MacMadame

My surgeon was using a 48 f and his patients were regaining their weight at 2-3 years out. He uses a 32 f now and this is less of a problem. The regain stats are more in line with the DS and better than bypass and the initial weight loss is similar to bypass. (He's done over 1000 of the things and has been doing them for over 7 years.) Because of that, I wouldn't use a surgeon who was using a boughie over 30 something.

Like me! I could kick myself for taking so long to get to this point. I wasted all those years. But... nothing I can do about it now, right?

You aren't wrong, but I think of it slightly differently. My slider foods are foods that I can *always* eat no matter want because they *always* go down. So Protein bars are a slider food for me. For me, I have no issue with dieting. I'm actually pretty good at it. Maintenance scares me more and is more difficult. However, if you don't like being "on a diet" think of it a "retraining your body on how to eat". Because that's something we have to do. I look at what normal people at a normal weight do. And they definitely watch what they eat and cut back at times. So we are going to have to too!

My feeling is that my calcium related numbers are much better NOW than they were pre-op because I've improved my Vitamin D numbers and stopped taking the blood pressure meds which were depleting the calcium in my blood. (PTH was fine though.) I think if you are conscientious about your labs, you can avert most of this stuff. Plus most of us will end up on more than 1000 calories a day long term. I'm already up to 1400 most days.

I think it's because deep down I want to lose a few more pounds. But I don't want to continue to eat 1200-1400 calories a day, either.

I have that trouble too! But I kept going back and eventually I learned them. Until we'd have a sub with new moves! :lol0: Now I do other things... no time for step class.

Heh, that's funny because I made some trail mix for working out yesterday. :lol0: I have to be careful though because nuts can be a trigger food for me.

When no one posts, the thread isn't high enough and I forget to post. Monday - planned rest day Tues - BRIC workout at gym in AM (Spin, Run, Core, but we had a sub and didn't do core today); track workout in the PM with the focus on form I swing my arms too much and over-stride when I go faster than my normal pace. Need to work on that. Tomorrow I have a session with my trainer in the AM. Normally I do a swim workout in the PM but I have my bariatric support group then so I may swim at lunch time or I may say "screw it." It depends on what is going on at work.

There are people with bands who had their gallbladders out at the same time... so it can be done.

I would just slowly cut back on them now so that it's not a big shock post-op. Immediately post-op, you really need to get that Protein in to avoid losing a lot of lean muscle mass. When I first started tracking my food pre-op, I was eating 300 g of carbs a day! By the time I had my surgery, I was down to 150 g, a lot of that from fruit instead of the junk food I was eating before. Once you are eating more, then the lean muscle issue isn't as acute. At that point, it's kind of up to you what approach you want to take. Some people start out eating like they are on maintenance from day one. These people almost always lose slower. Some of them do fine and get to goal and are happy, but it's been my observation that enough of them find themselves slipping back into old habits and not getting to goal that I am glad I didn't take that approach. I decided to treat myself as if I was a newborn just learning how to eat who didn't know what I was liked or didn't like. I was (and still am) very careful about adding back in stuff into my diet. I tried things I didn't like before and I was open to the possibility of not liking things I used to like before. As a result, I eat MUCH healthier now and my ideas about food changed dramatically. I now think of a treat as adding half a banana to my shake instead of eating a cup of toostie rolls. I do still eat things that are traditional treats, but the amounts and frequency are way down. I've had brownies, Cookies and candy since surgery. But it's something I might do 1-2x a month and I have, generally, 2 bites of this stuff. I used to have a whole cookie (or 2 or 3) and I'd have a "treat" almost every day. I also stop if I realize I'm not enjoying it. I had some dulce de leche cake on Sat at my son's graduation ceremony and party. I did not like so I did not finish it. Before, I would have finished it and, since I didn't like it, then I'd try the other cake to see if was better! Before I decided to have surgery, I never thought I could live without lots and lots of carbs, either. I had a sweet tooth and I loved carbs. I had no intention of giving up a lot of the stuff I just don't eat any more. But when I was retraining my stomach, I found it had different ideas. I'm glad I gave it the opportunity to assert itself! :thumbup1:

It's not uncommon for people to have regrets early out -- no matter what the surgery. And the regrets at this time are generally not surgery specific, but more "what have I done to myself?" because of the changes and because it's permanent. Also, sometimes it can be hard to see the future and to realize that it's not going to be like it is today for the rest of your life. But -- trust me on this -- you won't be eating 2 bites of hard Protein and then be done forever. You won't have a lack of energy forever. You won't have explosive BMs (like you do on liquids) forever. (Thank goodness... that was a PITA figuratively and literally :lol0: ) You won't be living on 400 calories a day forever. Most of the stuff you experience in the first 1-4 months is not forever and it gets better all the time as you heal and your swelling goes down. By 6 months out, even the people who have the roughest time of it are generally pretty settled, eating a reasonable amount, and have lost enough weight so that the future looks rosy to them. There are also things pre-ops can do to prepare themselves for surgery. You can't prepare 100% -- it's kind of like marriage or having kids that way -- but you can work on things that will ease your transition. Some of the things I did pre-op that helped me were: -Worked on my relationship with food for about 3 years prior (not as a prep for WLS but because I had this idea that if I just had a healthy relationship with food, I would somehow become a thin person... I was wrong, of course, but it really has helped me now. :thumbup1:) -Stopped drinking soda, even diet soda (I already didn't consume caffeine--but it's better to go through caffeine withdraw pre-op than post-op, if you are a caffeine drinker) -Started drinking more Water -Got in the habit of tracking my food -Started eating smaller portions... I never got down to sleeve-size portions but I got close and it helped to train my eyes as to what a normal portion is so I didn't go from 8-16 oz meals to 1-2 oz meals overnight -Worked on my cardio so my heart would be healthier for surgery I also tried not drinking with my meals but was completely unsuccessful. :biggrin0: It's a lot easier now though because I have the restriction of the sleeve to help keep me in check. So I didn't need to practice that... but I've seen others who could benefit from it, just like I could have benefited from working harder on the whole chewing thing. I also researched like crazy and I hung out on the boards and *watched* what people said about their surgeries at various times... because, f you ask people if they have any regrets, you mostly get responses like on this thread -- it's the best thing I've ever done, I wish I'd done it 20 years ago (with the occasional "I feel like crap, what have I done to myself?" post -- but if you read the day-to-day posts, you will get a picture of the post-op lifestyle for a particular surgery and get a sense of whether or not it is right for you. This is why I didn't get a band, btw. I saw what band life was like on LapBandTalk.com and I realized it was NOT for me.

Hey, my son graduated from HS on Sat! I am thinking about stopping losing weight and maintaining. But then I freak out when the scale goes up a pound -- even though in maintenance your weight is going to fluctuate. I've also been super-hungry lately. So my eating is very much in flux as I try to figure out what works for me.

There is at least one, maybe two, US surgeons who do the sleeve on an out-patient basis. You don't even get overnight in the hospital -- you go to a nearby hotel. The price of the hotel is included, but I would want to be in the hospital after having most of my stomach cut off.

It seems more like the old stomach stapling operation to me than a band.

That's great!

I'm due for my yearly check-up in Aug. though I might wait until Sept. (Because I'll have to do labs then.)

I told my trainer I had WLS just because I tell everyone and I wanted to make sure he wasn't a WLS bigot. But it never comes up in our training. He's training me like any triathlete.

Hey, you are "one of us" now. I missed that somehow!

Nope, I'm not sorry. I wish this had been an option 20 years ago, in fact.

Mine uses a 32 f and is adamant that you have to use the smallest size possible or you don't get good long-term results. Of course, using a small one doesn't mean the surgeon is going to make a small sleeve. But you can't make a small one with a 60 f no matter how good you are and some docs still are using sizes like that. In this one study, they compared different sizes and concluded that you need to remove at least 500 cc of stomach to have long-term success.

It seems to really vary. We know estrogen is stored in our fat and we know it gets released when we burn up the fat. But it seems like that releasing process does different things to different people. Some get their period when they didn't used to get it. Some stop getting them for a while. Some get moody, like they have PMS. For me, I've had the early hair loss, which may or may not be related to hormones (but that's the only explanation I can come up with) and I'm also getting irregular and having break-through bleeding. But, that could just be me entering peri-menopause. Or not.

I've been doing more cooking and baking since my WLS. It's part of my effort to take control of my food choices. Oddly, I don't particularly want to eat any of it. Just the act of creating it seems to be enough for me.

I don't love running, but I don't hate it any more. I've decided I can live with that.

That would really cheese me off. It's your body and you should know everything! I went through this when I bought a 2 piece. I know I look 1000x better than I looked in my swim suit when I was MO and yet I am convinced I look awful and people are wondering how I dare to wear a two-piece! Student loans are quite reasonable though. My payment was so small and the interest wasn't bad at all. I had scholarships and grants too, but they didn't cover everything. Sounds good to me!

I have a feeling he's secretly pleased she calls all the time and is taking it as a sign that she wants to have a relationship. So when they cut it out, will your health problems go away? Yep, we were out all day .. first MacBoy's graduation ceremony and then the end-of-the-year party. At my Raley's the FAGE is in the Natural/Organic Foods section. They only have "Greek Gods" in the regular yogurt section and it's got tons of sugar and carbs. I really hate it when stores have "special" sections like that. For example, I needed some whole wheat flour. I really don't care if it's organic or not, but the stuff in the baking section was too big so I was running back and forth between it and the Organic section trying to figure out which bag to buy. :tongue_smilie: