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Don't you worry that if you do not get in enough calories, that is unhealthy too? I think 1000-1300 range should be good.

The liquid stage is really difficult to get enough calories in, even on full liquids I struggled somewhat. But, I definately do not feel it is safe to purposely dip below 1200 calories a day for any amount of time. I really hate hearing about doctors who are telling people to eat 800 calories a day. There was just a major scientific study done a few months ago that proved that people on a restricted diet (below 1000/day) did lose weight but that it came right back and they ended up in worse health than the group who ate a balanced diet above 1000/day. I have done well with my band and I truly believe it's because I make sure to eat enough each day. But, during the liquids stage just do the best you can. I know I just couldn't eat much during this stage so I used my protein shakes as often as possible to try to get in as much nutrition as possible. You'll be fine!

I was told from the very beginning 1000 calories a day. When I was on liquids I know I didn't make it even close to that amount. I go back on Thursday (hopefully for an adjustment) and I am sure the 1000 calories a day will still be my limit.

Hi Jennifer! Congratulations on your surgery!! I agree with Reverie in that you should be focusing on healing right now. Its all too easy on this site to compare ourselves to someone else's journey which always leads to frustration or guilt that you may be doing something wrong. Its amazing how different everyone's body reacts to the surgery and from the 8 months I've been on these boards its hard to find two people with the exact same experiences. Its really important right now also to make sure you are drinking your protein. In the days after my surgery it was the first thing I drank in the morning. Even if it didn't taste so great I knew it was what my body needed and I believe it has helped me tremendously. Now that I'm on mushies I track all my protein and calories on a website like FitDay and it keeps me accountable for what I'm putting in my mouth. I also make sure to measure my portions. While I could easily eat more than a cup of food at a meal I haven't broken from it since being banded. Not having restriction makes it so hard on everyone at this stage. Just stay focused on why you decided to make this change! Good Luck with your journey!!

This sounds like the best solution to me as well. Have something high in Protein to help get you through your workout, and yet felling enough to last you until you can get dinner fixed. IMO, as long as you stick to your doctor's calorie, protein, carb requirements for the day, it should be up to you when you get them and how. The same plan isn't going to work for everyone and obviously the way it is now, his plan is not working for you. Take care and try to keep you chin up! Always choose laugh over cry.

I would take Celine up on her offer...also, what others have said is good advice...I am also out 2 months...had my surgery May 6...per my NUT's plan, I need to get in 60 to 80 g of protein daily and 64 oz of liquids...she doesn't have me counting calories or carbs but I generally get in no more than 800 calories...I don't worry about carbs because I am mainly eating lean proteins and some veggies...no fried foods, no sweets, no starches at all (no corn, potatoes, rice, bread, cereal, pasta, crackers, chips)...if you aren't eating those kinds of starches and carbs and only eating 800 calories per day, it would be difficult to go over a carb limit...I have trouble getting in 64 oz of fluid, but I am trying to get there...also, my plan calls for daily exercise...I have been having low energy levels so I rarely walk more than 20-30 minutes daily--I am trying to improve...still no drinking with meals or at least 30 minutes after eating...still supplementing protein with the shakes when needed...no carbonated drinks...a multivitamin, B12 and calcium daily...can't think of anything else now

Did anyone else stall at 3 months? I've been stuck for 2 weeks. Think I need to increase my calories. I only get around 700 per day.

You may have hit a point of equilibrium where the amount of calories you take in equal the amount of calories you burn on a daily average. If you would like to lose more weight, ensure you are doing the basics: Don't drink Water 15 minutes prior, during or 45 minutes after eating Eat lean Proteins first, then good carbs Exercise - push yourself, don't just go through the motions. Your heart rate should be up there. Do you track on MyFitnessPal?

If you go back and look, many of us have complained, whined, wimpered about how much we gained day of surgery...for me it was 6-7 pounds due to IV fluids for 24+ hours straight...and it took me about 5 days to get rid of that and back to "normal"....Since then I'll lose 4 pounds in 1 week then 1 pound for a week or two then none for a week or two, then 3-4, repeat...1-2 pounds a week consistantly is realistic and nothing to be upset about. Be proud that you're losing 1-2 a week. Also, you're so close to surgery your body is still adapting and your metabolism is adapting. When I do liquids I lose quickly for 7-10 days then come to a screeching halt for a while....I've calculated it and when I'm on my docs liquid diet I average about 600 calories a day, my body doesn't like that and the weight loss stops, totally. Keep your chin up, 10 pounds is great!

Ok, from the liquid stage to the mushy stage, is it normal to gain back a few pounds of lost weight? I figure it should be due to increasing your calories just a bit..heres what happened.. I was on liquids for a week and a half..lost 20 pounds. Went to mushies, and gained 2 pounds...is this normal? Perhaps im not watching the caloric intake as well as I should be. Ive only been on mushies for a weekend..but it scares me that Ive gained back 2 pounds. eep!

Make sure you drink enough water. The more you drink the more you will release. I find it odd that you have not lost more. How many calories are you consuming? Try to stay around 500-700 calories eat only protein and take your vitamins. Don't worry about exercise, you will lose weight regardless.

I am also 1 and half years out, and yea some days its a real struggle i gave up smoking a few months ago in order to get my cosmetic surgery on my lose skin and had to have a 1mls unfill .. its been extremely hard to keep on track, but like the smoking if i had cigs in the house i would smoke them so the same with food , i have only kept on track by not purchasing any unhealthy food .. if i do have a snacky day where i eat too much even of healthy food i just burn it off on the exercise bike, burning more calories than u eat means u can at least eat more food if u have a bad day, it also makees u more accountable as to what u do eat its like having to pay the bill at the end of meal, except your bill is having to burn the calories u ate

Hi guys thank you for your advices and encouragement .. Sometimes it's good to hear that others are in the same boat but are doing something about it to get back on the wagon I'm going to restart counting my calories and protein and start using my "portion perfection plate" .. My dietitian had a good stern talk with me yesterday .. I'm over this body .. Time to re-establish realistic goals and believe in myself that I can do it !! All the best to you all ???Š

Baked Salmon often when hubby is home (he makes it look so easy; it moist and flavorful... but for the life of me I just cant cook it: it just sucks)! I like the sweet & spicy tuna in the pouch. It's like 90 calories and I add about 2 TBLS low fat mayo. It keeps me full the longest. Also I marinate chicken breast overnight and cook them in the steamer; helps them stay really moist. I will do 3-4 breasts and after cooking weigh out 4 oz portions then ziplock them individually. Baked catfish is good but not as filling as tuna or salmon. Breakfast is either a Protein shake or scrambled eggs. My new favorite (a banded friend turned me onto) is jumbo lump crab meat! I add it to hummus, laughing cow cheese, scramble eggs, Soup, or just weigh 2-4 oz pure crab meat and eat....yumm 4-6 boiled shrimp keeps me satisfied for hours, but have to chew very well. Charbroiled oysters. (Seafood is a staple b/c I live on the coast) Snack: laughing cow cheese with cucumbers

Look into Bariwise fruit drinks. They come in little bottles with just powder and you add the water and shake. A great travel aid. The powder does not weight all that much. I order mine online from Bariatric Choice and they have Chocolate, Coffee, Orange pineapple, Kiwi strawberry, and Wild Berry flavors. 15 protien and70 calories. I have had all but the chocolate and none were chalky! http://bariatricchoice.com

Howdy y'all, I'm scheduled to get my first fill this Friday. My band was installed EMPTY of July 1st and I've lost just over 30lbs since my surgery. I'm eating 1/2 to 3/4 of a cup of food 4 times a days... which adds up to 1000 Calories. The good news is that the portion size that I'm eating right now leaves me FULL. The bad news is that it only last an hour and a half; 2 hours at the most. I'm then hungry for the next 2 hours until I can eat again. My concern is that if I get a fill, my portion size that I can eat will get smaller. I'm very happy with my portions right now and I'm afraid that if they got smaller, I'll have trouble getting 1000 Calories in each day. (Any less than 1000 puts me into starvation mode.) I know I have no restriction right now. (I've accidentally swallowed very large pieces of food on several occasions and have had no discomfort or issues.) And I like having that safety net of having a loose band just in case I forget to chew... But I'm tried for being hungry half the time. There's also the knowledge that most people don't fill restriction until their 4th fill swimming around in my head. If I DO pass on getting a fill and get it later when I feel like I desperately need it... That first fill probably won't do anything for me and I'll then be waiting for the next 3 fills before I feel restriction! Aurgh! What to do?!

ok first of all -- BRAVO!!! 100 pounds in a year! that is so incredible and inspiring, ESPECIALLY because you said you did all that in the first half of the year and have been able to successfully maintain that weightloss for the past few months. so a huge round of applause to you girl, seriously! im gonna respond to the post you wrote on my visitor wall in this message board because you asked for my advice and i feel like i have to explain myself a lot more than this website will allow to fit in a visitor message! :wub: wrapping my head around being "skinny" is really hard, and im sure it is realllllly hard for you too, at least that is what i gather from what we have talked about in the past. one of my first memories of clothing sizes was in 5th grade wearing a size 12 (of course i worked my way up to a size 20 by the time i was banded). well the first few months i dropped weight consistently, and can say i had it down to a science because every day i have been writing down everything i eat in my online calorie counter. i bought my first pair of size 12 pants at the end of march.. but in the 2 months since then i did not really lose any more weight. i was overstressed and that had an effect on my band of course-- like everything does-- and at the beginning of may i had my band completely unfilled after my doctor was worried my stress had caused a slip (i could not get any food and eventually any liquid down). a week later i had an upper GI (had to swallow the barium liquid so they can look at me through an x-ray), and my body had already healed itself. this i could have told the doctor anyways-- because i DEFINITELY am hungryyy! but that is great news because it means i can slowly put Fluid back in my band. but unlike a year ago, when i would have felt hungry and gone out to eat a 4th or 5th or 6th meal at some fast food place, something has finally clicked in my head. i am so thankful for my band (JUST LIKE YOU OBVIOUSLY SHOULD BE!) because without it, this plateau would not have happened--- we both know i would have gained the weight back, then been depressed about gaining weight after all that hard work and eventually gain MORE weight. thankfully, with my band, i know i cant let myself down. this is why i have continued to write down everything i eat, even when i know i am going waaaay over the calories alotted for me for the day. i know sometimes i make poor food choices or say i shouldnt have eaten that or drank that... but because i am aware of what i am putting in my body, i know exactly what i have to do to lose the weight i want in the time i want to do it in. we are also in the same boat exercise-wise -- i have also found my motivation again! a few weeks ago is actually when i will say i started up. we both know how much i was exercising back in november-february, but school work made my life too busy, especially because i wanted to hang out with friends in my free time. but like i said-- i guess something clicked in my brain. i want to be healthy and fit and active more than anything, and while this band will certainly put me in the right direction, nothing and no one aside from me will get me to my goals. even when i dont have time for it, i HAVE to make the time for it. it takes a half hour to get in a solid workout, thats all. and then an hour to quickly shower and dry off/cool off, which i can do while watching tv or doing homework anyways. the hospital i went through assesses your physical fitness with a personal trainer in their physical therapy center before surgery, and when i first met him back in november, we became pretty good friends. i can obviously exercise without his help, but i called him and decided to "hire" him as my personal trainer for the summer (he hooked me up with a sweet discount because he knows im self-motivated so i wont be a tough client for him). i am so excited to work with him and get off this final weight. it is great to have someone else excited for me to lose weight and get fit too, and who cares about my well-being so that i won't injure myself doing so. i already feel so strong and powerful, and i have always loved that euphoric feeling that comes with exercise. i worked out really hard this morning and a few hours later i was still a little red even after a shower, but i saw an old mentor who was just gushing "jane-- you are absolutely GLOWING! you are so skinny now too! are you in LOVE or something? is there a BOY in your life?!?!" hahaha wellllllll that is certainly not the case, but its good to hear that my after-exercise redness makes me look like i am GLOWING and in love! ha i really want to give you solid advice-- like "do this" or take this magic pill and suddenly you will find the motivation in yourself to eat better and exercise on a lazy sunday. i want you to let go of your fears and let yourself get skinnier and healthier like you DESERVE to be. but obviously, i cant do that. all i can do is offer support and motivation like you do for me. and it sounds like something has finally clicked in your head too. year one is done and you have proven you were a successful bandster, and now it is time for year two-- the year for you to REACH YOUR GOAL and be healthy and happy and MAINTAIN IT! i have absolute faith that you will be there by next summer. alright. ive written a lot here, haha. but i hope this is all stuff you wanted to hear, and i hope that this summer we both accomplish our short-term goals! the past two weeks i have turned my plateau around and am losing again, finally. my size 12 express jeans are getting too big now, would you believe that? im smaller than the ten-year-old me!!!

@Mis73...did u gain weight while increasing your calories?

That's a great tool! I have been using that website since my surgery, also. Just keep in mind that it also depends on how many calories you use up each day. I use the BodyBugg which is similar -- you tell it how much you want to lose each week, and it tells you how many calories a day you can eat.... and how many calories a day you have to use (and it calculates how many calories you have burned throughout the day). I was pretty shocked how much effort it takes to use up the amount of calories I have to use each day in order to meet my 2 pound a week goal! I'll tell you one thing I have learned from the BodyBugg.... the best thing you can do to burn more calories is just move, every opportunity you have. Get up and walk throughout the day. Take the long way around. Take the stairs. It has made a much bigger difference than I realized, in how many calories a day I burn. Good luck, guys!

Did your doc specify what calcium sources he wanted you to use? I do have yogurt sometimes, but usually mixed with Cereal so it doesn't slide right through. It's a mushy, so it's not going to give you the satiated feeling that solid food will. My center says no liquid or mushy calories except 2 dairy servings per day. Which sounds more sensible to me than excluding dairy. I still don't get enough calcium, so I take a Viactiv chew these days.

Same here going thru some what the same so I decided to make my favorite dishes just smaller but using fat free or sugar free ingredients n high in protein. Trying to get all my protein from meals I do 5 small meals a say. Sometimes I start with a protein shake just to boost up my intake. A shake counts as a meal. So watch ur calories

I understand where you're coming from. I too become hungry when I'm sick (except a stomach virus) and tend to eat more comfort foods and I was sick A LOT this past winter/spring. I'm only 11 months out, but around 9 months I remember one week putting on 5 pounds in about 1.5 weeks. I let myself get into some old habits...one week I ate out everyday and grazed on a lot of snack foods for all my other meals. I didn't gain anything, so I just continued, but the next 1.5 weeks (although I did start to get a little better) I noticed the scale start moving slowly upwards. I cut back on the eating out (completely stopped going out for lunch at work), decided to buy some healthier Snacks (granola bars, yogurt, fruit--as I don't tend to crave these as much and will stop when full), and just started taking more notice of what and when I ate. I decided that if I continued to go up in pounds, I'd go back to low carb and/or measuring foods/counting calories, etc., but really didn't want to feel like I was on a diet. I just tried to do what I thought a "normal" person would do in this situation and it worked. Good luck getting back on track! That's just one thing I love about this tool...it's still there when we need it. Oh, by the way, I too seem to be able to eat a lot more than others mention on here. I also never truly lost my hunger either. So I guess we're all different.

Sliders! This applies equally to a sleeve as to a band, easy foods that liquefy when you chew them. With a band, there is no difference to the amount of Cookies I can consume now than I could before I was banded. I can still down a packet of Tim Tams (google that little Australian delicacy) in minutes and I can still eat an ENTIRE family block of chocolate. They just slip right on through. But if i eat the right foods, portions remain very small. Its choices, pure and simple. And along with those slider foods generally come a large dose of salt and sugar that make you bloated and put on weight very quickly. It is physically impossible to gain 2lb of FAT from eating a piece of pie though and if you get back with the program this weight will disappear. The trouble is too that to date, science has not come up with any sure fire way to lose weight other than calorie restriction. But it is very true that on a diet of 800 to 1000 calories a day you DO lose muscle and you DO slow your metabolism very significantly. There is no way you could continue to eat that way without the help of a sleeve or band, but the truth is, after a year or two or more of eating so low, there is no way you can go back to normal eating without massive weight regain. Its why we need these tools FOREVER. There's no learning better habits and that's enough, our bodies are damaged by the weight gain and weight loss process in ways that mean we have to be small and careful eaters forever.

Hi. I have been researching the Lap Band for almost two years, I feel very confident that I know pretty much everything I can expect with it. I just feel so lost. I am so worried that people will think I am a failure and am disgusting or something for doing this. I feel afraid to not depend on food anymore. Giving up the way I eat and the things I eat, which I know is why I am over weight. But, thinking about it all is really scary. I just wonder if I will be the same person, will I be obsessed with food, calories.. will people love me more if I am thin? I dont know I just am so unsure. The biggest reason I want to have it done is so I can tell my children some day that I made the choice to be healthy and live a long life to be with them. I feel like my parents didn't choose to be healthy for me and they are slowly killing themselves with obesity. I dont want my children to think that about me. Sorry to go on and on.. I just am not sure where I should go from here. I really want the band some days and then others it feels so frightening to give up everything I know and change myself. Has anyone gone through this? I need help. I know its what I want/need but it is so scary.

Dr's prefer you to eat your calories not drink them. The band is designed to work with solid food not liquids, however lots of bandsters are too tight to eat in the morning so they have a shake for breakfast. Maybe you could have yogurt instead and he might be happier with that.