay the course. Have an extra Protein shake or something....you'll make it! ~David.

I bumped into someone in the kitchen at work whom I've not seen in months. Her reaction was "Where's the other half of you?" While it's only roughly a quarter of my body-weight lost, it's still nice to hear. ~David.

10/1 Name, real or screen~ David Pelletier Goal weight for October 31st~ 220 Weight on October 1st~ 229.6 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for October~ Keep at it. Exercise goal for October~ 5 times a week Personal goal for October~ Spend some times with my son before the twins arrive. Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ pre-op:31, post-op:35 10/8 Checking in at 229.6. Was an up and down week. Doing well on all three goals as well! 10/15 227 this AM 10/22 Another up and down week....checking in again at 227 on the nose. Doing well on all of my goals. ~David.

My go-to meal in that phase was either canned chicken, tuna or salmon (chopped up fine if it wasn't already) and mixed that with part of an avocado. Add in a little salt, pepper and ground mustard for a little zip and that would fill me up and be a great source of Protein. ~David.

10/1 Name, real or screen~ David Pelletier Goal weight for October 31st~ 220 Weight on October 1st~ 229.6 Age~ 34 City/State~ Flemington, NJ Dietary goal for October~ Keep at it. Exercise goal for October~ 5 times a week Personal goal for October~ Spend some times with my son before the twins arrive. Date banded~ 8/6/13 Total weight loss since banding/pre op diet~ pre-op:31, post-op:35 10/8 Checking in at 229.6. Was an up and down week. Doing well on all three goals as well! 10/15 227 this AM ~David.

The Nutribullet has two separate blades, the normal one for chopping.....and then a less violent one for just milling things...exactly like flax seed in bulk or coffee Beans and the like. I use mine every day I commute to work. The two small cups are my perfect Breakfast portion size. Half a cup of skim milk, a cup of ice (as crushed as my fridge spits it out), a scoop of chocolate Protein powder (body fortress) and then one other thing. I've tried peppermint extract (not bad), cocoa powder (not that good), instant decaf coffee (awesome), and most recently PB2 (awesomer!) Pre-op, I used it a lot (lost thirty pounds). Post-op, I used it for the blended phase of the diet and now for breakfast shakes. Long term, I'm not sure it's the best as I think it would be too easy to slip the liquid through the band. I'm reserving judgement for just now. ~David.

First off, congrats on your 20 pounds post op.... Next, and I've posted this before, is that after I committed to the band, I really had to stop thinking of it as cheating. That was something I did when I dieted. Now, I think of it as treating. And after the hard work that we put in, you definitely deserve it. Most of us do this so we can enjoy life more moving forward. Treat yourself once and a while. Allow yourself to enjoy things now and again. Don't beat yourself up. ~David.

The Nike Fuelband is a nice device, sadly, it only works with an iOS device (iPhone, iPad and such). That ruled it out for me. They said for about a year and a half they were going to put out an Android app for it, and then, recanted that and said they were no longer working on it. Also, I wanted to point out that Fitbit officially released their new device today, the Froce (http://www.fitbit.com/force). I'm really interested in seeing what people are going to say about it. The wristband form factor that the Flex provided was very appealing to me, but I had heard that people that talk with their hands a lot, or who don't move their arms when they walk (ie, pushing a stroller or something), were not getting accurate reading from the device. Time will tell. And I still love my One. ~David.

Checking in at 229.6. Was an up and down week. Doing well on all three goals as well! ~David.