MacMadame

There is evidence that some aspects of obesity are genetic.

I want to be a competitive ballroom dancer.

DH is watching the 10 Commandments. I'm in another room to escape. That's fun enough for me though I'm thinking about going into an even different room to watch Mythbusters. Now THAT's my idea of fun!

Um... well, okay. :wub:

Here's what I've gotten from Google: There are about 7-8 band manufacturers. However, three seem to be the main manufacturers and only two of them have their bands FDA approved. As far as I can tell, the 3rd hasn't started the FDA process and doesn't seem to be interested in doing so. Of the two bands available in the US, one is made by Allergan (they bought it from Inamed) and is called the Lap-band®. The original bands they did clinical trials on have been upgraded a bit so there are currently quite a number of sizes and styles out there. The newest bands are called the AP System and come in two sizes. This style has just recently been introduced in the US though they've been used in other countries for a while. The improvements include making the reservoir (where the saline goes) go 360 degrees around, making it wider (supposed to help with slippage), and having it semi-divided into sections. Their web site is here: Home WARNING: it plays music. And if you wait long enough, some lady talks to you. (Man, I hate that) The other company is Ethicon, a Johnson & Johnson company, and they bought their band from a company in Sweden and renamed it from the Swedish Band to the Realize Band. It already had a reservoir that goes around 360 and is in the new wide style that most modern bands use. The plastic is softer (supposed to help with erosion) and the reservoir doesn't come pre-divided. It did get upgraded right before being introduced in the US. The upgrade was to have a low profile port and to make the port so it can grip the stomach muscle with little claws. It's up to the surgeon whether or not they use the claws or sew the port in place the way the Lap-Band port is installed. (The Lap-band does come with a low profile port option but you have to work it out with your surgeon to get it and some charge slightly more for it.) The claws are supposed to be better for preventing port flipping. Here is their web site: Home - REALIZEBand.com Both bands come open and are buckled together during installation. Both bands have a good record of weight loss. The Realize band at one point had a better track record with slips and erosions but that was before the Lap-band upgraded to the reservoir that went all the way around with the creases. I haven't found any studies comparing the Lap-Band AP system with the Realize Band, but doctors say they perform about the same. The 3rd band is the MIDband and it's made by a French company (Whose initials are MID) and is sometimes referred to as the French Band. You can get this band in Mexico, if you go there for surgery. It came out after the Realize band and also is wider, softer and the reservoir goes all the way around. It has a titanium port. (The other two have silicon ports, I believe.) If you get one, you need to make sure your local fill doctor will work with it. Some won't fill a non-FDA approved band. If you aren't getting fills locally, that's not an issue. Their web site: Hello and welcome to the MIDBAND™ website Finally, Allergan is working on a revolutionary new band that doesn't need to be filled via saline. It's adjustable with some sort of remote control device. It's just entered the FDA approval process: LAP-BAND: Laparoscopic Obesity Surgery | Easyband I've also found some info about the history of the different bands. However, all the articles contradict each other and some are heavily oriented towards whatever band company wrote them. So it's hard to know what to trust. :wub: Also, the reason I keep saying "supposedly" and "thought to" is that there are lots of claims made that this band is better than that band so it's hard to know what the truth is. Plus our understanding of band technology keeps changing. So far, the surgeons I've talked to say they perform about the same and many use both the Realize and the Lap-Band AP. I personally wouldn't get an older Lap-Band -- it's not like a tv where last year's model is good enough. At the same time I wouldn't wait for the next improvement -- because it seems like there is always a new improvement coming.

I always keep my shoes on at my doctor's office. It sounds like the surgeon's offices don't do that ... I had planned to wear my running shoes. They weigh 3 lb just by themselves!

I just made my appointment. She said it would take about an hour, maybe 1.5 if I need to do a questionnaire to be screened for depression. So this one does the talking first. It seems like a lot of others do the questionnaire first.

I thought only left-wing crazies complained about mercury. :cheers2:

Plus incest is illegal. :cheers2: Seriously, parents can be so weird sometime. I'm not sure why they think this stuff is motivating, but I think they do. My mom would say things to me when I was growing up like "You'd be such a pretty girl if you'd only stop biting your fingernails." As if feeling bad about myself was going to get me to stop. They made similar comments about my weight. And what gets me is that I wasn't actually overweight at the time -- at least not according to those BMI calculators.

I've been off the To Go packets for two days (because I keep forgetting to bring more into work) and I still have heartburn. So I guess that's not it either.

Me too. I didn't think you were. I thought maybe you were thinking I was getting down on you. :embaressed_smile:

Okay. NOW I know what thread you guys are talking about. I can get off the short bus now! I hate it when people play with smilies just to play with smiles. :eek:

Well I bought a new tire once, drove home about 2 miles, parked, and when I came out the next day, the tire was flat. Sorry, but I blame the tire company. I'm pretty sure they didn't install it correctly -- especially since there was no visible puncture. And yes, even though it was over 15 years ago, I'm still made about it! :embaressed_smile:

Yep, that's where it is. It shares land with the CA School for the Deaf. There aren't a lot of students there though. Around 70-80. The School for the Deaf is much bigger, over 200. It's been here as long as I've lived in Fremont. I didn't realize it hadn't always been here. Interesting.

I'm blogging. Scrapbooking is one of those things I think I'll do but never get around to. :embaressed_smile:

Ohmigod, is THAT my problem? I've been having heartburn like crazy lately. Sometimes Zantac works for it and sometimes it doesn't. I thought it was related to my Water intake but since my water almost always has Crystal Light in it... though I was out of it today and still have some heartburn, so maybe not.

It might make you feel better to know that I didn't find out I was pregnant until around 4.5 months the last time. During that time I: 1) was on Jenny Craig and getting only 1200 cal. per day 2) drank like a fish for a week when I was on vacation 3) took provera (a hormone) to kick-start my period and my kid turned out fine! :wink2: Also, I was still overweight so my doctor told me to keep my weight gain down and not gain as much as a thin person would during my pregnancy. I didn't count calories at all. I counted RDAs. I had a list of what I had to get in each day -- so many servings of Calcium, so many of Vitamin A veggies, so much of Vitamin C foods, etc. So many servings of Protein, etc. If I got that in, I was happy and didn't worry about how many calories it was. My baby was born 9 lb. 1 oz., too so it's not like she was deprived.

So now I'm in a weird state. I started logging everything I ate and drinking more Water. As a result of that, I've lost 4 lb! I'm in a bit of a panic since I haven't had my initial consult and weigh in with my surgeon and I'm getting perilously close to being under 40 BMI. Between getting measured an inch taller the last two times I was at the doctors and losing 4 lb., I'm down to 41.3 and my appointment is still 1 month out! Last night before I went to bed, I had an extra bowl of Cereal with milk just because. I was going to start working out or maybe take a yoga class because I can tell I'm not exercising as much as I did when I was ice skating regularly but now I'm afraid to. How crazy is that?!

I've been trying to eat slower and chew more in preparation for getting the band. Prior to this, I've been REALLY into spicy foods. Well, I've found when you take time to actually CHEW your food, it's got TONS more flavor then when you gulp it down. You don't NEED to put a ton of spice on it to give it flavor. I'm a bit in shock, actually. :wink2:

My kids all know. I like to be really upfront with them. My grandmom was rather secretive about things -- had breast cancer and didnt' tell us until months after the mascetomy, for example -- and my mom has always been a bit squirrelly about health issue -- told me she had an underactive thyroid when she was taking diet pills and then later couldn't remember having said that when I asked about her thyroid condition -- and I think that these sorts of things have impacted my relationship with them, especially with my grandmother. I don't want to put my kids in that position. So I've told them I'm thinking about it and dd and I watched a Lap band surgery together. (She's into blood and guts and science and thought it was cool.) I plan to bring her to a support group meeting at some point, too. I plan to bring dh because he's really going to have to change his cooking and grocery shopping style once I get the band. No more "Pasta and gravy" with no veggies two nights a week for us!

It would be nice to feel wonderful and healthy again. :wink2: But it will be irriating to know that some stupid chart will say I'm still overweight when I'm as healthy as a horse. Just to be clear: I think it's great that you've gotten to be tiny person. You seem very happy and healthy. I, OTOH, think that running a marathon must be on the things they make you do when you get to one of those Circles of Hell. :wink2: I am more of a yoga, ice skating, ballroom dancing kind of gal and I look forward to being at a weight where I can start doing those things again without so much discomfort and lack of progress.

My PCP suggested WLS before I could bring it up. So I don't think the letter is going to be a problem. But I worry it won't be in the right formate or include all the right details for the ins. company. Because I'm a worry wart like that. There was supposed to be a sample PCP letter in my packet from the surgeon but it wasn't there. Anyone have a link to a sample letter online that I can print out?

I don't know where you are reading these things. Not only do you not have to have a re-operation in 5-7 years for the band, but there are people in one study who had their bands twelve years! There are also people who have had a problem with slippage or erosion and many of them were able to heal up and get a new band in as months, not years. There are others who decided to do a revision for RNY or another WLS and were quite able to. OTOH, if you decide RNY is not for you, you can't have it undone and get a band. Also, most of the complications of bypass are due to the malabsorption issues, not the co-morbidities. Maybe it was the mortality rate that is related to co-morbidities? RNY is often done on people with really high BMIs and serious co-morbidities and any surgery is more dangerous for them because of that. OTOH, it's not accurate to say that only they have a higher risk of dying than lap band patients. It's a more involved surgery -- organs are cut -- and it takes longer. Both of those things increase the mortality rate over an less invasive surgery that takes less time. There definitely good reasons to get RNY but don't do it based on bad information.

I know I have a small frame. It's very obvious when you look at how narrow my shoulders are compared to everything else and how small my wrists and head are. Also the two c-sections for having narrow hips and big babies were a bit of a clue. Based on that, the weight charts say I ought to be at the bottom of a 100-130 lb range to be healthy and that goes against my own experience. I have been wonderfully healthy at 145, which is my current goal. I had low blood pressure, Iron of 14.7, cholesterol of 155 and my sugars and liver function and everything else a doctor can test all looked good. I could do any exercise I wanted to with no limitations (and did). I have been 100 lb. (in HS) and I had to worry about getting blown around in a strong wind (really happened to me, not an exaggeration) and about having a blood pressure so low that I couldn't give blood and also had fainting spells. I don't think there is anything healthy about fainting. Now I may get to 145 (my current goal) and find that the band lets me go a bit lower. I couldn't maintain 145 before because I was always hungry. But I assume that won't be an issue with the band. But even if it does, if I get close to a weight where my blood pressure drops below 90/55-ish, I'm going to run screaming to my doctor for an unfill. Chart or no chart.

Behavior Intervention is Behavior Modification, really. At least as far as a layman is concerned. It's about focusing on behaviors and changing them via positive and negative reinforcement. It's different from therapy that focuses on your emotions and motivations, because the focus is on the behavior and what positives and negatives that behavior brings you.