Cocoabean

You've had one of the best results of the band you can have. Improvement of your diabetes. And you do state that you are aware of that. My losses were never at a steady pace. I ticked me off to no end until I realized it is just the way my body works. It fought and fought to hang on to each pound. With tongue in cheek I blame it on my great-grandparents who survived the famine in Ireland. I have one of the most economical metabolisms around. Come the next famine, I am surviving while my DH starves to death! But really, my body would hang on for dear life to the weight and mess with my head for weeks, up 1 down 1, up 2 down 1, stay the same for 2 weeks. Then drop 4. It made no logical sense!!! But at the end of the day, I AVERAGED 3/4 pound per week. Not as much as 'they' say the typical bandster should lose (1-2 pounds per week), but you know what? I have the rest of my life to practice my new eating habits. I decided I didn't care if it took me 5 years to lose it. Being banded isn't a "diet" that we start and hope to end some day. It is a new lifestyle that will be with us forever. Once I realized that overall the trend was going down, I was OK with it. You will learn how your body works. Relax and try not to get on the scale everyday. No small feat I understand.

Yes, my band is my fickle friend named Bandit, because he steals meals from me. What went down yesterday might not go down today. It's just something I've come to accept.

pureed peperoni? That doesn't sound very appetizing. Pureed foods will go through relatively easily. Most people don't feel much restriction until they start getting fills. Before I started getting fills, I could eat pretty much the same amounts as before banding. Stretching the pouch is not an easy thing to do.

I believe diagnosis is through an upper GI and treatment is an unfill. But he is the expert. My surgeon wants to do an upper GI once a year to be sure all is well.

If a life-threatening emergency, insurance will cover the problem. They cover emergencies no matter the cause. If you jump off your roof aiming for your pool in a drunken stupor and miss, they will pay for your care, even though it was a foolhardy thing to do. If not, you will generally have to pay, if you were self-pay to begin with. My insurance covers my after-care and complications, but it doesn't cover any revisions. So, if my band has to come out, they will pay for that. If I want it changed to a bypass, they won't pay for that part.

I feel sorry for the patients that go to this clinic. What kind of aftercare are they going to get? What sort of expectations will the center tell them to have? "'Come on in, get a band, lose weight. No work, no changes to your diet/life style." Bada boom, bada bing. Done. Let us bill your insurance, now go home.Complications? Yeah, call this number...1800-dontcallme! I really wonder what demographic they were going after.

The mushy phase is designed to be part of the healing process. Follow your doctor's orders and take small bites. You will build up confidence as you go. You cannot stay on liquids forever. That's not why you got banded. Take a bite, swallow, wait a few seconds, then take the next bite. If you feel any discomfort at all, don't take another bite until it is gone. You'll do fine.

My first slime/stuck was at the county fair. I am NOT admitting to what I ate. But 'twas great fun sliming and carrying around wads of paper towels in hordes of people unsure of what was happening. Then it hit me...OMG...I am STUCK! You IDIOT!

As we heal from the surgery our bodies return to "normal" we feel like we did prior to surgery. If you weren't given any fill at surgery time, you'll feel hungry! It's like you didn't have WLS. You find yourself wondering what the heck you did to yourself. Bypassers lose very quickly at first. They have great motivation to begin their journey. We don't always. After I was returned to solids, my surgeon didn't expect any losses from me until I started getting fills and getting the benefit of this tool. Fluids go right through the band. If your swelling is gone, that explains why Water goes right down. Even with good restriction, I can drink Clear liquids as fast as I want. We are told to sip, sip, sip at first due to swelling. Hunger is a physiological function. Don't beat yourself up for being hungry. 3 days post-op I was eye-balling my dog I was so hungry. Keep your chin up. Keep healing. It gets better. Just follow your doctor's orders and heal up.

2 rules for me, do NOT eat while distracted and do NOT eat while driving (see first rule). To try to drive while stuck is just plain dangerous. Personally, I find eating while driving gross. My pet peeve (well, one of many) is to see someone driving along shoving a cheeseburger down their pie-hole. Nasty! For a bandster, paying close attention while eating is rule #1! I have urped in parking lots, bushes, and public toilets. none of which are fun, but for me were unavoidable. I usually try to walk it off first, for some reason that can help. But once the slime starts, it is generally coming up in my case. Unless it is a true PB (productive burp) where I am not really stuck and sliming yet, and just burp up a mouthful of stuff, I have time to get to a bathroom. A couple of notes for public toilets. Put a seat protector in the Water first, that will prevent backsplash. I have been hit in the eye before. Totally gross! Also be very wary of auto-flush toilets! I was stuck on shrimp, too, when I got a free face shower thanks to auto-flush at a PF Changs restaurant. Over time, I've gotten to where I can urp pretty quietly and quickly, so I don't worry too much about being in public.

For dense foods like steak or chicken, I cut them into pencil eraser sized pieces, and make sure that bite is done before taking the next. Mushier foods I can take a bigger bite.

The ad gets me more than the ignorant blogger. There will always be naysayers against WLS. They are welcome to their opinions, just as I am welcome to have WLS to better my health. But show someone stuffing his face and say get the band? Ugh, how low-brow can you get. That's not a medical group I would want to trust my life to.

One thing with weight loss, your calorie deficit of yesterday does not always equate a loss today. My weight went down in fits and starts. The body seems to want to hold on as much as possible, then will let it go all at once. I'd stay the same for 3 or 4 weeks then drop 4 pounds. I'd go up 1 then down 2, stay the same for 2 weeks then drop 1. It was not steady at all. But over the course of time, the trend was DOWN. That's all that mattered in the long run. Try to only get on the scale once a week. This is really about long-term life style habits. Get used to eating proper portions, the weight loss and better health will come.

I called it "explosive decompressions." I wouldn't go for a couple of days and then...whoosh!!!

One of my worst stuck episodes was on ground beef. It can have pieces of gristle in it that can get painfully stuck. Since it's ground, we don't tend to chew it well, just swallow it down. I didn't have any specific restriction against it, but I've found it to be a food that I tend to have problems with.

Port pain can be a sign of errosion. Glad you have an appointment. Hopefully you just tweaked it. Keep us posted!

The good news is that you are maintaining your 40 lb loss! That is awesome. So to get back to losing should be fairly easy. Just a few tweaks to your diet should help. First off, get your fill. That is very important. If your band isn't working right for you, why have it? I find that when I need a fill I am more prone to eating the junk because the physical hunger comes back and I want to graze more. With the physical hunger controlled, I can more easily make healthier food choices and control my portions better. I still allow myself the junkie treats, but I don't live off of them. For me, food is an important part of my life, and I love the flavors of junk. To live without it is no way to live for me. Like you, I don't know very many people in real life who are banded. I am on this board daily for support. It keeps me in touch with my banded self.

It's a little of both actually. I am mostly in a size 10, but I do have a couple of size 8s, by the way. For me the journey was a fairly easy one. But I love not always being the largest person in the room. I love that I don't feel as though people are judging what I am eating or putting in my grocery cart. My body image is catching up with reality, although that has been a long road. Now when I look at my "before" pictures, I look so uncomfortable. When I see my current pictures, I see "me."

Hi there! I've actually been at this weight for over a year now. I bounce up and down a few pounds here and there. I suppose I could change my ticker, but that seems blasphemous somehow. I consider myself at goal. Woohoo!

If you cannot keep water down call your doctor ASAP. Even if after hours.

Do you still have your gallbladder? We are prone to gallstones, so just keep it in mind!

I have BCBS California ACCESS Plus H M O. I went through it three years ago.

What Cindy said. I tried to practice while waiting for my surgery. But until you have experienced the pain, it is hard to remember. Yes, it IS painful. It feels like I swallowed a rock that is sitting just below my sternum.

I did not have to do a pulmonology exam or chest x-ray. I also didn't do a sleep study. My insurance request was submitted right before Thanksgiving and I heard back mid-January. My surgery date as a month after I got the call with the approval. I had to do blood work during my insurance work-up then again during my pre-admittance appointment. for the hospital. My surgeon's pre-op diet was 2 weeks long, so I could not have had my surgery any earlier than 2 weeks after my approval came through. Some surgeon's don't require than long.

Self-pay and what an insurance company is billed are two entirely different things. The best way to find out is ask your surgeon's office what they bill. But there is also how much the hospital and anesthesiologist bills. You will have follow-up tests in years to come as well. My surgeon wants me to have an upper GI every year.