BillOh

Where I live, there are 2 major players in the market and they both offer monthly meeting to people considering the surgery. They both have Q&A periods at the end. If you have this available, I suggest you go and ask yourself. I barely qualified at a BMI of 35 with other medical condition and got that clarified at that meeting.

I watched my wife go through it, and I may have to give up my Man card for admitting it, but I was very happy this week to go buy, and wear to work, 36 jeans and a Large shirt. (former 42/XXL)

I may steal that from you. Congrats.

I certainly understand that sentiment, and is part of the reason I didn't tell a lot of people. Despite having the surgery, I still credit myself with most of the work in losing weight. I know how difficult it has been over the last 25 years raising a child, trying to stay employed, keeping a good marriage, I didn't have enough left in me to try and lose weight. I'm proud of myself for making the decision to go forward. That said, I have to admit to looking down on the guy from the Biggest Loser who had bypass and still was 400 pounds.

Coming to Erie this weekend for the first time since my surgery. It will probably be the first time I don't eat an entire Barbato's pizza and a few pepperoni balls.

My uneducated guess would be if it doesn't get stuck and goes into your lower stomach, it would be the same as before your surgey, I'm sure you swallowed gum as a kid.

I can relate to this one, stretching your upper torso like this or sitting up straight as possible and as tall as possible then relaxing helps. If its too big of a piece coughing it up may be required. As for the Water, people need to differentiate between a sip (hot as some have suggested) and a gulp. A gulp of water definitely makes things worse.

Glad to here it. I'm an Erie Native, living in Columbus, Ohio for the past 32 years. My sister is going to Hamot now.

Oh, yea, this will be the last day of my 40's :thumbup:

Sounds like pneumonia (sp?) IN my wife's RNY surgery, they had her doing breathing excercises in the room before she was discharged to avoid that. They didn't seem concerned with that for me in the lap band surgery. I hadn't thought about that till now.

Another fan of Dr Mikami as well.

I was extremely happy with the program at Ohio State (so is my wife) A friend of my wife and her husband went the Mt Carmel program around the same time we did. My observation was that with our insurance (Ohio Health) OSU required less up front money. Mt Carmel demanded more up front and they later re-imbursed.

Sorry I didn't find this thread till now. I've now done 2 5ks. The first one was the Susan Komen race for the cure downtown. Did you go to that one? I don't get moved very easily, but I was near the starting line and had to make way for a trolley that was carrying people who are currently undergoing treatment for breast cancer. I was just a couple of feet away when a lady on the trolley broke down from seeing 45000 people there supporting the cause. My wife and I did the Habitat for Humanity 5K in Dublin last weekend. She isn't a runner either and finished it in about 42 minutes I think. I was a runner in school (30 years ago) and finished it in 28 minutes. I'm about to sign up for a 10K 6/7 downtown. Oh, the highlight of the Dublin race was a police pursuit coming through the race.

Hello everyone. While I've been on the forum awhile, I wouldn't have discovered this section without a PM from Special K. Now I'm back to reading this thread.

Do doctors avoid working on patients banded elsewhere? I was very pleased with how well my fill went at OSU, but have no idea if they will take other patients.

I might try to make this one. I just asked about it, replying to a PM you sent me earlier. I'm in the mood to brag today, so I'll mention if I do come, it will be after running a 5K in Springfield in the morning. :thumbup: How many people typically show up? PS, yesterday was my dentist appointment to fix the crowns that OSU broke. It took a couple of months and some implied threats to get them to cough up the money (around $1000) for the dental work) That said, the Ohio State Bariatric Surgery program and Dr Mikami were great.

Do you still meet?

I see you have lost a lot as well. You are at the 27 BMI. How did you choose your goal weight. A 23 BMI is one of the lower goals I've seen. I selected 195 because I remember I looked good when I was last at that weight (1988). Once I get there I may set another goal of 183 which would be a BMI of 24, which I believe is the top end of healthy.

Wow, 125 lost. When were you banded? My wife lost 125 in a year with the bypass. Never mind, I took a closer look at your signature, you've lost 125 in around 10 months!

I shouldn't have said I totally disagree with you. There certainly is truth in what you said, and perhaps even in a majority of cases you are right. However, the minority tend to be the vocal minority. It just takes a few cases to make your situation difficult.

I have heard of people saying they had hernia surgery. For me, my boss was great, and I told him that I wasn't making my surgery public knowledge and he respected that.

I hit a new low this morning (Yea, I'm here bragging, that is what you are here for :thumbup: ) I'm in the home stretch for the last 15 pounds. Based on recent results I'm guessing it will take 15-30 weeks to get there. Anyone else lose faster in the last few pounds? (So glad I did this)

I did run into one situation where I had to tell one person I was eating lunch with. I got a piece of chicken stuck while dining with this person. While not an overly serious situation, what I was going through could appear to me something much worse to someone who has no clue about your surgery. If you totally put weight loss surgery out of your mind, the look on my face and my actions could be interpreted as a much more serious issue (choking or stroke) come to mind.

Interesting reading, thanks for posting. Mine was done at the Ohio State University and involved first doing a 200 question multiple choice test before the discussion with the doctor. At the time I was taking medicine for depression and was worried they wouldn't approve me for surgery.

My insurance company and hospital requires a BMI of 35 with certain morbidities. My doctor did tell me I was the smallest person he ever worked on. But I'm so glad I did it. I'm totally off blood pressure medicine and am almost cured (as of 17 pound ago) of my sleep apnea.