Help I am a Banded Bulimic:puke:

Teresita,

I WAS bulemic and still have tendencies.

You are not alone.

Please, we have to work on this.

I keep thinking of something my banded friend said.

She said something like, 'We have to watch out how many times we 'test' our band, because we have to take good care of it to KEEP it..."

Now her idea of 'testing' may have been overeating.

In my case, it is eating, vomiting and eating more. Any such stress may aid in erosion, the band eating its way into the stomach lining or putting stress on our esophagus. There are many things htat can happen.

So I guess I am saying, we love our band, we need to be careful to follow the rules as closly as we can, not putting pressure or stressing it by overeating, and/or bringing up food unnesessarily.

However else we need to release our stress, we need to find a way OTHER than eating....

hugs and know that you are not alone.

Good for you for coming out.

I guess it kind of helped me come out so thanks for that.

Teresita,

***hugs***

Would you help educate me. How can you be overweight and bulimic? Do you eat so much and then throw up so that the body still keeps some of the calories? Not trying to be flip, just trying to understand.

Forcing oneself to throw up with the band could be very dangerous. Most of us try everything not to so we don't have our band slip.

You can definatley be overweight and bulimic, just as you could be overweight and anorexic. It's about what goes on in your mind that makes the disease so dangerous. I'm sure Teresita is aware that vomiting is bad for her band... hence her confession.

Paulax... your post is so supportive! We all need to be picked up once in awhile.

Teresita.... I know it took tremendous courage for you to admit this in an open forum like this.... this is the first step to getting better girl!

Hang in there and keep posting!

People cannot understand our disease of purging.They are trained to hold IT all in all nice and in order! I thought about it the other day while wiping down the toliet seat as not to be noticed by my sister. When we purge we are letting IT all go.... free form...letting IT all out...we are getting rid of IT, like we cannot stand to have IT inside us for one minute longer. Food represents that IT, and each one of us has to find out what IT is that food stands for! Like I said the outside world takes pride in keeping IT all together everything is kept inside. When we purge we go against everything that makes sense. They love us and want us to get well because we confuse them! But we are not going to get well hanging our beautiful heads over toliets! We have to find the courage to seek help! If we spent half as much energy trying to get well as we did concealing our getting sick we would all be on our way to recovery!

I have been chewing up food and spitting it out. I just don't need to put the food in mouth in the first place. I have got to do better.

I do not pb on purpose but when I do it is because I was eating too fast or to much. Self control is what I need more of.

Ohhhh Teresita...

hugs to you...if you need encouragement or a good laugh...you know you can always email/pm me... I am here to support you in whatever way I can.

:straight Terersita,we are all here for you! This site in an unbelievable place for support and education! Hang in here with us you cannot go wrong!

(((hugs))) I know how hard this can be. You said:

I do not pb on purpose but when I do it is because I was eating too fast or to much. Self control is what I need more of.

A few questions for you

1. Is your band too tight?

2. Are you sitting down and eating your meals? (I find I PB if I am eating on the run, like in the car)

3. Are you having a cup of warm tea or coffee before meals, that helps.

4. Try to eat as soon as you start to feel hungry, so you are not in such a hurry to consume too much.

5. When was you last adjustment?

6. How often are you having PB problems?

I know that I was too tight for 6 months, and was PB'ing almost daily. When I went to see my doc, he asked me point blank, "do you think you are helping lose weight any faster by being overfilled? If anything you are putting your band at risk of erosion..." That scared me enough to have some removed, I have only had 2 real PB's since October. Both times in the car, damn hectic schedual and Wendy's chicken nuggets. I hope these questions give you some help to finding answers, you don't have to answer them here, just think about them. I hope you feel better, and have the control that you want/need. ~Mandy

Mandy

1 Nope (just tight in the morning but that is a good thing)

2 Most of the time (I have been stress eating lately)

3 No, I use to but I don't want to take the chance of being full from the Fluid.( I want to get the satisfaction of the food)

6 Maybe 2 days out of the week and it is a gentle pb (I've had the painful ones before)

My problem is stress and I am falling back into old habits of running to food to deal with the stress. So I will get the food and out of guilt instea of swallowing it I will spit it back out after chewing it up. I am trying to get back on track. I have a slim fast for Breakfast and big bottle of Water. I bought lots of lettuce last night for salads and I have tuna for lunch. I going to fix a pot of Beans tonight for the weekend. I do better when I have food already prepared. My stress snack for today is a Reese.

Teresita, count your lucky stars you are not "bulimic" in the true defintion of the word. To be so,you must actualy be self inducing "vomiting" after consuming food. It is the repeated vomiting that is so very harmful to a bulimic. You absolutly in my opinion have an eating disorder that needs attention from a professional! But thank God you are not bulimic! Good luck with your struggle. We are all here to help!

Teresita

You need to be so careful. I am bulemic and have had several slips with my band due to my bulimia. I had two diagnosed before I confessed to my surgeon what was going on. Try to face that battle before it gets to that stage.

Josy

I too do the chew up and then spit out thing, usually because after I have started chewing I realize I am not hungry. A great stress snack is one of those 100 calorie popcorm bags, or any of the 100 calorie snack packs. I keep several in my car, one in my purse, and a few at school where I volunteer. They have oreos, cheese nips, popcorn, and some others. Might want to check them out. A low guilt stress snack. ~Mandy

barbara465-there are many ways in which a bulimic can purge. vomitting is not the only way. for example: a bulimic may go on a binge and take in 2500 calories. a way to purge may be to vomit. another could be to exercise until they have burned off 2500 calories. or they may purge themselves by starving for a couple of days to counter the effects of the purge. and you can still be overweight because you are just purging yourself after a binge, not after regular eating. hope that makes sense. eating disorders can not be summed up in a single word or phrase, but someone else did a good job of explaining an aspect of it. it is not about the food. the food is just a vehicle used to get to the purge. or at least it was for me. the purge was euphoric. it was my way of releasing out of me all the icky bad stuff that was going on on the inside. in order to get that stuff out, i had to recreate the situation. i had to stuff food in so that i could purge myself to get the bad out. i gorged on food so i could feel the purge. so i could feel the release. to those that don't struggle with it, they don't understand what i am saying. it almost sounds crazy to them.

Christa thanks for the explanation. I understand better now. I always thought that purging was for the food. Now I see it is for the feeling or getting rid of the feelings.

I never ate much at any sitting, but I certainly was a grazer. A little of this, a little of that, and before you knew it I was overweight. I've been feeding my "feelings" since childhood. I would sneak food and find myself to this day doing the same thing. There is something comforting about eating something without anyone knowing it.