Phoenixrising

Yep typo, Meridia not Meridian or merida.

Congrats on your success sounds like you are doing a great job working with the sleeve to change your life. FYI I think the medication is called Merida

I love sweet potatos as well. Thanks for the great tip about the grill, never thought about that. I just usually nuke mine and eat the right out of the skin, sometimes I eat the skin too. I like the grill idea because this time of year in Phx I try to avoid the oven as much as possible.

Congrats on your success and on your continue journey. Sounds like some glitches early on you are making mega strides. You Go

Way to work your sleeve.:wink0:

Given that this thread is about our doctors and surgery it is what I have continue to discuss on this thread. I did post my story on that board and I just posted my "how did I do it" story. Thanks for reminding me to do that.

I have been "challanged" to share my success story and am happy to do so. I had my surgery in Jun 08 and since then I have lost over 120 lbs and went from size 28 to size 6 petite. The restriction I have as a direct result of the physical changes to my insides has been a part of my success but there is much more involved, The sleeve itself helps me feel full faster and stay full longer and has allowed me to develop a different relationship with myself, food and eating. I am now mindful of my eating which was a new concept for me. I do not diet per se, that never worked before. I am however now making better choices. The bottom line is, regardless of surgery we are all responsible for the choices we make. I am about a year about and my daily intake now averages about 60-80 gms of carbs per day, almost all of which come from fruit and veggies and what is normally foods. I do not routinely eat bread, pasta, cookies, cake etc. I do eat this at times but not on a regular basis. This is not because I am depriving myself of them and I don't miss having them I am just making different choices today. I keep my protein above 80 gms per day, usually between 80-100. I eat beef, chicken, fish, cottage cheese, carbmaster or greek yogurt and other high protein foods. I do drink a protein shake in the morning, not so much for the protein per se, but because I have never been a food in the morning person and this starts off my day. Before surgery my "food" in the morning was several cans of Mt Dew and in any given day I was drinking around a 12 pk of Mt Dew per day. I now pay attention to myself when I am eating, not just mindlessly shoving food in to my mouth. I pay attention to how much I am eating, though I do not portion out my food. I did early on but no longer do. That does not mean I am not paying attention I just no longer need to measure. I have started exercising and now walk 3-6 miles every morning during the week and more than that on the weekends when I have more time. On the weekends I generally do 8-10 miles. I gradually built up to those distances, started out doing a mile or so and kept increasing it. Walking in the morning starts my day off on a good note, helps with my awareness of myself and burns calories. I have done a lot of work on myself related to my issues with myself, food and my relationship with food. I have done this through both individual and group therapy as well as local support groups. I highly encourage anyone with longstanding issues to do this. I also suggest finding a therapist that is familiar with issues related to compulsive overeating, obesity and related issues. I also strongly encourage getting invovled with a professionally run support group that deals with issues specific to this weight loss transformation/journey. Losing weight rapidly can play havoc with our hormones and emotions. Having a new body meant for me working on a new body image, the messages I tell myself about my body and my identity. This is a challange I continue to struggle with as so many post op bariatric patients. I have worked with and continue to do some follow up with a nutritionist dietican who is skilled in dealing with WLS patients. This is a powerful tool to have in your toolbox to help with continued successful maintenance of your weight loss. This is a continuing journey and for sure it is not a sprint but a marathon.

I never said Dr C did not work for Betancourt, I have said, repeatedly that he no longer does. I am not sure how old the info you continue to put out there about him and Betancourt is or how recent the info about patients having had bad expererience with Dr C is, I, for one, would like to a link to some of these easily found internet posts. Please enlighten and educate me. I woud love to see some "proof" of what you so readily post about. I am going to stop this endless bickering now and I look forward to seeing any posts, internets sites, links etc that both Wasa and Mac have posted about.

Forgive for not describing specifically enough for you. Clearly if I had NO problems post op I did not have a leak, stricture, infection or ANY other problem or complication which DOES speak to the skill of the surgeon. We can play tit for tat endlessly. The bottom line is I had a good experience with this surgeon and I will continue to post about it. This board is about an open forum for our PERSONAL experiences with our surgery. You can continue to talk about YOUR experience with your surgeon and I can continue to share mine. Again, you can argue with me but you cannot argue with my results.

Given that I have met Dr C in person I think I am in a good position to say it is not the same surgeon that did my surgery. When was it that you had face to face contact with him??? I don't recall insisting that he did not work for Betancourt, it appears that many surgeons were affiliated with Betancour at some point, however the fact that they no longer are seems to be more important. You have NO information about what research I did or did not do and are no position to comment on it. Please enlighten all of us with "proven" statistics or facts that back up what you say.

Once again let me educate you 1) He was NOT working for Betancourt when I had my surgery. I have no idea when he did and only have your word and your unreliable source for the fact that he did. I have no idea if he really did, or when he did or why he is no longer there. I have worked in places that after being hired I found out where not what I thought they ought to be so I left. 2) Since I did not have my surgery with Betancourt I am not sure why you continue to bring that up. Are you suggesting that a surgeon is not a good surgeon because of who allegedly USED to work for but no longer do?? 3) Why would I be interested in learning about a surgeon or program I did not use, that may or may not even be currently in business. I did not have my surgery with Betancourt. 4) I beg to differ that a surgeon's skill has "virtually nothing" to do with a person having or not having problems post op, having or not having pain post op, the amount of restriction from the sleeve which is a large part of post op success, my not having a leak or infection like many have had. If these things are no indicative of a surgeon's skill what is?????

Oh hell yes! Can't have it both ways, LiveInPhx. Either they have ethics or they don't. YOU were the one that used them as a source, not sure why you used them to back up what you said when you do not find them credible. You are the one that wanted it both ways, you were the one that cited them as your source to back up what YOU said. I actually know very little about them except for what has been posted, primarily by you, that is at best unflattering. I have no idea if Dr C worked for them or not. I did not ask him for all his previous employers. You continue to lump anyone that had anything to do with Betancourt into the same "they must be terrible cause they were associated with Betancourt basket". Just because a person works somewhere does not make them bad surgeons. The point being they no longer work there. You can continue to trash any surgeon you do not approve of, and I fully expect that you will. The FACT is that for me he was a great choice, skilled, experienced, compassionate and caring. The FACT is that I have had NO problems post op and did not any need pain meds after I left the hospital. The FACT is that he saw me at least 3x each day both in the hospital and hotel. The FACT is Ihave lost over 120 lbs since surgery and have had zero problems with GERD, reflux, vomitting, "dumping" and so many other problems so many folks post about post-op. To quote another poster " YOU CAN ARGUE WITH ME BUT YOU CANNOT ARGUE WITH MY RESULTS"

Are you suggesting the are a CREDIBLE source that you would go to for ACCURATE information????? Are you suggesting they would give out PERSONAL INFORMATION on their previous employees to anyone that asks????

Let me continue to clarify things for you. 1) I did not "leave in a huff". I left after considering the pros and cons of staying on this board given the level of animosty that has been shown. 2) I did NOT attack another member, I replied to your previous post, albeit strongly but not much different from your approach to me both on this and other boards. 3) Once again you find little "technical" things to " call me out on". Indeed only one of my posts was "edited" but that is because I left shortly after that incident. I believe I stated that I expected my posts to be edited as they had been. Just to make sure there is no further misunderstanding .. I expect my future posts to be edited as A previous post was prior to my leaving the board.

I answered this already in a PM to you but since you chose to take this public so be it. After communication with Alex I opted to return in large part prompted by the erroneous info posted by another poster about my surgeon. I think this forum should be about facts and it is important to me that erroneous, inaccurate and biased info not go unchallanged. I expect my posts will likely be edited by you as they have in the past. I expect that there will be continued questioning of my credibility as has happened in the past. Let me say I can back up my "facts" and my opinions are my own and not stated as facts. As far as my identity goes I am also able to prove who I am and what my occupation is.

Given that my surgeon does not work with Betancourt and given your liberal trashing of him and his office, I again say it would appear not working for him is a good thing. Also given your opinion of them I am not sure why you now think they are a credible source. On the one hand you think anyone that worked with or for them is suspect yet you suggest I would go to them for accurate information.

Once again I would appreciate you showing me "hard evidence" of what you say. I did not find any reference to the clinic (which by the way has nothing to do with my surgeon) being on any watch list. Also please show me hard evidence of anyone being fired from anywhere. Interestingly you have made similar accusations about other surgeons being fired from Betancourt's clinic. Given the terrible things you have said about Betancourt I would think it was a good thing not to working with him,

You will also find this posted on the thread related to my surgeon Dr Contreras. It is important that erroneous info be cleared up. This is a reply I sent to another poster based on her alleging that another physician with the same name was actually the surgeon I used. This is untrue and I wanted to set the record straight. Here is my cut and pasted reply to the other poster. Not sure where you got your "facts". Same name but totally different surgeon so far as I know. Might want to check out your posts for veracity before posting things like this. Additionally my most recent internet check (this morning) indicates it is a well know and highly rated clinic (albeit alternative medicine). The Dr Contreras that you are referring to also has a new book coming out that is edited/co-written/recommended by many well known and vetted cancer surgeons and other physicians.

Not sure where you got your "facts". Same name but totally different surgeon so far as I know. Might want to check out your posts for veracity before posting things like this. Additionally my most recent internet check (this morning) indicates it is a well know and highly rated clinic (albeit alternative medicine). The Dr Contreras that you are referring to also has a new book coming out that is edited/co-written/recommended by many well known and vetted cancer surgeons and other physicians.

Many of the MD's travel to other cities to do the surgery. Juarez/El Paso TX seems to be a "new market" in terms of WLS and the MD's from other areas of MX are traveling to areas that have been "underserved" so to speak. El Paso/Juarez is more convenient for folks from NM and Far West TX rather than having to travel to San Diego or Eagles Pass/Monterrey area.

I have heard that Cigna was going to start requiring this but I hoped it was just an ugly rumor. I agree it is just another road block they are putting out there. I don't know which is worse, saying they will cover it and then making in impossible to meet the criteria or just excluding all WLS of any kind which is the policy my employer has with Cigna.

I know about the support groups through some of the MD's and hospitals in the Valley but I am inquiring about any other support type activities. I had heard there are some folks that get together for lunch or dinner from time to time. I have not had lapband and am due for VSG in a few weeks and am looking for a way to stay connected with others pursuing the same path. I have tried posting on OH but there does not seem to be much action on the AZ board and this one seems more lively so here I am.

At the risk of getting flamed I am going to say my piece. First let me say I have NOT had the lapband but I have had experience with Dr Arturo Rodriguez. He was supposed to do my VSG a few weeks ago but due to a monumental bank screw up it had to be cancelled but that is not the point. My point is I came on to this board tonight to see about getting info on how folks handled liquid diets but when I came across this thread I could not keep my fingers from responding. I also tried to get hard facts and sources from WASA on another board and not only could/would she not give me her sources or cites for her stats she became rude and disresptful and finally put me on ignore. I had a conversation and several email exchanges with Dr R about the accusations Wasa had made and I found his answers to be credible. He did talk about the band they used over 10 years ago and was honest about the problems that resulted, hence they stopped using that band. As for all the hype about Dr Sanchez, the man is dead and accusing others of being incompetent or worse because the associated with him defies logic to me. I wish I had been able to have my surgery with Dr Arturo Rodriguez. The reasons I am not have nothing to do with any concerns I had about him, had nothing to do with my doubting his skills and everything to do with timing and location. I think everyone is entitled to their opinion, however when folks starting spouting facts and statistics they refuse to back up that is no longer an opinion.

Has anyone had their surgery done at this hospital. What was your experience like?

Does anyone have any info on Hospital INT in Tijuana?