AlienBandit

alcohol can help cause erosion why bother if your only going to hurt your stomach? Plus you get drunk so much faster after being banded. So unless you want to be wasted 3 times a week it would be best not to drink so much when banded.

Hey guys so I went jumping and it was intense. I chickened out of the ankle jumping just because my vertigo was bugging me ( and I just ate lunch which meant my food would be above my balloon which made me nervous for jumping) but did the waist jumping with the highest bridge available to jump from in Korea. Next time I will ankle jump from a lower bridge. If you want to live vicariously through someone here is my friend who jumped before me. He took a video while jumping. You can hear my friends root for me ("come on Jaclyn") as I stood on the ledge while he is jumping. When I get my video my friends took i'll post it to. I higly recommend this

It is strange how I struggled for years with losing weight and keeping it off yet I have been able to maintain my weight for the last 5 months. Yes I have a balloon in my stomach but it doesnt so much for me as I can drink and eat whatever I want ( sometimes too much like alcohol ooops ). I am actually surprised I didnt gain any weight as the last few months have been easy. These last 20 lbs will be hard though for sure. But trust me it is possible :bored:

Luke, if you really knew me you would think i was lying when I talk about all the surgeries i have had since getting my band. I am freaked out too by things like anesthesia awareness but worst of all needles period. Since my band I have had a few lipo sessions and a balloon placed in my stomach and not once did I ever wake up during surgery or be aware of what was going on during my surgery. Having said that every time I go for surgery I always wake up immediately while still on the table of course after everything is finished and it has never been scary ( i was told that my liver or something must be very healthy because i wake up and am alert and can even walk back to my room if I wanted to). When I do wake up it is nice to see the nurses and hear the doctor tell me how things went right away instead of waking up alone in my room with no one to tell me the outcome. Something like anesthesia awareness can be mentioned to your doctor so they can assure you about your fears. Good luck on your journey

Hey! I am Canadian too but got my band in Korea. We almost sound the same though. I always had lot of problems with losing weight and keeping it off. Since surgery was too expensive in Canada and I would never qualify because my bmi was never 40 I got the surgery when I moved to Korea. I started at 205 lbs a bmi of 33 and right now I am 160 lbs with a bmi of 25. I lost my band due to erosion 5 months ago and thankfully didnt gain any weight back. I get a new band soon which will hopefully help me get to my goal of 140ish lbs. I just want to let you know that it is possible to lose all that weight with the band and your goal of 145 wont be too far away. Good luck :bored:

May I ask the name of this doctor? Do you know if he accepts patients banded outside of Canada?

July 10th for me... here I go... here I go... here I go again :smile2:

my doc told me that metamucil is BAD BAD BAD and that I shouldnt use it. Others on this forum have posted that as well. Does your doctor know your using it?

Though I was originally banded last October I am getting a new band ( as mine was removed) in July. I feel like I forgot everything about how to eat with a band. Hopefully it is like riding a bike but I am sure there will still be come challenges. My blog talks all about my experience when I first got banded and I have found I am reading it again just to give myself a refresher on what life was like when I first got banded.

My bmi was 33 when I started. In total I am hoping to lose about 75 pounds. I am due to be rebanded next month and hope to lose the last 10 kg ( 20ish pounds). I didnt have any problem losing the weight and luckily I didnt gain any weight back even though I went without a band for 5 months :thumbup:

wow you heal so well! I have a question about your arm lift. Are your scars noticeable now some time after the surgery? I want an arm lift but am concerned about the scarring. I saw your 3 month post op photos but how do your arms look now?

I am from the country where the fresh smell of grass and sometimes cow poo( from the fields behind me) would fill the air in the summer. Often I remember back home you would have to watch the road closely to make sure there were no loose farm animals out like chickens or cows ( still sometimes to this day there can be chickens trying to cross the road) Now I live in Korea. Luckily I live along the country side where the view from my "mountain" ( big hill I live on) is amazing and also gives the apartments a nice fresh clean breeze of fresh air every day. Beside the road as you drive down the hill are little gardens maintained by people who live near by. As you drive down the road past the hill you see lots of green grass and huge mountains with a few houses along the way. Also close to my house are tons of rice fields which for a Canadian is something weird to see but I have grown used to the sight of them and the workers who work in them rice hats and all. Where I live could definitely give some people a huge culture shock but I can't imagine seeing where everyone else is describing where they live. Where I am is now what I call home.

sadly pizza wont be gone forever. Even with 7cc in a 10cc band I could still eat pizza. Everyone is different though

if anyone is interested I am having a seoul meet and greet at olympic park June 20th. Msg me for details or check my blog

You should be fine. I went to an amusement park a little while after getting banded and didn't hesitate on any rides. The strangest thing was you dont get the butterflies in your stomach feeling anymore. So on scary rides the anticipation might kill you but the band wont :smile2: I have a post about my experience on my blog. It was in February I believe.

Ok Bandsters in Korea. The date is set for our meet and greet. I am planning for June 20th at Olympic Park. Check out my blog for more details and links to what the park is like. Please let me know if your coming :tongue2:

how is your scarring looking after everything you have already done?

The time you take off really depends on your job. I had my surgery on a Saturday afternoon and went back to work on the Monday. I am a teacher so I dont do much lifting mostly walking and standing all day. It wasn't that hard. I also don't take any time off work when I have had lipo. Just got some the other day actually went home a few hours later and went back to work again on the Monday ( surgeries always on Saturdays for me). It is better to move around a lot after surgery so going back to my job only helped me get rid of the gas faster etc.

I agree about maybe trying to do dates that don't involve much food. Since being banded and losing a lot of weight I have gone on a few dates. Since I have gone mostly with the same guy I have had to come up with different things for us to do like hiking, going to museums/galleries, going for a wine and cheese sampling thing ( you dont have to eat the cheese and dont need to drink a lot of wine) the movies, etc. Now that I have had the band removed for a while I have only recently started the eating out dates which is a nice change but you can definitely do dates without having the eat for awhile, at least until your comfortable telling the person about the band. Even if your not going to tell the person, try eating at places were the food is very rich and therefore you only need to eat a little to get full even as a normal person. I did this once at an Indian restaurant and it was so easy to pass as normal.

I have tons of tattoos some I got before and some I got after my surgery. The tattoo I worried about the most was one on my hip. I got it when I was smaller and then gained over 80 pounds. Now after my surgery and some lipo it still looks amazing ( you can see photos on my blog). Not one of my tattoos has changed because of losing/gaining weight etc. :eek:

I have had a few times where air was in my band as well. The first time I thought I was over filled and convinced my doc to remove some saline from my band. As he was slowly taking saline out I felt instantly relieved and mentioned so, so he stopped and said my fill should be ok. The next time I went to see him, he removed all of my fill ( and put in a new amount of saline which he does each visit) and I was shocked to see I had more saline in my band then I expected. When I asked him why he didnt remove some saline the last fill he said that he was going to remove some of the fill but got air first and when I said I felt better he didnt need to remove some of the saline. Apparently it happens sometimes.

I was banded last October and in Feb found band erosion ( had no idea I had it). I had my band removed the same month and since then have been doing well. I had no complications with the surgery, or after. Even with the band gone I found I was never hungry and still got thing stuck because my stomach shape had changed. After 1 month I got a balloon placed in my stomach. Since the day of my band removal to the balloon placement ( 1 month) I didn't gain a pound! I wish you the best in your recovery. Hopefully things will go smoothly. Didnt your doctor do an endoscope exam to see if the band was actually eroded?

Keep your chin up :tongue2: the band will work just give it time. You could have gained a pound maybe from your stomach being swollen after surgery. The first few months after surgery is meant to let your stomach heal. If you lose weight during that time it is a bonus. When I had my band removed and had some lipo I gained 3 kg ( over 6 pounds) of Water weight that took a few weeks to get rid of. Once the water weight was gone I had actually lost 3 kg from my surgery weight.

People in Korea are very open with their weight. Everyone knows how much all the celebrities weigh etc. When I told my co teachers ( one at each school I work at incase somehthing went wrong) they were both supportive because it meant i would lose weight and so as long as your losing weight the surgery isnt seen as being a bad thing. One of my co teachers even wanted more info to give to her sister who she thinks should lose weight. My other co teacher wanted to get the surgery herself but of course it is not affordable for some people. I havent told any other Koreans in Korea but the idea of the lapband surgery is not that bad. I don't believe people see it as a cheat. I do know some see it as a magical tool ( the ones getting banded) and expect to lose all their weight very fast. Some patients dont really exercise either I think. The issue is not seeing the band as a cheat in Korea, the issue here is really trying to get people to understand you won't lose the weight over night.

I had my band removed a month ago. The difference between a filled band unfilled band and no band is almost nonexistent to me. I still have some restriction even without my band ( ie my bagel getting stuck the other day) because my stomach has changed shape I guess. I have talked with 3 bariatric doctors from 3 different countries about this and they said it is a common "complaint" from patients who had their band removed. Since having my band removed I have not gained weight. I find it difficult to still eat certain foods which I am not complaining. Just letting you all know that even without the band you can not eat like you did before unless you want it to be a very uncomfortable experience. I am not pushing my luck. I don't need that bad junk crap food so I am not going to eat it