MollyRN

How are you feeling today? I can feel the tightness without even drinking something - is that in my head???

Froggie....I looked it up and I think you are right. It's a good thing right?? It has gotten increasingly strong. From what I read it means that your body is burning fat, is there a down side to that? You just changed my entire feeling about my metal mouth!!!

Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyone notice a metallic taste in their mouth? Started during the pre-op diet. Forgot to ask the doc today...

Got my first fill today. Nutritionist said "We installed the band 24 days ago, but today we turn it on." Excited. Got 4ccs, which I hear is a little aggressive. liquid going down - feeling good. Anyone else able to feel the tubing move inside of them during a fill? Little freaky... no pain though, doc went in blind with no numbing...but darn, shouldn't he know where my port is? He put it in afterall!!! I put some other observations on my blog A Lead Singer

Me too! First fill.... got 4ccs though! A little scared!! How did your doc make the determination about how much to put in?

I am excited to have my first fill tomorrow. I am 23 days out from surgery and my weight loss has now pretty much leveled off - I am hoping for a little jump start tomorrow even though I know that it often takes a couple of fills to get it right. I know the doc does the fill and then has you make sure you can swallow Water. Do you go back on liquid for a couple of days?

For me it was 9 days exactly :cursing: 5 days where I just ate/drank what I had to... a couple of days feeling happy to have shakes and then hunger set in. But it has been manageable and I have stayed in control. My first fill is this week and I am happy about that. I liked the promise of not being hungry and I am ready to feel that!

I can totally relate - I am 3 weeks now and I am hungry more than I expected to be. I pretty much am dieting right now... but I get my first fill this week. Call your doctor and see if they will do it sooner. If not, fight fight fight. It won't always be this hard - this is bandster hell right? Don't give up. Two weeks will fly by ..... you can do it.

Taking on the air stretches a new pouch....burping or not.

AWESOME!!!!!! I am LIVING for that day...so cool. Congrats and keep up the awesome work!

I totally spent hours doing the same thing the days after my surgery! Funny!

My surgeon is George Fielding is kind of one of the leaders in the field of laparoscopic surgery (not just the lap band) and he explained the reason most people do a preop diet and it does relate to the liver. They need to manipulate and lift the liver. Imagine doing this to a piece of bread, it may crack or break. The liquid diets make the liver more flexible and thinner (most of us have fatty livers to begin with). I think the pre-op diet probably correlates to overall statistics on outcomes, honestly. If you do the research, the doctors with the lowest negative outcomes probably are the MOST conservative preop.

I love the blogs! Mine's below.

I know someone who had their surgery put off and I also know someone who could not have their surgery laproscopically because of the condition of their liver.

Regular food? Not mushies? I am on my 2nd day of regular food and I find that I am eating anything, just VERY smalls bites and chewing like crazy. It is a little stressful so I resort to mushies each day....

It is hard for people to compare their pain thresholds. Just remember to get up and walk as much as you can as soon as you can. The gas pain is, IMHO, worse than the incision pain for sure.

Have you had your esophagram yet? That's what my doctor used to see if I was ready to come off liquids. You really have to be careful now because you may feel better but inside you have swelling or other healing going on and you don't want to do something that will mess up your surgery.

I honestly felt that the liquid post-op was harder than the pre-op. But today is the day that I finish the mushy part and I have to say, I am a little scared. I almost wish I could hide behind the shakes again....

Estrogen is stored in fat cells - so if you are burning fat, you will see an increase in estrogen which is similar to taking a low dose birth control pill - not enough to keep someone from getting pregnant, but enough to mess with your cycle.

Cheers to my fellow practice mate.... I TOTALLY have the same thing - although it has started to subside. I took advantage of it to learn the new flow of my body if you will

Yes - I can imagine part of it is scaring us!! I am still on mushy food and have come nowhere near one of these episodes.... I will be terrified as well ;(

I am in bandster hell and I am employing all my dieting experience in order to stay the course. It's rough. As far as the starvation thing, I agree - we have enough energy stores to keep our bodies going - but I also agree that everyone has an optimum place to be losing weight. My doc say stay at 1000 calories and I journal like crazy because I need to learn what 1000 calories feels like (if this makes sense). When we panic about lack of weight loss, I think we need to stay the course and tell our bodies, NO WAY, things aren't changing and I am serious this time. Burn the fat, stop waiting for more food :thumbup:

Kelly - did getting the fill make your port hurt at all? That's kind of one of my fears - it already bothers me and in a week they are going to mess with it??

CHEERS JULY 26TH!! Can you believe that it was only 2.5 weeks ago...feels like ages to me. I go in next week for my first fill - my doc does it at 4 weeks. I will ask then - but definitely I feel like it was worse yesterday and today than it has been. And you are right, no one told me it would hurt...:thumbup: