Fanny Adams

"Not to be a complete bitch, but I need this surgery more than someone who weighs 225. " Now THAT's an epic fail!! At not being a complete bitch, I mean, in case anyone was wondering...

So Headhunter, are you in a Witness Protection Program yet? Is there somewhere we can send money to aid you in your valiant efforts to avoid the evil Bariatric Surgery Industry assassins? I sure would hate to see you fall victim to those heinous criminals and if there's anything I can do to help save you from their clutches, please let me know!

I know what you mean about having to learn to listen to our bodies but it is a complex process and it takes months before it really sinks in. I'm over 4 months out and only just now beginning to get the hang of it. I think that, no matter how much we "know" that it isn't a miracle cure and that it "is only a tool", deep down we are all still secretly hoping for that miracle. We don't really know what the signals feel like and it takes time to learn the subtle sensations. As an experiment, this idea was just to try to help someone to feel the limits of the band and get some hope that it is working at some level. I definitely don't recommend it as a full time eating plan! But feeling "full" and feeling "not hungry" are different sensations after banding and maybe it could help someone to recognise those new feelings.

Okay, I'm going to put an idea out here but before I do, let me first state that I DON'T know if it is a good one and it might actually be a very bad one, so before anyone tries it, have a good hard think about how you would do it. I would also recommend waiting after you read it to see how many long term bandsters tell me it's stupid or even dangerous - and if they do, don't try it! My idea is this: For those people who have had 2-3 fills and feel that they don't have ANY restriction at all, try cooking up a really big pot of spaghetti bolognaise meat sauce and mix it with some Pasta (eg elbow pasta). Make it a really good one, high grade minced beef and no oil in the cooking. If you use a good recipe, this should be less than 300 cal per cup, so one night's "blow out" on this won't be utterly disastrous. Take a measuring cup and measure out exactly one cup into a bowl. Sit down and eat it slowly and carefully following bandster rules for chewing. Wait for at least 15 minutes. Go back and get another cup full. Eat that slowly and carefully. Wait 15 minutes. Listen to your body. You might not be full yet, but are you still HUNGRY? If you are, go back and do it a third time. If necessary do it a fourth or more times. Try to find that spot where your body is no longer telling you that it is hungry. I think you'll find that you reach it at about 2-3 cups at most. I know in pre-banding days, I could EASILY eat 4-5 cups of this at my first sitting and about an hour later could tackle another cup or two for "seconds". After my first fill, however, I would eat one cup and still be hungry and think "I don't have restriction yet!" so I'd eat a second cupful. I felt more satisfied then but still didn't feel FULL like I used to. I stopped at that point, because I COULD control the hunger by then and COULD stop, but I probably could have squeezed in a third cup if I had tried. Pre-banding days and there's no way I could have stopped. If I was trying to diet and NOT eat 4-5 cups, no matter how much I promised myself that I'd be good, I'd go back to the pot and pick at it for the rest of the night till it was all gone I absolutely could not do that after even the first fill and now (after 3), the one cup is my limit. If you can still easily down 4-5 cups of spag bol & pasta after 3 fills, then yes, you are probably not feeling any restriction and you might have to wait for several more before you get there. However, I'm betting that you will find that you aren't hungry after only 2 cups and are probably feeling quite full after 3-4 at most. The band IS giving you SOME measure of restriction, even if it isn't as much as you were expecting. You just have to learn to listen to it and not seek that "stuffed full till it hurts and I can't move" sensation. That was BLOODY HARD for me to accept and to give up, because I was ADDICTED to that pain sensation - weird, I know, but I am realising this truth now. Now I would NOT recommend doing this until AT LEAST 4 weeks after surgery. I know we all get worried that we might "stretch our pouch" but I don't think this can happen in one night of pushing the limits. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND taking this as slowly and carefully as you can so that you don't do yourself any damage. However, I think it would be a worthwhile experiment to do for just one night because I think it would "prove" to you in your own minds that the band really is doing it's job and that you WILL get to the sweetspot eventually. Ok, it might not be making you satisfied on half a cup yet, but if the first fill gets you down from 5 to 3 cups and the second fill gets you down to 2 cups, etc, at least you know it's doing SOMETHING. Like I said - it's just an idea and it might be a horrible one, but perhaps worth pondering at least... If the long term bandsters think this is utterly stupid, please say so, coz I really don't know but it makes sense to me.

Interesting! I'll have to ask my doctor about this, because I can feel something similar. I can feel my port just about any time that I am lying down but I can only feel this when I am lying on my right side, letting my stomach muscles fully relax and my belly kind of spilling forwards. I always thought it was the band itself but it is exactly where you describe it - about 2 inches higher than the port and slightly to the left for me - so maybe it is the tube I'm feeling?

I love this! Ahahahahahahaha!!! Where's James Bond when you need him? Those evil Bariatric Surgery Industry assassins could be after any of us!!! Oh noes!!! *quivers* I admit, I haven't read past the first page of that yet (and I'm planning to do so right now), but already my alarm bells are ringing over this statement: This sounds very much like the guy has a hidden agenda that he plans to reveal later (selling some new diet plan perhaps?) I will be interested to read the rest of the thread and find out if I was right in my guess...

Heheh - I know how you feel! I don't know if it is the same for everyone, but for me it settled down after about 6-8 weeks out from the op. I'm just over 4 months out now and, while it growls now and then, it's not anything like it was in the first several weeks. I tried to take the attitude that every time it growled, it was my band telling me it was hard at work and I would smile thinking of where I was hoping to be one day. Of course, my work doesn't require me to be in meetings with lots of people very often, so that's easy for me to say :confused:

Quoted For Truth!

I used one about 5 years ago and lost 20kg in only 4 months (which is more than I've lost with the band, haha!). It was in Australia, though, so I don't know if you have the same company there (ours is quite possibly a subsidiary or franchise of a US company). Here, they are called Lite-n-Easy and I was quite impressed with them. You could order your food and pay online, there were always 2 choices for Breakfast and 2 for lunch, different on each day, and about 40-50 choices for evening meals. They would changed the menu every season, so the variety was good. The food quality was WAY better than anything Jenny Craig or Lean Cuisine put out. The only issues I had with it were the packaging (every single item was individually wrapped and then bagged into meals, generating HUGE amounts of plastic) and that it didn't teach good eating habits, and I gained the weight back when I stopped ordering the food. I also tended not to eat all of the food delivered so accumulated heaps of leftovers of bits I didn't like much :confused: Still - in the short term, it was a good option. Expensive compared to cooking for yourself, but really convenient and very easy.

My guess is that we tend to judge whether or not we at our sweetspot by how we feel when we are at our hungriest. For many, this is at night. When we put ourselves on a standard meal plan and aim for say 1200 calories a day, we have to force ourselves to eat the 600 cal throughout the day, taking them in in soft foods and liquids if we have to, because we are too tight for solid food. When it comes to night time, we have no problem with the 600 cal meal and still feel hungry afterwards. Because we feel really hungry then, we say to ourselves "make it tighter, make it tighter!" as though we were expecting NEVER to feel hungry at all. We get another fill, and then wonder why we are having even more problems with PBing and sliming in the day time, but still don't feel we are at our sweetspot, because of how we feel at night. If instead, we listened to our bodies and didn't worry about the 600 cal throughout the day (unless we felt hungry then!), we would be able to eat a much bigger meal at night, maybe even a late night snack, and still not go over our target of 1200 for the day. We would feel satisfied at the end of the day, and not have to struggle with hunger at night OR feeling too tight in the morning. I think the only problem would come with this if you found yourself eating nothing throughout the day AND struggling to get in over 600 cals in the afternoons and evening. If that was happening, then you would probably be too tight and need a slight unfill. On the other hand, if you are easily eating a solid breakfast, a solid lunch and a solid dinner and STILL feeling hungry at night, then yes, another fill could be the answer. I'm not saying this is how everyone works. Quite often I am hungry in the mornings, so I eat a solid breakfast (poached egg, baked Beans & mushrooms usually - about 250 calories). I then eat a lot of fibrous veges for lunch (eg carrots, celery, etc) and some chicken. By the time dinner comes around, I am only just starting to feel hungry again and often leave half of my small child's plate. Other days it doesn't work like that and I skip breakfast and make up for it in the evening when I'm hungry. My personal opinion is that we should be less rigid about expecting our bodies to behave the same way every day. There are so many influences - stress, time of month, salt/water intakes, different activities - that we are unlikely ever to have exactly the same physiological reactions every day. Just go with the flow for a while and learn to LISTEN to our bodies. I'm giving that approach a bash, anyway - wish me luck with it! Good luck to all of you that are trying to work out the intricacies of living with this wonderful tool :confused:

Oh god, to wear a skirt or a summer dress! *dreams* I can't sit comfortably with my knees together yet, and haven't been able to for years - not sure I even remember how! I've tried a few dresses but I look like a sausage tied up in the middle and SO uncomfortable when sitting. Can't wait for that NSV!!

You're welcome! I don't claim to have lots of answers - I'm just as new to this as all of us in this group - but my doc's advice really struck home for me last time, particularly when I realised that I had forgotten the bit about not sticking to a meal plan and not worrying about breakfast. I, like most people I'd guess, had heard the "must eat breakfast!" message so often, that it just didn't sink in when he told me that the first time. I feel much better about managing things now. A suggestion for your lunches that you might like to try: On the weekends, when you have time, marinade up a half dozen boneless, skinless chicken thighs for an hour or two. I use a 1/2 cup of soy sauce, 1/4 cup of honey, teaspoon of tobasco or 1/2 teaspoon chilli powder. Grill them or fry in a non-stick pan (with no oil) then let them cool, then chuck them into a good tupperware container and put them in the fridge. They should last about a week like that, using one a day for lunch. At the same time, chop up a couple of celery stalks and carrots and put them in another sealed container. Drain a can of unsweetened pineapple pieces and buy a punnet of cherry tomatoes. Then each morning you can pack a really quick meal for lunch into another plastic container and you're ready for the day - lunch anywhere anytime and no utensils needed! You can try to eat this in one sitting or snack on it all day, whichever suits best - just put the lid back on when you stop feeling hungry and come back to it when you're ready. PS: CHEW CHEW CHEW this well!! It is very bulky and will keep you full for hours but you gotta chew evey last bite! Don't try this within 2 days of being filled - my doc says liquids only for at least 48 hours then test the waters carefully as you move back to solid food.

When I went back for my last fill, my doctor reminded me of his advice, which is contradictory to standard dietician's advice, so I guess I had forgotten it amongst all the other messages we receive. It was this: Don't try to eat when you're not hungry, just because it is meal time. Don't worry about trying to force in Breakfast if you are tight in the mornings - drink fluids and wait until you are hungry in the afternoons/evenings to eat. Don't try to eat until you are "full", just try to eat until you are "no longer hungry". Push the food away as soon as you stop feeling hungry. If you find that you are hungry again later, you can always go back for more, but most times you won't need to. Aim to eat like a picky 3 year old - use a small plate and be prepared to leave food on it! I think the getting stuck/pb'ing thing is almost always related to eating too quickly and not chewing well enough. I think we all try to do the right thing immediately after the surgery but when we have healed and start back on solid foods and discover that, because we don't have restriction yet, we can eat just about anything, we can get complacent and not follow the rules. I know that is true for me. Before my first fill, I chewed and chewed and was so strict with myself and had no problems. Then I accidentally forgot a few times and swallowed a bigger bite - and waited for the pain. Nothing happened! So I got lax about paying attention and the bites got slightly bigger, the chewing slightly shorter and the wait between bites slightly less. After my fill, again I tried to be "good" but didn't get the pain indicator when I made mistakes, so became even more lax. After the second fill, occasionally I would get a twinge if I was gulping food but still no real STOP NOW indicator. Now, after my third fill, I finally get what restriction, getting stuck and PB's actually mean. I can still eat anything I want but I HAVE to pay close attention to every bite and HAVE to chew every last tiny little lump out of it or I know all about it! I have had a number of painful episodes that passed quickly without a PB, when I have not chewed completely. I have only gotten stuck to the point of having to PB to relieve the pain a couple of times, and both times have been when I was talking and not paying attention. A couple of those is all it takes to remind me what the bandster rules are all about! I'm really trying now to follow my doc's advice - and it seems to be working because the scales are moving faster and I really feel like I am at the "sweet spot" already.

I need to add a letter to that - B for Am I Bored? I find eating when I am bored is my most common trigger :huh2:

Am I the only person who has read this thread and is totally uncomfortable with the acronym "POS"? To me, that abbreviation has always stood for "Piece of Shit", in the same way that "SOB" usually stands for "Son of a Bitch". I KNOW it isn't meant that way, but I have cringed every single time I've read it in this thread and 6 pages of using it to mean "Person of Size" has done nothing to alleviate that cringe factor! I HATE the way those terms are associated in my mind - is this just my own paranoia?

I was never overweight as a child, teen or even as a young mum. I can remember crying my eyes out when I hit a whopping 60kg (132lb) at around 22 (daughter was 3 at that time), and promptly took diet pills to get down to 55kg again. I started gaining my weight in my late 20's, when in an abusive marriage, but didn't really balloon up until I got out of it at 30. I went on a 4 year binge, putting on the fat suit, and since then have struggled trying to take it off by losing some, regaining more and generally just getting fatter. 15 years after getting out of the marriage, I am finally taking the last steps to repair the damage it did.

Way to go, Joshie-Boo!! Congrats!

I think you'll find that the surgeon has to anchor the port to the abdominal muscles. That means that if you have a certain thickness of fat above the muscles, there's not much he can do to change the "depth" at which the port must sit.

IMHO don't switch doctors until you've tried taking his advice and eating solid foods. It sounds like you are still living on soft foods and that really works against everything that the band will do for you. Soft foods are essential in your first few weeks while you are healing but after that you NEED the solid food to feel the "full" effects and tame your hunger. For example, you'd probably find it quite easy to eat 2 cups of cream of chicken Soup and still might feel hungry at the end of that. Instead try 1/2 cup of solid chicken meat and a small salad, and I'll bet you feel MUCH more full! The band won't "magically" make you lose weight - all it does is help you to feel full so you don't eat as much. This won't work if you don't try the solid foods. The soft foods generally have way more calories, carbs and fat than solid food e.g. 2 cups of cream of chicken soup can be as high as 358 calories, 20g fat, 30g carb, 15g protein, whereas 1/2 cup of chopped chicken breast (no skin) with a green salad is only 144 cal, 3g fat, 7g carbs and 22g protein. What's more, this will make you feel FULL!

Hey wow! I'm from Perth, Western Australia and I'm planning a trip to the US in June/July to visit friends in various states. One of the places I'll be going is to Baraboo, Wisconsin! What a small world!

Hehe - apples are the one thing I reach for if I'm having trouble coping with the hunger pangs. It is absolutely guaranteed to make me feel completely full for hours. I do have to be supervigilant while eating them though, and chew chew CHEW!! I've gotten uncomfortably close to getting stuck on them with only the smallest of unchewed lumps going through, so really have to pay attention - coz even that much HURTS!

I was fully self-pay and didn't get asked to do a psych eval. I kinda regret that as I think it might have been interesting to see what came out at that!

Ditto - my surgeon has really only mentioned vomiting as a cause of slippage and he is dead set against getting so tight that you PB even occasionally. He gave me 2 lots of anti-nausea pills, one to take to control general feelings of nausea and one to put under your tongue for an instant "DO NOT VOMIT!" reaction when needed. I've not had to use them yet, but keep them close at hand in case.

Also check any painkillers you might be taking. Anything with codeine or any of the opiates in it (eg Oxycodone) will cause constipation. You might have to switch to something that doesn't give that problem.

I didn't even know you could do it on the public purse! I thought you HAD to have private health or fully self-fund (which is the way I went).