Jachut

Yeah, it'll never be as hard as it is in the first weeks. I'm not young, lol, I'm nearly twice your age, but us old bags like to go out on the town too. If I were at a bar watching a game, which really, nothing is as Aussie as going to the footy on a Saturday, then I eat what's there to eat. I might have a glass of wine and I'll have a few fries. If DH buys me a hot dog, I'd eat the sausage and not the bun, but I'm not worried about people looking at me weird. Otherwise I'd just pick at whatever it is, eat very slowly and carefully and leave half of it on my plate - honestly people dont notice or car what you're eating. I'd differ from the advice above in that I'd never ever pick a cocktail - horrendous calories. White wine is much more diet friendly, or red, but it turns my teeth grey, lol. And a drink and a couple of nachos does not derail a healthy lifestyle - its what you do 90% of the time that counts and if most of the time you eat healthy and exercise, then at your age, there is no need to give up on fun things like this.

I dont really have the shoe fetish thing going on, shoe shopping isnt high on my list of priorities (dont tempt me with jeans though!). My everyday footwear faves are really funky birkenstocks and the like. However, I dont hesitate to wear high heels when I'm going out - and I'm 5ft 10. I just embrace the whole Amazon sort of thing and really play up my height rather than try to hide it with flat shoes. My DH is 6ft 3 and I can sometimes be almost as tall as him, but I dont worry about towering over other men. To be honest, being tall, I've never found small men appealing anyway, for me to find a man physically attractive, he does have to be taller and heavier than me! Not that that's a conscious decision but I just would never a man shorter than me attractive in that sort of way. And I'm not looking anyway, so I dont particularly care. I love being tall, I wouldnt swap it for being a shortie. What I did hate though, even though I never got beyond a BMI of 36, was being tall and heavy. I just felt remarkably unfeminine and its also why I guess I've always aimed at a low BMI, tall and willowy to me is elegant, tall and and well padded just made me feel plain huge, whereas you'd call it curvy on a more petite woman.

Its a lifelong battle isnt it? The band is a really helpful tool but it certainly isnt a cure for most people. I've been shocking lately and its *just* starting to show on the scale, by a couple of pounds. I'm having a fill in an hour, for me, I think its that I've had hardly any restriction for the better part of a year so I'm really pleased and proud to have maintained, but its just getting really hard to stay on track. I seem to fall for every temptation along the wayside and I eat a healthy meal and am just not satisfied. Restriction is vital in this process. I find I need to be tighter than I would ideally need to be to maintain weight but that it really helps the appetite when I am - I'm better to have to try not to lose than to try not to gain if that makes sense.

Ugh, tell me about it. I had obstetric cholestasis in my 3rd pregnancy. I used to sit up all night with my hands in those silver wine bottle coolers that you keep in the freezer and pay the kids to scrach my legs with hairbrushes

WTF? How is a healing sprained ankle relevant? My main reason for having the surgery on the health side of things was a stuffed ankle, I had terrible chronic heel pain and I most definitely wasnt able to use my ankle to its full potential, heck I couldnt even walk for exercise!

Fat is fat is fat and the only way to burn it off is with cardio and calorie reduction (in whatever form appeals to you, high carb low fat, low carb etc). Lift weights and preserve your lean muscle too, that helps burn fat as well and if you do it in the form of high intensity weight training or circuit training and the like you'll get cardio/fat burning benefits from the actual exercise too. But no amount of crunches or abdominal work will directly shift fat from your belly. You get six pack abs the same way you get visible biceps or quads, by losing the fat that's hiding them. Unfortunately though, where your body stores fat is genetically and hormonally determined. I'm lucky to have a flat stomach but there's no help for my backside. I will always have a saggy rear end, its where I store fat and my skin is loose and yuck there. To lose the fat I store there the rest of my body would look like I just came out of a concentration camp. To some degree, plastic surgery is your only option once you've exhausted reasonable fat loss.

I would personally choose a band again five times over and I still consider that post terribly biased, negative and misleading. There are disadvantages of ALL weight loss surgeries - the only completely safe thing to do is nothing - afterall there's only one disadvatage in that - staying fat! Why cant people accept that different surgeries are appropriate for different people? The sleeve isnt better than the band for everyone and the band isnt better than the sleeve for everyone.

I can eat bread and sometimes do but forget about the four slices or so a day recommended for the general population. I will always argue that good wholegrain bread (not supermarket rubbish) is a worthwhile healthy food and I dont find personally that I have to avoid carbs to lose weight - but in the scheme of what a bandster can eat, filling up on bread would not make nutritional sense - other foods are far more nutritious and worthwhile.

This is really really common. But what I've found amongst people I actually know in real life is that this phenomenon, know as first bite syndrome, seems to pass so that it becomes not as bothersome. I suffered from, it and it had passed by a year out, my DH has suffered it and it has passed for him now at almost a year out. I've talked about it with people on line and with bandster meetups locally. What you have to do is be excruciatingly careful with your first few bites, take a teeeny tiny one, chew well, swallow, wait a few minutes and so on. Your stomach seems to eventually wake up to the fact that food is coming and start to function. A hot drink before you eat helps a LOT. Nonetheless this is a pain in the behind and really gives you problems when you want to eat out and/or are eating under a time limit. But it does appear to pass for most people. I never get this anymore. And remember too that every fill level is transient early on, if you are filled a bit too tight, as you lose weight, you loosen up and you'll suddenly realise you're eating more, eating isnt uncomfortable etc. So if this is contributing, it will probably resolve over a smaller time period.

Yeah, I just drink milk - I dont see the need to add worthless sugar to it. I skip the chocolate part. Although Milo is good.... you guys dont have that, its another Aussie icon like Vegemite (probably owned by an American company, lol).

I've got a fill scheduled tomorrow, I can eat about a cup to cup and a half. It depends what and when - I cant eat a full cup of breakfast cereal but I can eat a cup and a half of dinner. In and of itself, this is no problem, I mean a cup and a half meal made up of a lean Protein and steamed vegies is hardly unhealthy or fattening. But its the appetite that comes along with it - I find if I can eat this much I'm also getting hungry quickly and, not feeling satisfied, heading towards sweet carb foods again. I'm not losing or gaining so I no longer guage it by weight loss but I can foresee gaining a couple of pounds if I keep eating as much as I am at the moment.

We've all been there, it happens to all of us. I'm a bit the same at the moment, I'd hate to admit what's gone down my cake hole in the last few days. I'm going for a fill on Thursday. I had the same thing, I didnt get REALLY tight but just a bit for comfort and I convinced myself that I needed a bit out. Which I did, got relief but the the whole last 12 months has been much more of a struggle to maintain, I've dealt with head hunger and appetite the whole time. I havent gained anything significant, thanks to running about 700 miles a day. But I'm probably a kg or two heavier than I was at this time last year and its better to act now! For me, the tightness was transient, in hindsight I should have waited it out because I'm back at the same level and can easily, and I mean easily, eat an entire sandwich. Which in and of itself is not so problematic, but the appetite that comes with it is. So I'm going to have a tiny fill. And then another if I need to. I've farted around way too long complaining about wanting to have lost just 10 more lb without actually using the band for what it is meant to be used for - well filled you can eat little enough to lose weight! I guess I just kind of feel I shouldnt need it this far down the track and that my doc is going to scold me for wanting to lose more weight. What more can you do? Just approach that good restriction cautiously and slowly and keep up a lot of exercise, which works wonders to preventing weight gain. I guess you ARE starting again in a sense but if you cant take the fast aggressive fills then no amount of trying to is going to work for you, you'll just end up unfilled again. Slow and steady wins the race. Oh, and did I mention exercise! Its your number one weapon in preventing regain.

Not single, so no comment there, but Fanny, you look FANTASTIC in your avatar. What a change from your old pic!

I didnt have to do one either - at a BMI of 35 and in pretty good health, it wasnt likely I had a very enlarged fatty liver and as it so happened, my overzealous general doctor had sent me for a liver ultrasound as well as a barrage of other tests when I asked for my referral, My surgeon said that the actual percentage of surgeries having to be cancelled due to fatty livers is very very low and that the pre op diet is a safety measure but probably not vital for most patients.

Hmmm, somehow I dont think soybeans are a freak of nature that occurred simply so that whizz bang Protein drinks could be manufactured for perfect human nutrition either. Everything we eat is just there by chance. If we didnt have supermarkets we would be eating things we found in our environment, killing and catching what we could, and if we were lucky enough to stumble upon a nest full of eggs (which are baby birds, not food) or a cow with a full udder, I think we can be fairly certain we'd take advantage of it, especially if we'd had to chase it ten miles. And I dont think we'd be pissfarting round working out how many grams of carbs or protein were in it either. Humans can pretty much eat anything and are evolved to do so. We're omnivores - animal, plant etc it doesnt matter, we can eat it. Unfortunately what we're NOT evolved to handle well yet are the loads of additives that occur with manufacturing and the mega gigantic calorie load that comes with such abundance. Milk is the least of our worries I'd suspect.

Oh, for sure, that's why I said its not the answer for everyone. You have to get pregnant in the first place, and in such cases its a risk/benefit analysis. And the benefits FAR outweigh the risks. But breech babies and reflux and being unable to eat a lot are hardly bizarre or unusual pregnancy symptoms, they're very normal and very common. I simply mean that in a situation like mine, where I had no problem getting pregnant I would personally wait until after a pregnancy because I can foresee some (tiresome rather than dangerous) problems with a non adjustable sleeve and there's definitely been lots of stories about bands refusing to behave the same way again after the baby is born.

The morning after surgery I was hungry, but overall, I had a dream run. I had no Fluid in my band but I had absolutely superb restriction for about 10 weeks following surgery - superb in that I was full quickly, with half a cup or so, and stayed that way for hours and had a complete absence of appetite, without any nausea or feeling unwell. I just couldnt care less about food at all. If only I could have replicated that later on! I did well with my band and reached a normal weight, which I have maintained, but boy it would have been SO fast and easy with restriction like I had post surgery. However, my natural appetite returned and it became more of a matter of balancing head hunger and physical hunger with my body's new ability to cope with food. The band has never stopped me getting hungry - but then its NORMAL to get hungry and to eat in response to that. What the band does for me is slows me down to the point where I have to think about what I'm eating and whether or not I've had enough. Appetite control and lack of hunger are not a part of it for me. I get that only briefly post fill, but it dissipates and I become normal again within 2 weeks. However, I didnt take lots of fills to get restriction, I found EVERY fill gave me adequate restriction, the main difference came with getting tighter - then the restriction would last longer. Like, my first 2 fills were only 6 weeks apart, my 5th and 6th fills over a year apart. Although I've had great results, I would DEARLY love to be another 14lb lighter or so, it would be a really spectacular result for me. And I am seriously tempted to go for a tight fill (which I've never really had) to get me there, just to try to dampen my natural inclination to always want to be eating. But with that will come super tight restriction and that I dont particularly want, in this sense I'd say I've had more bandster hell later on in my journey than early on. Not that I'd call it hell, what a problem, to have a BMI of 22 and want one of 20! Hardly worth getting too upset about.

Its actually not THAT much exercise, it just sounds a lot for totally sedentary non exercisers. If you're constantly tired, start to get sick, dont sleep well and get depressed, then perhaps you have to start thinking that your body needs a bit more rest. But what you are doing is fairly low intensity cardio, even though to an unfit person it would not appear so. Its gentle on the body, fairly low impact, unlikely to result in injury and unlikely to seriously exhaust you. Covering 6 to 8 miles per day on foot is entirely reasonable and probably what most of us ultimately need to do to reach and maintain a normal weight, as opposed to a just a better weight than what we started at. Our bodies are designed to move and very well equipped to cope with this amount of exercise. When you ramp it up and do the really hard stuff like full on weight lifting and interval training cardio, then you have to have days off to recover, you will wear yourself down to nothing doing that daily. But a day off might mean walk 6 miles at a nice pace, not lie on the couch with a bag of chips. Its only addiction if its affecting your life - if its causing you stress, putting other people out, if you're doing dangerous things like going out alone at midnight to run. Its not addiction transfer at all, I dont think, unless you are seriously weird about having to miss a day - I mean, I dont like to miss a day if I can help it but that's because consistency is the key to good results, not because it makes me panic. If I'm busy, I'm busy, end of story. And I have to do stuff like get dinner for my kids so if I've run out of time, I've run out of time. Being committed and dedicated to your routine in a healthy way is not addiction, its what it takes to maintain a fit healthy body. Being easily distracted to miss sessions becuase of a busy life is much more problematic and a much less healthy attitude.

You might have a different experience this time around. Saying you do not eat meat or chicken when the band is tightened indicates a few possibilities: the band is TOO tight. You should be able to eat solid Protein in small quantities. You have been slipped or had some band troubles for longer than you think - thus causing you to not be able to eat solid protein or you are not eating right - too big bites, too fast, etc. Again, you should be able to eat solid protein. My experience of the band has been the exact same normal diet I had before without all the treats, just in much reduced quantity. Portion control plus a lot of running worked together to get rid of about 40kg for me. Oh, I occasionally have mishaps that lead to vomiting - like when I shove something in my mouth because I need to run out the door, or when I am talking and socialising and forget to chew enough or when I'm starving and cant stop myself taking big bites and swallowing too fast. But generally, its trouble free as long as I follow the rules. Eight years ago, there were different bands, less knowlede etc. You'll probably get much more information, different information etc. A lot more research and development has been done, so hopefully this time around you will have a band that works even better for you. Its entirely possible to lose all your excess weight if you work it right.

Erk. Yes, when you see some of the special drinks the half marathoners and marathoners leave out rather than take the water at the stations, you wonder how they drink them! Milky stuff just sitting tables!

What post op pain meds did you have? I could literally tear my skin off when I have morphine.

Really, I think the answer is to cut down severely on processed foods, and that includes Protein shakes. We take in so many additives, artificial sweeteners etc, its just horrid. Learn to drink Water, train yourself to drink you coffee and tea unsweetened and give up the enormous confectionary coffees. That way you dont have to worry about sweeteners OR sugar in your drinks. Make smoothies with milk and eggs and fruit instead of Protein Shakes if these are a staple of your diet. There's a lot of protein in an egg and a glass of milk blended with say, some vanilla and a banana and its real food too. I would vastly prefer to take in real sugar on the occasion that I want something sweet - that way I know I keep the vast proportion of my diet healthy and unprocessed and keep the sweet treat foods to the small proportion they should be.

I'm very intrigued by it because it is supposed to result in some skin contraction. My tummy is a bit weird. I have a patch, nothing more, of loose skin ABOVE my navel, despite being completely pear shaped and never having a big stomach. It must be more from pregnancy than weight loss. To grab my stomach and pull the skin down has minimal effect on this upper stomach loose skin, and my lower stomach is absolutely flat. I would NEVER consider a vertical incision down my stomach as you cannot even see this loose skin under clothing, you would assume I have a perfect stomach. In this centre, portion of my stomach and over my entire stomach, I also have some residual fat, just enough to overhang tight waistbands and annoy me. All I'd need is a bit of lipo, rather than a tuck. So I was indeed planning on looking into this later this year. I'm also intrigued by abdominal etching, lol, do you know they can lipo a six pack stomach for you?

Actually, that's a point. I did have lots of activity focussed goals - once I ran a 4k, I trained for a 7.5k and then I did a couple of 10k's and then I did a 14.2K and then a half marathon. In fact, losing weight was almost secondary to my running through this whole process.

Hmmm, I dont know that I'd risk it before pregnancy to be honest. My first two pregnancies were text book, so easy, my third baby was breech, she sat high, I could BARELY eat by five months in. I had the most horrendous reflux and heartburn too, I'd bend over to pick up something and just vomit everywhere. I honstly dont know how I'd have coped - I had more restriction with pregnancy than I do with my band, I could only eat teeny tiny quantities. If my teeny tiny sleeved stomach were as squashed and misplaced as mine was, then its NOT as simple as eating an extra meal a day, not at all. It'd just about have to be a constant infusion of tiny morsels which would not be a pleasant way to live for six months I dont think. Then again, I'd be nervous about a band before pregnancy too, so many stories of just never getting back to good restriction. Personally, I'd say that its safest to have no WLS pre pregnancy but obviously that's not an answer for everyone. I think its one of these things, like with a band where the literature says fine, no problem, but pregnancy does weird things to your body and the way it works.