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I'm 4 weeks out of surgery and am raring to get in the gym and lift some weights, the only thing is I feel like I've lost my strength, it's obviously because I can't eat much but will it come back eventually? How long did any of the guys wait before they got in the gym? Sent from my iPhone using the BariatricPal App

Oh wow, those are some great or horrifying depending on your pov, stories. LOL I needed a few weeks before I could write about mine, Pamela you get props for posting on the same day! I know there have to be more, come on people.

Hi! my name is trina and I live in Lufkin Tx, about 3hrs away from dallas. I was banded in june, ended up having a leak for quite a while,port was replaced in late dec and all is almost well! lol!! Well, im 29,was married for 9 yrs, divorced and mother of 3 girls ages 4,5, and my olderst will be 12 next week!! I have been a registered nurse for almost 7 yrs and am really excited about meeting new people, ya know, just to hang out with. So, maybe we can be lapband buddies or something!:scared2:

Hi, I was banded September 27th and the first three weeks were fine, but this past week I have been really tired and experiencing a sharp pain, almost constant, in the port area. Is this anything unusual or is it normal?? Please help my dr. is on vacation.

hi, I'm about 6 weeks post op (rny) and I'm having the worst time getting all my proteins in. The shakes are making me want to gag and so is tuna, eggs, refried beans etc. Would having a few of the jerky bites be ok if I took extremely small bites and chewed the heck out of it??

Hey! I'm from the Dallas area, too and have been banded just over a week. I am 18 lbs down from pre-op diet until now! Feeling great. Had very little pain and am just starting to eat the mushies. You really just feel way too full, kind of like after Thanksgiving dinner, when you think you're just gonna pop! lol I have not had ANY of the scary pain, regurgitation, throwing up, sliming, PBs, or any of that. Its been great! I was banded by Dr. Marsden/True Results through the Richardson office, but the hospital was Baylor Trophy Club. It went sooo smoothly! Good luck and keep us posted on how you're doing!!

Hi Marion, Silly typo!! :thumbup: I'm supposed to do 2 weeks with 4 shakes and one light meal of 4 oz. lean Protein, salad + 2 fruits per day! Not as bad as other pre-op diets I've been hearing. Enjoy the weekend!!! Carol D'

I guess you mean 30th ???? Great news not long to wait now...do you do the Optifast diet before your Op.?? I only did it for 9 days as my date was set on my first visit and QUICK..but most patience do it for 2 weeks.... Have great Friday mine is over and I am off to bed to read and listen to the rain...niceeeeeeeeeeeeeeee sleep in a little tomorrow.. Marion

I was banded march 2012. I am down almost 90 lbs. I had a fill in January that put me in the red zone. They removed the fill. I was ok at my February appointment and didn't need or want a fill. Last month, I felt I needed an adjustment (since ice been on a plateau since January). They gave me .2, I can't tolerate anything more than that. Anything more takes me right in the red. Anyways,,,, I've always been tight in the morning, coffee is my morning beverage of choice always. I have trouble with tiny tiny sips for about the first 2 hours in awake. About 4 hours after I'm awake, I can comfortable eat oatmeal and nothing else. Breakfast is usually about 10 am. lunch comes at noon and usually I can eat my lunchtime meal. After lunch my band is really open and I'm totally in the yellow zone and constantly hungry till about 6 pm. About that time, I'm in that wonderful green zone. I tighten up almost immediately as soon as I lay down. My first and second meal have to stay on schedule... If I don't have my lunch on time, it's Soup the rest of the day or I have to start over with oatmeal. If I go more than a few hours without eating... I close up. I've never had symptoms of being too tight. Besides the over restricted, nothing is getting through this baby bandster hell. No night cough, reflux, weight gain... Nothing. At my last appointment last week, they did a swallow, due to my appointment, I skipped my noon meal and of course I was over restricted. The barium was sitting right on top of my band. I had a tiny bit of dilation but not enough to warrant a complete unfill or even a partial unfill which shocked me. She put me on the 2/2 as if I had a fill and said to come back if I had anymore problems. Before being banded, I had really bad reflux. Once I was banded it completely disappeared. There was NO hiatal hernia repair either. There are times I feel burning around my band, but nothing like the reflux I experienced post-banding. I'm finally losing again, being 4 lbs the last month! Not much, but so glad I'm on the losers bench again. Has anyone ever experienced this kind of fluctuation between zones? What have your experiences been? Mine are: No more than .2 at a fill 2-4 weeks before I'm adjusted to the fill Extreme morning restriction If I lay down more than 5 minutes, I'm super tight. After 30 minutes... It's as if I'm at my morning tightness. I have to eat on schedule Any recommendations? It's really hard to keep a newborn eating schedule and I live in constant fear of eating! As long as I stick to my schedule, the PBing is maybe 4-6 times a week. Thanks for any input!

Week 9 out from surgery, I’m challenged with head hunger and I am obsessed with cheese, and I’m rebelling agonist the shakes and food , I want to eat so much more how do you Handel head hunger thanks

Tuesday, August 25, 2009 New Hope--Second Lapband Fill Had my 2nd fill today. Dr. definitely made sure I'd feel some restriction. I think I'll be on liquids for a few days, until the fat pad around my stomach shrinks enough to loosen the band and let a little food through. Absolutely stopped the cravings I was having. I'm back to sipping tiny little sips. No danger of me eating too much. Protein shakes and water are about all I can get down. Have to drink them very slowly. I also actually got some work done in my classroom today. I finally got all the class lists, and was relieved to see the number of my students who are returning. I'll be working on the schedule and some testing the next few days. I'll also be contacting parents of kids who were marginal whether they needed to see me or not. It helps my bottom line if I do have at least 2 contacts with them a week, since my program gets paid per contact. But these are parents who don't want their children missing a single thing in order to come to me. Other parents are in denial that their child needs help. I want to keep an assistant 3 days a week and not have to drop to one or two. There's so much organization and paperwork required and that's not the stuff I'm good at. The more student contacts I have, the more $ come in, the more I can do with and for the students. I have some special computer programs that have been shown to improve kids reading scores by an average of one to two years in just 6-12 weeks. The high number of student contacts I maintain is what has paid for the yearly licenses for those programs and my assistant works with those kids on the computer while I teach the rest of the kids. I also get parent involvement money and money for group counseling provided for the kids based on the number of students I see. Its all intertwined. The loss of students at RCS impacts my funding and limits what I can do with the kids. I know its all in God's hands. I just pray that the NCLB funding will come in and pay for me this year (its not in yet), and that next year the new vendor will hire me. I've made my classroom such an ADHD/ADD friendly place for myself. A good part of that is my assistant who is really more like my partner. I rely heavily on her advice on how to set things up, and I totally rely on her to keep up with all the forms and files. Meanwhile thanks to the lapband fill, I'm not eating. I had to fight to get the second fill only two weeks after the first fill. I wanted to start the school year with restriction. I didn't want to have to take off work to get the fill. This fill should last quite a while. It may even be the last one I need. It depends on how loose it gets after I lose the next 35 lbs. I had a student who didn't recognize me at first today. I had my hair up in it's Pebbles Flintstone do. She's used to me with short hair and a much fatter body. LOL. I'm also working on my DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) pile of clothes. I'm amazed at how fat women's clothes are designed to accommodate a huge weight range. Most of my pants definitely don't fit me, but the tops don't look too bad. Instead of being stretched around my fat, they now drape around me gracefully. I might invest in a decorative, loose belt to upgrade their style a little. Eventually I'll have to cave and get more clothes but for now I'll make do with these clothes and with my thrift store buys. Last night I felt somewhat hopeless. The return of my cravings threw me for a loop. In the past they could have been the start of regaining, with interest, all the weight I've lost. Thank God for the lapband. Life's vicissitudes can't throw me back into the food nearly as easily as they did. My optimism about the school year has returned now that I'm not worrying about the food on top of everything else. I can do all things, through him who strengthens me, Yes, I can do all things, through him who strengthens me.

My doctor says I'm in the green zone, maybe so but I feel I need a fill. I can go at least 4 hrs between meals, good I know but at mealtime I feel like I could eat more than a cup worth and sometimes do, not very often but today at lunch I went overboard and knew it. Also for some strange reason, keep in mind I'm a little over a yr post op June 13th '12 and all of the sudden I can tolerate bread, rice, toast, eggs, chicken, just about anything whereas before, I'd say 6 months ago I would get stuck on those things. I don't eat these things in excess i.e. bread, rice, toast with the exception of tonight I had a half of a sandwich for dinner and a little snack cup of apple sauce. I just don't understand why I can all of the sudden tolerate these foods and before I couldn't. I don't see him again until July 11th at which time I am to discuss a colonoscopy with him to have done within the next few weeks, I know you're saying I'm not 50 yet but my brother has colon cancer and the kind he has is hereditary and I am to be checked every 3 yrs and this is my year, ugh! I'm hoping for a small tee tiny fill because I really don't feel restriction, the only thing I feel is my soft stop which is a hiccup, is this the same as restriction? Or is restriction considered not eating more than a cup worth of food or eating less than. The scales hasn't moved in 8 weeks and I've teetered between 228 and 226 and finally got back down to 226 this morning, thank you Jesus! I've tried exercising but it is very hard on me on the treadmill due to a bad knee and 2 knee surgeries, it gives me heck. Even riding a stationary bike hurts my knee at the gym. The trainer there doesn't seem to get it about my knee. I feel silly going in and working my arms, abs and thighs for 20 mins and leaving, that is literally all I can handle physically. My arms are so big and heavy on me now that any exercising of them physically drains me, I have no strength in them. It wears me out just to dry my hair because of the loose skin. I seemed to have hit a plateau I guess. Thanks for listening.

Did your surgeon prescribe painkillers for you? If so, use them if you aren't! If not, or if they are not working for you, get in touch and get a prescription (or a better prescription). Pain is absolutely normal after surgery -- but so are painkillers that are supposed to take care of it! That said, there are some kinds of nerve pain that most painkillers are just not going to touch, and that can happen if, for example, your drain tube was jammed in to a nerve for a while. It took a couple of weeks for my pain associated with the drain site to resolve, even with painkillers. Try different kinds of protein shakes. Did you stock up on samples before surgery? If not, this is the time to try. Go to Nashua Nutrition or Vitalady and get different brands and flavors. You might also have better luck with hot/warm forms of protein, such as the protein soups, hot chocolate, or cappuccino -- all available at Nashua Nutrition. Or get some samples of the Unjury Chicken Soup protein (unjury.com). Their Chocolate Splendor protein powder makes a drink that is a lot lighter and more palatable than Premier IMO. You can also do things like add a half scoop of unflavored protein to warm chicken, beef, or miso broth. Also, have you tried the Syntrax Nectar protein powders? They mix up with ice water and are definitely lighter in texture and taste. A lot of people find they do better with them than with the thick, chalky, milk-type shakes, particularly the RTD ones. Keep trying on the protein but definitely get all your fluids in as your first priority. Yes it is normal to feel weak and tired after surgery -- give it a few weeks at least! With respect to the BM - you may want to contact your surgeon and see what is permitted to get things moving . . . lots of people use Miralax or Milk of Magnesia. While you don't have a whole lot of food going in right now, you don't want to let things get too backed up.

Yep and the closer you book to the date the more expensive the tickets get. I checked 2 weeks ago and the tickets were just over $200 but I didn't buy them. I checked today and the tickets are $300-400. I can't order them until this Friday so I am scared to see what they will be.

I am nine weeks and I eat tomatoes and lots of salsa, I haven't had any problems, but there is always a chance.

My post op diet says 7 weeks.

Hi all I am day 11 after my gastric sleeve surgery. The surgeon advised us at the hospital to only take tiny sips 3 minutes apart of all liquids for 3 weeks or we risked getting a leak. I wondered if this was true? I haven't seen any other advice supporting this and a few times I have accidentally taken a larger sip at much shorter intervals without any discomfort. Can drinking too much water or liquid cause a leak?

I work in an office that receives many gifts of food during the holiday season. I am finding it very hard not to try a "taste" of these goodies. It's mostly cookies and sweet stuff that seems to go down real easy for me. So, I try it and then feel guilty for having done so. I'm so mad at myself because I know I'm doing the wrong thing. Is anyone else having this type of problem? I've only been banded 3 months and did great at Thanksgiving with a nice loss that week. But now, I'm really struggling...

I was Banded 2 weeks ago today. I played 9 holes yesterday afternoon with no problem. I plan on playing a few more today. The Doc Cleared me Thursday for any activity that I felt like doing. The Doc Told me that the band would not hinder me in any activity that I wanted to do.

I just had my surgery on the 20th.. I too was sent home the next day.. not really having any problems.. no trouble going to the bathroom...no hair falling out.. I do have hunger but they say that will go away in a week or so. Cant wait to move to the next level.. Im out walking every day and in the house.. I think the key is walking.. it makes me feel better when Im up and walking. I have not weighed myself.. I dont think I want to til I go for my first appt. loving the sugar free pops I get to have.. those are delicious. protein shakes are good too.. so Im doing quite well I think.. Pain ball out.. still taking liquid loratab when needed.

You look great!! I had surgery 1/10 and am stuck in a stall. We started at the same weight and by you posting this just have me a huge amount of hope back so Thank you!!!!! I think you should do what is comfortable for you!! You look great and are feeling good!!! If you get to skinny you might lose your energy. Good luck!

Because the middle of the BMI is not considered "excess" weight. Once you are healthy you are healthy. I was informing the others how the dr's calculate it from - but I def am aiming for mid range sure!! Depending muscle tone etc as well top of healthy is where some might want to stay and look best at. I think I will re-assess when I get there Yes lucky not to stall but I eat carbs to fuel my workouts and I think that helps.

I guess this is the first post so many draw back on post surgery and think "I can't believe that was me!" I too want success in my life and it feels like a lot of my personal successes have been stalled or overlooked by my weight problems. Here's my history... I was born a normal weight with no issues. I was involved in tons of sports, dance, and activities as a kid and was very thin until about age 12. After some minor health issues at 12, I started having some unexplained stomach ache problems. I went from dr to dr. Went to specialist after specialist. It was diagnosed as allergies and I went on medications. I was supposed to stay away from foods that triggered the massive stomach aches. Of course as I entered my teen years, I ate what most teenagers ate. In middle school, I first experienced being called fat. I was probably 5'4 and 130 lbs. I was still in dance and sports, but not as much as I used to be. I wasn't the heaviest girl on campus but I was not as thin as most of the girls either. I was somewhere in the middle. I started bugging my mom to help me lose weight. My mother herself was (and still is) about 100 lbs overweight at the time I asked for help. As far back as I can remember, I believe at some point she gave up and decided to be fat. She lost some weight here and there but essentially chose to let her weight control a lot of things. I love her and she's a fantastic mom but now that I'm a mom too, I see so many things that she and I missed out on because she didn't feel comfortable or physically couldn't participate. I also remember on a few occasions other kids talking about how fat she was. In high school my weight fluctuated from 130 to 150 at the most. I was 5'5 and felt HUGE. I was on several of the sports teams and on dance team. I was the largest girl on dance and track at size 12. I bounced from sizes 8 to 12. Most of my friends were a 4 so I thought I was disgusting. I tried some crazy diets, diet pills, exercising like crazy... all to be beat out by the smell of something like pizza and a weak will. I believe the only reason I didn't reach 200 lbs in High School was because I had my stomach issues and I was SO busy with school, sports, dating, dances, friends. I kept very active. Still, as I look back, I wasn't involved in tons of social stuff- I always felt like a cow and didn't go out to large parties or anything. My senior year I did a weight training program and a vegetable diet. I lost 20 lbs and kept it off for about 2 months. After high school when I left to go away to college is where the real trouble began. I had a horrible college roommates and the few friends I thought I had in the dorms all of a sudden didn't like me. I think I had changed and wore my insecurities on my shoulders. I felt sad, alone, worthless. I probably wouldn't have wanted to hang around me either. I amazingly joined a sorority (a pretty good one too) and thank God for that. I'm definitely not your typical sorority girl but had it not been for the sorority I would have left college and not met my future husband. College (especially college in a sorority house) was practically a weight experiment. I went from 140 lbs to 175 lbs my freshman year in the dorm. Then my second year I topped 185 lbs but then went on these Herbalife drops with a few other friends in the sorority and lost 25 lbs. I met a guy who I ended up dating the next two years. He was sort of out of my league but I got comfortable anyway. We ate fast food a lot together (which I of course loved) and yet he DID care if I was fat or not. I would go on diets and look good one minute, then fat and awful the next. We broke up a few times and finally for good before graduation. At work on campus I met my future husband. I was 5'5 and about 150 lbs and a size 10-12. Of course, again, I thought I was humongous. He is a great guy who I thank God I found but that's not to say he loves my weight issues. He never dated anyone overweight before me. Still, I know he loves me. So we date for several years and my weight jumps up and down. I went from size 10 up to 16 and even once to a size 18 from the ages of 22 to 25. I joined Weight Watchers, did MANY at home weight loss videos and programs, crazy diets found online, etc etc. I still had not reached 200 lbs. I had come close but I was still exercising a ton, keeping busy with my career, socializing. Age 26 was the real benchmark. At the beginning of the year I was 180 lbs. By the end of the year, I was 220 lbs. I had done nothing noticeably different. I just gain 40 lbs out of nowhere. I went to the dr and had my thyroid checked but they said it was "alright." My breasts had gotten so big I had a breast reduction. I like to say before I had "40 longs" (40E) and after I was 38C. At age 27, I starved for 4 months before my wedding in 2004 but still weighed 200 lbs and wore a size 18 wedding dress. My wedding was absolutely perfect except for the disappointment and embarassment that 300 people were watching my husband and I up in front where we weighed probably the same. The photos make me cringe a little actually. In 2005, I woke up out of a dead sleep feeling like I was choking. I had a lump in my throat. What did I do? I got up and went to the computer and googled. Everything that came up said "thyroid." I went to a different dr who told me I was actually severely hypothyroid. By this time I weight 230 and had all but stopped working out. My body hurt and I slept about 14 hours a night/day. Several issues came up with my thyroid and ultimately it was removed surgically (end of 2005.) Unfortunately, the parathyroid glands were removed accidentally too and now I deal with other vitamin issues too. I have been on synthetic thyroid hormone and vitamins since. 2005 & 2006 were me working but tired, disappointed in my lack of diet will power, and living at size 22/24 and weight of about 250 lbs. At one point my husband tells me how much he loves me but how sad he is about my weight too. To his credit, he was nice about it but it didn't sting any less. I outweighed him by 40 lbs after all. So beginning of 2007, I joined a weight loss competition and decided despite massive hunger and knee-pain, I was going to win. By the end of month one, I was down 20 lbs and pregnant! I always wanted a family but felt like I was too fat to even think about getting pregnant. It was unexpected but I was thrilled. I was classified as a high risk pregnancy due mainly to my weight and becoming gestational diabetic. I was 221 when I got pregnant and ended up being 278 on the day I delivered. The gestational diabetes was an absolute nightmare. Testing my blood sugar non stop, the insulin injections, the DIET. Oh yes, not only was I fat and craving of all things, sugar, I had to be on a freakin diet when pregnant. I had a beautiful baby girl and feel so blessed! Immediately after, I was depressed that I was a new mom at size 24. As a little girl envisioning my future wedding and birth of child, I never envisioned being over 200 lbs and more than a size 18. I felt bad like these events were actually mediocre and that I should've been at a normal weight for them to be right. (CONTINUED IN NEXT POST...)

I mentioned before that Lexie, my only friend I've told about me getting bariatric surgery, told me that she heard the "sleeve" was better than the "band." My gastroenterologist said the same thing and wanted me to look into it and talk to the surgeon about the sleeve option. I mentioned it to the counselor today and she briefly said that she sees very few Gastric Bypass patients any more as most patients are choosing the band or the sleeve. She said it's been 50/50 on band vs. sleeve patients. She admitted that there's been more WL issues with the band patients (slower loss, not any loss, and band failure) in HER practice but she was quick to state that it doesn't mean that it isn't good and won't work. She simply said that in her practice there that the sleeved patients lose weight faster and have fewer WL issues apparently. She agreed with my gastro's advice in speaking with the surgeon and deciding what would be best for me. She told me to research both, have pros and cons, and analyze the options. Then have a list of questions for the surgeon when meeting with him. I planned to do that any way and I didn't get the feeling she was pushing sleeve. I think she was being very honest with me about her experience with both sets of patients which I appreciate. Here's my initial PRO/CON list for Sleeve and Band... (after I research more, I'll likely update and/or change and fix my list!) SLEEVE Pros: 1. One surgery, no "fills" (so I won't need to tote my toddler with me in for regular fills.) 2. Decrease in "ghrelin" hormone that induces hunger due to stomach portion removal 3. Faster weight loss (more immediate results) 4. No "bandster hell" 5. Much higher success rate associated with this procedure. 6. My friend and one of my dr's recommended this procedure and thought it might be the better option for me. Cons: 1. No way to fix or reverse at all 2. Staples may pop, cause leaking, or fail 3. No long term data including effects on pregnancies 4. There is still a possibility/likelihood that the sleeve will stretch out and may need revision later. 5. Hernias apparently more common with this procedure lately. 6. I haven't researched the dietary guidelines post op so I have no idea what the longterm eating management includes. (Maybe I'll research that next and do a post on the differences of that.) BAND Pros: 1. Reversible/removable 2. No removal of anything 3. Necessary dr appt followup (with fills) will cause constant analyzing of program/plan and communication with surgeon 4. As I need it, I can go in and get it adjusted tighter to meet my needs. 5. Two doctors recommended this procedure over sleeve or GB for me due to my medical history. Cons: 1. Possibility of infection of band OR port 2. Regular followup and fill appointments 3. Bandster Hell and the months it will take to get to Sweet Spot. 4. Possibility of necessary revision to sleeve or whatever..(have read several posts online of 3 and 4 year post banders going in for gastric bypass, sleeve, etc.) 5. May not solve my hunger issue. 6. Have heard from more than one person that as they got closer to goal- their port site or actual port became more visible- yikes! 7. Over fills.. this sort of worries me. I don't want to get overzealous and get over filled and then have to race back in to get unfilled and then wait weeks to get filled again. 8. The waiting between fills. I understand why it is set up that way but it doesn't mean I have to like it. This is just my preliminary thoughts on both. I'm not an expert, I haven't decided yet, and I don't even know if the surgeon will think I'm a candidate for the sleeve. I'm starting to consider it as an option though. I've got some research to do.

It took me 10 years and many, many, many failed attempts of dieting on my own before I was finally willing to have the surgery, but I am glad I did. Could I do this on my own? Maybe. Would it last? No. My deciding factors were simple for me (when I finally go there!) - two people lose the same amount of weight - one with surgery, one on their own - both are seemingly healthy. However, the person who DIDN'T have the surgery is still at a much higher risk of weight related diseases than the one who had the surgery. That was pointed out to me by a physician and the decision was made for me. I am just a week post-op, but no regret whatsoever!!!