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Now, my reactions towards those of Lee4's communiques which he has recently been posting in R&R have been qualified by having read some of his earlier posts, ones which he had submitted in the general lapband forums. Those posts were wordy but open and friendly. He had been very direct about describing himself, his family, and his particular weight issues. Now he has discovered what is arguably LBT's most challenging and most interesting forum. This is the area where those of us who are interested in this kind of thing have the freedom to get together and discuss controversial topics, usually very controversial topics. As we all know there are many LBT folk who are uncomfortable with R&R and who would be happy to see this particular arena shut down. But those of us who like it here like it here a lot. It is possible that I am a Pollyanna but I do not believe that Lee4 is a troll, a perv, or on drugs. I do believe that neither his formal education nor his life experiences marry up with many of ours in a slick fit but I don't think that that means that he doesn't have a right to engage in conversation with us. Now, the individual to whom BJean was referring to was an odious type who was called Ron Cusano. He had serious problems with spelling and syntax, an annoyance for sure, but the cat was smug and also had an agenda which he was pushing big time. I for one have no sense that Lee4 wishes anything more than to engage in discussion with the rest of us though it is true that he can become kinda cranky at times. Of course some of us have given him a rough ride, too.

Ah, pierogis are seriously deadly being as they are a combo of carbs and saturated fats with a whole bunch of sodium in order to make yer dining experience extra divine. They are part of my father's awful dining heritage what with him being a Polish Jew who was born within short kilometers from the Ukrainian border. Most of the cuisine which comes from this part of the world is strong on carbs and sat fats. We used to eat potato pancakes (latkes) and chopped liver. The first was grated potato which, once wrung dry of all juice and added to beaten egg whites, was fried until crisp in butter or lard. As for the second, this was a mash of hard boiled egg, cooked chicken livers, onion, and some kind of fat. Because my father was an atheist Jew I believe that we used butter. The old man was a real fan of butter. When the mate and I were in Moscow we were treated to cheese blintzes (crepes stuffed with a cheese, lemon zest, and sugar mixture) for Breakfast. All other meals featured fatty meats, potatoes, bread, and cabbage in various forms. The cabbage thing was interesting; you would see this pickled and boiled. Sometimes borscht (beet soup) would be on the menu. (I didn't poop for a week, something which concerned moi quite a bit at the time.) I hadn't been exposed to this kind of cuisine for many years and I had been happy about this. However, a couple of years ago my husband and I were invited to a saint's day party for one of his good friends, a Polish guy. It was a good thing that we decided to go there by public transit and to cab it home. The food consisted of devilled eggs, cheese, bread, and meats. Not a fresh veggie to be seen. The drinks consisted of, well, serious drinking. We were the only folks there who were not Polish. We left at 4 AM. I had a hangover that lasted for 2 days. I also had an appt for a root canal short hours after I got home. The drill jockey and his assistant laughed at me but they were very kind. As fer chicken-fried stuff, I have always assumed that this means meat done KFC style and I am hoping that I am right. While you can find chicken, fish, and seafood which have been dipped into batter and then deep-fried up here it is impossible to obtain chicken-fried steak; this is steak en croute, I assume. Please tell me if I am wrong for we Canadians hear a lot about chicken-fried steak and yet most of us have never, ever seen it. Food is so fascinating, isn't it? I am so enjoying our discussions. And hasn't this thread wandered off course?

I have got to confess that before I got my sexual wings clipped thanks to my considerable array of anti-depressants I used to be more than a little offended that my husband seemed to like wankerie as much as he liked me. This was especially annoying because I am a total and utter failure at self-abuse. I thought that this was because my imaginary life had more to do with shopping, home decor, and food and that when I tried to think hot I ended up giggling but it turns out that my ma was a flop at this as well. Guess it's genetics, eh. To tell you the truth, the other thing which I had noticed about myself long before I ended up on modern anti-depressants is that I do tend to lose sexual interest in my partner after life becomes, well, too domesticated. The more deeply I love someone and am settled in with them the less I am interested in having sex with them. My sexual interest in my mates is always the most powerful during the first 6 months to a year of coupledom, then it does plummet. From my observances of men and women and the sex thang sexual passion and deep emotional or spiritual love do not always go together. I know a couple who have gone their own sexual ways for decades now. In fact they once jointly decided that the husband should sleep with me "in order to get it out of his system." He has not been physically faithful and yet he is one of the most profoundly emotionally attached men whom I have ever met. His wife, a woman who has only strayed once, I believe, is much less emotionally engaged in her relationship with her husband. How can I speak about this couple with such authority? Well, I have been friends with them independently of each other for decades now. I have been a confidant of both. I divorced my ex-husband because he was unfaithful to me and he was a disappointment to me in other ways. He later became involved with a fabulous woman who loved him enough that she was willing to swallow the infidelities, though these did cause her pain, because she felt that the relationship which she shared with my ex was worth it in oh so many ways. Indeed she was his main woman, the one who really counted, as I had been while I was married to him. She is a splendid woman and she chose to stay with my ex for decades, until he died of cancer in fact. She is also one of my best friends, by the way - a really cool divorce present, eh. In every relationship there is an equation which, though based on psychological intangibles, roughly mirrors a business relationship. We are not only giving, we are trading a collection of personal items, and if we come to feel that we are getting nothing back then we will eventually split. Of course these personal items which we are trading may not be particularly healthy - we could be talking an appetite for emotional abuse, for playing the role of martyr, of victim, or whatever........ These may be items which we have created out of our low self-esteem and feelings of self-disgust. It is possible that we are desirous of a little bit of bad treatment because we have never, ever learned anything else. We figure that we are the inferior trading partners, eh. Very long post from Green, eh?

Delo, I think that you must go to see your doctor again for I find your experience to be awfully strange. I would also like to see you repost this question as a new post in one of the two categories that you will see listed when you go to the top of your screen and hit "home" on the LBT chat menu. When you enter this site from home you will see two categories which deal with any and all questions to do with the lapband. Enter either one of these and post this question under new topic! You will need to give your question a title and I would suggest something along the line of Help! My port area is filling with liquid! By making a fresh post on one of these two subsections of LBT you will ensure the maximum amount of readers and you will be sure of getting advice from oldtimers who have experienced your problem. Good luck, grrl.

In fabulous southern Ontario, the province which believes that it is the centre of the Canuck universe, we don't get them 4 litre jugs. I do know that my mate and myself prefer the milk en sacs en plastique arrangement because I am always baffled about which category of our elaborate garbage system those cartons belong to. Are they cardboard and therefore eligible to be recycled under the paper category. But they are coated with something mysterious. If this is plastic then these boxes may belong in our glass and plastics category. Or maybe, being a hybrid, these cartons are just plain garbage. Another reason why I like milk in bags is that those plastic bags left over after the milk has been consumed pack down real small. The final reason why I like milk in plastic bags is that you can say "honey, is there another udder/bladder of milk in the fridge or are we down to the last one?"

It would be a good thing if there were charitable organisations or foundations set up in order to assist individuals who are anxious to adopt needy out of country children. These might assist such families by providing interest free loans which the adoptive family could start to pay back upon or after receiving their tax credits. Making the loan interest free means that the family isn't on the hook for still further debt in the form of interest payments, and making the aid available in the form of a loan means that the fund would be able to assist other families in the future. And as for those families whose finances do run aground through the loss of a job, medical issues, etc, perhaps a share of their loans might be forgiven by these foundations. We are talking charity afterall, aren't we? Maybe Angelina Jolie herself might even want to start a foundation of this nature.......? It would be a natural fit with her own ethical concerns. If anyone of you thinks that my idea is not a dumb idea, please feel free to run with it.

I think that I am lucky that my husband has no hang-ups in this area. He's always been an enthusiastic wanker. He had a truly horrible case of acne when he was a teenager and so was a total wash-out on the dating scene. This is when he began to apply himself seriously to solitary pleasures. He has since grown up to be a very handsome man but he has mixed feelings about women coming onto him because he was so badly dissed by them when he was young. His feelings are very similar to ours when we lose weight and find ourselves being taken notice of by men, I guess.

My husband loves to masturbate. This is a good thing for me because I have no sex drive at all thanks to being on anti-depressants. I am lucky that he is a loving man but he does leave me feeling sad that I am chemically castrated and don't do much for him except go through the motions every few months.

Wow! White glop! Now you've got me all interested again. Tell me more, grrl, tell me more. :ranger: As for poutine, I have to confess that I have never tried it. It is a Quebecois treat and not available in Toronto. I suspect that it is rather nasty as well as a recipe for a coronary event or a stroke. :omg: Within that line of cuisine I do confess that I am fond of pierogis. I like 'em fried in butter along with onions and then eaten with globs of sour cream. :hungry:

I just wonder if we are not being just a little bit elitist because all of us who post on this particular forum are lucky to have unusually fine written communication skills is all.......

Right on, sister BJean! Thank you for expressing this so well.

I don't know why we are sold milk in plastic bags but this has been the way of things for a number of years now. We have the option of a one-litre or two-litre carton or a bag containing 3 one-litre bags of milk. Of course you have to make a one time buy of the special jug that you drop your bag of milk into before opening it. Many years ago we used to have returnable 3-litre jugs made out of hard plastic but not anymore. It is true that "green" Canada does use a lot of plastic bags but it seems that we will soon be recycling them as part of our recyclable garbage and many of our grocery chains already sell recyclable shopping bags which you can use over and over again. The ones which I and my mate have got are really great. We have used them as carry-ons on planes and as beach bags and we paid 5 bucks for 5 of them. Because they are made for carrying groceries they are very strong and the store will replace them for free if they fall apart. @Enterprise: do come to Toronto. We are situated in the same province as Thunder Bay but we are in the south. You will notice great differences with respect to size and affluence, I am sure, but all Canadians look pale and sickly after a long Canadian winter, even our visible minorities. :phanvan By May our local temperatures are in the 60s, 70s, and 80s and the outdoor cafes are open. This is when you get to see huge numbers of pasty people soaking up the rays. It is one of the natural wonders of Canada. :heh: Haha

Aw, Chickie, now that's just a bummer! Hearing about your weight loss within the context of these boards is very, very different from your story being the poster story for a lapband clinic. I am so sorry to hear that you have been receiving these PMs questioning the truth of your personal history. The truth is that I believe that your story is as important to the rest of the LBT members as the stories of those individuals who lose slowly or who have run into other difficulties. There are always newbies here who are doing their homework, trying to decide whether the lapband is the right choice and it is important for them to read about the very, very good as well as the good, the bad, and the ugly. Folks like yourself are a real inspiration to the rest of us, you know.

Honestly, Chickie, if I had heard your wonderful story before getting banded I would have been so bluddy skeptical that I would have dealt myself out of a sweet piece of weight loss hardware. Your weight loss is truly extraordinary and both you and the inventor of the band are to be congratulated for this. At the same time individuals on this side of the Atlantic are so used to being sold miracle cures that people like myself run the other way when confronted with stories such as your own. And remember that up here in Canada we do have to pay for the lapband. I ponied up 16 grand in Can-bucks for my equipment. And it has served me well. I, too, am hovering around my target weight and now have a BMI of 23.9.

Hah! Right on! There is that info which is contained in the fine print. :heh:

This makes sense. Thanks for this info, Derick.

And you must resubmit your application.......

Ugh! Bastards! Of course you are the most eligible individual and the hiring committee is utterly blind.

It's a good thing that I never saw any advertising of this nature concerning the lapband. I never would have gone for it and I would have missed out on getting hardware which really has turned my life around. In my case it just took 9 months. Products which advertise miracle results really turn me off, especially if these appear in the form of info-mercials. You see, I feel that if a product really works as advertised it would be sold everywhere and be used by everyone; it would not be flogged on an obscure cable channel or on late night TV. Two major areas where we are vulnerable are both connected to our appearance: one has to do with our weight issues and the other has to do with ageing. Many if not most of the products flogged to us which advertise miracle results hook into one or the other of these fears. Use these cremes and you will look years younger. Buy my fat burning product and the weight will simply disappear. Of course the stuff doesn't work. If it did we would be thin and wrinkle-free. If it did we would be hearing about it on the media. If it did we would all be wishing that we were smart enough to buy shares in the companies that produced these products. And the few of us who did would be retiring awful early. Now, unlike you, Alexandra, although I was a chubby teenager I spent my pre-menopausal years as a normo - although I sure didn't appreciate this at the time. (I began to gain weight once I became post-menopausal and that, grrl, was a long, long time ago. I went through menopause when I was 41 and refused HRT until I was around 47. I was on HRT for about 3 years max, by the way. So this is my fat profile, eh. LOL) I am inclined to believe that some individuals are more cynical than others by temperament (and maybe by education/experience?) and it is these individuals who are likely to be alienated by the miracle ad. I also note that both you and I are atheists. This would also indicate that we are prone to be skeptical. At the same time I have to admit that I am not entirely immune to trying stuff out. I have just returned from a health food store where I bought a month's supply of Conjugated Linoleic Acid (CLA) for a whack of cash. I did this because one of my grrlfriends has thick and glossy hair and she takes the stuff. The main ingredient is safflower oil and I am thinking that I am plenty stupid to sucker myself into buying these little capsules instead of buying a bottle of the oil. And the bonehead who sold this stuff to me kept referring to the oil as being saffron oil! Even the best skeptic will dream occasionally.

Thank you for opening this topic, Sunta. I find it interesting and would like to know more. Are you saying that the American government charges its own citizens those big fees when they would like to adopt internationally? I had always heard that international adoption was expensive but I thought that it was the foreign governments who were shaking down the adoptive parents for this cash. And it is indeed sad when there are folk who are anxious to adopt and children who need parents who are blocked from finding each other due to the big bucks issue.

A slow and steady weight loss is much healthier for your body to accept in the long run. I was banded last Sept 7 at TLBC and am now around goal. Be patient, SusanSilver, you will get to where you want to go.

Wha...??? Don't you have milk in plastic bags down there? :faint: Do you have sour cream and chive flavoured potato chips? Salt and vinegar? By the way, on her blog :ranger: the American woman who moved to Canada mentioned that she found that Canadians tend to be cheap compared to Americans. She says that while Americans will simply pay for an item that they want Canadians tend to shop around and then yap to each other about the various prices they have paid for the item. I am very pleased that you appreciate Toronto, Lucy. It's my home town.

I dunno that I agree with you, TommyO. I do think that to some extent weight is a class and money issue. Money and education often do mean that people make healthier lifestyle choices. They can afford to go to gyms. They can afford to buy better quality foods and are more likely to cook using fresh produce. They are more likely to read the nutritional info on prepared food items. But money alone plays a huge role; it is much cheaper to feed your family on macaroni and cheese and hotdogs than it is to feed them chicken breast and salad. And a loaf of white bread costs a lot less than a loaf of 7 grain whole wheat. And the more affluent and better educated do receive more social pressure from their friends to be thin. Let me explain this last statement: whenever I visit those temples of culture - museums and art galleries - I rarely see truly large people. I do, however, occasionally see them in my local Walmart and Zellers.

Because you can still eat a lot it sounds to me that you need more fill. You haven't hit your sweet spot yet.

It has happened to me on a few occasions and it has always been women who have asked me when the baby is due. Because each time I was asked I was well beyond menopause I found the question kind of funny. I always liked to tell them that "that ship had sailed years ago'", that I am post-menopausal and just fat, and then watch them squirm with embarassment. The weiner you met in the club wouldn't know how to squirm, unfortunately.