Happy New Year bandsters! A new thread start for a new year?

For those struggling, this is a great time to recommit!

Melody

Hello everyone!

I hope all is well with all of you. I am starting what should be a very busy week at work but that is a good thing because the days just fly by! My band has been very tight for the past two days...not sure why because I almost never have tight days (I've only had 1 fill). I've just had to be very conscious of eating slowly and chewing well...luckily I haven't PB'd. I lost a little over 2 lbs last week so I am now over 60 lbs lost since I started my pre-op diet on November 18th. When I started this journey, my DH bought me a Pandora bracelet and started me off with a charm to represent my surgery day...I add a new charm for every 10 lbs I lose so I got to go pick out a charm this weekend .

Hope you all have a wonderful day!

Happy Hump Day !! I hope everyone is doing well ☺☺ I've had a lot going on, BUT .. I am woman ! I CAN get thru it all!!

I have a question - when you eat, do you really get a satisfied feeling of being full? When I eat, my chest hurts, my ribs, etc... In Nov there wasnt any sign of a slippage. I DO have a small Hiatal Hernia, but they didnt think it would cause any problems. Anyway, I'm just wondering what you feel when you eat.

Have a super day, All!! Gotta go run a few errands ...

Talk to you later on !!

Hi Everyone...at about 1:20pm yesterday, my MIL calmly slipped away. Hospice made her quiet and comfortable. Made her breathing easier. They were a wonderful group of people. I cannot thank them enough.

Now the crazy-ass games begin. MIL wisely appointed an independent fiduciary to settle the trust. He is now in charge.

SIL's son, wife and two teenage children arrive today. They were coming to visit her for 10 days. SIL thought it would be GRAND if they stayed in MILs house with her. Oh yeah, great idea, 4 people in a home where we have removed the door to the bathroom so that MIL could get in and out easier.

So anyway. MIL passes...SIL cannot understand that the kids CANNOT stay in the house. She calls my DH and is trying to put the bathroom door back on. He says why? Well for the kids...

So I ask what if one of them puts a tampon down the toilet and the pipes blow? Who pays for that??? (The estate, by the way). So we call the fiduciary, he says no way, give me her #. So then I go off to find documents to take to him. Meanwhile SIL then calls DH hysterical. What do you mean there is a trust? What is a fiduciary? Why is he in charge? OMG! Why can't my kids stay in her house? I don't understand! Why does the house have to be locked up? Now mind you, this woman took Mom's purse and a picture on the way out the door. Uh, to stop people from coming in and taking stuff will nilly!!! DON'T YOU GET IT? The house isn't YOURS!

Oy vey!

Denise,

Wow...when you said Hospice, I just assumed (from the way her daughters were treating her) that she still had months to live! Don't know who talked her into a trust with a non-family member in charge, but somebody should probably go give them a pat on the head and a 'well done'! Sounds like it will be a lot less stressful than if a family member had to deal with all of it.

My condolences on the loss of your mil.

.

Denise-I'm so sorry to hear about your MIL's passing. You will be in my thoughts as you deal with all of the craziness to come. It's amazing how people's true colors come out in times like this...

Denise, I'm sorry all this is going on, but glad you and DH have each other. The storm will calm with time.

Happy Hump Day !! I hope everyone is doing well ☺☺ I've had a lot going on, BUT .. I am woman ! I CAN get thru it all!!

I have a question - when you eat, do you really get a satisfied feeling of being full? When I eat, my chest hurts, my ribs, etc... In Nov there wasnt any sign of a slippage. I DO have a small Hiatal Hernia, but they didnt think it would cause any problems. Anyway, I'm just wondering what you feel when you eat.

Have a super day, All!! Gotta go run a few errands ...

Talk to you later on !!

Bobby!

Right now, yes I feel full/satisfied when I eat. I'm very tuned in with my full signal. The problem I have right now is I'm very hungry about 30 mins. after I eat. I need a fill. I couldn't get an appointmant for one til the 6th.

Do you think maybe you are just eating a bite or 2 too much? Maybe you are eating stuff you can no longer tolerate.... like steak? I would think this far out you should not have pain like that. Maybe you are missing your 'soft sign/full signal'.

Thanks everyone!

Elfie, that would be me! DH's brother tried some shady stuff a while back. So I had the idea for an independent fiduciary.

The sisters are now ticked at us because the house is locked up. "But it's our home!" Uh, no, it's your mother's house. The trustee has to protect the assets. The sister that lives in back wants to know what she is supposed to do if it catches on fire and she doesn't have a key? She cannot go over and put it out!!! Uh, you call 9-1-1 like you would have before and let the fire department put it out. I got yelled at for 15 minutes over that one.

At the funeral home with the other sister. The funeral director asked if we wanted her to be wearing her glasses for the viewing. Sister said no, she didn't want that, besides we didn't bring them. I said you can donate them to the Lion's club. They will make good use of them. She made a snide comment about we could if the house wasn't locked up! Well, it isn't locked up forever, and the Lion's club isn't going anywhere. Damn.

They wanted to know why we couldn't have waited a few days to call the trustee. Maybe because she was passed? He needed to start things in motion?

Until I asked, no one had called the funeral home to make arrangements. The family all assumed they did everything and called us when the service would be. Grand.

Denise,

We may be related. Your family's shenanigans sound so like the dysfunctional behavior of my family.

When my grandmother died 2 years ago, it was a circus.

.

Denise,

We may be related. Your family's shenanigans sound so like the dysfunctional behavior of my family.

When my grandmother died 2 years ago, it was a circus.

.

I'll take you for a sister any day, Melody!!

DH and I have been dreading this time for these reasons. She got the fiduciary because my BIL was the trustee. Several years back he was having some financial problems. He asked Mom to quitclaim the house over to him, "to make it easier for him to take care of the estate." Fortunately she asked DH if it was a good idea. Nooooo! Not only that, but you have to take control of the estate away from him. He was trying to figure out ways to screw one sister and leave her with nothing. Could not have happened, due to what Mom had written, but what a mess. His wife made several comments about all the work she would have to do to the house to get it ready for sale and would "have" to charge that time to the estate.

We were all very relieved when she chose the fiduciary.

It's the middle of April and it's freaking snowing! At 7 a.m. I could still see the grass through the snow. Now, 2-1/2 hours later, it looks like a winter wonderland! My lilac bushes have already started to bud so we're going to have yet another year with minimal lilac blossoms, if that. Not a happy camper.

So, getting rid of my band did not get rid of all my problems...and may even have created another one. The pain in my arm has been slowly coming back and I have some interesting pains across the area where the laparoscopic incisions were (and they were rooting around to install and uninstall the band) that makes me (and the surgeon) think it's more adhesions developing. He said he removed a bunch when he took the band out but if that created more, it seems idiotic to go in and remove these since wouldn't that just create more.? Then again, he thinks it's the adhesions that may be causing a problem with the diaphragm.

On the plus side, it appears that the band permanently reshaped the entry into my stomach so that it's still like having the band in without a fill. Which means taking small bites and eating slowly and if I forget...yep, sliming. The sliming isn't a plus, but the 'reminder' to continue to take small bites and eat slowly is nice.

Can you tell...I'm in a fine 'mood' this morning. I think I'll burn up some of this irritation and wash down the living room walls in preparation for painting them...but won't pick the paint out until I'm in a better mood or I'll end up with either blood red walls or pitch black.

.

Melody, you just cannot win for losing, can you? Wowser!

Maybe there is some way they can cut the nerve to deaden the pain? They did that with nerves between my toes that were causing pain. NOT the same thing, I realize, but the theory might hold?

Today is MIL's service. The viewing was last evening. We did not go, but it truly bothered DH thinking of her lying there. He was very out of sorts for the 4 hours the casket was open. I think that is a hideous custom myself.

Ok, never get dressed for a funeral in a house with a yellow labradork! Butters doesn't know what is going on and keeps rubbing up against us.

So he got himself tossed into the back yard. But my black pants are lint magnets. When I wear them to work, I am up, dressed, and out without stopping.

I will be looking like I am wearing a yellow fur coat before we get there! Ugh.

Denise,

I know what you mean about funeral services. I've never understood the grieving family standing in a receiving line for hours while people come through and stare at the dead body. My husband's family has a much more pragmatic outlook. When my husband's first wife died, my mother-in-law said he showed up at her house with a box of ashes and said, "Here's your daughter-in-law." and then sprinkled her ashes on the vegetable garden. When my father-in-law died in November 2009, the funeral home came out and picked up his body and brought the box of ashes back the next morning. A year plus later and they're sitting on my mil's dresser...with her husband's knit stocking camp on top of the box (keeping his head warm). She said it's going to stay there until she dies and then she wants to have her ashes mixed with his and then sprinkled in a meadow somewhere. Then 3 days after he died, they had a wake at the house but it was lovely with people sharing memories, quiet laughter and smiles. I want an old fashioned Irish wake with people retelling stories of all the stupid things I've done in my life. Let 'em remember me as I was, not a painted up corpse in a box.

Oh...and maybe you'll start a new fashion statement with your yellow fur dress.

.

The snow is gone...yeah!!! I'm hoping it will get to at least 45 today so I can go out and clean my herb garden and hoe at least one of the other raised beds. I've made a vow that I'll either work in the garden for an hour or do Richard Simmons. Please God let it be nice enough to work outside!

I washed two of the walls in the living room yesterday in prep for painting, but then my 18 year old walked through and asked, "So, mom, what are you going to do with Beelz (demon kitty) until the paint dries." Uh...crud.

I have visions of painting the trim around the picture window, only to have the 12 lb bruiser hop up on the sill and then wander with painted feet across the carpet. Not that the carpet doesn't need replacing, but I hadn't planned on doing it just yet!

.