Mary Cade

Hi, i made a private group for us June sleevers on fb since so many of us were interested in having one, so if your interested just send me a friend request (nany rosario) on fb and a message saying "june sleever" and i'll will add you! The group is completely a secret the only way you'll see it is after i add you!???? (i have a face pic on fb with my hair down i have 2 tones in my hair brown on top and blonde on bottom)

I can only handle tuna, but ii have injury chicken broth my stomach is sensitive so I feel your pain.

What I can tell you is there is no norm on what people lose in a certain amount of time. The factors already stated above influence - age, starting weight, etc. My signature below shows my weight loss the past 13 weeks. I have lost almost 50 pounds since surgery (5'7" 236 starting weight and today I weighed 187.5). I have never hit a stall, but I've consistently lost at a snail's pace. Please note it took me 7 weeks to get through the 190's!!! I started walking on the treadmill for 1-1.5 hours daily the past few weeks. While the scale isn't reporting much, my body composition is changing. Exercise makes a HUGE difference! I found that I was becoming skinny-fat. Don't just base success on what you weigh. I found I was losing a lot of muscle weight and everything was just sagging. Not anymore. Exercise plus my slow weight loss has meant I have very little sagging skin! I have learned to accept my slow weight loss. Comparing myself to others loosing 3-7 pounds per week just leaves me feeling discouraged.

My husband eats one meal a day. At three months we were told to stop the shakes. I usually have yogurt for Breakfast. No lunches here. Tonight we will share a filet mignon and some green Beans. A piece of lowfat cheese if we get hungry during the day. I don't even cook anymore. I just try to keep certain things in the fridge to snack on if we get hungry. As you get further out you won't be doing so many mini meals. We are seriously trying to curtail the eating since it is now harder to lose weight. Good luck.

Does anyone else feel like they're always eating? I know I only eat about 850 calories a day, but they come in so many tiny meals, it just seems like I'm eating or having a shake about every two hours! I guess that's a good thing. But it's so funny, I thought my life was all about food before, but now it still is, just in such a different way! I certainly wouldn't go back, but it's just a bit funny I suppose.

Not only am I amazed at how much and how fast some people eat but some of them are quite thin! What's up with that? A few of my friends are like that. I ask for my to-go box right away so the portion differences of what has been consumed aren't so obvious!

So happy to see I'm not the only one who's experienced this. Had a moment in the Wal-Mart checkout line. Was feeling judgemental that the person in front of me had chips, donuts , soda & other junk while I was getting fresh fruits and veggies for the party I was going to. Then realized that would have been me a few sho

What a great thread, matt1912! No, you are definitely not alone on this!
After my surgery, one day I noticed an obese person shoveling in a 12" Subway sandwich so fast it looked like she wasn't even breathing, and I just saw my OLD SELF; then went to my car and cried--for me AND for her. It just gave me another reason to be so thankful for this second chance at health and happiness. I must say that I too was surprised at myself for my reaction and thought I was being "judgemental." I doubt that any of us are thinking "mean thoughts" toward these people that we are now noticing, we are just reacting to SEEING OUR old habits. That's really pretty powerful stuff for the ol' emotions to handle!

I felt all smug sitting at Golden Corral, watching all the people walk by with plates overflowing and feeling like I was so much better than them.... then it hit me, if I hadn't just had surgery a few months earlier, wouldn't I be making my 2nd trip to the buffet about now???? **** consider me "Pimp Slapped" ****

I read a post from my phone that inspired me to write this... but I can't find the post so I am starting a new thread!
So many share incredible transformation stories - and that post mentioned people who pose in bikinis (raising hand here) to show off this transformation. We all Celebrate and say "wow" and all that great stuff.... but how does it make people feel who have more "average" results, not quite getting to goal, maybe not doing plastics etc so they don't feel as "wowed" by their transformations.
I want to say something about this. i reviewed some progress photos and looked long and hard at the ones where I weighed about 190... I started at over 300# so it was a big difference. at 5'5" I was still overweight at 190, but you know, I was "pretty good". It's very hard to not feel a certain pressure to succeed in the way that others define it, but truth is this is our own journey and not someone elses. If I had stopped at maintained at 190 or thereabouts... or even in the 170s... I really met my most important goals. Improved health, no more sleep apnea, no more high blood pressure, could hike and ride more easily and could shop at normal sized stores.
BTW, as far as attention from the opposite gender, it was definately MORE when I weighed around 160-170 range then my current weight of 140. I have no idea why... but it is the truth.
From a quality of life perspective - getting down to my current weight did not really improve it much more. We need to define our own success and not let the excitement of the success story board make you feel like you aren't successful.
Lets be honest, statistically, many of us reporting getting down to that elusive "goal" will regain a few pounds or 20 over the coming years. I don't plan on that, but it is a very common occurance.
I want to give a shout out to all of you who have had amazing success even if your BMI is still over 25. Think about how far you have come and how much you have improved your life! also, look around, the average person has gotten bigger over the decades and someone in the 25-30 BMI range is considered pretty average size now.
congrats to all of us for taking control of our health and fitness!!!!

I'm getting sleeved today. I'm getting ready to go to the hospital. I didn't get much sleep and my stomach is in knots because I'm nervous but I am determined and I know I will be OK. I'm singing the happy song all the way to the hospital. LOL I might be singing a different song when I wake up lol but that's OK. Please sent good vibes my way and keep me in your prayers. I will try to update as soon as I can.
Ps...That stuff they give you to take a shower with the night/morning before surgery actually smells pretty good.
Talk to y'all later.

What a LONG, strange trip this is that I'm on. I was sleeved on 11/27/12 at 418 pounds. I am now at 298. That's 120 pounds down & about 120 more to go. Being under 300 pounds is monumental for me, though. I honestly wasn't sure that it was ever going to happen.
I am obviously not one of those uber success stories that took off all their weight in one year & I am learning to be okay with that,
My experience was that for the for 6 months after my vsg it was like the weight melted off. 100 lbs. in 6 months. I thought that I would be to my goal weight in no time. Then it was like I hit a wall. Now if you look at my other posts you will see that I struggled. Struggled with getting in Protein. Struggled with avoiding carbs. Struggled with exercise. Struggled with what a drastically different lifestyle being sleeved is. I even gained back about 10 pounds. I did not do "everything right".
It took me about a year to really revamp my lifestyle and find out what works for me to lose weight but feel balanced. I have now losing consistently at about 2 lbs a week for the past 12 weeks. It appears that I have found my groove. I have no doubt that I will get to my goal weight. It might not be as quickly as other people have, but I will still get there.
It might be literally 3 years after my surgery before I get to goal, but so what? Even if I was not still losing weight, the weight that I have lost already has changed my life. My health has improved dramatically. I actually went hiking last weekend! I'm going camping in a month. That's something that I've missed doing for years.
Getting sleeved is not a magic bullet. Losing weight is still hard. I still struggle with my self-esteem. I truly miss eating the way I used to, and sometimes I literally feel sad that I can't eat more. I still don't like exercising. I have come to see it as a necessary evil. I might never like exercising, This is just the truth.
I'm getting married at the end of September. After we got engaged in January, I spent months beating myself up that I am still so heavy. I thought if only I had tried harder then I could have been a thin, beautiful bride. That may be true. It may not be. What is true is that I am certainly more ready to walk down an aisle in front of 100 people now than I was at 418 pounds.
I have not given up. I am still moving and look forward to someday posting that I'm at my goal. I hope that this post is helpful to someone. You might be considering surgery. Maybe you're newly sleeved. Maybe you're where I was 6 months ago...gained back 10 lbs & not moving. You can do it! I can do it! Just don't give up.
Here are a couple before & after shots at this stage.
   

VPAPNYC- I was thinking the SAME thing....HOW IS SHE EATING ALL OF THAT FOOD! I could BARELY take a couple of spoon fulls of anything and she's eating WONTONS>>>WTF?? This surgery is not for the faint of heart! And like Birthsjourney said YOU have to be willing to put the work in for success. Her husband enabled her by cooking tht mess for her!! My husand ask me CAN YOU HAVE THAT?? (thanks babe for caring enough to ask)!!

I was lost for words!!! She had her husband deep frying dumplings after the sleeve....WTF!!! And said something like, "I can't live without dumplings"....it seems like soon she won't be living at all. The poor nutritionist came to try and help and she almost bit her head off. Doesn't she feel sorry for her son who will grow up without a mother? They were showing what she was eating right after the sleeve and it seemed like way too much food. Is it possible the surgeon did make her sleeve small enough??

Does anyone watch this show on the TLC channel? It's on Tuesdays and it shows people who are close or even over 600lbs who undergo wls to save their lives. This last one on the 21st was the story of a 45 year old named Penny who weighed 530lbs. I was so frustrated watching the episode! She was in the hospital for a month and lost 40lbs so the dr agreed to do wls on her and chose the sleeve. He wanted to do the switch eventually. She never lost any weight!! They followed her for a year and she GAINED weight! She had an excuse for everything they asked her to do. She was bed ridden and refused to try to get up and walk!! She never walked the whole year, it ended her weighing 495lbs and still not walking. I just don't understand why you would uproot your life, undergo surgery and then not follow drs orders. I honestly didn't know it was even possible that you could even have that surgery and NOT lose weight! The dr suspected her husband was sneaking her food! She was griping at the nurse that no one told her she was going to be on a diet and expected to lose weight while she was in the hospital! Are you kidding me?? She was in the hospital 4 months after and never lost a pound so the dr gave up. I just don't get it. I guess some people really think wls is a quick fix and you don't have to do anything but wait for the weight to fall off. It was just very frustrating to watch. Anyway, that's the first one I've seen that had a bad outcome. Most of them have been really neat to see how they get the weight off and go on to living life again.

I'd rather have the surgery than to waste time and money on those dangerous drugs. I hate I didn't get my band sooner, but I'm here now and it's the best thing I've ever done for myself. I love my new body and everything it has done for me.

Been there did that for a year, had great success until it stopped working...which it eventually will. When it does your clinic will start coming up with new "cocktails" to try to achieve similar results. My experience with those "cocktails"
Jittery
Nervousness
Irregular menstrual cycle
Cranky
Suicidal thoughts
Other self-destructive patterns including bulimia
My advice would be to avoid taking them. Phentermine was the mildest of what they gave me, but it still affected me in ways I didn't realize. I lost 60lbs, but when it stopped working I started gaining again. The "cocktails" helped me maintain the loss, but I simply got tired of taking so many pills everyday and wondered what the long term side effects would be, especially with the side effects I was already getting from them. Long story short, when I stopped pill popping I gained those 60 pounds back and they brought along 22 of their friends. Who wants to take pills for the rest of their lives? Not me! Heck, I take liquid Vitamins now because they are more like a treat for me with the band more than anything else. The only benefit I got out of the whole experience is that I wasn't required to do a supervised weight loss program before getting my band since I had gone through that ordeal. Good luck, but RUN!

Hey everybody!
Hope everyone is doing AWESOME!!
Let's brag/celebrate:
Show me your muscles!!!
I don't care where you are in your weight loss, I want to see you flex!
(Guys & girls) - arms, legs, back, whatever.
I just recently starting lifting more. I was a little discouraged at first because I had lost so much strength while losing weight. But now I'm starting to see progress, and I'm super excited!!

What
is your weight at 15 month .

I am 68 years old...was sleeved on May5th. I have always had flabby looking arms and I am wondering if anyone is doing anything special to deal with saggy skin.

I feel so bad but the only time I had pain was right after I woke up from surgery. No pain since. Thank god , I feel bad for those with pain

Thank you all for the support, Had my 1st BM today, YAY!!!!

Valerie this Hair loss thing scares me too, I have my wig ready because my hair is what I consider thin already but the back is thick. Not sure if this is true but I was told if we get it cut short it doesn't fall out no where near as bad.

Feeling bones I've never felt before. Knees, hip bones, wrists hell even my fingers feel skinner. Also the simple things like getting easier to get in and out of bed, being more mobile. It's the little things I tell you.

I am almost four weeks out and in the same boat. I am doing cardio everyday and feel fine when I am exercising but the rest of the day I am exhausted. I am out for the summer from work( I teach) but am worried about making it through the day when I need to go back. I have to take a nap everyday and then can still sleep like 8 hours at night.