TheGh0st

I'm one of those that has started risking it even with some of the horse pills. I worry it could get stuck but am tired of the effort to break them up. Tricks for swallowing larger pills if you are so inclined are to one space them out so they don't stick together and clog things up easier, take them with warm liquids that help "loosen" the band. Tips for stomaching crushed pills. You can try chewing something with a fairly strong flavor that also leaves your mouth coated with a residue. I sometimes chew on a mint or even chewable Vitamin first. I've tried mixing the meds with honey and even frozen orange concentrate. Didn't help with some of the stronger flavored ones. What worked best was when I got a local pharmacist to sell me a small bottle of the syrup they use to mix up the liquid meds. I store it in my fridge and crush and mix my meds when needed. I was told once not all meds can be pre-crushed and dispensed as a liquid at the pharmacy as it will reduce its effective life substantially. But as long as it isn't a time release med you should be safe to crush and mix just before taking each dose.

Lynn Marie - I've got a perfectly good treadmill at home as well, and a DH who won't let me add a gym to our budget. I Don't think I've walked a combined 2 hours on my treadmill in the last 2 years since being banded. I feel guilty about it and am convinced I could have done better, faster if I had but I sure am in no position to lecture about excercising. That said - GET OFF YOUR BACKSIDE AND CALL ME!!! I'd love to have you start walking with us. I know I'm going to be laid up for a while in October with the PS and all but we could still walk the next two weeks and you could keep walking while I'm down. The one gal I walk with (Machele) she is just a couple months out and even though she is just starting this whole journey and I'm getting ready for my PS, she is one of my role models. She helps motivate me to eat right and keeps me moving. When we first started walking. She'd walk 1 lap and then sit on the sideline, then it was 2 laps & 3. Now we tend to walk around 2 miles, even 3 miles sometimes without even realizing it. Lately we've been meeting at the Great Mall of the Plains as it is indoors. Most of the time we walk but sometimes we drift in and out of shops checking out the sales. She lives in Olathe & I'm in KCK, so we've been planning on adding a 2nd day a week out at Legends or somewhere else in this neck of the woods. The great thing about walking with friends, is that they help make you accountable to going. After all it's easy to ditch exercise but harder to ditch a friend. And its fun to chat in person. I've also posted a link to a local KCBandsters online group. Not sure if you've seen it before. http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/KCBandsters/

Makes sense, alas, my DH has no interest in sleeping at an angle along with me. So I try to creat a faux ramp with multiple pillows starting around my waist and stacking slowly higher and higher towards my head. Last 2 nights haven't been as bad, as I've been baby-ing my band with mostly liquids throughout the day and NO foods or drinks after 7pm. It SUCKS because sometimes I'd kill for just a small glass of Water. But I finally decided I needed sleep more than food/drink. Still I'll be glad when I get that unfill next week.

***OFF TOPIC*** (In the off-topic debate area - How dare I!) Angela! Its good to "see" you again. How are you feeling now? I stop in on the SMMC Chicas site occasionally but none of the same gals anymore. Last weekend I actually ran into another gal banded a few months after me (about the same time as you I believe). She sells custom jewelry at local art fairs. I went up to her booth to ask where she was when the good-looking, thin, blonde says "Diane, is that you?" I was absolutely floored, she didn't even look like she could be related to the woman I remembered. I miss everyone, but I don't have any intention of going back to the monthly support groups. Do you still talk to Cate, Holli or Robyn? I wish we could all get together again sometime.

Mazie - I have to agree with Juli - I love the smiley's! And I really think you hit the nail on the head. (Would love to see a smiley for that one) I've grown to love my sis but she is pretty much the complete opposite of me in so many ways. For one she has been known to refuse to answer the door for even our mother if she hasn't finished her hair and makeup yet. Talk about drama queen! Her worst re-occuring nightmare growing up was that she would wake up without her hair, of course now after the band it's my hair that is just a bit thinner. I did have a talk with her over the phone yesterday about it and she apologized. She said that she remembered me asking something like "You don't want to see these pics do you?" in a light-hearted tone which is probably right. So she thought she was being just as light-hearted when she "joked" she didn't want to see them. She claims that though she would be weirded out about seeing her sis naked she would be very interested to see before/after bikini-clad shots. I guess I feel better about it.

I haven't had one of those moments yet where I see my reflection in a window and think boy I wish I were that thin before I realize its me. I still think the reflection looks "chunky". But I was at an art festival this weekend and saw that a fellow bandster had a booth so I went to see if I could find her. I hadn't seen her for nearly a year. When I got to her booth it was swamped but she was no where in sight so I wandered around the booths nearby killing time until the crowd thinned out so I could ask where she was. But low and behold when I went back the beautiful thin blond that didn't even look related to her, WAS HER. I was floored! We had a great talk, but what I really couldn't get over was when she told me her size and I realized she was 2 sizes LARGER than me. What is so wrong with me that I would still swear that she was thinner and wish I could get "down" to her size?

I've always been interested in going to a Dave Ramsey seminar. But haven't had a chance yet.

Peaches - Thankyou for your post. I'm doing the PS in reverse order to you. TT in 2 weeks and BR sometime next year. I wanted to do both at the same time but the doc wouldn't agree. I've been worried work would give me a hard time about even more time off for additional surgeries, my husband is already sick of my not having any vacation time left over for the family. So it's good to hear you were up and going within a week after the BR.

Malley and the others shouldn't mind if you have all the labs done at once and sent to each of the docs. I was self pay and the regular 6 month lap work tests the band docs want me to do isn't covered. So I got the list of tests they wanted and showed them to my PCP She was more than willing to add them to the lists of labwork she wanted to run so my insurance would pay the bill. Then I've just hand delivered or faxed the results in to my band doc. I was originally with Hoehn, but switched to Malley this year. So I haven't done this with him yet but I'm planning on doing requesting my next round of labs from my PCP next week. Some docs might require the labs to be forwarded through more formal channels but they should have no reason to insist they all be done seperately.

Karen - Happy Bandversary - I know this last year's been rough but hopefully this weekends trip will fix that. Try to stay positive and let us know next week how it went.

I rub it hard enough it sometimes turns the skin pink but I can't say that it ever hurt the arm I was rubbing. The shoulder of the hand I'm doing the rubbing with has been a different story though. I went at it a bit too vigourously at the start and somehow pinched a nerve in my other shoulder. Or it might be just a coincidence and I just slept on it wrong. But if it is hurting I'd say take it just a bit easier. And PLEASE let me know if you see any results within a week. I'd love to know I wasn't crazy.

Heather - because of my shoulder pain and the fact I'm already scheduled for PS on my tummy in 3 weeks I haven't really done any serious massage to my pannis. Though I would think if it really is helping the skins tone and overall "health" that it might help with a quicker recovery and better results, at least it couldn't hurt. I've also heard recently about a technique called "skin brushing" that is suppose to help but haven't tried it yet. Skin : Women Beauty Whole Health Clinic - Dry Skin Brushing

I know many people who had friends and family members that were against the surgery. They either thought any surgery was too dangerous or that I could just do it on my own. Like that had worked so well in the past! Many I know chose not to tell some or even most people they'd had surgery (including thier own husbands in a couple cases) and were just vague when people started to notice the weight coming off. My mother in law was against it. She worked a combination of acting like I was wasting her son's money (OK, I make MORE than him but whatever) and the good old "If you just used a little will-power, & restraint you could do it without surgery." I finally had to have it out with her when over 6 months after surgery and 60 pounds down she kept going on and on about whether I'd read some dribble (I mean book) called "Why French women aren't fat". My own mother fought tooth and nail for me not to have the surgery, begging, crying, yelling, using every scare tactic she could think of to talk me out of it, offering to pay for all sorts of alternatives from hypnosis to a fat camp. Sometimes I'd wished I'd kept quiet about the surgery as well, but that's just not my personality. So I dealt with it. Now my mother couldn't be prouder and I keep getting asked by both of them to talk to their friends or co-workers who are looking into surgery about my experience with the band.

Congrats - The 28th is a GREAT Day, ofcourse its my Birthday, but still I'm excited for you.

I'm finally at a point where I'm ready for the unfill. I've been dealing with this for nearly 10 months. sleeping propped up with 7 pillows and still waking up coughing and spitting a couple times a week. I know eating or drinking after 6pm aggrevates it but its hard to be tight enough that you can't eat until nearly noon then be loose enough and hungry enough in the evening to get the food down only to have it come back up when you try to sleep. I used my PS in a few weeks as my final straw to push me to schedule the unfil for the 25th. Now I can hardly wait. I'm sick of being up past midnight waiting for my stomach to settle. All I've had since coming home from work today at 4:30pm has been 24 ounces of fluids (half of that a Protein drink) and 1/3 cup of sunflower seeds. The last I ate or drank was 9pm then tried going to bed at 10:45. Should have known better. Now I'm sitting her rambling to you all with this terrible nasty taste in my mouth that I can't even wash out because it will only make things worse. Top it off I can't find anymore cough drops which were the only thing I knew that would help. UHGHHH!!!

PRBROOKSIE & LYNN MARIE - Shout out to fellow Malley mates.

Betsy - I'm with you 100% GREAT POST!

Thanks Juli! Deanna! JUST 3 MORE WEEKS!!! Just a quick rant today. My sister came down (the size one Bi$c#! - gotta luv her) to visit a week ago. She came in the room while I was on my internet checking some posts on LBT. I offered to show her my befores if she wanted. She physically flinched and responded vehemently she didn't want to see them. It was as if she was so offended that I would even ask her to look at them. At the time I just laughed it off, after all not everyone is into the same interests. Though I would have thought she would be a little interested seeing how she's had PS as well (albeit breast enlargement). But the more I think about it the more annoyed I get. Even though I know not everyone is interested, and even though I am just as disgusted with how I look under the clothes, it bothers me that she would be so offended to see my photos. It's not like I'm actually nude. And I've seen her plenty of times in a bikini. Why does the excess skin make my photos unthinkable for her to look at the same time she wouldn't think twice to walk in front of me in her bikini?

Karen, I'll be praying for you this weekend. Good Luck!

I'm aware of the certified training required for the conceal & carry. We are a C&C state and I have a permit. Would love to see it expand to all weapons. On the other hand I'm against the Federal form 4473 & fingerprints allowing the government to keep tabs on the law abiding citizens who choose to purchase firearms legally. The only exception I might concede on that view would be for the fully auto weapons. (Several of which a relative also owns, legally.) I guess basically I'm for as little control over it as possible but I do like the idea of education/safety classes. After all we wouldn't just allow any tom, dick or harry to buy a car and drive off the lot without proving he knows how to drive it. It's just smarter to have the government prove you know how to handle it before you use it rather than waiting until you screw up and kill someone first. (Whether that is with a car or a gun.)

I just rub the heck out of them for short periods of time whenever I think of it throughout the day. For example while sitting at a red light in traffic or now while I'm posting this. I doubt I rub for more than a minute or two at any given time. But I do rub hard enough to occasionally turn the skin pink (very fair skinned). Kind of like when you give someone a knuckle rub on thier head, or holding my hand in a rigid karate chop type pose and using the side of my hand to rub. Haven't figured out how to do this very effectively to my inner thighs though and haven't been able to convince DH to consider it part of intimate foreplay:eyebrows:. I did start seeing results on my arm within days. It took about a month to get to 2" and maybe 2 months to get to 3" though I don't do it as often as I use to, skipping days here and there. I would LOVE to have someone else here give it a try. Take some pre/post measurements and let me know how it works.

Terri - Offended might be too strong a word. I have been to Vegas a couple of times and have had a great time there. Just hadn't been to T.I. before. I'm sure it will be GREAT and am hoping I can get there.

I've heard that about the calcium as well but I do still drink at least one glass of skim milk a day and my 6 month blood work ups have always come back fine so I haven't worried about it yet.

SlimFast - May I ask which one you are drinking? I love the Low Carb version. Not all stores carry it. Walgreens does but CVS doesn't. But it has 20g of Protein to 6g or carb and 4g of those are Fiber and can be subtracted. I have it practically everyday for Breakfast. First Fill - I absolutely hate needles and am afraid will my first fill did hurt. But since then that first one it hasn't hurt again. There have been fills where he was done before I even knew he had started, and my doc doesn't even use a numbing agent like some. He likes to laugh at me though because I tend to bite a knuckle while he fills me to give me something to focus on, just on the chance it hurts again. Good luck! Try not to worry about your fill. Bite your knuckle if you have to (it really helps)

Vitamins - I actually look forward to mine. I use the Chewable Centrum Silver and Chewable Viactive Calcium they are kind of like a little "candy" for me. Protien drinks - I'm pretty tight in the mornings as well. I usually wait until around 10 am then have a Low Carb version of SlimFast. I've tried other drinks and have nothing against them but I like that the Slim Fast has a variety of vitamins/minerals as well as 20g of Protein to 6 Carbs (4 of which are Fiber).