gamboagirl

Over time I've learned to eat Protein when I want something sweet. But I'm still as large as ever. I gained all my weight in pregnancies and despite long term bfing, never lost all of it and kept adding to it w each baby. I eat a mostly organic, low carb diet rich in grass fed or pastured meat products, eggs, veggies, some fruits and Water. My down fall is if I happen to pick up or bake something like Cookies, so I just try not to. I developed a thyroid problem in my last pregnancy and it's been difficult to loose any weight even on medication for my thyroid. I can eat low calorie, I've done it before many times over, it just is not sustainable for a life time in our society or at least I fall prey to the larger portions and higher carb foods and then have to wean myself off again. But what I'm reading is that the band is temporary and when it's out, weight loss becomes a struggle again. So, I have to wonder why the Lap Band is becoming so popular over something like a Deonuel Switch or vertical gastoetomy both of which are not super popular but seem to have some very good qualities about them long term and fewer malnutrition risk compared to standard Gastric Bypass.

As I research "options", I did not know the band was not for life. Considering it's to be removed, if over eating is the real problem, money is better spent on a permanent solution. If it was hard to loose weight before the band, it will be just as hard after in theory. If you over eat and are forced to not over eat due to "pain" or some other discomfort of having a smaller stomche, once that is not there -- it's free range. It would be great to think the eating habits have changed, but I know from experience I changed for over a year w WW and then fell right back and then some. This was a good read for sure.

Your healing sounds like my own after birth issues w my midwife not stitching me up properly and I have not healed yet -- baby is 1 this month!!! I started seeing a GYN for help and I go some good advice, but healing is slow, very slow. That sounds like a horrible ordeal. Will insurance not pay for removal since you are having medical problems? I get that ins won't pay to put one in usually, but complications should fall under a different catagory, I would think...

Out of sheer curiosity -- what sort of calories is a person consuming AFTER lab band? And is how your body sees those calories any different than if you just decided to eat less without the surgery? For example - I know I tried the 6wk Body Make Over diet, I made it to day 3 and felt ill. I counted up the calories and it was 600 to 800 for those 3 days. Well, no wonder I felt like crap. I went from 3000 to 4000 calories to 600!!! That was a few years ago, now I have prediabetes symptoms of hypoglycemia. I get shakey if I don't eat and I have to eat Protein. How would I feel different w a band verse just eating less?

Why do they want you to be so unhealth to get your life back! I'm a BMI of 35 and I hate it. I've been a BMI of 30 since 2002, documented. Ins is so not fair to those who need help! That is just cruel to HAVE TO BE over BMI of 40. The Lap Band is approved for BMI of 35 and every lb of weight you have on you makes for more difficult surgery and recovery and greater risk of General Aneathesia! Geez... That is terrible.

Well, being treat for my thyroid by a gyn isn't exactly the best care. He won't be doing any level tests until next week, 6 mo from the start of meds. I think most ppl on meds get checked and fine tuned sooner from what i read on thyroid forums. but I'll take what i can get. The double whammy w thyroid is energy gone for so long and thus far even on meds, my energy is not back. Don't get me started on nutritionist, I know more about nutrition than any stupid nutritionist I've ever seen. How about a Celiac herself telling me not to bother w foods over 3 ingredients long! Yeah, that is livable -- not. And certainly not for a child who can have many things like his friends, if you can read a label and call a company. I guess the idea that someone is smart enough to do that was beyond her scope of practice. I feel sorry for those who buy into her no more than 3 ingredient Celiac GF living philosophy. I just think it is sad that these LapBand docs are holding seminars with "financing" companies telling vunerable women they need this surgery before doing the proper testing. This is how my friend got sold up the river via a seminar! She didn't even try for insurance coverage. Estrogen dominance can cause weight to not come off as easily as one might expect. Bottom line there is not a "easy" solution no matter what you do and my df has learned the hard way -- ie family finances a wreck and kids going without Christmas b/c she had to have this surgery.

I only became overweight after my first child. Lost w WW over 2 years and then gained in a 2nd pregnancy and have struggled ever since despite WW success in the past. I work out daily at the gym, aerobics, weights, and yoga alternating. If I don't make it to the gym I work out at home. I eat a whole foods organic diet. I don't eat refined and processed products in general. My kids are all in the 10% and tall. I'm tall. I was unknowningly hot in HS at 5'8" and 135lbs -- I thought I was big, compared to my Latin female friends my size 9 was big. Now I'm 225plus pounds, I waiver 5lbs on my home scale almost daily. My doctor's scale I gained from Oct to Nov 2lbs 224 to 226. Lap Band for me is definitely not the solution. I don't have an intake problem, if anything I don't probably eat enough, but if I eat more I gain weight. Something is wrong with me on a hormonal or metabolic level and I'll have to figure it out myself. My doc told me to do Arbonne Figure 8 -- Not happening! Too sweet to tolerate those shakes and the stevia after taste is horrid. I should have never signed up to get the discount until I tasted those shakes. I've been doing a shake for a meal for years and NO doctor believes me when I say what I do eat!!! It's that damn fat stigma... I say I eat 1500, they automatically think 4500cals!!! I say I work out 5 days a week, that means to them I might work out 1 or none. I even brought photos of me before kids and after each one to show the a pattern. It didn't help me get help.

To be safe you better read what your plan says and then call and ask questions, get the call center's person's name and get a log number. Document every conversation you have. Then make sure your supervising doctor actually accepts your new ins. It seems like your damned if you do and damned if you don't.

Until you have a complete blood work up for Hypothyroidism, a complete work up for Adrenal function and a complete hormone level check. If your doctor fails to preform these not so basic tests, he or she could be selling you a surgery you do not need. Or a surgery that will not give you results like you expect. You need to be sure your labs include Free T4 and Free T3, Cortisol levels via saliva or urine, and hormone levels. Too much estrogen will keep weight on you as well. Look into Liver Detox, the best plan for weight loss will not work if your liver is not functioning properly. I found out I was hypothryoid. I dropped 18 lbs on medication in the first 2 months. I've slowed down to a hault. But that is the plight of hypo patients and no amount of intake restriction is going to resolve the weight gain issues of a hypothryoid person. I'm still reading, but thus far it's a no. I'm waiting for my 6 mo mark on meds to have my levels drawn, then I might get an increase in medication and drop more. At the same time I was going through my journey to dx. My bf went in for LB surgery. She lost some weight during the pre-op and 2 wk post-op and then stopped. She stopped while still on a liquid and soft diet! She has had another fill and still no more weight loss. She is in debt, depressed, and still just as fat as she was in September. She did not get the lab work ups she should have had IMO. She was sold up the river that a surgery was the answer to her problems. She still suffers from depression which is a major sign of hypothryoidism in additon to low energy and lack of weight loss. Just don't get sold up the river is all I'm saying. You have to be your own advocate for better health. Be sure you find out if you have underlying causes. Doctors usually only run the TSH thyroid test and for millions it will come back fine when in fact the main hormone tellers T3 and T4 are not fine and have not been checked. I spent almost a year finding a doctor to actually run the right tests and then he was so shocked I spent another 3 months going to another doctor who was a jack a$$ and back again to my doc. The JA would not run the thyroid antibody tests, the cortisol and adrenal tests, the hormone tests, nothing total waste of my time and money. All he saw was a fat woman w a normal TSH test, he ignorned my super low T4 and T3 levels. There is a stigma against fat -- I'm fat only b/c I over indulge or am lazy. I'm not lazy, I'm not an over indulger. And docs can't get their heads around it. I was told a doc automatically triples what a fat person tells them they eat and subtracts 3X what a fat person tells them they exercise. I'm shot down just by walking in the freakin door! Just don't get sold up the river like my bf. I feel for her, I really do. I so want her to go to a doctor and insist on the right tests.

My GYN doc sells Arbonne (for it's progesterone cream as a starting point). He told me he wanted me to try the Figure 8 System. I researched it, finally bought in and got the shakes. TOO SICKY SWEET to be drinkable EVER! I'm sending them back. I bought a Figure 8 kit which included the shakes, the supplement, and the chews and I bought the tea. The chews are doable, I ate a chew while baking Cookies for my kids. Not tempted at all to eat a cookie! The supplement may or may not work, I don't feel any different. The tea is great, great ingredients, things that are in my herbal tea anyway, in a convient portable tea bag -- I'm an herbal tea from the herbalist kinda gal and make herbal tea w/o bags. But I think you need 3 to 4 cups per day for a theraputic effect -- that is a standard herbalist answer. So, I tried the Fiber first. I thought I would die. I had my son try it too and he spit it out gagging. I got a headache from the sweet. It's the Stevia, it's too over powering. I don't have a problem w BMs until I drank this... My doc suggested mixing it w the vanilla -- double stevia over kill is not going to make it better. Then I tried the chocolate, again too sicky sweet. I tried it in coffee, I threw it down the drain. Oh, gross, gross, gross. I mixed up some vanilla. Again too sicky sweet w a sweet after taste from the Stevia again. I threw it down the drain. I don't see how milk will tone down the Stevia. It can not. The products have TOO much Stevia in them. The after taste is too telling of the probelm. It's like diet soda w/o the chemical aspertame and it's dangerous health affects but yucky after taste. Thank goodness Arbonne has a 45 day satisfaction guarrentee. These are going back. I'll stick with whey Healthier Protein from Mercola.com. FWIW - I take thyroid meds and I can not have Calcium within 4 hours of taking the medication. It binds to the calcium making it less effective, it also binds to Iron, so don't take iron supplements at the same time either. I've been doing Mercola shakes (97 calories w/ raw milk 243cals) and Figure 8 Supplements since 2nd week of Dec. I bought tea and supplement on e-bay while I was waiting on deciding, the shakes on e-bay were always more or the same price to buy them through Arbonne direct. Anyway, in that time I've lost ZERO! I've been eating calories according to the Figure 8 website and for me that is 1400 to 1900 ish. I've been doing 1500 and not one stinking stupid pound!:faint:I worked out at the gym 5 days a wk in 2002 to 2003 and did not drop 1 single pound then either - sweating, toning, building muscle and still nothing. My mum, now just overweight and not obese anymore said I need to eat only 1200 cals to loose weight. And it will shut my metabolism right on down to nothing. There has go to be a better solution. If you cut calories your body starts to shut down and everything you eat turns to fat stores b/c the body is smart and says hey I'm starving, keep it, keep it, keep it. It will take good healthy greens and turn them into sugar and then fat. The brain has to have sugars to function, it's called glycolisis and it happens in the liver. I eat a very healthy diet, I've never been into junk food, sweets, carbs, salty. We eat a whole food organic diet. I don't buy into the chemical laiden "fat free", "sugar free", "net carb" garbage -- it surely isn't working for Americans. I've gotten fatter with eat pregnancy, never was fat before! But for me Figure 8 Shakes are just too gross to handle, especially when there are other things on the market that are more healthy. The fructose in Figure 8 is just as bad for the body as High Fructose Corn Syrup (a hazmat chemical in case you were wondering). If you buy Figure 8 through Arbonne, you can return it if you don't like it. So that would be my suggestion. I'm a busy mom, I do not have time to stand in front of a blender and add stuff to this mix to make it edible. If it isn't edible as directed, it defeats the purpose of being "Go Easy". Mercola shakes add Water and they are fine, add milk and they are fine -- shake and go. If I want to make a smoothy I have rice protein isolate and hemp protein isolate powders sitting on my shelf - add a little fruit, water or rice milk, flax seed meal, ice and those are really good. But high in calories and simple carbs from the fruit. To take figure 8 at 110 calories and low carbs (8g) and start adding to it, well, then it sort of defeats the purpose IMO. Their special complex in the supplement is Chromium, good for blood sugar stablizing and some herbs. Their special complex in the shake is Alpha Lipoic Acid, Coenzyme Q10, Alfalfa, Kelp, Ginseng. Take a supplement in stead of this shake! I drink alfalfa in an herbal tea daily, I take a kelp supplement, and never had much use for ginseng. For Fiber -- eat more rich green salads! The fiber is Maltodextrin (corn derivative), oat fiber, cellulose, rice bran, orange fiber, apple fiber, Bamboo fiber, pea fiber some gums including Guar Gum (which will induce serious bowel movements on it's own), and psyllium husk. Seriously eat an APPLE every day, it will also help Detox the liver. Eat Oat meal if you can everyday. You don't need a shake to do that. Apple is 80 calories, super good source of fiber, slow to digest. Oat Meal 160 (Weight Control flavored variety) w added boost of protein Green salads 15 cals, filling, good for you, and "real food" Living food for a living body, save your money and buy real food.