Jachut

Thats quite possibly the most sensible advice ive read - and great advice for a bandster if six years thinking she doesnt have the restriction she used to have!

Feet going numb is common on the elliptical. The pain sounds like sciatic issues which could be your spine, or it could be like me - my sciatic nerve on the right side runs through the piriformis muscle not under it like it hould (not uncommon) so exercise causes the muscle to expand which constricts the nerve. I just ignore discomfort and run nyway ,but i stretch a lot because if i let my buttock/hip muscles get tight i end up in real pain.

It makes me so angry when i think what i went through just to get my fill back after having to unfill for surgery. I mean, i work my freaking guts out to not regain weight, its 40 degrees celcius in the melbourne summer, ive had half my intestines removed and have an ileostomy lirterally pissing water out of my body at the rate of a litre an hour, im having chemoherapy, and im out running 8 kms so tt i dont gain weight. My reward? Oh, youre not overweight you dont need any fill back in!!!!!! It took me months of cajoling, pleading, begging and eventually changing doctors within the ractice to get someone to understand thatbit was sheer bloody mindedness tha kept me from gaining, not the fact that i didnt need any restricyion. Yet idiots like this can ge fills they dont need fro stupid doctors ho are obviously only in the business to make a buck out of fat people and fools. Disgusting.

I do but not that badly. I just have constant ear pain and frequent loss of hearing in my ear on that side. But i do have a weird unknown eye cindition called map dot fingerprint dystrophy which was active at the time of my lapband surgery and i asked them to put lubricant in my eyes when the put me under which they did so no torn corneas when i woke up. Definitely ask if they can do whatever ypu need to prevent problems.

Thats a real eye opener. At five feet ten and 140 lb, i still see the 200 lb figure when i look in the mirror , i got banded at 240. I can see objectively that i do look like the 140 lb ladies, but i make excuses "oh,shes younger, fitter, etc" why is it so hard to see our achievements?

Mines declined steadily over the past six years, i could easily live wiyhout it. Oh, i make the effort and usually enjoy it, but i never feel like it anymore. Ive had a lot of other issues too which are probably a factor.

I wore an underwire bra home from hospital the next day, it didnt bother me. I wore jeans too, lol. They didnt hurt either.

Hmmm, could this be the green eyed monster talking? I know my DH is jealous of my achievements and what I get from my fitness and jealous of the time it takes me - I will always make time to walk with him, but that's on top of my exercise (because in my overzealousness, I dont consider mere walking exercise, lol). He's always on at me to "help him" but once he's got me to drop a run or miss a gym session, he's "too tired", "too stressed" and I've given up my time for nothing. Which, I suspect, is what he wanted. Truth is, I'm committed to running, and committed to exercise, but not addicted. If I've got time, its something I love to do and I make time for it. But I would never put it ahead of something the kids have on, or if there was a terrible mess in the house, or the kids hadnt been fed. But I sure as heck dont miss a run to do washing, clean a bathroom or whatever, that stuff can wait. I prefer to go to the gym than watch TV at night. I'd always welcome a fun social engagement and would miss a run for that, certainly, and I've taken it easy this week because I have a sore knee - but that injury, illness stuff gets to me, I ran 10 days after a bowel resection and right through chemotherapy, with an ileostomy (huge dehydration risk) and in the hot Melbourne summer- in hindsight, that was a bit stupid - i pushed myself really hard and I was having cancer treatment - that does border on addiction but that sort of silly behaviour has passed for me now treatment is over. Truth is, being fit meals a lot to me and I prioritise it in my life but I'm generally not stupid over it. But we can find our partners preferred our couch potato ways as they dont like feeling guilty, being less fit and having you have such an interest in something that doesnt involve them. Its GOOD for your mental health, I do indeed use it to cope with stress.

I took up running and that is my main exercise. At various times ive done body pump and for 18 months i did boot ca, which i loved, but our group disbanded when the trainer moved out of the area. I like spin classes too. Basically i do what i enjoy, no pkan but i am into pretty hard stuff, like to really work. Im fit, toned and pretty thin now.

Id agree, i just dont have the sort of restriction i used to have and can eat all foods. But with discipline and exercise i still control my weight and maintain my loss.

Another teacher here who walks in the door to a houseful of kids. I feel like its thevlast thing i want to do but am very good at doing it anyway and itbdoes rejuvenate you. Plus when you get as ive gotten you turn into a bit of a human dynamo. Ive just done a spin class but dh is home and wants a walk so i will do that too! I wont lie though, things go undone in my house so that i have time for running, its more important to me than clean bathrooms or having all the laundry done and i dont tend to run my kids around to activities quite as much as other mums i know (i still do it of course, they just have to share our family leisure time with me).

Runnung. I do either bootcamp or body pump too for strength training, but running and lots of it is what keeps me thin. I do mainly interval stuff rather than plug away for hours at a steady pace.

Thats too tight, definitely not green zone. But it may settle, often youre very ight at first after a fill

We're not talking long term here, just the healing phase. It is dangerous to cheat during this stage, you risk the ling term health of your band by doing so. During this time your stomach needs to be kept as still as possible, so that scar tissue can develop tp hold your band in place. If you eat solid food you disrupt this process. If you're hungry during the liquid phase, all you can do is have more liquids! In my humble opinion if you cheat during this stage and think youve gotten away with it, then dont come crying to this forum when your band slips in two years time. And dont blamevyour surgeon either. Aftervhealing, i tend to lean towards the moderate, a little bit of everything in sensible amounts kind of lifestyle. Id rathervlose weight by cutting off a leg than by the sorts of diets some people live on here, but you yourself pointedvout that we're all different and must each findvwhat works for us.

Ive never drunk protein shakes ever, in six years of being banded. Theyre not seen as necessary in australia. Ive never had any problems. A simple fruit smoothie madevwith fruit, yogurt and milk has plenty of protein. So does decent broth you make yourself.

I was losing 2 lb a day after my cancer diagnosis and i was already thin. But that highly anxious unable to eat state doesnt tend to last, you do improve somewhat. I too used exercise to get me through, focussing on my running helped me through a pretty awful year but i have ended it very thin, its kind of inevitible. Be strong, you can survive this xxx

Slider for me also. I can practically inhale it.

Alcohol affects me the same as it ever did, it didnt change when i got banded. Im only really a wine drinker, one or two is enjoyable, three is a good buzz and definitely no driving, more is ugly. Same as always.

If only i could get back there! I only get this sporadically, and can think of only a few months within my six banded years where this was the norm - my band is almost full!

there's some great products out there isnt there? I feel so guilty whenever I eat anything that comes in a box, I'm a cook from scratch kinda person. But really, read the nutrition label on those wraps - what's so bad about that? Unfortunately, cooking for five every night, I dont really get to use some of those great convenience products - way way too expensive to use in that kind of volume. I am a convert though to powdered peanut butter!! WOW! The very thought horrified me when I first heard of it but curiosity got the better of me and how bloody fantastic it is to get to have chocolate Peanut Butter on rice cakes (my very favourite breakfast) without the horrible calories of real peanut butter and real nutella! I had to buy it off ebay and import it :-( But I must have more!

What a contentious topic! I think there's a large percentage of people that know the band will be work but secretly hope it will be magic. I know I sure did. I mean WHY would you have a surgery that you didnt think was goign to make a hard job easier? And lets face it, although it doesnt make it so much easier that it feels like magic, it DOES make it a lot easier - or we all wouldnt have lost weight. NONE of us could do this alone before, and with the band we can therefore it does do something - it does cut down on the willpower required, it does reduce hunger (even if you still get hungry) and it does reduce the portions you can eat. What it does not do - cut out head hunger, chocolate cravings, the habit of a nightly glass of wine. That's where willpower comes in - and even then, with the smaller food intake, I have not had to give up those things entirely. If someone is doing their best to stick to the plan, but falling off the wagon here and there, and not losing as much as they thought, or just maintaining - that's quite normal pre fill. If someone is stuffing themselves stupid and eating all day and every day and crappy food at that, then they are really not exhibiting any self control or willpower at all and probably deserve to be told they have a bad attide. Ditto exercise. No reason not to be doing it, other than laziness or in some cases, inability/disability. The band wont cure that sort of "bad attitude". It only cures the doing your best but not perfect kinda person, who tends to get better with fills. But we pretty much are all fat people who sat on our butts and stuffed our faces, a little humility goes a long way. Post op is incredibly difficult for some people.

I went 12 weeks from surgery for my first fill and during that time had the most superb restriction. I lost about 1/3 of my excess weight in that 12 weeks, it literally poured off me. Once that swelling wore off, I have never, ever been able to replicate that restriction - I have never been able to get to the point where I have no hunger at all like that first couple of months, yet could still eat anything, just a tiny portion. Now, to get to that level of "unhungry" I'd be so tight I couldnt eat anything. I get it for a day or two after a fill and that's it.

Amen to that - if you rely totally on a tight band to keep you on the straight and narrow you are absolutely up a creek called merde, sans paddle if you ever have to unfill for any length of time! You really need to have learned what and how to eat if you're going to manage and you MUST keep up the exercise. I'm also very very grateful that my need to unfill came five years into my banded journey - I had not only learned new habits but my body was well and truly used to being thin - it appears to have a new "set point" if you like.

I've had great success with the lapband. I do attend a practice in melbourne that is run by Prof. Paul O'Brien who is one of the band's pioneers. Their aftercare plan and their dietary guidelines are simple. Eat 3 meals a day (small Snacks if you really are hungry), come in regularly for checkups, get fills on consultation with your doctor - and the schedule and amount differs for everyone - settle in for slow but steady loss and never accept vomiting, reflux, night coughing as normal. Eat a normal diet - from all food groups, dont eat sliders, no need to cut carbs, obsess over Protein or avoid the occasional treat. Exercise regularly. Even thought that sounds simple, of course there are people who have the troubles you're experiencing. The band doesnt suit everyone and getting just the right restriction can be tricky - many people go back and forth from too tight to too loose and cant find just the right amount, I've even come close to having that sort of trouble myself since having my band unfilled totally for a big surgery, cant get the restriction I had, but I know I"m getting close to tight. So....... I know I have to work with what I have. The band takes a lot of work, if you let it it will help you eat the right things in the right portions but you are ALWAYS going to have to have self control to not overeat bad foods, which all too often go down very easily. If you expect it to literally stop you eating too much or eating the wrong things you are going to be very disappointed. It also doesnt result in very fast weight loss, its more slow and steady and it does require exercise as well as diet. It sounds to me like you'd be better off workign with the lesser restriction to the best of your ability and stop looking for the band to give you complete control. And if you cant do that, as many cant, this is a complex disease that has emotional and physical elements to it, then perhaps you might be able to look into a differnet surgery that might suit you and your issues better. The band does tend to work very well for lower BMI patients with eating habits not too out of control (which is what I was) and who are able to put in reasonably intense and regular exercise. This is not the situation many morbidly obese people find themselves in and the band is not always the right choice.

For me, I dont go to the gym regularly - but how long you work out depends on intensity. If you're walking on a treadmill and doing a machine weights program, you're going to need an hour and a half to two hours maybe three or four times a week. If you do interval training and heavy free weights, 45 mintues all up would be plenty. I'm a runner, for me the magic number was always an hour (at first about 7kms, now its about 10) and it always seemed that five times a week was vastly more effective than four - usually I try for six. It takes me about that to be able to eat anything I want and maintain. when I go to the gym I usually do a spin class which is an hour long.