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

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

Melody

2:30 a.m. and the shoulder pain is back with a vengeance. It actually hasn't been too bad lately. I've still had it at night every few nights or so, but not so bad I couldn't find a way to make it stop. Tonight, however, I'm in hell. I tried a hot shower to help with the tightness in my neck and shoulder (from tensing at the pain) and then some camphor type stuff you put on aches but so far nothing has helped. I figure at some point I'll be so exhausted, I'll even be able to sleep sitting up in a chair.

<yawn>....

Melody

:seeya: checking in.....

It's been a rough week with my job situation and I've been exausted when I get home and slow down for the day.

I lost another pound. It is very strange that in the past when I had stressful times in life I always gained weight and now I lose weight. My mom was thin her entire life and she used to get even thinner when she dealt with stressful things.

Maybe my metabolism is changing to be that of a thin person!

My mind is still having trouble catching up. I watched the new 'Biggest Loser' the other night. When the people got on the big scale and showed their fat bodies to the world I felt like I was as big as they are. It was a strange and sad feeling. I'm 5'7" (most people think I'm even taller) and I now weigh 155 lbs, but when the 250-300 lb people stood on the scale I felt like I was about that size. :piggy: :out:

Melody, I'm sorry the shoulder pain is still messing with you. It sounds like it isn't as bad as it was a few months ago?

Mine still messes with me off and on, but not too bad. I use a pain patch on it about once a month and that I can live with.

<STRONG><FONT color=#006400 size=3>I'm here...I have been really busy! I too have managed to at least keep wrestling with the same couple pounds during the holidays...so all in all not too shabby. I am never able to get to my sweet spot (at least what I thought was my sweet spot) though so alot of my future weightloss will all depend on me. Welcome to all the newbies! Melody-sorry to hear about your shoulder again. Are you going to go for the surgery? HB-congrats on the quilt! Leigha-LOVE SUGARBABY! It's nice to be back...although I start school in less than 2 weeks

HB: I'm so sorry your job is stressing you out, but on the bright side, at least now you aren't easing that stress with food (since you're losing weight rather than gaining) which would only create more stress. Isn't it funny how our body image is a warped version of the reality. When I weighed more, I never thought I looked that fat. Now that I weigh less, I think I look just as fat as I used to. I'm not sure how we fix that.

Stacey: If you can eat a reasonable meal and not be hungry for 4 hours, then you're at your sweet spot (according to my surgeon). I used to never feel at my sweet spot because I kept looking for physical restriction. Now that I understand, I'm almost 3 full cc's below where I was before (when I was still looking for that sweet spot) and have found my sweet spot...and if you're like me, still able to eat the quantities you did pre-surgery...yep, it's going to be all up to us. The bright side is that the self-control is at least doable now that the hunger isn't driving us, yes?

To both...yes, the pain has been not as frequent, or as painful. There are a few exceptions like last night, but rather than go into surgery again, I think I'm going to try and wait it out and see if weight loss doesn't resolve it.

Melody

No doubt there will be a nap in my future today. I think I 'might' have had about 3 hours sleep (and not restful at that) last night. Fortunately, I don't have to do anything today that requires much thinking or energy other than making egg rolls for my son to take to his 'game night' at a friend's house this evening. All I have to do is make the filling and put the egg rolls together. They're going to cook them tonight. Good thing because I love egg rolls and don't know if I could resist 'eating just one'.

My tossing and turning woke up my husband and he mentioned that he found a blog that mentioned a friend of ours who died last March unexpectedly. Right after she died her adult children announced on her facebook page that she had died but were quite secretive as to the reason and, of course, nobody wanted to pry. However, she was only 62 years old and in fairly good health so we couldn't help wondering. Well, the blog my husband found was written by another friend of hers and it did tell what the reason was. Apparently she died of complications from lap band surgery. I was shocked. We hadn't seen her in years because she lives on the west coast, but she was not overweight the last time we saw her. I know she was a heavy smoker and tended to be an L.A. 'party girl' for much of her life (married to an actor) so perhaps that upped her surgical risks.

At any rate, events such as this and my son's mil dying at the age of 49 from a blood clot after surgery to her knee, make me even more determined to try and wait out this shoulder pain rather than resort to surgery at this point. Call me chicken.

Off to do some Tae Bo and hopefully wake up a bit more before tackling the egg roll fillling. Then perhaps I can get a nap in while it's cooling.

Have a great day everyone!

Melody

Happy 2011!

I hope you all don't mind one more newbie, but I love this thread and hope I can join I mostly lurk on the rest of LBT... I post on ocassion, but feel the responses have taken on quite a negative, judgemental turn in the past few months. Sad.

Anyway, some background on me if you'd like -

I'm 33, single mother of a 4 year old. School counselor extraordinaire (I'm at work right now -shh! don't tell!) and LBT gets blocked every so often by our IT department because it's a "message board", so I may disappear sometimes. I've just returned to school part time working on my doctorate in administration.

I'm divorced and have a knack for horrible relationships (my dad says I'm a "bum magnet" ) but have recently found the ONE. He is AMAZING, and even my dad agrees!

I was banded on Nov 18, 2009. I lost almost nothing until July 2010, with my 6th fill. I was hungry constantly and still eating as I had before the band. I have lost a total of 66 pounds now.

I have been overweight my entire life, except maybe at birth! In fact, my entire family is morbidly obese. My mom has had gastric bypass and one of my sisters is in the approval process for GB as well.

At 19, I was diagnosed with Crohn's disease and my gastro says I am quite the contradiction, as Crohn's patients are typically very skinny from the disease. Go figure.

And after years of suffering with headaches, fatigue, and general "blah" that I thought was normal, I have just been diagnosed with a gluten allergy, so I am now learning how to eat without wheat, barley, rye, and oats, which are in just about everything!

I enjoy working out for the most part, I just don't like the sweating part! haha. I go to the Y 3-4 times a week and am training for my first 5K in May.

So that's me in a nutshell! I look forward to learning and laughing with all of you along this journey!

Happy 2011!

I hope you all don't mind one more newbie, but I love this thread and hope I can join

The more the merrier! I wish we had more active people in this thread!

Melody

Hey everyone!

Melody-- I hope your pain goes away soon. I just cant imagine having to live with that.

Councilor-- Nice to meet you, I look forward to hearing more about you.

Hey Stacie! Good to hear from you, Yeah for school!

HB-- How do I see pics of this quilt? The new fricken format has me on this one.

Shammah-- I hope the port revision does the trick!

Elcee-- WOW, I was reading about the floods, like it wasn't bad enough they had the drought.

Well I am back to work 6 days a week again. Time for people to get their taxes and buy cars.

I lost most of my holiday weight I am down from 137.8 to 134.2 so about a pound to go. I have to say I am amazed at how easy it is to lose weight now, it feels like its not real. I love my band. (and Sugarbaby)

Leigha, The quilt pics should show up in my blog under "hobbies help" and in a friends only album in my gallery.

Councilor, and the others who have recently joined the thread, just jump in any time you want. That's how the vets of the thread have always done it. If you get busy and can't keep up with following the thread, it's ok. Sometimes it's very active and other times, not so much. The more you post the better we all get to know each other.

I am in sunny Miami beach thus week with my husband and no kids We are having a wonderful time and fly back home on sunday. Needless to say its been a little challenging on the diet. Im not able to eat near the portion sizes that I used to, of course, but im feeling a little freaked out by all the meals out and the Drinks we've been having :-( WEwere hereone night with a large group from hubs work and the wine was flowing like a river all night. Its the First time I've really over indulged since surgery. I was so freaked out that I was going to throw up the next day! Luckily I made it through with flying colors and stuck to water the next day :-). After the holidays and now this trip...im ready to get back to the task of losing weight! On a good note..I am still running every other day on my vacation...ran for one hour on the beach boardwalk...beautiful!

Morning peeps!

I think I finally found an activity for me that I'll keep up with on a daily basis - Tae Bo! Normally, I'm not even 5 minutes into whatever activity I'm doing and I'm checking the clock, appalled that only 5 minutes have passed because I'm so booooored. So far, the only time I'm checking the clock is when I finish (reach the point where I know I'll overdo it and pay for it in crashing blood sugar levels) and look to see how long I lasted...and it's 30 minutes!

It's amazing fun, but I will admit that I can't keep up with him when he kicks into that high gear. I'm just still too out of shape to move that fast and not just flail my arms and legs. So while he's double timing it, I'm just making a point to do the moves right...and I'm still getting cardio.

Yesterday I did 30 minutes in the morning and then 30 minutes in the evening (just cuz I felt like it). Love it!

Apparently my body has decided to hit another stall after 2 months of losing. I would've thought my holiday 'food vacation' would have kept that from happening, but oh well. I've been consistently on plan since New Year's so hopefully, I'll start to see that downward slide on the scale soon. My son is getting married on May 15th and I really really want to be below 200 pounds by that date. One would think I could lose (even at my age) 20 pounds in 5 months (she says hopefully).

.

After the holidays and now this trip...im ready to get back to the task of losing weight! On a good note..I am still running every other day on my vacation...ran for one hour on the beach boardwalk...beautiful!

Sounds like you're still mindful and not just binging and I'd call that a success! 'Sunny florida' (she sighs wistfully and enviously as she looks out at several inches of snow and more coming down.).

.

HB,

The quilt is beautiful! Love the colors!

Melody

Good morning all! TGIF, what a week! Down a pound since Monday (my "official" weigh day), so that is good, but we sure have been full of crazies here at school.

All this talk of quilting has gotten me a little inspired. I used to sew a little tiny bit, nothing fancy, just pillows and such. I got a sewing machine for Christmas LAST YEAR, but it's still in the box.... I think I'll get it out this weekend for a little bit of therapy.

2b: Sunny, warm, Florida, huh? I'm so jealous! It's cold and windy here. Was soo wishing for a 2 hour snow delay today but just a few little flurries. Poo. If it's gonna be this cold, at least let me get something out of it.

Elfie: I totally get what you mean about 5 minutes and then utter boredom. It's all I can do to keep from pulling my hair out. Im constantly fiddling with the incline and speed on the treadmill because it's all I can do to stay with it... up, down, faster, slower, run til the miles get there, climb til the calories get here... always a mind game to stop the boredom. I also love the tae bo, but all I have from years ago are VHS tapes... and no more VCR. Hm.

Anyway, I guess I've procrastinated enough on here this morning! Have a great day, eat well!

Welcome Deb, 2beskinny, counselor, and all other new bandsters to the thread.

Went for pre-op--small, funny shock happened. For years I have been thinking I was 5'5--lo and behold I am 5'3." My ticker, BMI, has been all wrong--no wonder my 6'5" husband always felt so much taller--I just thought he was taller than he thought

Leigha--good job on losing weight. Thanks. I have got to search to see if after port revision you do liquids--I would assume so, but how long. I meant to ask the surgeon.

Melody--hang in there. I just cannot figure out what to do--I am getting 1200-1600 calories in before exercise and scale remains unmoved this week. I was doing 60 grams of carbs--going down to 30lbs--I know 60lbs was too dang many.