MacMadame

I do Pilates 1-2x a week, run 2-3 times a week, and do the exercise bike 1-2x a week. So most weeks it's 4-5x that I do something.

I got a new bike! It had to be ordered because I am short. Hopefully it will come in before the weekend. http://www.specialized.com/bc/SBCBkModel.jsp?a=b&minisite=10029&spid=38456&language=US

Welcome to LapBandTalk!

Publishers are in business to make money. I don't really expect them to be vetting this and that. But if someone is going to promote something on their show, they should make sure they understand what it is they are promoting. It's their integrity on the line when they endorse something, no one else's. That said, all she had to do was say "This story really moved me; I have no idea if it's true or not and I don't think that matters because a good story is a good story." and she would be off the hook. I think it was dumb of her not to promote the book that way after some of her past experiences.

You can buy an artificial vagina?! :wink2:

Oh, duh, I know that program. But for some reason I thought the doc's name was Hogan or Horan or something. You should ask on the CA section and you'll get lots of responses. Most people seem very happy with the UCSD program and the ones that aren't are unhappy because they don't like the university aspects of it -- seeing lots of different people who don't always know what you told the last person you saw (or act like they don't, anyway). But if you ask on the Doctors & Hospitals or the CA subforums, you'll get more detailed answers from people who have actually used them.

Welcome to LapBandTalk! Be sure to ask on the Texas section, if you don't get an answer here.

You have to make it clear that such comments are not acceptable. If he still continues, then, yeah, I'd dump him. But make sure he understand you won't put up with that crap first. Sometimes that's all it takes.

I don't think her problem is exactly unique. I've seen it posted on LBT before. Generally it's one of several things: 1) Band or port or tubing is leaking and the fill isn't staying - sometimes just using a thicker Fluid will fix this and sometimes you have to replace the band, port and/or tubing. 2) Some people don't feel *any* restriction until their band is quite full and right up until the last fill that gives them restriction. So they are frustrated until they get that last fill in. 3) Some people's stomachs are too small for the size band they got. Either they got a bigger Lap-band than they should have or they are just too small for the Realize (which comes in only one size, but has a bigger reservoir so it can accomodate more different kinds of stomachs). You can overfill the bands and sometimes that works, but if it doesn't, you have to replace the band with a smaller one. 4) The amount in the band isn't what the paperwork says for some reason (but the band isn't leaking). Taking all the fluid out and seeing how much is there will tell you that. If there is much less than the office thinks, make sure they are HITTING THE PORT. Yes, sometimes they just inject the fluid into your stomach and miss your port and then it does no good at all. Most of the time, the problem is #2 or #4 so don't get too stressed.

Cool! If you contact them, say "Hi" to Dr. Cirangle from me. He really is an awesome surgeon.

I got to bed and settled by about 2am. That's what they believe in Europe! Um, should you really be asking her that out here in public.

I am 51 and I wish I had done this back when I was 30 and went on my first big diet. Except that back then my own choices would be bypass or .... some other surgery that has since been discredited. It wasn't as safe in '89 as it is now either. So in some ways I'm glad I waited until the right surgery for me came along and also until the industry has progressed to the point where there are lots of choices and the safety factor is much better.

I think you may have misunderstood. No reputable surgeon is going to take out a functioning band and replace it with a sleeve for no reason. As an example, there is a lady in my support group whose surgeon suggested she get a sleeve because of how much weight she has to lose. She opted for the band instead, but now is sorry. But she's losing just fine -- has lost over 200 lb! -- and her surgeon has said she needs to keep plugging away with the band until it stops working for her. There are a few people on this forum who have had band to sleeve revisions. None of them got them "because they were on maintenance" though a few of them were at goal when it happened. In every case, they had problems with the band. In some cases it slipped or eroded. In others they had esophaegal spasms and couldn't keep down solid food. IOW, they had medical reasons for doing a revision. The rest got the sleeve because they weren't losing weight with the band. One of the reasons I went with the sleeve is because I was self-pay. I think the sleeve makes the most sense for a self-pay. My surgeon will tell self-pays who want bypass to go for the sleeve instead because it's cheaper but just as effective.

I'm up too. When the alarm rings tomorrow at 7:30am I am going to be one sad puppy.

My sister and I BOTH did that. Only she did it on purpose and I just ended up that way because those were the only names dh and I could agree on.

I have a sleeve. It's under my avatar, but I forget that not everyone knows me. :party: I came here when I was thinking about the band, but after a while I decided a sleeve would work better for me. I stuck around because I made friends and then Alex made me a moderator so now I'm a permanent part of the landscape. Hee. The thing about the sleeve is that you start off super-restricted and then, over time, it loosens up a bit as the swelling goes down and it gets to it's final size. So in the beginning you can't eat much. The band is the opposite -- a lot of people are hungry at first because they have no restriction and it's really hard for them to limit calories until they gradually get to full restriction. So in the beginning I had to work hard to get in 500 calories. But now I do more like 700-800. My surgeon wants me to stay there until I get to goal and that's okay with me. It doesn't seem to be impacting my workouts.

Honestly, I didn't do much research. I tried, but the choices were so overwhelming. I road a similar bike at the store to get the frame size right and looked at a bigger version of it. I liked this one because it has Shimano parts and also both forks have some carbon fiber in them. Plus it's "entry level" and I didn't want to spend too much. After I ordered it, I went online and looked up reviews of it. It gets really good ones and seems to be a popular entry level road bike for people who want to get serious about biking.

Amazon says mine won't come until 1/5 at the earliest. :party:

Welcome to LapBandTalk!

Welcome to LapBandTalk! Where is CA is Dr. Horgan? I'm in NorCal and used Dr. Cirangle, with LapSF.

So what are you going to do about fills now?

My surgeon has been doing sleeves for 7 years. Most surgeons have been doing them for about 3-4 or even less. In their 5 year study, they only had 3 years of data with the 32f. However, data falls behind reality and I think the practice has more like 5 years of experience with that size. With most WLS, regain happens around the 2-3 year mark. That's when the hunger comes back for everyone (though usually not like before), when everything is at its max stretched out, when the patient is most likely to ease up with the rules, etc. With some of the older surgeries, regain would happen farther down due to failure of the procedure -- at about 5 years out. But the VSG is the stomach portion of the DS and that procedure has been done for around 20 years with no failures like that. Plus partial gastrectomies (of which the VSG is a subset) have been done for decades. So we know what happens with this kind of operation long term and we know there is nothing that is going to fail. For some people, the lack of data is a sticking point with this procedure. They want a surgery that's been around for 20 years too. I can understand that, but it wasn't for me because I believe the operation is sound from a engineering point of view. There is no stoma or pouch to enlarge like with bypass. There is nothing to grow back together like with VBG or bypass. There is nothing mechanical in there that can fail like with a band. Plus my aunt battles stomach cancer and has lived most of the time I have known her with a partial gastrectomy so I have personal knowledge that people can have good lives with part of their stomach missing.

With EVERY wls, there are some people who don't lose much or who gain every drop back. Just like there are people who get to goal and beat their surgery type's average EWL. But the average EWL for the sleeve is about the same as the bypass, which is better than the band. There are a number of reasons for this, but I think the main one is hunger control. Hunger control with the band works by giving you proper restriction. If you don't have enough restriction, you will be hungry and if you are hungry, you won't stay on your diet. Some people have found getting to the "sweet spot" to be elusive inspite of their best efforts. They get restriction and then lose some weight and lose that restriction. Or they never get true restriction and are doing it all by willpower -- the same method that we've all tried before and failed. Hunger control with the sleeve, OTOH, comes from removing the part of the stomach that produces ghrelin, the hormone that stimulates the appetite. While some people still experience hunger, it's nothing like before (and often not real hunger). So it's a more sure thing. As for complications, the sleeve is a more serious operation upfront. There is the possibility of a leak which can be very serious as people die from them if not detected in time. But once you pass the 1 month mark, you are pretty much home-free. So the long-term complication rate is very low, much lower than with a band. With a band, the short-term complication rate is excellent. It's pretty rare to die from a band -- and usually going to a butcher is involved, though of course there are also freak accidents. But the long-term complication rate is not good. The longer you have the band, the more likely it is that something will go wrong that will lead to a re-operation including slippage, erosion, port flips, band leaking, esophegal spasms, uncontrollable acid reflux, etc. One hospital reported a 40% complication rate by 10 years out. My surgeon says it's more like 25% in his experience. Yeah, 25% is a lot less than 40% but it's still ASTRONOMICALLY high. It was too high for me and that's at least one reason why I got the sleeve.

I have a confession. Last week when when I weighed in, my weight was 159.5. I was pissed because two days earlier it was 159. So I put 159 in my ticker figuring it would go back down to 159 the next day and then I'd lose some more and no one would ever know. This breaks two of my rules. First, I was weighing more than once a week. Second, I *always* round up. So today I paid the piper. I only weigh 159 and now it looks like I didn't lose anything this week even though I did. That's what I get for cheating, I guess.

I don't think ordering club soda is weird. I do think it's weird to order two different drinks every time you go out. Sometimes I switch drinks in the middle because I'm sorry for my first choice, but not very often and not every time. (And not since my surgery, obviously.)