AlysonRR

Have you tried the strained Greek yogurts that are popping up in grocery stores lately? The two brands I can find out here in WA are Fage and Oikos - they each have ~20g Protein per half cup, are pretty low in carbs, and their texture is quite different from typical yogurt. I like the 0% Fage, but their 2% variety isn't much higher in fat and I've heard it has a better texture. There's another brand in our area - I think it's Greek Gods? - but it doesn't have the high protein so I haven't tried it yet. I like mine mixed half and half with Kashi GoLean and/or Fiber One Cereal and a little honey.

(yesterday) B: 2 hard-boiled eggs, 1 slice toasted Ez 4:9 bread, 1 tsp Earth Balance L: 3 oz hamburger, 1/4c mushroom/onion, 1 oz reduced fat cheddar; 1/4c sweet potato fries D: 3.5 oz snapea crisps... (today) B: snapea crisps again! This is my worst week of the month for carb cravings, but this snapea crisp solution is at least better than my pre-band choices (bag of chips, half a pizza, popcorn slathered with butter...). I know I can make better choices, but I refuse to beat myself because that way lies defeatism... Positive affirmation - I choose to eat healthful foods most of the time. S: skinny cow mini-fudge pop L: mountain bread, 2 oz turkey, 3 slices bacon, tomato, onion, arugula, 1.5 tsp light mayo D: (planned) 3 oz chicken w/pesto, 1/4 c tomato, 1/4 c penne?

For softer food I use pyrex 6-oz "custard" cupa. I measure my eggs and milk (or eggbeaters) into a cup so I know the portion size before I make my omelet. For more solid foods, I have 8-oz plastic boxes - mine are bento boxes, but you can use tupperware-type containers, like those from Lock&Lock or Snapware. I don't measure everything, particularly at restaurants, but since I've loaded these boxes with meals for weeks I'm pretty good at visualizing a 1/2-1 cup portion. When I make sushi at home each roll has 1/3-1/2 cup rice and 1-2 oz filling. Rice doesn't interest me much anymore (who'da thunk it?) so I usually order edamame and sashimi or teriyaki tofu (yum). Hope that helps -

B: 1/2 c eggbeaters, 1/4c cooked mushrooms, 2 oz laughing cow light L: 2 oz turkey, 3 slices bacon, mountain bread, arugula/tomato/onion, 1 tsp light mayo D: 3oz burger patty, 1oz roll, 1 tsp light mayo, catsup, mustard, onion; 1/2 c sweet potato fries Wish I didn't have to wait another 10 days for my next fill!

B: 6 slices bacon, 1 slice whole grain toast, 1 tsp margarine L: 1/2 c eggbeaters omelet, 1/4 c cooked mushrooms, 2 oz laughing cow cheese, 1/2 c arugula D: 3 oz chicken, 1/2 c cauliflower with a couple tablespoons cheese sauce

It's on the My Plate page. It's a Gold Membership only option. The link is titled "Week-at-a-Glance View". HTH!

B: mini pita w/egg, 1 oz cheddar, 1 morningstar veggie sausage patty L: 1/2c oikos greek yogurt + 1/3c kashi golean + tsp honey D: 3 oz burger, 1 oz cheese, slice onion, slice tomato, 1/4c arugula, a couple baked sweet potato fries

The paid Gold membership version of The Daily Plate has mobile access. What I find easiest about TDP is the "my foods" look-up, where I can search all the foods I've previously entered or just click on the foods from a "my foods" list. Also, the Week View let's me drag and drop food items from one day to another. But mostly what I like is that I haven't had to enter more than two or three items - even the most esoteric item seems to have been entered by someone. That wasn't the case at SparkPeople - I had to enter at least two or three items a day there. I must eat weird stuff, lol. What I don't like about TDP is that since the data are entered by users, occasionally someone will change the data on an item and affect my calculations. And their recipe calculations never turn out correct for me.

Congratulations, Mary! I can't wait to join you in Twoterville

One of my favorite mushies is baked ricotta. In a small (2 c) Pyrex dish, mix 1/2c ricotta with a tbsp of eggbeaters and 1/2 oz parmesan cheese. Top it with 1/4 c tomato sauce and 1/2 oz mozzarella. Bake at 350 until lightly browned. Like lasagna without the noodles - yum!

Now I don't have much restriction yet, so my choices may change as a result of the next fill or two, but for now these are my standard breakfast choices: Eggbeaters or eggwhite omelet (1/4-1/2c) with cheese (1oz) or cottage cheese (1/8-1/4c) and 1/4c veg One or two scrambled hard-boiled eggs and a little fruit Scrambled egg and cheese and salsa or chopped tomato/onion wrapped in mountain bread Egg salad in lettuce leafs Egg sandwich: fried egg, 1/2 oz cheese, morningstar vegie sausage patty, in a mini pita Kashi oatmeal (has 9 g protein) 1/4-1/2c Kashi GoLean or Fiber one mixed with an equal amount of Fage or Oikos greek yogurt (greek yogurt has ~20g protein/cup) and a tiny bit of honey Crustless muffin-tin quiche which has egg, cheese, vegies, and maybe crumbled up vegie sausage patty cottage cheese pancakes (very rare!) Hope that helps :-)

Totally agree. I find that cloth is so much more comfortable!

I've been eating a cup of salad greens almost every day since a couple days after I started on the post-op solid food stage. I've had two fills so far and usually start back with my daily greens a couple days after each fill. So far I haven't had a problem, though I'm not particularly restricted. Hope that helps -

After a fill I typically have three 4-8oz Protein drinks a day and one or two 4 oz servings of Soup (Ginger Cashew Carrot from Pacific Foods is my new fave) and one or two servings of Special K iced tea w/protein. I drink chocolate (EAS) but only with added sugarfree DaVinci syrup: peppermint, hazelnut, coconut, caramel, orange, raspberry, chocolate. Sometimes I add berries or canned peaches. My favorite new vanilla Protein Drink is to mix it with 4 oz soymilk then add 4 oz sugarfree oregon chai concentrate. I also like to make fruit smoothies with added vanilla protein, or just add some of the Da Vinci syrup (hazelnut, cinnamon, raspberry, caramel). Not the most interesting "meals", but it's only two days... Good luck on your fill - hope it's a good one for you :-)

Cari - I definitely felt more restricted when I had a cold. You might get more replies posting in the General Discussion forum. HTH! Alyson B: mini pita w/egg, 1 oz cheddar, 1 morningstar veggie sausage patty L: 2 mini pitas w/1 oz each turkey and salami, 2 babybels, and half a pear D: 3 oz grilled mahi mahi and 1 cup spinach with a tablespoon of asian dressing

He's in Olympia, but also does surgery in Bremerton and Shelton. I linked his website a couple posts down.

B: eggbeaters omelet (1/2 c) with 1 oz cheddar and 1/4 c sauteed leeks L: Mountain bread sandwich with turkey, spinach, light mayo S: 1/4 c grapes and a South Beach Diet 100 cal chocolate delight bar D: 1/2 c Kashi Golean with 1/2 c Oikos greek yogurt and a teaspoon of honey

I like EAS chocolate - haven't found vanilla yet, but haven't looked very hard. I have Designer Whey vanilla - it's okay - I think it's better than unjury, but I know tastes vary widely...

Oh, and we had no trouble getting mercury-free vaccines, except for the flu, which is recommended for both me (asthma) and my daughter (who has several heart defects and had open heart surgery at 3 days of age to correct the imminently fatal one). I usually wait til November, and if we've managed not to catch a cold by then we skip the vaccine, but if we've been sick all fall we get the flu shot.

We've chosen to selectively vaccinate, and stretch out the sequence. We delayed MMR until each child was 4. I was a little nervous about delaying MMR, but my son already had intestinal and neurological problems and I wanted to be cautious. I asked our pediatrician how many cases of mumps, measles, or rubella he had seen, and he replied that he had a case of mumps in the 80s, a couple cases of measles in the early 90s, and had never seen a case of rubella - I was less nervous after that... My husband is a virologist, I'm a microbiologist - he knows more about immunology than I so he made a prioritized list of the vaccines and we discussed our modified schedule with the pediatrician. In some cases she suggested a change and if it made sense to us we complied. Since we homeschool we haven't had the additional paperwork required to exempt a child from vaccination yet. Someone mentioned the difference in the number of vaccines. When I was a child we received a total of around 25 individual vaccinations before the age of 5; my children's original vaccine schedule would have included almost twice that many, most before the age of 2. And many doctors would give two multivalent vaccinations at one visit. I think forcing a child's immune system to make immune responses to up to six different viruses at one time does not make sense. Yes, some children's systems will manage just fine, but despite the studies that have been done, I still think that at some point a biological connection between the number, timing, and/or formulation of vaccinations and children who have neurological or immune issues will be shown. I have absolutely no scientific basis for this, except a knowledge of the complexity of the human system and the reality that we are still in the infancy of our understanding of it, particularly the brain.

If you're past the healing stage, I'd skip the Soup and move on to solid foods. My typical day looks like this: Breakfast: scrambled eggs or small eggbeaters omelet with a little cheese and vegies or Kashi (protein fortified) oatmeal Lunch: deli meat, lettuce or spinach, grated carrots, a little lite mayo, and maybe a little cheese on a sandwich made of Mountain bread (a flatbread, thinner than a tortilla, that doesn't cause me problems) Dinner: salmon or other meat with cooked vegetables or Kashi Golean mixed with greek (high protein) yogurt and a little honey Snack if necessary: yogurt or an ounce of cheese or a piece of deli meat I figure it's good practice to mostly eat the solid Protein that will help me stay full when I reach ideal restriction, so I stay away from soup and Protein drinks and try to make more solid choices. You can make a small pizza using mini pita bread or a small tortilla as a crust, if that's what you want to eat :-) Pita, sauce, sauteed vegies, sausage or pepperoni (I use the vegetarian versions), an ounce of mozzarella. Yum :-) Maybe instead of thinking about a cup, think about 8 ounces? My nutritionist's suggestion was to try to stay within 4-6 oz per meal, with half of that made up of protein and the rest vegies and complex carbohydrates. Hope that helps - you've made great progress so far - congrats, and keep up the good work :-)

Thanks, I just looked again and realized that the two sandwiches they were advertising as 200cal are not yet on the menu at my local restaurant, though similar sounding sammies are. The menu just has the four others, and those are listed around 300 cal. Good to know that substituting the regular dressing for fat free would save me 10+ grams of fat. I probably won't bother switching out unless going there becomes a regular thing, though. Thanks for helping me figure it out :-)

My doctor wanted me to avoid lifting more than 5 pounds immediately after surgery. At a post-op follow up three weeks later he said I could increase that to 15 pounds. I'd talk to your doctor about your situation and find out his/her opinion.

PS - I have some similarities to your story - I started dieting as a pre-teen, didn't start gaining steadily until my mid-20s, and agree that I wouldn't have made it to 300lb without dieting. My main reason for choosing to go forward with lapband surgery is that the arthritis in my knees and hips had gotten so bad I was using a cane most of the time and couldn't walk on uneven surfaces, like the beach or a hiking trail. I have two small children who love to go hiking and to the beach and I realized I was making their world smaller with my disability. The orthopedist said he wouldn't (and he doubted anyone else would, either) do knee replacement surgery on someone my size, that I'd have to lose 125+ lb. When I talked to my primary care doc about my frustration and hopelessness, she asked if I'd ever looked into lapband surgery. I hadn't - I had lumped it in with gastric bypass and knew I didn't want to risk that surgery. When I looked into lapband and realized that it had a miniscule mortality risk and seemed to be working for a large number of people, I decided to go forward. I had to self-pay - our insurance excludes treatment for obesity, too - but I feel much more hopeful about my chances for improving my mobility and the rest of my life. What really got to me was comparing the success rates. With diets, we've all heard that 90% of people who try to lose weight by dieting fail and gain it back, usually with extra. With lapband, at my doctor's office, 90% of the patients lose at least 50-60% of their excess weight. At that point it was an easy decision to go with the option that gave me a much greater chance of reaching my goal. I honestly don't care if I get into a normal BMI range - I just want to increase my mobility, decrease my pain, and be a more energetic person. And so far I feel a positive difference with every 20 pounds I lose. It's been worth it for me, definitely. As for the eating, I never would have believed I could be satisfied eating 800-1000 calories. Some days it's 700, some days it's 1200, a very occasional 1600 (usually when I've had a couple glasses of wine!). Just after surgery I was pretty restricted due to the inflammation and I was having trouble getting over 400 cal/day - shocker! I do feel that I'm dieting at this point, not because I'm hungry, but rather because I am tracking everything I eat so I can ensure I'm getting enough Protein. Not everyone does that, but I'm a bit of a control freak I can imagine that when I am perfectly restricted and used to the different way of eating (protein first, then veg, and whole grains or fruit if there's room) I won't feel as though I have to keep track anymore. Even though I'm not perfectly restricted, I'm not looking for food between meals except when I'm pre-menstrual:rolleyes:, and when I succumb to those cravings I just can't eat much. My previous pre-menstrual binges were often a 7oz or larger bag of chips, or half a large pizza. Now, pizza just doesn't appeal that much, and my salt/crispy food of the moment is 1-3 oz of snap pea crisps - they're not the best choice, but they fulfill the salt/crisp craving and are comparatively high in protein, and regardless, much healthier than the bag of chips they replaced! I hope all that helps - I kind of got on a roll! Best of luck as you make your decision.

I've been baffled most recently by the big signs at Quizno's that say their new Sammies are $2 and 200 calories. The menu, however, and their online nutrition guide states that each of the four types has around 300 calories. They're still a good choice for me when I haven't made my usual bento box lunch. I eat the insides and about half the bread and it's a filling meal. But why the discrepancy between the large font ad and small font menu? I asked but the worker was uninformed - I think I'll write Quizno's and ask.