Wow I can’t believe the lack of Vet topics we have in this part of the forum. My Husband and I will be 4years VSG next weekend. When I first started researching VSG for us this was my bible. The amount of Vets that had so much good advice and were willing to share it freely. I know we all get on with our lives but I also know that we each have our own struggles and concerns.

Let’s try to be there for each other and make sure those that do pop in or comeback know that we want to help and that we appreciate them sharing their experiences.

My sleeve was Dec 2011; hit goal Feb 2013 after losing 150#. I was a pretty prolific poster, including sharing my plastics experience. There is alot of truth that people just move on - WLS itself isn't really that central to my life.

Another reason haven't posted here much lately because I concluded that newer people prefer advice from other newer people - advice/input from me simply isn't relevant and I am okay with that - it just isn't a good use of my time. It took me a while to figure that out - but it is the simple truth. Part 2 is that as much as i would like support from other vets (my experience is maintaining has been much harder 5+ years post op) I can't seem to really find that here. I have always disliked OH, maybe that is where many "vets" have moved to, but i didn't.

So, it is unfortunate for me that there isn't an active Vets community anymore because this site was a big source of support for me a few years back. There are a lot of Facebook groups, but I guess I prefer the forum format.

1 hour ago, CowgirlJane said:

sleeve Dec 2011; goal Feb 2013 after losing 150

@CowgirlJane

EEEEEK,

do my eyes deceive me? is that really you?

hey sleeve twin - 6 years for me on December 15th.

your sleeve is 4 days older than mine, new is better!!! LOL

age before beauty LOL (kidding bud) There are some VETS

@Julie norton (10 years LB) that are still here, hangin'

around, they/me are like a bad penny, or the energizer

bunny.!!(like me)!!! We keep on going and going and going etc. -

they can't get rid of me - lord knows some have tried being

sleeved was and will continue to always be a bigggg part of my life!!
(i would never have met you if i weren't sleeved).

many times i see OP reach out for help from OP that are older than

have more experience -, not necessarily a VET. as you said, maintaining is

very hard. Do you have any restriction left? i really don't. i know

the sizes i should be eating, or on a rare occasion i will measure. for me

its a head game/mental attitude - My NUT told me llllllong time ago -

Eat til you are full, then stop 2 bites earlier!! LOL

come around more often - it is nice for OP to hear your words of

wisdom. Let's meet for drinks tomorrow - i'm buying - WATER of

course - take care bud

kathy

@CowgirlJane - I tried OH as well, but that platform is just awful. Very difficult to navigate and then Guy's section was literally a weekly weigh in. This place of course has a more traditional forum layout.

It seems like the majority of vets that have stuck around or pop in from time to time are either not active, failing or struggling and trying to get back on track, or batshit crazy and looking for attention. Me personally I am a creature of habit and check all my forums in the morning. This place is like that car accident in the lane next to you. You can't help but look.

My sleeve was Dec 2011; hit goal Feb 2013 after losing 150#. I was a pretty prolific poster, including sharing my plastics experience. There is alot of truth that people just move on - WLS itself isn't really that central to my life.
Another reason haven't posted here much lately because I concluded that newer people prefer advice from other newer people - advice/input from me simply isn't relevant and I am okay with that - it just isn't a good use of my time. It took me a while to figure that out - but it is the simple truth. Part 2 is that as much as i would like support from other vets (my experience is maintaining has been much harder 5+ years post op) I can't seem to really find that here. I have always disliked OH, maybe that is where many "vets" have moved to, but i didn't.
So, it is unfortunate for me that there isn't an active Vets community anymore because this site was a big source of support for me a few years back. There are a lot of Facebook groups, but I guess I prefer the forum format.

So Glad you posted I used yourself and many others on so many occasions pre sleeve and after I had my sleeve for advice. Then I went back and read as much as possible about your plastics. I had plastics about 14 months ago but researched for a year prior to that. I also went overseas to have it done but went to Bangkok. Yourself and many others are surely missed. Your right we do get on with our lives but sometimes maintenance can be a b***h and unfortunately we are now in a position where there are only a small handful of people to get meaningful advice from. It’s a shame because by the time I went to see my Bariatric team pre-sleeve I was so so prepared because of everything that I had read and learned from here. I really hope I can find somewhere that will offer the same this far out in maintenance.

Nice to see some friendly veterans around. I cannot answer more questions about stalls or constipation and you guys never ask those!!
Life goes on. I'm a bit on the higher side than where I like to be. But very healthy and exercising and trying[emoji736]

On 16. Oktober 2017 at 0:44 PM, FLLyssa said:

I'd like to know about your revision, what did you have done? Did it help?

I got converted from band to MGB. Helped my volume reflux issues a good deal but I wasn't able to cut the PPI out completely. There was a 20% chance that I wouldn't be able to cut them out and unfortunately I'm in the 20% crowd.

So it helped but not as much as I hoped it would.

On 10/23/2017 at 10:59 AM, proudgrammy said:

@CowgirlJane

EEEEEK,

do my eyes deceive me? is that really you?

hey sleeve twin - 6 years for me on December 15th.

your sleeve is 4 days older than mine, new is better!!! LOL

age before beauty LOL (kidding bud) There are some VETS

Nice to hear from you Kathy - maybe we need a virtual celebration/party in December!

On 10/24/2017 at 4:09 AM, BigViffer said:

@CowgirlJane - I tried OH as well, but that platform is just awful. Very difficult to navigate and then Guy's section was literally a weekly weigh in. This place of course has a more traditional forum layout.

It seems like the majority of vets that have stuck around or pop in from time to time are either not active, failing or struggling and trying to get back on track, or batshit crazy and looking for attention. Me personally I am a creature of habit and check all my forums in the morning. This place is like that car accident in the lane next to you. You can't help but look.

I guess the reality of it is that I expect t have to battle with weight issues forever. I am about 30# over my fine skinny self and am currently engaged in working it back off.... I don't consider it a struggle or failure - hell, I used to be 150# overweight so this is just ongoing maintenance/reset that I will need to do.

Even obese people assume that all obese people got fat by stuffing the face with candy - well, in my case, overeating just a little bit continiously allows me to slowly let the weight creep back on. It is clear that I just don't need as much!

Anyway, I completely dislike OH - not crazy about facebook for support, but due to circumstances around here - doesn't feel like a great fit either. The disappointment is that this place was such a source of inspiration and knowledge for me before, and I just don't see where to get that from over the longer haul. I don't take it personally, but all this talk about how rude and mean veterans is offputting to me. I personally would be quite happy with a veterans forum and I can avoid responding to non vet posts if that is what people really want. I frankly don't really get it, but okay.

On 10/25/2017 at 5:23 PM, ausmith said:

So Glad you posted I used yourself and many others on so many occasions pre sleeve and after I had my sleeve for advice. Then I went back and read as much as possible about your plastics. I had plastics about 14 months ago but researched for a year prior to that. I also went overseas to have it done but went to Bangkok. Yourself and many others are surely missed. Your right we do get on with our lives but sometimes maintenance can be a b***h and unfortunately we are now in a position where there are only a small handful of people to get meaningful advice from. It’s a shame because by the time I went to see my Bariatric team pre-sleeve I was so so prepared because of everything that I had read and learned from here. I really hope I can find somewhere that will offer the same this far out in maintenance.

Wow - you have done great. Plastics (especially going out of country for it!) was for me scary, but life changing. I feel more beautiful now in my 50s then I ever remember feeling in the past. Plastics didn't make me feel beautiful, but it was like trading in the 3X pair of sweatpants for a more flattering, fitted look! I am so glad I was able to share my story that helped you create a wonderful success story you too can share!

I am working off a small regain right now - and I have tried and failed at this a few times this year. I am trying something quite different now - I think I will wait to see how successful I am at it before reporting out on it. Maintenance, for me, got much harder at the 3-4 year post op mark BUT I am still a normal sized woman, in good health - and THAT is my victory at the end of the day.

Maintenance is way harder!! In the beginning, if I gained something, all I had to do was eat the right way and it came off. Now, if I eat wrong, I gain about 3 lbs and no matter what I do such as protein shakes all day, with a high protein small dinner and the scale doesn't move . It sure moves up if I eat wrong though.

I am 8 years post sleeve. I am considering doing a complete fast.

Oh and the other vets are on Lipstick Lady's page on OH

Edited November 4, 20178 yr by Oregondaisy

Wow - you have done great. Plastics (especially going out of country for it!) was for me scary, but life changing. I feel more beautiful now in my 50s then I ever remember feeling in the past. Plastics didn't make me feel beautiful, but it was like trading in the 3X pair of sweatpants for a more flattering, fitted look! I am so glad I was able to share my story that helped you create a wonderful success story you too can share!
I am working off a small regain right now - and I have tried and failed at this a few times this year. I am trying something quite different now - I think I will wait to see how successful I am at it before reporting out on it. Maintenance, for me, got much harder at the 3-4 year post op mark BUT I am still a normal sized woman, in good health - and THAT is my victory at the end of the day.

What’s your diet and exercise like now, has it varied that much from when your weight was stable ? It’s funny how our bodies play games with us. I remember you going through a stage when you were struggling to eat.
Your right about how we feel after plastics, it was like having weight belts on. Then you wake up after surgery and all that skin around your middle is gone.
I also had a lot of feedback about not getting it done all at once but decided to get it all over and done with. I started with the Circumference body lift and bra lift. Then 10 days latter had a breast reduction, breast lift and my arms done . Painful and hardwork but it was definitely worth it. I only had one small complication and that was one of the stitches became infected on my arm. A quick visit to a doctor where he scraped it and removed a couple other stitches to prevent the problem happening again. 15 months latter and I forget what it was like carrying all that excess skin around.
Your truly a success story but like all of us we will always have to be on our game to keep the weight off. Good Luck

On 3. November 2017 at 8:05 PM, CowgirlJane said:

Anyway, I completely dislike OH

I dislike OH as well. A "view new posts" button would tremendously help. It's a pain in the butt to navigate that board.

Quote

The disappointment is that this place was such a source of inspiration and knowledge for me before, and I just don't see where to get that from over the longer haul.

I think that's completely normal. Of course there was a lot to learn in the beginning but now you're at a point where you know your stuff. Maybe there isn't that much to learn now? What exactly do you miss?

Quote

I don't take it personally, but all this talk about how rude and mean veterans is offputting to me.

What's putting me off is the amount of zealots with black and white thinking that are still within the first year or half year of surgery. Like WLS is some kind of religion you converted to there is quite a bit of bigotry around. I get that itch to respond (and not always nicely) and then I hold my virtual tongue because people don't want to hear what I have to say about certain things anyway. Not worth the blood pressure raise.

I totally get the "some veterans are rude and mean" though - it simply was that way a few months ago.

On 15/10/2017 at 7:10 AM, summerset said:

Hopefully not. The last thing this site needs are local bariatric heroes with a know-it-all-attitude that are all about people needing to "wear their big girl panties" when dealing out their so-called "tough love" and behave like crybabies themselves when someone dares to talk back in the same manner.

However, if you're really missing them quite a few can be found at Obesity Help.

This made me laugh !! Well said

On 11/3/2017 at 2:05 PM, CowgirlJane said:

Nice to hear from you Kathy - maybe we need a virtual celebration/party in December!

I guess the reality of it is that I expect t have to battle with weight issues forever. I am about 30# over my fine skinny self and am currently engaged in working it back off.... I don't consider it a struggle or failure - hell, I used to be 150# overweight so this is just ongoing maintenance/reset that I will need to do.

Even obese people assume that all obese people got fat by stuffing the face with candy - well, in my case, overeating just a little bit continiously allows me to slowly let the weight creep back on. It is clear that I just don't need as much!

Anyway, I completely dislike OH - not crazy about facebook for support, but due to circumstances around here - doesn't feel like a great fit either. The disappointment is that this place was such a source of inspiration and knowledge for me before, and I just don't see where to get that from over the longer haul. I don't take it personally, but all this talk about how rude and mean veterans is offputting to me. I personally would be quite happy with a veterans forum and I can avoid responding to non vet posts if that is what people really want. I frankly don't really get it, but okay.

Wow - you have done great. Plastics (especially going out of country for it!) was for me scary, but life changing. I feel more beautiful now in my 50s then I ever remember feeling in the past. Plastics didn't make me feel beautiful, but it was like trading in the 3X pair of sweatpants for a more flattering, fitted look! I am so glad I was able to share my story that helped you create a wonderful success story you too can share!

I am working off a small regain right now - and I have tried and failed at this a few times this year. I am trying something quite different now - I think I will wait to see how successful I am at it before reporting out on it. Maintenance, for me, got much harder at the 3-4 year post op mark BUT I am still a normal sized woman, in good health - and THAT is my victory at the end of the day.

I would love a group for us Vets!! If you decide to set one up please let me know. I am over 4 years out and to read this forum now is a little bit hard to relate to them. Some think they know it all and some jump to the quick when it is your opinion. So please let me know.

8 hours ago, shedo82773 said:

I would love a group for us Vets!!

This is the group for vets - it's just not very active. Start posting more in here and it will become more active. Setting up a special group (do you mean Facebook?) would drain even more vets.

Well DUH!! My bad!! I really feel dumb now. No way did I want it to be on Facebook. I just (like the rest of you) want a place to come and be with other vets.

Happy to still be here and reading about cyber friends...
yes ... I'm still trying to wrestle with 10 lbs+.
But it is a fact that I'm not arguing with 90 lbs. still... it is NOT easy... I'm realizing that it probably will not be....frustrating, but healthier!!