lellow

Hi Missy, based on that I consistently am in a 3500 calorie deficit a week (I track my exercise and eating separately so as to not eat back my calories, but added together it's at least that) and have been since the beginning of the year. Albeit I lost more than a 1lb a week to start with, I am definitely not losing a lb a week now. I'm hoping this is a temporary plateau. I'm seeing my dr in a week about a full band replacement and I guess I wanted to get a grip on this whole weight thing before that time....

Thanks for your reply, Missy. Yesterday I upped my cals to 1200 cals and it's actually harder than I thought if you don't eat 'rubbish'. It's actually quite a lot of food. My BMR is 1714 cals a day and I keep getting told I should at least eat my BMR in cals per day, but that seems a lot to someone who ate like a bird for almost 3 years while banded!

For those who don't know me, my lapband successfully helped me lose a lot of weight. I had 3 stress-free maintenance years and then about 14 months ago, it sprung a leak. There have been two attempts to fix the leak (revisions), but I'm still leaking today. In the first 7 - 9 months after the leak started, I gained weight. About 33lbs in total. In January or so this year, I decided that enough was enough and started calorie counting to lose. I've lost about 13lbs since then, almost all of that in the first 6 weeks. Also in early Jan this year, I fell on my butt while roller skating and fractured my tailbone, and was in consistent pain for about 8 weeks (and just starting to be pain-free now). This meant that I could not exercise, and only got the clearance from my dr to walk for fitness in the last two weeks or so. So where am I now? My weight loss has slowed right down in the last two weeks. I'm talking a lb in the last 2 weeks, and that keeps coming on and off. I am eating about 1000 calories a day, with one 'off' day where I have calories that is still lower than my BMR. I am now walking about 7000 steps a day, and raise a sweat when I do, but the scales aren't really moving. I belong to another weight loss forum and they advocate increasing my calorie intake to at least my BMR but as a bander, I know I maintained my stable weight for 3 years by always being under my calorie requirements. So here I am, as a bander who is losing without the help of a band now, asking for advice from other banders. What SHOULD I be doing? Be in calorie deficit still (1000 cals or so a day?) or increase? I can't increase my exercise just yet, as walking takes time and that's one thing I struggle with, with work. I could burn a lot more cals in a shorter time with different exercise, but I don't have that option just yet.

I maintained easily with just the band's help for 3 years. Band started leaking, hunger came back, staying at a BMI of 23 became much harder. I hate having hunger after years of not feeling it. I hate having to count calories when I never had to before. I hate that I wonder if I'll ever find the green zone again. But I do have some lessons that I learned from having the band that I'm grateful for, many of which have to do with good food choices, so it's not all bad news. But what I wouldn't give to be back at that point again where being in the green zone made staying at my stable weight so easy.

Welcome (again) NYC. I hope for a speedy approval process for you!

After my husband and I spilt, I was NOT looking for another relationship. I did however meet the most amazing guy, sweet, loving, intelligent, handsome and while there was sexual chemistry, we both realised early on that there were no romantic feelings developing. So we enjoyed each other's company sexually occasionally without the 'strings' of a relationship. We would meet up for dinner and a gossip every now and again about his love life and mine, and about 50% of the time, we'd end up in bed, and usually end up staying up after watching a movie, or playing boggle on my iPad. Other times we'd split a bottle of wine, or go to a pub and just laughed with each other, and that was fun too. And now I'm partnered with someone I do have romantic feelings for, and I'm still friends with the first guy, because we both knew early on we would be great friends, and could have a sexual relationship, without it becoming more. When I met my current partner, we didn't even talk about it, the sexual stuff just stopped dead. As consenting adults, it worked for us and it was fun to boot. And I certainly DON'T suffer from self esteem issues. I'd rather be with someone like him, who I cared about, than a one night stand any day.

Thanks, but my band is leaking now so I'm back on the weight loss wagon. When the band works, it's pretty awesome!

lol this reminds me of yesterday. One of my co-workers use to make sure he'd sit next to me at business lunches so he could eat my leftovers. He felt completed cheated when my leak happened and I started eating more of my food. Now I'm dieting again, he's ecstatic and told me so yesterday at lunch!

I set my own goal weight initially but as I lost, my surgeon discussed where he wanted me to be, which was a BMI of 27 (and higher than the goal weight I set). So I had his goal weight as my goal and my goal weight as my 'nice to have'. I surpassed both in the end.

I have always bought what I wanted to eat, and then throw most of it out. One of the first things my dr said to me is 'be prepared to throw food out'. I'm asian, we don't throw anything out. My mum had heart attacks every time I didn't finish my food. But I realised that if I wanted salmon, and would likely only eat 1/3 of it, I should still order the salmon. It used to kill my ex that I'd get a dish and eat 2 mouthfuls and then push the rest around my plate. But damn, it's hard enough trying to eat well without denying myself beautiful food to boot. So I ate beautiful food and STILL lost weight. Win!

I don't chew to a puree. I never have. I don't want the food passing through the band like it's liquid, but that's me. I make sure I break down any big chunks but I'd say when I swallow it's usually like chunky soup. If it's a fibrous food like steak, or very hard protein like prawns I take extra care to break down the big chunks so I don't get stuck but I won't chew it to a puree.

hell you can't ask too many questions with these things. I buy store bought, preferably with no sugar added and I'll buy any brand that is pineapple juice and not a concentrate or a watered down mix. I'm not sure how easy it will be to get but over here there is an Aussie brand that makes it and it's in every service station so I didn't bother stocking up, I just went out and bought some if I needed it.

I'm in Australia so it's only 4.40pm here! And also, try pineapple juice, just sipping. When I couldn't hold anything down, for some reason pineapple juice would stay down and seemed to help with the swelling. I don't know if it will work for you, but it works a treat for me. Good luck.

I reckon the stoma swells in the time after you leave the office. If you can't keep your saliva down, go back and get unfilled because you will get dehydrated fast. If you can hold down your saliva I would say go slow, stay on liquids, try keeping to warm liquids and see how you go after another 24 hours. Throwing up means you probably have aggravated the stoma even more and may cause even more swelling so take it VERY easy and move very slowly back through to solid food.

I lost my ability to burp very early with the band. My dr thought it was funny coz most people burp MORE. I can't burp even if I feel a little bit of restriction. The one time I was unfilled for more than a day, I relished burping like crazy. I wanted to burp the alphabet! My partner thinks I'm so ladylike because I don't burp. But I MISS burping like a trooper sometimes!

In my case, I spent a lot of time working on the head hunger part so maybe that's why when the physical hunger disappeared so did my head hunger. When my physical hunger re-appeared so did my head hunger, but not nearly to the same extent as pre-band. I had my own methodology of dealing with my head hunger and I'm still using those same methods now for losing without the help of the band. I think you make a good point there Missy, and I think that if you go into this mentally unprepared to do battle against your headspace you will struggle the entire way. I found that in the first half of the year of my leaky band, that I was not in that headspace and my weight gain tells the story on that.

From highest weight to lowest weight (which I don't want to get back to, btw) = 113lbs

ROFL! Yep, do NOT get a tattoo ANYWHERE near your port/tubing when you have no fat left between it and your skin. Bad, BAD idea. Though they fixed that and I'm still leaking, so I wish that that was all it had been!

When I was in the green zone, I was like B52. I rarely felt hungry, often forgot to eat. I didn't feel any 'connection' with a lot of the 'bad' foods I used to love. When I thought to eat, I would craved good quality food because I could eat so little, I didn't want to waste it on KFC, I wanted something that would make every bite worth it. I easily maintained for 3 years and then sprung a leak so now experience hunger, which is how I know it was the band that was taking it away for me. I gained weight and now am trying to lose it again but losing when battling hunger is a lot harder. A LOT harder. But the band did give me long lasting gifts in that I still don't want KFC, or soda or a lot of the bad stuff that I was addicted to.

Yep I have a keloid scar where I had my two revision incisions done (same place, through my old body lift scar) and it's not pretty. That's what I meant when I mentioned that not everyone's scars flatten.

yep that was pretty normal for me. My incisions were 'swollen' for a while so I could feel them. But mine did settle, though not everyone's does flatten out completely.

That's a good tip, thanks, dylanmiles, I'll remember it for after my next fill. But I still wouldn't depend on it as my main food source nonetheless.

Yeah I'd never even heard about having Protein Shakes to supplement protein until I joined this forum. It's definitely not something that is 'done' in Australia either.

In my opinion, you need to eat real food. The band works best when you have hard Protein. It keeps you full for longer, and lean protein is low calorie (if that's what you're worried about). My dr had very few rules but a big one was 'don't drink your calories' because liquids go through your band fast. And personally I think a person can't live off Protein shakes for their whole lives, so it's a good idea to learn how to prepare and eat good quality food that will be something you take with you for not just now, but into the many years you will have to maintain your weight. I just did a liquid diet after a fill and I can tell you I was hungrier on Optifast than I am on hard protein despite the two having a comparable number of calories. This is the time for you to make lifelong change. A protein shake diet is (in my opinion) not sustainable for a lifetime.

Like tasteless milkshakes if you make it with cold Water. I stuck with the vanilla ones coz tasteless vanilla is better than tasteless chocolate. My only suggestion to you is to talk yourself out of seeing yourself having to do it for three weeks. Just tell yourself everyday "let me just make it through today". Then tackle the next day as that challenge all on it's on. Knowing I had to be strong for 16 hours was a lot easier than having to be strong for 3 weeks. I just coped with it better mentally.