BanTam

Everyone will say how the band is a tool. I see the band as my partner. My band will help me be strong. I'm a private pay patient and believe me, I have guilt! I mean, what I loser I must be to have to have surgery just to lose weight. BUT put the shoe on the other foot and I wouldn't hesitate to pay over this amount of money for a loved one to have a heathier life. You can do it but it is a committment.

You know, it's been a wonderful day. Last week I found out from one of the "higher ups" that they were dropping all allegations against me at work! Thank God for witnesses!! While I am truly grateful for my job, I am still a bit pissed off that it went this far. One more meeting on Thursday and it should officially be over. Seventeen years, with 13 of it being at the same position and they treated me like dog doo. The best news is I also had my surgeon consultation today and it went great! After having to cancel my appt last month, I was happy to find out that as of yesterday, my surgeon of choice, Dr. Faulkenbery of Southwest Bariatrics, now uses the Realize Band which is what I wanted! He seemed to like their support site very much. Tomorrow I make appts for the blood work/EKG, the psych appt., the exercise appt and then the nutritional counseling. I am hoping to have it all done by the end of the month so I can have the surgery by the middle of June. And if my day couldn't get better...I didn't even get charged in the parking garage ! :thumbup:

You know, it's been a wonderful day. Last week I found out from one of the "higher ups" that they were dropping all allegations against me at work! Thank God for witnesses!! While I am truly grateful for my job, I am still a bit pissed off that it went this far. One more meeting on Thursday and it should officially be over. Seventeen years, with 13 of it being at the same position and they treated me like dog doo. The best news is I also had my surgeon consultation today and it went great! After having to cancel my appt last month, I was happy to find out that as of yesterday, my surgeon of choice, Dr. Faulkenbery of Southwest Bariatrics, now uses the Realize Band which is what I wanted! He seemed to like their support site very much. Tomorrow I make appts for the blood work/EKG, the psych appt., the exercise appt and then the nutritional counseling. I am hoping to have it all done by the end of the month so I can have the surgery by the middle of June. And if my day couldn't get better...I didn't even get charged in the parking garage ! :thumbs_up:

Wow. I thought it was just me. Today I went in for my surgeon consultation. I was very nervous because I have been having those same thoughts...I’m going to fail, ‘cause I always fail. Well, all day I thought about my appointment and it’s not that I am talking myself into the surgery but for once I decided to look at the positive side of how it might affect my life. I also begin to think that a year from now I’ll probably still be around (with God’s help) and I’ll either be working toward a better life or working against it, with or w/o the band. But what a better chance I would have to be working toward a better life if I had the band…I need that kind of control. So my advice to you is visualize where you want to be a year from now and decide how you can best get there.

Now that's the kinda story I like ! My big worry is conscious intibation. I have sleep apnea and five years ago when I had an abdominal hysterectomy I had to have the breathing tube shoved down my throat while I was still awake. NOT a pleasant experience despite the banana flavored numbing agent...and yes, I remember everything including the feeling that I was choking to death. My consult is on the 13th and if everything goes well surgery should be the middle of June. ....ooow...I need to go shake off that memory now ! :frown:

I decided I wouldn't write again until I had something GOOD to write. Now I do... After all of the drama with my work the recommendation is now instead of firing me that they will "give" me 40 hours suspension w/o pay and I have to take a counseling class on "inter-personal office relationships". Whatever. I put in an application for another job today. :svengo: I'll keep "yes sir, no sir, whatever you say sir" until I can get out of there. Who needs that in their life, right? Everything still needs to be blessed by two more Admin Staff and who knows, they could go back for the termination. On even better news, I made another appt for my surgeon consult. It's on May 13. I think with any luck I'll get the 40 hr suspension just in time for my surgery ! Gotta make it work for me some how. To prepare for surgery I'm going to start a modified low carb diet this weekend and I'm going to start getting in more aerobic activity, too. My blood pressure was great when I went to the doctor this week, 112/60. Two weeks before surgery the surgeon requests a low carb diet, so I might as well start now. Afterall, this weight won't be coming back ! OH! I forgot to mention that last week I was bitten by a Brown Recluse spider. Little Insidious Bastard. :crying: He bit me on the upper/inside calf. I didn't even feel it. My advice to anyone who thinks they have a spider bite is to get to the doctor within 24 hours for antibiotic. My bite did not turn ugly though it did get a really red oval several inches around the center. The center was hard, and I could see the fang marks but now it's only slightly red and the center is peeling. No dead tissue. :thumbup:

I decided I wouldn't write again until I had something GOOD to write. Now I do... After all of the drama with my work the recommendation is now instead of firing me that they will "give" me 40 hours suspension w/o pay and I have to take a counseling class on "inter-personal office relationships". Whatever. I put in an application for another job today. :biggrin: I'll keep "yes sir, no sir, whatever you say sir" until I can get out of there. Who needs that in their life, right? Everything still needs to be blessed by two more Admin Staff and who knows, they could go back for the termination. On even better news, I made another appt for my surgeon consult. It's on May 13. I think with any luck I'll get the 40 hr suspension just in time for my surgery ! Gotta make it work for me some how. To prepare for surgery I'm going to start a modified low carb diet this weekend and I'm going to start getting in more aerobic activity, too. My blood pressure was great when I went to the doctor this week, 112/60. Two weeks before surgery the surgeon requests a low carb diet, so I might as well start now. Afterall, this weight won't be coming back ! OH! I forgot to mention that last week I was bitten by a Brown Recluse spider. Little Insidious Bastard. :rolleyes2: He bit me on the upper/inside calf. I didn't even feel it. My advice to anyone who thinks they have a spider bite is to get to the doctor within 24 hours for antibiotic. My bite did not turn ugly though it did get a really red oval several inches around the center. The center was hard, and I could see the fang marks but now it's only slightly red and the center is peeling. No dead tissue. :blushing:

Nothing at work is resolved yet. My Union Rep says not to worry and he thinks it will all be dropped or at the very worse we’ll win at appeal….hopefully it won’t come to that. I can’t wait until this is all behind me and I can finally schedule my surgery consult. And I HATE all of my frigging depressing blogs !!! ARRGH!

Nothing at work is resolved yet. My Union Rep says not to worry and he thinks it will all be dropped or at the very worse we’ll win at appeal….hopefully it won’t come to that. I can’t wait until this is all behind me and I can finally schedule my surgery consult. And I HATE all of my frigging depressing blogs !!! ARRGH!

Just wanted to pass the word about what happened to my sister last month. My sister was visiting me at the beginning of March. She flew with her just turned 5 year old child. Yes, my sister is also overweight, but her child is a little string-bean. As my sister is waiting in the "boarding with children" line when a Southwest Airlines employee comes up and asks her if she is comfortable flying. My sister says, yeeeeessss..... not sure where he was going with his comments. Then he started to ask if she was comfortable in the seats, yeeeeessssss......then it dawns on her. He is specifically asking her this because she is fat and he confirmed it by then asking her if when she is sitting in the seat can she put the arm rests down because the law states she must fly with the arm rests down. She was livid, but what could she do? Yell at the guy in front of her child ? All she could say was that she was flying with her small child and there would not be a problem. She was near tears. Mind you, the Southwest Airlines employee did this in front of EVERYONE. If Southwest Airlines has a problem with overweight people buying tickets from them, then they should say so at the time of purchase ! My sister found it very humiliating.

Dear Blog-Monstah... Thursday is a meeting with our supervisors to determine if they are going to send the recommendation (of one of the supervisors) up the chain to have me fired. It's unbelieveable. If I had actually done something to warrant being fired, okay, but I just don't understand this... I've waited years to have WLS and now I have the money in the bank just taunting me! Oh, and we received the payment book from the bank too, so the first payment is due in a month IF we haven't given the money back by then.... It will get better, I have faith. I have to assume that God just didn't think the timing was right for surgery and for some reason I needed to wait a bit more....I just pray that God also remembers I need my job ! Amen !

Dear Blog-Monstah... Thursday is a meeting with our supervisors to determine if they are going to send the recommendation (of one of the supervisors) up the chain to have me fired. It's unbelieveable. If I had actually done something to warrant being fired, okay, but I just don't understand this... I've waited years to have WLS and now I have the money in the bank just taunting me! Oh, and we received the payment book from the bank too, so the first payment is due in a month IF we haven't given the money back by then.... It will get better, I have faith. I have to assume that God just didn't think the timing was right for surgery and for some reason I needed to wait a bit more....I just pray that God also remembers I need my job ! Amen !

Jet Blue has larger seats, too. I know they had some problems last year about long wait times on the runway, but when we flew it was almost comfortable and AND I got to watch TV !

:thumbup:Good news: I got my call from the surgeon for our first visit set for April 22. :thumbdown:Bad news: I'm being recommended for termination at work and I had to cancel the appt !! SEVENTEEN YEARS of my life, 6 1/2 years from retirement and this is how it's going to end ?????? Are you kidding me????? My salary is half of our income w/o it I lose more than just my ability to have surgery, WE lose the house we built five years ago on the property we've lived on for 25 years, my 13 year old blind/deaf dog could not adjust to another home and we would probably have to end up putting her to sleep, not to mention my 33 year old horse...I know, waaah, poor me. Nothing is a done deal at this point but the recommendation has been submitted. I'm not one to yell discrimation at the drop of a hat, but I tell you, its happening. There are three of us women at work, I'm the "bad" one in this. The other two women are witnesses, all of us between ages 45-51 and our supervisor's supervisor is going to believe "one of the guys" over the THREE of us ??? What ? Does anyone have Gloria Allred's number ?? Really... I'm not looking for sympathy. I'm looking for justice (which is funny since I work for a law enforcement agency). I'm going to go cry in my water now and day dream about the big bulbous bald head of my supervisor's supervisor being squished in a waffle maker. And they always stick, too !

:thumbup:Good news: I got my call from the surgeon for our first visit set for April 22. :thumbdown:Bad news: I'm being recommended for termination at work and I had to cancel the appt !! SEVENTEEN YEARS of my life, 6 1/2 years from retirement and this is how it's going to end ?????? Are you kidding me????? My salary is half of our income w/o it I lose more than just my ability to have surgery, WE lose the house we built five years ago on the property we've lived on for 25 years, my 13 year old blind/deaf dog could not adjust to another home and we would probably have to end up putting her to sleep, not to mention my 33 year old horse...I know, waaah, poor me. Nothing is a done deal at this point but the recommendation has been submitted. I'm not one to yell discrimation at the drop of a hat, but I tell you, its happening. There are three of us women at work, I'm the "bad" one in this. The other two women are witnesses, all of us between ages 45-51 and our supervisor's supervisor is going to believe "one of the guys" over the THREE of us ??? What ? Does anyone have Gloria Allred's number ?? Really... I'm not looking for sympathy. I'm looking for justice (which is funny since I work for a law enforcement agency). I'm going to go cry in my water now and day dream about the big bulbous bald head of my supervisor's supervisor being squished in a waffle maker. And they always stick, too !

Now I'm just waiting for the call for the surgeon consultation.:thumbup: I am scared of surgery too. But I did have an abdominal hysterectomy. I doubt if the pain for lapband would be worse than that and that wasn't horrible. People don't think of hysterectomy's as amputations, but that's what it was... I'm feeling sad. I haven't been having a good time at work lately (17 years). A full month ago I get a call from a supervisor who said this other person told him I said he "goes both ways". I hardly know this guy and when he confronted me about it (over the phone) I told him I didn't say it and I had no idea what he was talking about. The whole thing was investigated by my supervisor who said he could find nothing I did wrong. THEN...my supervisor's supervisor gets involved and does a whole other investigation. This time he wants to know "did you hang up on him while he was still talking" No. "Did you slam the phone down?" No. "Okay, send it to me in writing that you did not yell and you did not slam the phone down..." Did I mention that there was a witness to my side of the conversation who has backed everything I said? Not good enough. Even our supervisor's, supervisor's, supervisor's secretary heard it all and has said I was not rude to the guy. It's all pathetic and just stressing me out to the max. As stupid as this all sounds, I work for a law enforcement agency...It's all so f'ing childish. Your hard earned tax dollars at work, you know ? :thumbs_up: Why don't they believe me, you ask???? Because don't you know there is just no way that the little size 6, double D, fake boob Be'och who started all of this, could be lying, right ??? It truly makes me feel sick to my stomach. :mad2: I've had to get my Union involved (but TX is a weak union state) and tomorrow we have a meeting to "discuss the findings". I swear, if they would spend this much time investigating actual criminal cases, there would be a lot less crime in the County. The saying, "No good deed goes unpunished" really fits this scenario....because a little over a month ago I was giving the "both ways" supervisor compliments to a group of people about his training ability...see where that got me!

I've had Blue Marlin that was really mild. Also, if you have not tried the Tiliapia loins, not filets, you will find them even better! I pop Tilipia loins under the broiler while they are still frozen, for about 12 minutes, sprinkled with lemon pepper half way through. I have also pan seared them with a tiny amount of oil and served with a sauce of lime juice, garlic and cilantro on the side. :redface:

Now I'm just waiting for the call for the surgeon consultation.:thumbup: I am scared of surgery too. But I did have an abdominal hysterectomy. I doubt if the pain for lapband would be worse than that and that wasn't horrible. People don't think of hysterectomy's as amputations, but that's what it was... I'm feeling sad. I haven't been having a good time at work lately (17 years). A full month ago I get a call from a supervisor who said this other person told him I said he "goes both ways". :huh2: I hardly know this guy and when he confronted me about it (over the phone) I told him I didn't say it and I had no idea what he was talking about. The whole thing was investigated by my supervisor who said he could find nothing I did wrong. THEN...my supervisor's supervisor gets involved and does a whole other investigation. This time he wants to know "did you hang up on him while he was still talking" No. "Did you slam the phone down?" No. "Okay, send it to me in writing that you did not yell and you did not slam the phone down..." Did I mention that there was a witness to my side of the conversation who has backed everything I said? Not good enough. Even our supervisor's, supervisor's, supervisor's secretary heard it all and has said I was not rude to the guy. It's all pathetic and just stressing me out to the max. As stupid as this all sounds, I work for a law enforcement agency...It's all so f'ing childish. Your hard earned tax dollars at work, you know ? Why don't they believe me, you ask???? Because don't you know there is just no way that the little size 6, double D, fake boob Be'och who started all of this, could be lying, right ??? It truly makes me feel sick to my stomach. :mad2: I've had to get my Union involved (but TX is a weak union state) and tomorrow we have a meeting to "discuss the findings". I swear, if they would spend this much time investigating actual criminal cases, there would be a lot less crime in the County. The saying, "No good deed goes unpunished" really fits this scenario....because a little over a month ago I was giving the "both ways" supervisor compliments to a group of people about his training ability...see where that got me! :crying:

I haven't been to the BL message board in a while, anyone here ever go ? They changed the format a couple of years ago and made it a lot less fun.

Find yourself another doctor and send your current one a postcard of a bEach. Maybe she'll get the hint. :thumbup: Good for you for being strong enough to realize there are a lot of good choices out there and she ain't it !

My co-worker has been watching the show and she also said his techiques are working for her. What I don't get is when he asks someone what their level of craving is for a certain food on a scale of 1-10...the people always give him a high number. Then he has them poke at their face, sing a little song and then he asks them again and suddenly they no longer crave poptarts, or whatever....is that scientific or the power of suggestion ? I dunno...can I just take my fork and poke my face as I'm eating the poptart ??? Just wondering.....:purplebananna:

I've been getting a lot of great info from the sight which have made my decisions much MUCH easier. It is very encouraging to find a forum for other people like me. I'm not yet banded but my loan has gone through so now I just have to make the appointment and get the process started. Doctors love it when you don't have to go through an insurance company...too bad they don't offer discounts !! :tt1: