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I had extensive complications with my revision from the band to the sleeve. I would do it all again in a heartbeat, and without a second thought. I've posted all my complications in threads and in my blog. I think most of them are posted in my blog on here. If you click at the top of the page where it says BLOG, you can find mine, and read back through my complications.

Congrats on getting banded! Glad to know you're doing better now. If you don't mind me asking, why did they decide to keep you overnight? I am concerned that I might have some complications due to past experiences. I have had surgery twice in the past, and both times, I experienced gratuitous vomiting almost immediately after coming out of the anesthesia. I imagine that's not the best outcome for someone who is essentially having stomach surgery. I'm told that it was a reaction to demerol, but I don't know what that really is, or if it's necessary during surgery.

At the clinic where I had my banding done, the policy was to treat all patients without the kind of co-morbities which might complicate the operation as day patients and the surgery would be performed in the clinic. Patients who might run into difficulties due to co-morbities would be operated on at a hospital and they would be kept there overnight.

Hi Ky Gurl! I just wanted to let you know that I took the plunge and had my surgery!!! I had my surgery 12/17 but had a few complications and had to go back in for a 2nd surgery 12/20 but am doing great now. I have lost 23 lbs so far. How are you doing?

Just because she is self-pay please don't make her lack of research a generality for all self-payers. There are many of us who paid for this procedure ourselves, including ALL of our post surgery adjustments, who researched the heck out of what we were getting ourselves in to, because if something happens to our band, we're on the hook for the complications, not the insurane company.

Though i have gained a lot of info on pregnancy with band but please help me with these queries i got banded on 28th june and have lost 34 pounds and i am now at 188 pounds ... is this a good weight to try having a baby ... i am going in for a pregnancy because of the other complications which i have how many of you went and had a baby at my current weight and how many of u delivered safely without complications what happens to band during pregnancy and has anyone resumed their weight loss journey after the band .. what if one has to have a cs cant a lot of morning sickness give rise to a slipped band anyone had any complication with band during pregnancy which led to some surgery can one have whey Proteins during pregnancy PLEASE HELP

Hi, You make a good point about the sleeve. Sorry you're in so much pain from your lap band erosion and complications. I did not do well myself with the band and since it's removal am switching now to RNY. I feel I need the malabsorption also and since I could not lose with the band have more confidence with RNY, also my daughter had it done a year ago and has been very successful so far with RNY. Good luck to you with your complications and eventual revision, Nancy.

That's really smart, and I'm happy that they offer complication insurance. I learned something new today, lol.

I had the revision from sleeve to RNY last August due to severe gerd. Have lost all my excess weight and I can finally sleep restfully all night long. No severe gerd. I can't say whether you will screw up again but I assure you, with the RNY, it'll be much harder to slide back into bad habits. I'm in my 10th month and it's been a lovely journey for me so far. I am still elated that I can get full on 2 eggs. Unfortunately, complications can happen with all surgeries. I had a complication with the lap band and the VSG. No fault of my own. RNY is no longer a permanent surgery, but it is a risky procedure to reverse it. The sleeve is considered permanent. As for vitamins, I had a complete bloodwork 2 weeks ago and I was not deficient in any vitamins, minerals or protein. Cholesterol, triglycerides, sugar, all perfect. I only take a vitamin patch by patchaid. It may not work for others but it sure works for me. I hope this helps.

Thanks so much slikchick...this is what I was hoping to hear!!!! I have never been truly FULL with the band except for duiring about a week after a fill, and due to all the complications I have had with my port I have had many fills. The feeling that I get for that week after is what I expected the band to feel like all the time. During that time when I do feel that I can easily reject all foods that I shouldn't have as I do feel satisfied and genuinely NOT HUNGRY and that is what I thought the band would be like having MOST OF THE TIME.....instead I am constantly fighting hunger especially later in the day when my band loosens up and I can eat as much as I want and whatever I want and am not satisfied without eating large amounts. I lost a lot of weight with the band in the first 2 years, about 45kg (100 pounds) and then was so hungry I couldn't help myself like before I had the band. My hunger was increasing all the time and it was so hard. My portion sizes are my biggest downfall, not the crappy foods but the amount of food and the constant hunger. I want it to get back to feeling full and most importantly satisfied after a meal and to stop feeling hungry all the time. I think that the sleeve will be the right thing for me and hopefully will do what I thought the band was supposed to do all the time. If that happens and I can get that satisfied feeling, it will make eating smaller amounts a whole lot easier for me!!!!

It sure sounds like your body is trying to get rid of your port, and if it also goes to work on your band, your complications will get even worse. Like Carolinagirl, my life is more important than my weight loss surgery, and I'd go to the emergency room and call my bariatric surgeon immediately. Please don't think that your only choices are to live skinny with open abdominal wounds or live fat without your port and/or band. Once the port complications are dealt with, you may be able to revise to a different bariatric surgery procedure that doesn't involve implants. Good luck! Jean

complications are pretty rare - I'm sure you'll sail through just fine! Also, if you follow your surgeon's plan, you WILL lose weight!

I hate cooking - with a passion! Complicate things with a busy lifestyle, and it was always about fast-food or prepared foods. (Clearly, it's one of the reasons I ended up this way.) I have to learn to fix things on my on at home. Any good WSL cookbooks you could recommend that focuses on very simple and fast recipes? Thanks! ICanDoThisVA

When I went to True Results everyone was getting Lap Bands. Now it seems like everyone is getting sleeves. I wasn't even offered a sleeve. It makes me nervous that I will eventually have to have my band removed. I haven't had any problems, but it still worries me. Does the sleeve have complications too? Sent from my iPhone using the BariatricPal App

I am three weeks out from having my gastric sleeve and fundoplication surgery. I have been having such a hard time with retching. After the fundoplication it seems impossible to actually throw up. I spend hours each bad day I have retching or breathing in and out trying not to retch. It's like dry heaves from a bad horror film. has anyone else had this problem? I'm beginning to think most of it is anxiety. I wake up and think..."Do I feel sick....am I going to have a good day or a bad day?" Any ideas? I don't know how much of this is the fundoplcation and or my anxiety or the gastric sleeve. I keep waiting for the day when I will say "Gosh I would do it all over again." Help?????

How was it? How are you doing? Did you get good care,etc. Any complications? How much have you lost? How is follow up with fills? Would you do it again? Do you know of others that used him? If so, how is their progress? Sorry for all of the questions. You are the first to respond to being banded in Nashville at Vanderbilt. I go to the seminar on Tuesday. Psychologist appt in August. All of my other stuff is done. I guess, then waiting to make sure insurance is going to ok it.

Yes, she's likely thinking of a vertical banded gastroplasty (VBG), an earlier incarnation of gastric banding. It may have been laparascopic (as in lap-) but what it wasn't was adjustable. The device that the FDA approved in 2001 was the first adjustable gastric band available in the U.S. It's not done much anymore since it had a high rate of complications and failures.

Thank y'all so much for all the input. I've been doing the "Shrink Yourself" program (www.shrinkyourself.com) and one of the things it teaches you is to find some other activity when you want to eat. "Playing with a pet" is one of the activities and this would be a great one for me, since I'm such a dog lover. As lauradevans said, I will probably wait until a week after surgery to get the sweet baby, so that I can be sure I'm feeling a little better and that I don't have any complications. I'm doing some major life changes right now, and banding and a new puppy are just two of them. I'm so excited!

Many of my close friends and family know that I have had a battle all my life. A struggle that has been at the forefront of each and every day that I can remember of my life. Something that I know many of you can relate to and also struggle with. Weight. For all of my teenage years and into my adult life I fought every pound my body so readily gained. I was active, I rode horses every day, I played sports, I camped, and I hiked. I grew up on a farm, so throwing hay and carting buckets of water and grain was any every day normal for me, however, as active as I was I gained weight at what seemed to be astronomical speeds. I was always the heaviest of my friends, even though I ate far less and much healthier foods than they, growing up on the farm, we ate home grown everything. I didn't chow down on the cookies, cakes and fast foods my thin friends ate and yet, there I was 50-75 pounds bigger than all of them. I can remember in 8th grade I weighted 185 pounds at 5 foot 3 inches tall at that time. Every minute of my life all I thought about was how I worked so hard and stayed so active and yet I was heavy. When I was 19 I became pregnant and my weight went from 190's to 240 plus. I was able to lose a bit of the "baby weight" and got back down to around 210 pounds. Three years later, and after every diet known to mankind, from weight watchers to metabolife, I was pregnant again, this time ballooning up to 270 pounds. I was on depression medications afterwards. I was sick, very sick from the depression and literal pain of morbid obesity. Many years passed, and many more diets came and went, Atkins, The Zone, Jenny Craig, South Beach, slim fast, fasting, dexatrim, low carb, low fat, high protein, phen phen and hgc diet, I tried them all. In that time I was never able to maintain anything under 200 pounds. At 32 years old, I went through a terrible divorce, and I don't know about any one else but divorce was like a living death for me, I gave up on myself at that point. In 2010 and weighing 256 pounds I finally found some hope to all the endlessness. I was able blessed to have family and friends and insurance see me through a life saving lapband surgery in April of 2010. I finally had the extra push and the help I needed. Though I did not lose weight fast, 5 pounds a month or so, I was healthier. My blood pressure returned to normal, my pre-diabetic blood sugars returned to normal, I did not have to have a cpac machine, my joints ached less and I felt pretty great all around. (My photo is after my surgery, after I had lost some weight and felt almost normal) So than why, you might wonder am I here today? Two months ago my lapband "slipped." It is not in the right place in order to help create the pocket of my stomach as it once had. Basically there is no restriction. Not only has this caused me to gain almost 40 pounds in 2 months, I am no longer able to feel a feeling of fullness. I still eat healthy, as anyone who has had weight loss surgery knows, you have to go through nutrition courses and relearn how and what to eat, my issue is is that even after I have eaten my salad, I feel as though I have eaten nothing at all, there is no satisfaction, no full feeling and so one salad becomes two, becomes three, and so on until I am in literal pain and a whole head of lettuce is gone in one sitting, not to mention the tomatoes, cheese, diced chicken, onion, zucchini and what ever other topping I can find to eat with it. I have gained weight back so fast that my bones, muscles, joints and ligament scream in pain in a constant. In just the past two months I have went from 177 pounds to 227 pounds. My blood pressure is on the rise, and as we all know all the other health risks associated with morbid obesity are close at hand. Another complication my lapband has caused because of the slippage is sever heartburn, acid, re-flux and gurd. Those in themselves have life threatening side effects, esophageal cancer at the top of the list. Though I have insurance, it does not cover the full cost of the surgery I need to have the band removed and replaced with a gastric surgery. I know this is a lot to ask of anyone, and to some it may even seem selfish, but I am a 40 plus year old, married, mom and I am not asking this in order to win any beauty contests. This is not cosmetic, in fact I never had the excess skin removed from my last surgery (which is now filled in again) because this is not about appearances. It's about a person, many of you may know in one form or another that just wants to spend the second half of her life healthy. A life not waking up to the fears of diabetes, heart attacks, uterine cysts and cancers that are so often coupled with being morbidly obese. And to not have to carry that tag ("morbidly obese") of death every day of what could be a shortened life. From the bottom of my heart, I thank you, thank you for reading this far, thank you for your understanding, and compassion, you are a rare gift, and I mean this sincerely as there are some even in my own home that persecute me for even writing this. You are my hope and my salvation. Sincerely, Liv. https://www.gofundme.com/livs-surgery

Well, it has been a year. I have lost 50 pounds slowly and steadily and have gone from a tight size 18 to a 12!!! And a 1X to a L!!!:clap2: I have had minimal complications. Lots of pbs, but I am used to them and really know how to avoid them. I just have times where I am not paying attention enough to how I am eating. I also tighten up with stress and airplane travel. Every time we fly somewhere I know the next day is liquids, soft foods if I'm lucky! I have been suffering from some pretty severe heartburn and reflux but my Dr. has me on some good meds for it. And again, I know how to avoid it and I really need to start paying attention (I know- I already said that. Repetition is learning.). My arthritis in both hips and one of my knees is GONE. I have energy I never knew before, which is good because I have a darling 22 month old son who is a complete spaz (I say that lovingly). GUYS FLIRT WITH ME THAT ARE NOT MY HUSBAND. Has this been easy?? No. Would I do it again? In a heartbeat and for twice what I paid. This is the longest time I have been on a continuous, consistent weight loss path and even though it may take another year, I will reach my goal. I never would have gotten through this year without the support of the people on this board. NEWBIES LISTEN UP- this is a great crew and you can get good advice 24/7. Know that no one has a flawless ride with the band but the bumps are worth it!! Thanks guys!! Love you all:kiss2:

My NUT recommended between 800-1000 calories a day for optimal weight loss. I'm not really exercising yet due to complications but I have a feeling I'll be heading towards that 1000 calorie mark when I do start.

I thought I wanted the lap-band too, until I started reading all of the posts on my doctor's yahoo group. Ultimately, I decided the sleeve was best for me. It required much less maintenance and looking at my oil change and haircut track record, that was a bonus for me. Also, I just saw so many people having complications with their bands! My friend went with the band 1 week before I got sleeved. I have lost 120 lbs and she has lost 35 lbs because her fills just haven't restricted her enough. Overall, I ADORE my sleeve and have not had one day of regret in the past year. I'm sure talking with the support group members will help. But, remember that people are very sensitive about their choice and think that they are RIGHT no matter what! They tend to get very defensive :thumbup1:. Remember, you have to choose what is right for you. Read through the posts, look at some other sites, talk with your support group and doctor and hopefully you'll find what fits you best. Good luck on your journey!

I just had mine done at Ft. Riley. The bariatric program just started here and I was in the first group to have it done here. The surgery went as I expected. I had a lot of post op complications right after and was in the hospital for 6 days. The staff on the surgery floor were fantastic!

i'd stagger your surgeries. Complications are real. They happen. I understand wanting to go through it together...and you still will....but I'd space your surgeries apart. One partner is the patient, one is the caretaker....then you switch roles. You're still doing it together. I would suggest you get help for your household, even doing it staggered. Twins are a lot of work. Cutting down from two caretakers to just one....is a huge difference.

Hi Laureen- Lots of light ahead for you! I'm four years out and have been diagnosed with a slip. It does seem that the longer we are out from our initial banding, the more likely these types of complications are. The bariatric community is still assembling data on this. My slip was diagnosed under with a simple flouro test. The slip and pocket is apparent under xray. It explains why I have been waking up with acid reflux and able to eat so much more. A significant part of my stomach has migrated above the band. I'm scheduled for surgery on July 3rd to either remove or fix the band. Most likely it will be removed, and I'm getting to be OK with the idea of having it out. However if they can fix it, I'm good with that, too. However, I just want to be out of the woods as far as complications go, so that's what's most important to me. I'm sorry to hear about your challenges, but I'm grateful that you are sharing your experience here. It is helpful to hear from other long-time bandsters about our expeirences with the band as the years roll by.