stateofzen

Congratulations on your pregnancy Brenda-- at least your band is in place now and ready to use by the time you can use it. Hearing your story, I'm really hoping my birth control doesn't fail me now! That would be just my luck. One of the main reasons I got this surgery is that I've had difficulty with repeated (3) first-trimester miscarriages, and after the specialist did all of the tests he said "no real reason I can identify-- maybe the weight?". We hope to try again after I've been banded a year-- that will be our final attempt, and if it doesn't work out, we've become comfortable with the idea of being childless. I have been stuck at the same weight for a week, and I really think it's because I'm not getting in enough calories to lose. I'm not worried about it-- there is no possible way I can not eventually lose weight doing what I'm doing-- but I sure do like the steady loss over the plateau :smile2: I'm managing somehow not to be too hungry, even though I really haven't had anything that felt like restriction or "band" stuff. I just feel full on less food, which part of me thinks is because I've been eating so much less for weeks now. No complaints though-- I'm definitely not looking forward to getting stuck. Oh, for those of you on soft foods-- last night I pureed about 2-3 tablespoons of fat free cottage cheese with about 2 tablespoons of a store-made artichoke jalepeno dip, then stirred it in with 2 eggs and a little bit of skim milk. Baked in a small dish at 350 for about 40 minutes and had an excellent crustless quiche (made 2 servings).

Thanks for starting the thread, Brian! And John, thanks for the inspiration from a 2009'er! It's amazing to think where I might be in a year. Yesterday was my 2-week anniversary for my band and I am very happy I did it. Most of the time I feel normal and I haven't really had any problems with following my diet. I get to add more natural Protein on Monday, so I'm excited for that since I'm having a hard time getting protein in. I'm looking for a truly unflavored Protein powder I can just stir into stuff-- any suggestions? But, I have to admit, there are a couple of things I'm bummed about. #1, I have an incision site that the dermabond came off of too early and it is a little open (not bleeding open, but definitely not closed skin). My surgeon looked at it and said it would be fine, though will probably take longer to heal/have a larger scar, but the bottom line is he didn't stitch it back up. So now I'm taking nasty liquid antibiotic and I have to be even more careful with lifting/bending etc. It's a bummer when I see other people healing faster than me. Maybe related is the fact that I STILL cannot sleep comfortably on my side and forget the stomach! My back and neck hate me from sleeping on my back and I'm just really tired of it. I know absolutely that it will go away eventually but I'm so impatient! The good outweighs the bad though. I'm looking and feeling better everyday. My in-laws sent me a Macy's giftcard as a "get well" present and I went to spend it yesterday. I hit the clearance racks and grabbed 1x, thinking that I am currently at 2x and I could shrink into them. But, the thing was, they all fit or were even too big so I ended up in the shoes instead. I've got a great new pair of calf-length gray boots :smile2: Thanks in-laws!

The things on my soft food list are: Scrambled eggs, yogurt, mashed potatoes, oatmeal/cream of wheat, tofu, mashed bananas, no sugar added applesauce I've added laughing cow soft cheese and hummus to that list. On Monday I get to add steamed-soft vegetables, baked fish, and very wet and finely chopped tuna/chicken salad and i can't even express how excited that makes me :thumbup:

I live in Alabama and I'm a college professor.

Hopefully the psychologist will catch this during the psych eval and refuse to recommend her. She should absolutely NOT have the lap-band while an active alcoholic.

I've heard that it helps if you marinate it (like with a low cal italian dressing). I've been thinking about starting with shredded crockpot chicken that's been cooking in chicken broth when I'm finally allowed to eat it-- I wonder if that will help?

September 17th surgery (one day short of 2 weeks) Ups: I've lost 14 lbs since surgery (49 since started process) I can wear my wedding ring for the first time in 6 years My rolls are visibly shrinking! I am down into the clothes I wore last more than 5 years ago I look better in clothes People are noticing, but are attributing to my hair cut Downs: My neck is killing me from having to sleep on my back I had a minor complication with one of my incision sites, so I'm taking nasty liquid antibiotics I miss red wine :drool:

Sure, if the only reason you want to lose weight and keep it off is for vanity reasons, then I'd think twice for sure. Vanity isn't why I did this. It is a personal decision. Everyone needs to get all of the facts they can, ignore the "advice" of uninformed family and friends (unless they are physicians, I guess), do some soul-searching, and then decide yay or nay, or maybe even "maybe later".

The first time I saw my PCP it was to talk about surgery. I just went in and told her I wanted to pursue weight loss surgery and asked if she'd help me through that process. Straight up and direct. We had a conversation, she said yes, and I'm banded. I'd just be frank about WLS being your priority. If after hearing all of the things you've tried, your new doc suggests something else first, it's time to move on to the 3rd doc and try again :drool:

My husband and I love red wine. We look for good bottles, we enjoy tastings and winery trips, and we like to have the occasional conversation about it. I have no intention of giving up red wine (not to mention all of the health benefits it has). I just won't get to drink as much of it (1 glass instead of 2). The biggest thing for me to adjust to will be to not drink it with food. Agh, it kills me to think I'm not going to be able to enjoy wine/food pairings anymore. Actually, the whole "no drinking with food" restriction was the one thing in all of my surgery materials that made my husband freak out for me

I was in a lot of pain too for a few days. The night of my surgery I went home and was miserable because the liquid lortab made me vomit, so not only was I not getting pain relief, I was in MORE pain from the dry heaving. My doc switched me to pill-form lortab (cut up) and it was so much better! I was back to work 5 days after surgery and I felt so much better by then, and at about a week out I stopped taking the pain meds. It gets better, I promise!

It will fly by, I promise! It seems like such a long wait when you first hear 6 months, but my experience was that I was able to use that 6 months to get myself in the right mental state, start a gentle exercise program, etc. Treat it like an opportunity :rolleyes2: A tip about the psych consult: My surgeon said "here, go to this guy". But "this guy" wasn't covered by BC/BS. So I found a psych who did the eval who was in my plan and instead of paying $350 for the test, I paid a $40 copay. I don't know where you are in AL, but private message me if you are in the Birmingham area and I'll tell you the psychologist's name. Good luck and you'll be banded before you know it!

I only had a 2-day pre-op liquid diet, but I put myself on a high protein-low carb diet for a month before just to get me in the right mindset so I'd be setting myself up for success. It really worked for me-- I got a headstart on weight loss and I feel good. But there are lots of people who don't have a pre-op and they do great too. If you think it would help you, you can always institute a diet on your own but it sounds like your surgeon is comfortable with no pre-op and you can trust that too.

Start talking to yourself while you eat, actively and often. This is one of the reasons docs/nutritionists don't want us doing ANYTHING else while we eat-- because the more "mindless" we are, the more we ignore the cues our bodies are giving us. Be mindful, monitor yourself intentionally, and when you hit the "full stage", use coping statements- I can stop eating now since I'm full; eating more than this will make me feel sick; I can be proud of myself if I put the rest of this away for leftovers, etc.

I don't know if your eating plan will allow this, but I plan to make the "fake lasagna" tonight and add sausage to the marinara (pureed of course) to get in extra protein. Basically it is layering ricotta, mozz cheese, and marinara like you would with lasagna, just without the noodles. Everyone raves about it.

I had pureed chili twice earlier this week and it was heaven! It was definitely the first thing I've eaten since surgery that was satisfying psychologically as well as physically My recipe is different though!

I bet your doc is saying "don't eat these for weight loss purposes", rather than you can't have them because of the band (which is why your nutritionist is saying you can add them). Some people low carb their way through weight loss (that's my plan since it works for me), but others still do pasta/bread/etc. in moderation and also lose. You might need to figure out what works best for you and what you can tolerate by trial and error. A good first step would be to just ask your doc next time why he says that and then you'll be able to make an informed decision with him/her.

First, make sure your employer hasn't excluded the surgery from coverage. I had BC/BS of Al under my employer and it was excluded by my employer, so I had to switch to my husband's BC/BS AL plan. Crazy. They require a full 6 month medically supervised diet (it ends up being 7 months because the first visit doesn't really count)-- you have to go every month to your doctor and they have to chart about your weight and diet. You cannot skip a month or you have to start over. They require a 3 year weight history of over 40 BMI, or 35 with 2 major complications (diabetes and high blood pressure, for example). I just had to get my doctor's records with weight faxed in for past 3 years. Once I did those things, I got approved immediately. Like, within 15 minutes of the doc's office submitting my stuff and they have been a dream once I met the criteria. Cost me some of the pre-op visits out of pocket, and $150 copay for the surgery. Not bad.

So I'm driving home from work today and feel a pain in one of my incisions-- like sharp nerve pain that you sometimes get when something is healing and I thought nothing of it. I get home and look at my incisions and one of them is gaping open a bit! No blood, but definitely what should be the inside, not the outside. I called my surgeon after hours and he said as long as it wasn't gaping "significantly" to put some neosporin and a band-aid on it tonight and see him tomorrow. :smile2: I said right after the surgery that I thought he did a crappy job with my sutures (they were not neat at all and I'm going to have unnecessary scarring but I never thought I'd burst right open! I'm being overly-dramatic-- no need for anyone to be scared out there in bandland but I'll tell you, I did not expect this and now I'm paranoid about it opening more.

Shay, I'm kind of with you on this one. For me personally, I feel like every time I think about "cheating" the system in some way what I'm really doing is cheating myself out of what the band can do for me. I trusted my surgeon with cutting me open and messing with my stomach-- I have to trust him that his plan for me is a good one, whatever that plan may be, and not shop around on the forums for one I like better. Sure, I could challenge the band by trying to eat things "just to see if I still can", but what would I be winning there? Just a first-class ticket back to fatland. I'm not saying that I'm perfect or we're perfect, but I am saying that for me, to really succeed I have to stop myself from trying to "test" the band by eating things I know I'm not supposed to. I'm sure sometimes I will not be able to win that battle, but I'd encourage people to really ask themselves why they feel the need to go their own way. Obviously, our own way of eating hasn't worked out too well for us pre-band :smile:

Kittykat- I'm so glad I'm not alone! I'm trying to reset my mind-- I'm not in a weight loss mode (I'm pretty sure I'm not getting ENOUGH calories to lose weight considering how little I'm eating), but a recovery mode. Loss will really start when I can go back to low carb. I say that and I've still lost over 10 lbs since surgery. See, I'm crazy! I hate that all of the detox I did will have to be redone though :smile: I'm picking as low-sugar foods as I can, but it's amazing how "too sweet" some things taste now!

I actually have no idea what band I have or if I got a partial fill-- my first appt. post-op is a week from today and I'll ask then! I suspect I have the Realize band since my doc prefers it, although he does use the Lap Band too on a patient-dependent-basis. Your dinner experience sounds perfect (except for the sliming)! I haven't experienced anything negative yet, but then again, I'm just starting mushies after full-liquids. I am not looking forward to my first stuck experience, that's for sure, but it seems like a learning opportunity. I think my eating issues are twofold: 1) when I'm working I often used to skip breakfast and lunch and then by mid-afternoon I'd be so starved that I would fast food scarf (followed by a carb crash nap, no kidding), and then have a big dinner too, and 2) we eat out a lot and I have issues with portion control. I don't really consider myself a binge-er in the traditional sense but maybe I'm fooling myself. So I think this band will help me- with portion control if nothing else. I'm still going to have to work on making good choices when we go out to eat. It looks like you did that Brian!

Danide and Brian- I think one of the challenges for me (us?) is going to be to NOT test the band to see if we can eat just like we used to. That's definitely not a challenge I want to win (sure, I could go get buffalo chicken tenders for lunch and see if I can still eat them, but why? what will that accomplish?). That's tough, but from what I've read, we have some toughing it out to do before we hit a restriction point with fills that keeps us full on less. I am having a small mental battle with my post-op diet, not because I want more (yet!), but because I did really well low-carbing it pre-op and it is killing me to eat all of these carbs! Anything liquid or mushy tends to be full on carb and for some weird reason I feel like I'm cheating even though I am following my doctors recommended diet. That's crazy. I know I can't really do low carb again until I'm cleared to eat vegetables (and then lean meats), but knowing that my daily diet is yogurt, creamy carby soup, mashed potatoes, cream of wheat, etc. is hard on my psyche. Anyone else dealing with that? LisaA: good to hear from you!

Can you say that you ate before you went, or that your tummy isn't feeling well? That way people might leave you alone about not eating. And definitely do drink your Protein shake right before you go. If worst comes to worse and you find yourself partaking, stick with meat and veggies/ no chips,tortillas, or dessert. Then get right back on track at the next meal.

There is so much variation by insurance plan. The $1600 could be a deductible, or it could be a 20% (if you have a 20/80 plan). Hospital stays are often charged separately from the surgery, etc. My copay was $150. I have a deductible that I haven't paid yet, so I'm pretty sure I'm going to be getting a bill in the mail one of these days for another $500. None of that counts any of the pre-op out of pocket costs. I have the attitude that I was going to get it done either way, so anything insurance pays is a bonus. I know others don't have the luxury of being in the same boat, but I would suggest anyone who has questions about insurance to call your company-- they're the only ones who can explain it to you.