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Band to Sleeve! Help please!



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Ya'll. I need help, or well really for someone to calm my nerves. I had lapband almost 5 years ago! When I started the journey I was 393. 5 years later I am 370. I am so disguisted in myself that I have failed. The fills hurt like hell. Every time I had a fill I would leave crying or wouldn't be able to eat for days. The GERD has gotten worse in the past month. I contacted a surgeon and attended the seminar. Now I have scheduled my first appointed! However, I am now completely scared that they will not be able to prove my band has slipped or there are complications. When I talked to the director yesterday she said that my surgery could be as soon as April! But that they needed to prove my band had slipped or there were complications. Now I'm sitting here full of worry that maybe the band hasn't slipped. Maybe I just didn't give it the chance to work. Any advice would be very helpful!

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Ya'll. I need help, or well really for someone to calm my nerves. I had lapband almost 5 years ago! When I started the journey I was 393. 5 years later I am 370. I am so disguisted in myself that I have failed. The fills hurt like hell. Every time I had a fill I would leave crying or wouldn't be able to eat for days. The GERD has gotten worse in the past month. I contacted a surgeon and attended the seminar. Now I have scheduled my first appointed! However, I am now completely scared that they will not be able to prove my band has slipped or there are complications. When I talked to the director yesterday she said that my surgery could be as soon as April! But that they needed to prove my band had slipped or there were complications. Now I'm sitting here full of worry that maybe the band hasn't slipped. Maybe I just didn't give it the chance to work. Any advice would be very helpful!
Hi, I was only sleeved 2 1/2 weeks ago, so am by no means an expert!

I am Australian, so not very familiar how health insurance works in the USA. Here in Australia, if you have private health insurance, the decision to have surgery is between you and your surgeon, and has nothing to do with your insurance company. They are obliged to cover and pay for the surgery if you and your surgeon decide that you want it and/or need it. We don't have any type of mandatory weight loss programs before surgery.

Are you saying that the insurance company won't pay your surgeon unless they can prove the band has slipped or there have been complications? What type of complications?

Have you worked out why your band failed? Did you lose weight and then put it back on, or did you just never lose it?

I can see already how you could "cheat" on the sleeve, and maybe it's similar to cheating on the band. Even though your stomach is tiny, and you get full very quickly, in theory you could snack on unhealthy foods in small amounts all day long. Nothing to stop you sipping on McDonald's thickshakes all day, and ingesting heaps of calories!

While it's true that some of the cells that produce the hunger hormone grehlin are removed when the gastrectomy is done, it doesn't take away eating due to emotional hunger, bored hunger, tired hunger, stressed hunger etc etc.

I am very happy with my progress, as I have lost 23 lbs in less than 3 weeks, but it hasn't been easy. It's been hard work. I am still on puree which is not pleasant. Neither are the shakes. And this is not reversible, whereas the band is (or you just stop having fills).

I think it will be a great procedure for you and your health, but I think it's very important for you to dig deep and be honest as to why the band failed for you, and will that happen again?

Best wishes and good luck.

Sent from my SM-G955F using Tapatalk

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I did not have a slipped band and had zero issues getting approved for a revision surgery. The way my surgeon was talking is that the band is considered "failed" if you haven't lost sufficient weight.

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How did you know it was slipped?

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    • Alisa_S

      On day 4 of the 2 week liquid pre-op diet. Surgery scheduled for June 11th.
      Soooo I am coming to a realization
      of something and I'm not sure what to do about it. For years the only thing I've enjoyed is eating. We rarely do anything or go anywhere and if we do it always includes food. Family comes over? Big family dinner! Go camping? Food! Take a short ride or trip? Food! Holiday? Food! Go out of town for a Dr appointment? Food! When we go to a new town we don't look for any attractions, we look for restaurants we haven't been to. Heck, I look forward to getting off work because that means it's almost supper time. Now that I'm drinking these pre-op shakes for breakfast, lunch, and supper I have nothing to look forward to.  And once I have surgery on June 11th it'll be more of the same shakes. Even after pureed stage, soft food stage, and finally regular food stage, it's going to be a drastic change for the rest of my life. I'm giving up the one thing that really brings me joy. Eating. How do you cope with that? What do you do to fill that void? Wow. Now I'm sad.
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      1. LeighaTR

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    • Alisa_S

      On day 4 of the 2 week liquid pre-op diet. Surgery scheduled for June 11th.
      Soooo I am coming to a realization
      of something and I'm not sure what to do about it. For years the only thing I've enjoyed is eating. We rarely do anything or go anywhere and if we do it always includes food. Family comes over? Big family dinner! Go camping? Food! Take a short ride or trip? Food! Holiday? Food! Go out of town for a Dr appointment? Food! When we go to a new town we don't look for any attractions, we look for restaurants we haven't been to. Heck, I look forward to getting off work because that means it's almost supper time. Now that I'm drinking these pre-op shakes for breakfast, lunch, and supper I have nothing to look forward to.  And once I have surgery on June 11th it'll be more of the same shakes. Even after pureed stage, soft food stage, and finally regular food stage, it's going to be a drastic change for the rest of my life. I'm giving up the one thing that really brings me joy. Eating. How do you cope with that? What do you do to fill that void? Wow. Now I'm sad.
      · 1 reply
      1. summerseeker

        Life as a big person had limited my life to what I knew I could manage to do each day. That was eat. I hadn't anything else to look forward to. So my eating choices were the best I could dream up. I planned the cooking in managable lots in my head and filled my day with and around it.

        Now I have a whole new big, bigger, biggest, best days ever. I am out there with those skinny people doing stuff i could never have dreamt of. Food is now an after thought. It doesn't consume my day. I still enjoy the good home cooked food but I eat smaller portions. I leave food on my plate when I am full. I can no longer hear my mother's voice saying eat it all up, ther are starving children in Africa who would want that!

        I still cook for family feasts, I love cooking. I still do holidays but I have changed from the All inclusive drinking and eating everything everyday kind to Self catering accommodation. This gives me the choice of cooking or eating out as I choose. I rarely drink anymore as I usually travel alone now and I feel I need to keep aware of my surroundings.

        I don't know at what point my life expanded, was it when I lost 100 pounds? Was it when I left my walking stick at home ? Was it when I said yes to an outing instead of finding an excuse to stay home ? i look back at my last five years and wonder how loosing weight has made such a difference. Be ready to amaze yourself.

        BTW, the liquid diet sucks, one more day and you are over the worst. You can do it.

    • CaseyP1011

      Officially here for a long time, not just a good time💪
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