MacMadame

Do you live near a Fill Center USA? There may also be other docs in your area who take orphaned lap band patients. It's hard to give more specific advise without knowing where you live.

Hey, I expected this thread to get a lot more replies. I guess it's just too stupid to even get worked up about.

Mini-Mac wants an iPhone. Mini-Mac whines "it's not fair" when she is told she is not getting one. If she keeps whining, she's told we can always take the phone she has away. That shuts her up pretty quick.

2010 in Vancouver. On my figure skating boards, people are already arguing over who the medal contenders are.

Now that we have all these cool forums for surgeries other than lap band, will some of the forums get converted to be about more than lap band? For example, it would be great if "Lap band in the News" would be "WLS in the news".

No one WLS is the "the best". Better in what way? It's less risky, but DS has better overall weigh loss stats. Plus DS patients often have awesome cholesterol numbers. So it depends on what is better to you. No.

Tri is in the Olympics now? I guess I need to pay more attention. Not that I'm watching it. The only summer sport I like any more is diving.

I like Shazam! You use it to tag music so when something is playing on the radio and you want to know what it is, you tag it and it tells you. Then you can watch the video on YouTube and buy the song on iTunes, if you want. It doesn't always catch all the punk rock stuff I listen to, but it catches a lot more than I expected when I first got it.

Good for you. It's not just this site, it's the whole freaking internet.

People always ask me what my kids want so they have wish lists I can send to people when they ask. But you should never include it in an invitation. That's bad manners.

You were misinformed. The sleeve starts out at 2-4oz mostly due to swelling and ends up at around 5 oz. for most people the end of the first year. After that, it doesn't stretch. As for going septic and dying, that is extremely unlikely. There is a *slight* potential for leaks, but it's much less likely than for RnY. In fact, my surgeon hasn't experienced a leak in over a year. The sleeve has a similar complication rate to lap band, but with weight loss stats as good as or better than RnY.

I don't know how much difference there is between a 32 and a 36 (there is very little between a 32 and a 34), but I do know I wouldn't go to a surgeon who uses 48-60f like they used in the early days of the sleeve. The data shows that's just too big, especially a few years out. You are much more likely to get a stricture from RnY than from VSG, even with a 32f -- which is one of the things surgeons who use bigger says say is why they are using bigger sizes. You are also much more likely to find yourself losing too much weight with a DS than with a VSG, even with a 32f. So I don't really understand why a few doctors say a 32f is "too small".

I'm so glad this forum got started. I wasn't looking forward to losing one my favorite places on the web now that I'm getting a sleeve. Any other sleevesters out there? I'm in the process of getting scheduled for Sept.

This article: All U.S. adults could be overweight in 40 years - Yahoo! News Has got to be the most stupid thing I've read in a long time. It's a prime example of how people think you have to be alarmist to get attention to your cause and also of how people misuse and misunderstand statistics. Don't get me wrong, I agree that obesity is a big problem and a growing problem. However, the idea that the current trend is going to go on unstopped forever, is just ridiculous. It completely ignores the fact that obesity is a disease, not a choice, and that some people's physiology is just not going to let them become overweight no matter what. It also ignores the existence of WLS. Do they really think everyone who has WLS in the past 30 years will suddenly start eating too much and gain weight? And all because of some numbers in a study? It's preposterous. :thumbup: Of course, the people who put out the press release know it's preposterous. They even kind of admit it in the article. But they think for some reason crying Wolf is the way to get people to spend money on the problem. Note: I'm not saying obesity is not a problem in the US. I'm not even saying that it's not a growing problem. I just think this is completely the wrong way to go about solving the problem. Sometimes the cynic in me thinks this sort of thing is done on purpose and that someone is profiting from our obesity problem and doesn't really want to have any good solutions, but just wants money thrown at it so they can continue to profit.

Whee! Thank you, guys.

Magic! That's it exactly. I have to say, I found the Lap Band ads very compelling. I'm sitting on the couch, thinking "how can I be hungry? I just ate something" and those lion roaring, tame the hunger ads come on tv and I think "oh baby, I want that." However, I rarely watch ads of any sort -- I'm watching something saved on the DVR or I'm watching "live" but I'm time-shifting and I skip over them. So I didn't see my first lap band ad until I had been here for months. Not watching ads has saved me from all sorts of things. :biggrin2: In fact, when Mini-Mac gets a case of the "gimmes", I forbid her to watch more than an hour of tv a day and they go right away.

Lots of others. And not just for bands but for more involved surgeries like sleeves and RnY.

I think that means he's planning to log on tomorrow and wish us happy birthday, froggi. :eek: I already got my present. I asked for Wii Fit, but dh couldn't find any so I got a flat screen tv for the bedroom instead. I told him now that I have this kickass tv, we need the HD version of Tivo for it. Hee. My niece is getting married Friday so my mom flew in for it tonight and a bunch of us are going to SF tomorrow to see the Chihuly exhibit at the de Young. And generally just hang out in the city. Even though work is collapsing around me, I'm still taking two days off. :w00t:

Happy birthday back! :eek: Also, I just realized when you said tomorrow, you posted that yesterday so tomorrow is today. My b'day is actualy tomorrow.

Yes, they think they have something magical. I already told you that! I was telling someone on OH that you can get your diabetes resolved with any WLS, not just DS, and the DS come back was that other WLS resolve but DS "cures" Type II Diabetes. If you are off your meds the day of surgery and never go back, then why is that somehow different than being cured?? On my surgery clinic's web site, the latest blog entry is all about how WLS cures diabetes. Not resolves it -- cures. So even the doctors aren't making the distintion that the DSers are making.

The rules of the tool. That's cute! :w00t: I had my surgical consult today. I came back with a 35 page booklet on how to eat post surgery (and some stuff on exercise) and a 30 page booklet on WLS in general and a 4 page Pre-op Checklist of stuff I have to do. Then I hear stories like this and I wonder where these people are going for their surgery!

Ohmigod! Tomorrow is MY birthday too. That is just so weird!!

We talked about you behind your back the whole time. :cry_smile:

It feels good, but it would feel better if I weren't at work right now. I can't believe how poorly a certain person communicates and doesn't think things through. Because of that, I have to make a major change in my feature and I only have 5 working days left to do about 10 days worth of work. Grrrrr.

I voted Yes but after I read your explanation, I want to change my vote. I am active in the Figure Skating Community and for a while our big Governing Council meeting was always Mother's Day weekend. This is a BIG event -- it's when all the club delegates get together and vote on what rules will be used by US Figure Skating to run everything -- including Olympic Trials. I was a delegate two years in a row, including the year that a bunch of mothers rebelled and made an action on the floor to make a rule that GC could be held on ANY weekend of the year except Mother's Day. Although being on Mother's Day didn't stop me from going, it did upset my family AND it was apparently a Really Big Deal to a bunch of people, enough that they made the organization change the date on subsequent events. I think if you have professional conference that caters at least 50% to women on that weekend that you will have diminished attendence and a lot of grumbling from those who do attend.