Fanny Adams

I have a pool and live in Aus, so get to use it for more months than most but still not all year round, and I still say go for the hot tub, hands down, no question about it. I've been seriously contemplating ripping out the pool and building a hot tub instead (house came with pool when I bought it). Pools are a bloody great money pit and damned hard work!

I'd say that was a slight nervousness/fear of intruders - wanting to be able to see them coming? Just as many people will choose to sit facing the door in a restaurant and hate having to sit where someone can easily come up on them from behind.

I think it is probably a definition thing, Plain. As I said in my response to Gadgetlady, I tend to equate "fundamentalist" with the young earth and Adam-riding-dinosaurs beliefs. I've had many debates with mainstream Christians, where I have been able to afford them the respect of their beliefs, but the dino thing really does get my "scoff factor" going. I'm also not very good at distinguishing all the subtle variations in the US religious scene. It doesn't really matter though, as I don't believe in ANY of the concepts, so it is only a matter of degree. I've never had the opportunity to debate with a Jewish person with deep religious convictions. There are very few Jewish people in Australia (I looked it up once and I think it was only about 12,000). I think it is likely that it would end up in acrimony though, as I find the persona portrayed as God in the Old Testament to be a despicable, murderous, megalomaniac and that's hardly likely to lead to a civil debate :tongue2:. I can debate with people who hold Buddhist beliefs, as those tend towards spiritual concepts and leave the science to the scientists, but I am just as skeptical about those who believe in the physical reality of Krishna (there's a blue fairy at the bottom of the garden for you!) or those who follow Druidism or believe in the power of crystals, tarot and astrology.

There is also a big difference between the beliefs of most Christians and those who subscribe to the Young Earth theories and believe that Adam and Eve co-existed with dinosaurs, which is what I would describe as "fundamentalist Christians". It is those beliefs, which fly in the face of all known science and logic, that I find utterly ridiculous. While I still don't believe in the more mainstream Christian views, I do have more respect for those spiritual beliefs that don't defy reality.

I know :thumbup: I should probably take my mother's advice (I guess there's a first time for everything :tongue2:). I don't want to cause offence, but it's either shut up, lie through my teeth or cause the offence, as that really is how I feel about those views. To me they are utterly irrational and I have a very hard time taking someone seriously when they have expressed a belief in something that I find completely silly. Unfortunately, the very action of expressing my feelings about those views is taken to be disrespect by the people holding them. Try to think about it objectively. If someone was earnestly trying to convince you about something that you found to be utterly ridiculous (like blue fairies), would you find it easy not to scoff? Would you not wonder how they could have become convinced about such things? The closest I can get is to say that I respect your right to hold your own opinion and have your own beliefs. I can't bring myself to say that I respect the actual belief itself, because I don't. Sorry, I should just butt out now, because this forum isn't the place that I want to use to argue religious philosophies.

I have a wonderful daughter of my own and two delightful granddaughters, so I know full well the overwhelming emotions that come when you hold them for the first time and as you watch them grow. Doesn't make me believe in a god though :tongue2:. Sleep well and, if you are interested, do take a look at that article. It is very well-reasoned and presented in understandable layman's terms.

I don't doubt your sincerity in your deisre to extend the comforts of your religion to others and don't hold that against you. However, you need to realise than many atheists feel the same compulsion to "wake you up" from what we see as your "childish fantasies". I've stayed out of this debate until recently, as I know that once we get down to brass tacks in the debate, it is very hard for me to treat fundamentalist Christians with any measure of respect. Rather than offend people by stating my true opinion of those beliefs, I have bitten my tongue and followed my mother's advice of "if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all". To me, it is like trying to have an argument with someone who is arguing with all sincerity for their belief in the little blue fairies who live at the bottom of the garden, or that Santa Claus really does live at the North Pole. They might seem to be very nice, very sweet and sincere people, but to be able to believe the "dinosaurs lived with Adam" nonsense, they obviously have a fault in their logical reasoning ability that I can't ignore when the debate gets heated.

He was also a philosopher, not a biologist, so his statements about the evidence of design in biology have no more weight than yours or mine do. He specifically retracted any suggestions that his definition of "deist" fit with traditional religious definitions of the word.

All the arguments I've heard from the Intelligent Design proponents centre around the "impossibility" of the complexity of life arising by chance. However, the calculations used to demonstrate that impossibility are seriously flawed. This site succinctly summarises the logical flaws in the "impossibly complex" argument: Lies, Damned Lies, Statistics, and Probability of Abiogenesis Calculations The site gives a very good layman's overview of how abiogenesis is not just "not improbable" but is actually "extremely probable".

I hate to burst your bubble, but Anthony Flew has not become a Christian. His statements about becoming a deist have been twisted by a number of Christian writers to mean something far more than he has ever said:

That monstrosity looks like a heart attack waiting to happen!! I like deep fried onion rings but not like that!! (The best ones are served by the fish and chip shops - real onions, cut into thick 1/2" rings, battered and deep fried with the fish, not those tasteless imitation McD's ones that are all batter and no onion!)

OMG!!! :tongue2:

Thanks for clearing that up, and I have definitely never seen a Bloomin Onion served anywhere here. Chips and gravy do rock though, fattening as they are :thumbup:. And if you ever make it out this way, sure you'll be able to make it a culinary tour - just stick to our wonderful range of fresh seafoods and tropical fruits and vegetables and she'll be apples :tongue2:. You absolutely HAVE to try the lamb at some point too. I've heard lamb isn't very common in the US but it is one of our staples.

Hehe - I didn't think I had the name quite right but couldn't remember what it was really called. From the descriptions I've heard, it is something like a roasted onion, split open and filled with gravy - is that right? Roasted onions are pretty common but not served in quite the same way. Usually, you just cut the top and tail off the onion and take off the loose skin without peeling it, then pop it in the roasting pan with the meat and potatoes. They are yummy! Once cooked, you do split them open and smother in gravy, so I suppose that is much the same thing, but I've never heard them called "bloomin onions" :smile2:.

Here ya go, Rochgirl: Ticker Tutorial with pictures. If you are still having trouble after that, PM me and I'll try to help.

I have to wonder where this Outback Steakhouse gets its recipe ideas from. We don't have that chain here in Aus and I've never heard of half the dishes it serves up. What the heck are cheese fries? Are they deep fried cheese sticks or chipped potatoes covered in cheese or what? And I've never seen an "onion blossom" here either.

Ahhh but you see, you're not one of those that says "I drank my three Protein shakes today (and ate nothing) but I'm still hungry! I think I need another fill!" :smile2: Nor have I seen you recommending people try for 100g or more of protein a day. To be honest though, I really disagree with the high protein/low carb diet. I think the balanced approach is far healthier.

I believe the recommended intake of protein for a woman is around 60-70g a day, and there is no reason why we can't get that intake from solid food once the healing phase is over. We are FAR better off eating this protein rather than drinking it - I see no need for protein shakes after the liquid/mushie phase.

Tommy-O? Go back and read my original post again. I said nothing about questions from newbies. Of course someone new to this procedure is going to ask a lot of questions and mostly they're the questions we've all heard at least a dozen times over. That is perfectly normal, doesn't bother me and wasn't what I was ranting about. I was ranting about people who have been here for several months and should know better about some things by now. To summarise: * People who label themselves as failures when they have lost weight at faster than or equal to the average rate. Negative thinking annoys me, especially when it is unjustified. * People who are wanting their fourth, fifth or more fill (i.e. have been banded for at least several months), and say they are hungry yet in the same post demonstrate that they DO have restriction but are eating around the band. Those are the ones that are going to end up with slippage or erosion from keeping the band too tight and will say the band is a failure, when it is their own bad eating patterns. * People who get caught up in the Protein, protein, protein craze, as though they have had a bypass operation and suddenly need massive protein supplements. Actually - it is the doctors who push this that annoy me, can't blame people for following their doctor's advice.

One of the things this did for me was to make me sit down and think about where and how my ideas of portion size got so skewed. I think that, like most people, I took my cues about what was a "normal" portion from the people around me, mainly my extended family. Well guess what? Most of my family are overweight! What's more, the times that I have made the comparisons (over the last 20 years) have always been at special family functions, when we have all been in "party mode", which translates as eating and drinking as much as possible! So my concept of "normal" had over the years become that of the portions taken by a group of fat people in full feeding frenzy. Now it wasn't always like that. I wasn't always fat, nor have most of my family always been fat. It's something that has crept up on all of us over the last 20 years. Over the years, as our extended family has grown and prospered, we have become used to "living high off the hog's back", and what used to be reserved for special events has become our normal eating patterns. When I recall the habits of the few among us who have remained slim, I realise that I have always looked at their plates and thought "oh they must be dieting" or "gee, so-and-so eats like a bird!" This forum has actually reinforced that concept in some ways. We all speak about our new portion sizes as being "tiny" and many of us have even worried about what others will think when we eat out. We need to change that mindset and realise that 1 cup of food is NOT excessively small. It is the norm for normal-sized people.

Bit of a story with this, but bear with me... I work on a mining camp and eat in a community dining hall every night when I'm on site. The availability of all that yummy food and the subsequent weight I gained on top of my already hefty size was what drove me to get the band. I've always known that I ate huge portion sizes but up on site, it never seemed all that excessive, especially when compared with all the piled high plates of the burly miners all around me. Anyway, I've been going to the camp gym most nights and have gotten on a nodding acquaintance with some of the few women on site (I'm not very good at making friends, especially women friends). So, one of the ladies had obviously noticed me making an effort in the gym and asked me today to come to a pilates session they were having after work. I felt a little awkward but agreed to go, and ended up joining her and two other ladies afterwards for dinner. All three of these ladies are very slim and obviously fit. I served myself up what I have been thinking of as a "bandster sized" meal - largish for the band as I am overdue for a fill and was hungry, but still only enough to fit on a sandwich plate: 1/4 slice of roast meat, 1 baby potato (1/2" diameter), 1 serving spoon of mixed veges, 1 spoon of ravioli (2 pieces of ravioli and 2 slices of mushroom) and a tiny piece of quiche (2" x 1"). I was a little nervous going back to the table, wondering what they'd think of big fat me taking this small meal, whether they'd think I was pretending to eat small for show or something. When we got to our table, I was shocked to see that my serving size was almost the largest portion taken by anyone there. These ladies weren't on a diet, they weren't trying to eat small, they'd just taken what they normally would take at an evening meal, and guess what? The "bandster size" isn't "tiny" at all!! It was their NORMAL meal size. That really brought home to me how skewed my ideas of portion sizes were. I'd been feeling all good and virtuous about eating these "little" meals and being so "good", and here it was the normal everyday standard for slim, fit, healthy women! No wonder I'm fat .

Willsmommy, I think it is unfortunate that your doctor is giving you so little guidance in this. One thing I can offer you is the advice from my doctor, which is that everyone heals at different rates and the most important thing you can do is to LISTEN to your body. Your body is telling you that it is not ready for those foods yet, and it would seem that this is right on par with the advice given to most bandsters. The vast majority of people are advised to stay on clears for anything from several days to a week, then move to full liquids for another week or two, and not to attempt anything as solid as mashed potatoes until they get to the mushy stage, which can be anything from 2 to 4-5 weeks post-op. I think you would get value from spending some time in the food and Nutrition section, looking at the recipes for the various stages and being careful not to try to move ahead too quickly. When you feel ready, introduce items from the next stage slowly and in small quantities (1/4 to 1/2 cup at a time), until you are sure your body is ready to handle them. Soon enough, you will be healed and you will feel your appetite come back. For some of us, it comes back with a vengeance and we are hungry well before we are "allowed" to move on to the next stage, so look upon your current lack of appetite as an advantage. It may also be a signal that you will be sensitive to fills and won't need as much to get to your sweet spot. Based on your current reactions, I would recommend being cautious with those, rather than aggressive, and don't forget to go back onto liquids for 48-72 hours after each one, then slowly reintroduce foods again to determine what you can tolerate at your new fill level.

Without getting into the little snippyfest you are having fun with :wink2:, I think you have a good point. Many of us ARE overly sensitive to comments about our weight and take genuine compliments in the wrong way, because we read our own self-esteem issues into other people's words. For example, many many people find the "you have such a pretty face" compliment to be a subtle insult because they automatically fill in the blank afterwards with "...for such fattie!" This is partly their own insecurities and partly the truth that they don't want to face! Just look at the thousands of comments in the before and after pics thread. Losing weight DOES make most of us look more attractive - that's half the reason we want to do it! Comments like "you are really attractive and if you'd lose the weight, you'd be stunning!" might be hard to hear, but let's face it - it is true, isn't it? I think most of the time when people give compliments like that, they are trying to focus on the positives without commenting on the obvious negatives. That doesn't always work, because we are so aware of and sensitive to the negatives that we add them even when they haven't been said. Sure, some people are really tactless with how they say it, but for many of us, it doesn't take a great deal to reduce a genuine compliment to an insult in our own minds.

The emphasis in Australia is very much on the balanced diet of lean meats, whole grains, vegetables, fruit and dairy. Recommended daily allowances for a woman who is not overweight are approximately 60-70g Protein, 100-150g carbs. Even our Optifast formula is different to the one marketed in the US and contains less protein and more carbs. When I was on the pre-op and following the strict Optifast diet (3 shakes a day, 2 cups steamed green vegetables), my carb intake was around double the minimum 30g needed for ketosis. From WebMD:

I like how the surgeon was careful not to cut into your tatt!