kacee

Oh and if you say you are still big.... SIZE is RELATIVE. If I knew someone who was normally 450 pounds and they lost 100 pounds and were waddling around at the stout 350....you BET I would say "HEY SKINNY!!!!" In their eyes they are....and it's relative to how they WERE.

Learn to love it my friend! It is a compliment of the highest order. I get called skinny girl ALL the time at work. All I do is just smile and smile and smile!!!! I mean....DUH.....don't you WANT people to notice you are losing? I sure do! Just short of putting a neon sign over my head that says, "YEP, I'VE LOST ALMOST 60 POUNDS AND I AM PROUD AS PUNCH WITH MYSELF!!!" This is how people who know you and don't know you can go "Way to go kiddo!!!" in just a few short words! We former fatties need to stop getting so darned bent out of shape by what we perceive as every not politically correct comment that comes down the pike. Take it as the compliment it is meant to be and say "YOU BETCHA!" You don't have to say "thank you"....I just say "You betcha and stillworking on it!"

I went crazy on cottage cheese with smushed up avacado mixed in. MMMMMMMMMMMMMM.

Well hey, T's Mom....welcome to ya! You're at the right place and you can arm yourself with all the info you're going to need in your new life. There's someone around every corner here who's been there and done that, and we'll be happy to escort you into BandLand!!!

Welcome and jump on in to the General discussion area! There's loads of useful info here!

And lauraj23 is right....you have to get OVER the diet mentality. This is NOT a diet. This is changing a way of living. There are NO BAD FOODS....just BAD PORTIONS. If you are on mushies and can have some pumpkin pie...by all means do...don't eat the crust because it's too solid now, and smush up the pumpkin filling so it's softer. And then have a few bites! There's nothing wrong with it. The thing is, you won't have it for breakfast, lunch and dinner, in huge amounts, for several days. I have finally realized I CAN tread into these types of foods...but I have to go at it like a "lean person" would handle it.

You just answered my question halfway down your post. As I read what your sister was saying I was thinking, "Oh she HAS to be overweight because she is trying the sabotage routine." Sure enough! IGNORE them. Do not give them ANY power of you or your feelings. If they try to go down that path just do the old, "Hey, you're either with me or "agin" me...I need positive people around me so if you're gonna talk like that this conversation thread is over. On to something else please!"

When I was big, I just ordered 1X and 2X stuff and lived in "big shirts". Hard not to fit in those. Now I am losing I actually find out I am pretty much a normal size. Those items that don't fit, I try to determine if it's worth it to get a size smaller (or larger) and just return them for credit or echange for another size. Going to a regular department store seems really daunting to me still. I LOVE castalogs. Plus I have ordered about 10 pairs of shoes on line and every single one has fit! WOW!

Here's something interesting.... Naturopathyworks - food cravings...

If you have chunks of ice you have too much ice in there and also you may not have a decent blender. For my shakes I put 1 cup skim milk in (first), 1 scoop powder (second), and a "handfull" (probably comes out to about 5 cubes of ice or less) (Last of all, closest to the blender blades). Then I blend on high for about 30 seconds untill the "chunking" sound goes away.

There are still some foods that seem to "burn" for me...salad dressings with vinegar in them are one. You are just getting used to working with more "solid" food. Yes, you will feel discomfort and fullness. The fullness you have is in another place and will take some getting used to to recognize it. Everything is still swollen down there and therefore, not a lot of anything will be going down for a little while. If you feel like you are going to pop, back off on the amount. Take in liquids until you just start to feel the "feeling" of being full and then stop....no matter what you have or have not already taken in. If it appears to come on suddenly then you are drinking too fast (and then everything all of a sudden hits bottom and you are miserable).

There are three things that worked for me in my journey and I will tell you why. 1. I weigh every day...not necessarily to see the weight melting off of me and not expecting a dramatic loss each day but to correlate my weight with what I was doing with my eating habits. 2. I log everything I eat online on a program called FitDay (there are many out there). Weight Watchers always touted this and I always pooh poohed it. NOW I kow why they say to do it. It makes you hypersensitive to what you put in your mouth. As you start out, you are training yourself, your mind, your stomach to be different from the way you were before. This helps you accomplish that. Knowing what you ingest and being able to correlate it with the numbers on the scale is invaluable. When you screw up with the intake and then the scale goes up, you can see it and know EXACTLY what happened and why. Too often I hear people saying "Gosh, I've only lost 3 pounds in 4 months...I just do NOT know WHY." THIS will tell you why. It's not Rocket Science...but it is pure physics. Cause and effect. 3. I set mini-goals. You DO need goals. Goals keep you moving in the right direction. Goals don't mean "Okay, I have to lose 200 pounds." Goals CAN be kinda fun...like I want to lose three pounds in the next three weeks. THOSE kinds of goals. Attainable goals. When you start reaching goals (no matter how silly and small) you get MOTIVATED to do MORE and you start stretching those goals, testing yourself. Without goals you just wallow around making excuses for why things aren't progressing. Success = Progress.

Okay guys, just jump on in and get your feet wet here! We were all newbies once, and I think because of the good experiences we had with folks on the forum who took us by the hand pre-op, we feel we should be available to do the same thing for folks after us. There is no substitute for experience. You're in good "hands."

Welcome Kiddo! We are totally here for you. We've been where you are and walked your walk. As you progress on your journey there will be TONS of folks (no pun intended) ready to take you by the hand and lead you down the path. There is no better teacher than experience.

I commend your surgeon on his recommendation. He can fill you in on the basic mechanics...we can fill you in on everything else he doesn't tell you about. I'm 7 months into my journey and 56, and I have been reborn. I am loving my life.

Okay, Mytggr.....how'd it go?

Sounds like you are keeping on top of things, and it is totally typical not to have restriction for a while when they first start filling you. I had NOTHING until my 3rd restriction and then it was "WHOA!!!! So THAT's what it's supposed to do!!!" If your doc has a flouro, request to be filled with that so they can really dial it in.

The last thing I would ever want to be is someone's "practice patient".

ALWAYS go to the MOST experienced doctor.... there is no substitute for experience. Fifty is not very much. If you are in or around Detroit, you gotta be able to find any number of surgeons way more qualified.

You are not giving up your food. You need to realize that. You are giving up the QUANTITY and PORTIONS of the food that you considered normal. BIG difference. You can eat ANYTHING that can get down, you just have to eat it in sensible amounts. My doctor keeps saying "This is NOT a diet. This is NOT a diet. You can eat anything. You have to eat it sensibly." There are no bad foods...only bad portions. Since I have been banded I have had "death by chocolate" at a restaurant, and all the other things I had pre-band. Difference is I have small amounts and I don't have it every day, every hour. You can eat that hamburger (if you can eat bread eventually)....but what you can NOT do is grab it with both hands and cram it in your mouth and wolf it down in 15 seconds flat...which the the typical MO of us obese people. Lean people eat all the same things WE do....but we just need to learn to eat it the WAY they do.

Why would you not go to the tests? Have you not decided this is what you want? Seems to me that may be the case. Regardless of whether you self-pay or go through insurance you have to submit to all the pre-op tests (blood work, ekg, stress, psych, and whatever else they can think up) before any surgeon worth his salt will touch you with a ten foot pole. Sounds to me like you may need to sit down and do more research to educate yourself...so you are comfortable with your decision.

<p>Yep, I didn't really want to wear one, but I got a bracelet and have it wrapped around the strap of my purse. Now I just have to make sure that when I get run over by the beer truck my purse is by my side.......</p>

Jack, dude. You are the most refreshing person I've ever had the fortune to read. Thank you for injecting your breath of sanity in this insane world...and heaven knows I am right in there with the looneys....:biggrin1:

Apologies from me for being so harsh and I did not mean to be "unnice". The world isn't always nice to us and life isn't a cakewalk. I guess it's because it seems I've read so MANY threads recently from newly banded folks who are barely out of the chute and already saying what a "horrible thing it is" "I want it out" and "I can't do it" and I think this just caught me at the wrong time. I really didn't mean to dump on you, honest. And I do know that things "come up" money wise, to bite you in the butt when you least expect it....the best-laid plans of mice and men, and all that. I guess what you have to do is sit down and assess your situation and start turning around the things you have control over. First to find out what's up with your hubby (I know it's hard to drag info out of them....the male species and communication do not go hand in hand). I wonder if he could be reacting in the predictable way of fear that you will "get better" and "leave him" once you are a "new person". Especially if he is not willing to talk it through...he may not be consciously aware of it or even be able to verbalize it. Anger is an end result of some fear. Getting to the bottom of that will help you in turn be able to cope with the other things in your life that feel out of whack right now. Just like losing weight...don't look at the total picture right now. Compartmentalize your problems, and take them one box at a time....open the box, assess, and strategize on the best way to turn it around, address it and move on to the next one (not the whole bunch). Good luck to you and give it all time, but don't just accept the negative as preordained and get mired in it. It's really easy to fall into a victim mentality and that is such poison to the body. Lord knows we've all been there though...

You sound just like me. I read an ad on the band in a magazine in March. Within three weeks I had a surgery date and was doing huge amounts of research online. I consider myself a success story with the band and I am more than happy...I am THRILLED with what I have accomplished in the last 7 months. My life has changed in unimaginable ways. I work closely with my band and listen to what it tells me. We have a fluid partnership and I think we're working together pretty darned well. Welcome to bandland.