I've been reading a lot about people getting stuck.. what exactly happens when food gets stuck and how is it cleared?

Thanks

I was wondering the same thing, so I hope someone responds! I'm in the very earliest stages of this process (my seminar is scheduled for February 6!), so I want to learn everything I can while I wait!

Your esophagus pushes food down your throat into your stomach. When you're banded and eat the wrong types of foods, don't chew enough, or take bites that are too large, the food can't make it through your band and causes a blockage.

Stuck food only has two ways to go. Either your body will manage to push it through or it will come up :thumbup:

You will usually immediately cough or snort and send the food right back out again. Another thing to try is a saline nasal rinse, which may help clear the food. However if you’re not seeing the food emerge pretty quickly, you do need to see a doctor. Food stuck can cause pretty nasty infections if not removed.

You will usually immediately cough or snort and send the food right back out again.

I haven't experienced this during any "stuck" episode. The blob of food kind of hangs out for a bit, usually.

thanks for the answers...

I find that if I don't chew enough or eat something too dry, like bread or tortilla, I'll get stuck. It usually comes right back up and I'm fine, but a couple of times it got really lodged in there and I had to call the surgeon's office. The nurse advised me to have a cup of water as hot as I could drink it with the juice of half a lemon squeezed into it. The first time I got stuck I had to do that twice before it cleared out. I was so stuck that not even the Isopure Zero Carb clear drinks would come up. The second time I got badly stuck I cleared on just one drink. I can't think that all the spitting up is good for my band.

this hasn´t happened to me, but i do think that hot water and lemon helps. is it with certain kinds of food?

Depending on how stuck...it can be mildly uncomfortable to downright painful. I have a hard time with fish no matter how well I chew or how small the bite. I have to take a bite and then wait a minute or two. It goes down a bit hard but usually resolves itself in less than a minute.

For a truly stuck episode, I try to wait it out, but if it doesn't clear in 2-3 minutes. I'll take a gulp of Water (standing over the sink) and as soon as that water goes down, it comes right back up. Most of the time it just moves things around in there and I'm unstuck. Sometimes, particularly if I have to take a second gulp, the offending stuck item will shoot out of the esophagus like a missile. These incidents are getting rarer and rarer as I follow the rules more closely and am more concientious about the size of my bites and how well I chew.

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You will usually immediately cough or snort and send the food right back out again. Another thing to try is a saline nasal rinse, which may help clear the food. However if you’re not seeing the food emerge pretty quickly, you do need to see a doctor. Food stuck can cause pretty nasty infections if not removed.

I've never coughed or snorted during a stuck episode.

Also I've never heard of an infection from stuck food? Anyone have any resources/information about this?

When I get stuck I get pain/pressure just beneath my sternum. Then I get the slime. This is a thick mucous the body creates to facilitate the stuck item's removal. Either up or down. As the passage to your stomach is blocked, the slime has no where to go but up and out the mouth.

Walking helps the pain and if it is not a bad episode, it will help the food move through.

If it is a bad episode, I will gulp some Water down which will immediately trigger the item to come back up. It is not really vomitting, as I don't retch or gag. It just comes up and out and it is over.

Before I learned this trick, an episode could last for a couple of hours. Now it is over in minutes. Once you find what works for you, a stuck episode isn't really that bad.

It IS possible to get something stuck that won't clear. Then your stomach swells making things worse. In this case, you need medical intervention. The Fluid needs to be removed from the band so that the food can clear and the swelling go down. Then the fluid can be put back in.

Denise

My doctor and nutritionist suggested that if I ever have a stuck episode to chew some of the Papaya Enzyme...has anyone tried this?

My doctor and nutritionist suggested that if I ever have a stuck episode to chew some of the Papaya Enzyme...has anyone tried this?

Hi Carmen, I too live in Stratford, scheduled for Feb12

i asked my doc about stuck food cuz that's a big worry of mine. he told me that he prefers to have another doctor (a specialist who's title i don't remember) go in and retrieve the stuck food rather than let fluid out of the band. he said it's like doing scope down the throat and they just grab the food and pull it out. he said this one lady swallowed an olive one time and it had to be retrieved.