Hi!

I'm Julie and looking to change my life on April 2nd. Yep, that would be my surgery date.

I'm a single mother of sometimes adult children. Own a very small salon in central Phoenix and have never worked so hard to make so little Just kidding, life is what I make it and it's awesome! This growing up has been a process and I feel like I have control over everything in my life but my weight. I've struggled my whole life with eating and bouncing up and down on the scale. More often it's UP! I feel like I've done it all... weight watchers, HCG, calorie counting, Atkins, and even the cabbage diet. Ya I lose, but when I get back to normal eating (No, one cannot live on Cabbage Soup), the weight slowly comes back on and adds a few extra pounds for good measure.

So here I am! This is me, getting real with myself and sharing my journey.

Hope to connect with you soon,

j~

Thanks Swadley, that will help. The Dr, told me i Could go back to work the next day if i wanted to. Think i will take a week off.

I would NOT of wanted to go back to work the next day! Wow! I'm shocked your doctor told you that. lol I don't think I would of made it.. I went back to work a week later and was still very week. My boss was pretty nice about it. What do you do?

Thanks for the warm welcome everyone =) y'all are great!!

I would NOT of wanted to go back to work the next day! Wow! I'm shocked your doctor told you that. lol I don't think I would of made it.. I went back to work a week later and was still very week. My boss was pretty nice about it. What do you do?

Thanks for the warm welcome everyone =) y'all are great!!

Hey swadley! Where in Dallas did u have ur surgery? I work in Dallas, my surgery is April 2

I had it at the surgery center of richardson. Dr. Benevides or however you spell it. Nice guy. Didn't even meet him until after the surgery.. that was different, but whatever lol I live in the south dallas area, around 30 and lamar. know where that is?

Ya I work at a salon in uptown. How has everything been since ur surgery??

Which salon do you work at! My mom works in the quadrangle in uptown! Everything has been great! Just tooting along waiting until I can eat real food again! I work at Sally Beauty Supply!! I'm the asst. manager at the one in Rockwall.

I would NOT of wanted to go back to work the next day! Wow! I'm shocked your doctor told you that. lol I don't think I would of made it.. I went back to work a week later and was still very week. My boss was pretty nice about it. What do you do?

Thanks for the warm welcome everyone =) y'all are great!!

I do home health, Take care of a 59 yr old man with MS, Not to hard

oh ok, thats not too bad. Good luck with your surgery!!

Thanks You too.

Hello to everyone. My name is Renee, and my surgery date is scheduled for April 2nd. I am a nurse, working in upper management for a large practice in TN. It has taken almost a year to jump through all of the hoops that insurnace has required but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I was first interested in the lap band after the surgeon who is part of the health group that my clinic is part of did a seminar for our employees to provide information to our patients about the benifits of weight loss surgery. He explained all of the options that were avialable at that time, and I felt that the lap band was the choice for me. I'm like most of us on here, busy, but my business was just an excuse not to do what I needed to do to loose weight on my own. I work about 50-60 hours per week, with about an hour commute each direction so that leaves little time for much else. I would skip meals, and then be so hungry that I would eat anything I could get my hands on or get a drive through. I knew this was not good behavior and needed help.

I've been successful loosing weight twice. Once was when I was in collage and had braces and it physically was painful to eat, and I was walking about 2-3 miles per day to class. I hadn't even noticed it really until I was trying on jeans at a store, and the size I had been wearing was too large. Then the second time was when my friend at the time asked me to be in her wedding and the brides maid dresses only went to a size 16! Yikes, so I got a personal trainer, and on the days that I wasn't working my 12 hour shift on the floor, I was at the gym for 2+ hours. Plus I was using some over the counter weight loss stuff. It's wasn't until I actually fell on the floor while working because of muscle fatigue and starving myself that I realized that was not something I could maintain realisticly. I did manage to fit into the dress but after it was party time not to have to do that anymore.

So after that I really maintained my weight for about 5 years or so, but kept creeping up. Then I participated in a medical research study for a medication for your cycles, where you wouldn't have them for a whole year. During that time is when I gained ALOT of weight, but couldn't figure out why since everything I was doing was the same as it had always been.

Fast forward to now, I've struggled with PCOS so infertility issues are many. The clock is ticking if I ever want to have children and any infertility physician I have been to says the first thing is to loose weight. If it were only that easy. So, now I'm ready, keeping that goal in mind, not that it is a guarentee, but it's a start.

I'm having the lap band done with stomach plication, which is part of another research study where the results have been shown to be as effective in loosing weight as gastric by pass at the 1 year mark. I'm only the 21st pt that this surgeron has done this procedure on, and I'm excited. Duke medical center has been doing this research for a year and my physician was trained there to perform it. I had my consult last week, and he spent over an hour with me explaining everything, showing me the improvments that have been made to the band itself and I feel very fortunate to have the opportunity to participate in this study.

One thing I have come to realize is that the support groups are not for me in a large setting. Since I'm in management in the same system I'm getting my surgery done in, I don't feel as if my information or feelings will be confidential so it's a little bit different for me so I'm glad that this group exists. I've been reading posts for about 2 weeks and finally have the courage to write my story. My DH is supportive, said he would do the pre-op diet with me. To him that meant, I won't eat fast food, but cooking a pizza at home was still ok. ARGHH! The pre op diet is harder that I thought it would be. I am craving the feeling of being full, which is hard to achieve with this.

Good luck to everyone and thanks for the support.

Hi runny and welcome to the group. We are a special group if I do say so myself

Please feel free to express yourself freely here as your thoughts and feelings may just help one of us with our struggles. It's already done that for me. I think of my friends here throughout the day and wondering how they are dealing. However different we each are, we all have the same goal in mind. To be healthy and happy in our own skin. it's wonderful!

Happy sharing and know your not alone.

julz~

Welcome to the group Renee. I hope we can give you all of the support you need

Welcome Renee glad to have you with us.

Hi all, I wanted to know if anyone was from NY...?? I'm 28 yrs old an single mother of a very active three year old boy. Work full time as a AR Manager and I can not wait to be banded on 4/5, counting down the days.

I have gain lots of weight over the past 4 years due too lack of mobility. I was diagnosed with bone cancer and had my knee and femur replaced (twice). I tried to push my self so much and i caused myself to break the prothesis.

Anyway I hope with this surgery I will walk better and be more active so I can keep up with my son., Ohh and of course look good for the summer..

Girlie. sounds like life has not been the best for you so far. hoplfully this will be an new start and you can put all that behined you. 3 yr olds are a handful without any restrictions, but oh are they so worth it.

You have made it through some tought times so this is going to be a piece of cake.

will keep you in my prayers.

Hopefully my surgery will be the same day as yours but not betting on it.