This is not a very positive post, so I apologise in advance.

I feel like I am drowning in fat.

I am 11 days from surgery day and I wish it was tomorrow.

I think I have a grip on eating in the morning, then I blow it later on in the day.

My whole body is so bloated. I am 33 and feel like I am 80.

I was all proud of myself, got myself down to 271 lbs from 285 in November. Then I had to switch antidepressant medication, and I ended up gaining it all back because it made me soooo incredibly hungry. I stopped taking those meds before I ballooned even more!

Now, I am back at square one, feel completely helpless, starting over again. Everything hurts, everything is bloated, it hurts to walk.......I just don't have it in me anymore to keep yo-yoing like this.

I know how you feel....and I am sorry that you feel that way. It sucks. I am in the same boat. Only weeks before surgery and I am having a terrible time staying on a diet pre op to lose weight. I just keep trying to tell myself that soon I will have a tool to help and I look things up on here about 3 times a day! Good luck. Just know you aren't alone!

thanks it's hard.....

I can sympathize with you. In just a year I've gone from 250 to almost 300. I'm like 290'ish. I could get around pretty okay at 250, but this being almost 300, I hurt so bad. My fingers are so swelled up that my wedding ring is like digging into my finger and causing rashes... Just walking up the three flights of stairs I have to go up everyday kills me. The tendons in my knees snap and creek... then, what do I go and do??? This morning I stopped by Chic-fil-A and got a bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit!! With a small sweet tea!! As I ate it I was telling myself "WHYYYY???".. but, I ate it with pleasure anyway. I think I'm eating even more because maybe I'm pre-mourning food that I won't be able to have later if I get the lap band. I say "if" because until I get approved, you never know what could happen.

I know how you feel, but stay positive. If you screw up there is always tomorrow to try again. You are headed in the right direction and although your surgery date seems far away it will be here soon. Sending lots of hugs..

Patience isn't easy but that's what it's going to take -- patience and faith that this WILL work! It's hard to imagine when we're used to being hungry if we deprive ourselves. And it won't always be easier. But from my experience so far, it's easier than anything I've ever done to lose weight, especially knowing that this is how I will eat the rest of my life. I don't feel deprived at all but that's because I'm not hungry all the time and I know that there are very few things that I can't have at least a taste of -- and amazingly, a taste is enough!

Hang in there and do the best you can and know that help is on the way! Reading and posting on this board helped me a lot, too! Good luck!

Soon you will be banded, Bert, and your life will begin to change. Once you have recovered from the surgery itself you will begin to receive your fills and then you will find that you will simply be unable to eat very much. The band will be a physical barrier against this. Of course you know this already. My hunch is that now that you know that a change is possible you feel that you simply cannot wait any longer, and your weight is really getting to you. This is a T-shirt which so many of us have worn and so we understand your pain.

Perhaps a good thing for you to do right now is to occupy yourself by reading over the information contained in the posts on this site and make yourself some lists. Making lists may make you feel that you are doing something positive in order to prepare for your new life and may also help these days go by a little faster. The lists can be about the preparations you will need to take in order to ensure that your post-op period goes smoothly, and you can also begin to figure out what kinds of meals you will want to eat which are rich in Protein and fresh vegetables/fruit/fibre and low in bad carbs and sugars once you are living the banded life. One exercise in food watching which I found both educational and kinda depressing was to read the calorie and nutritional content info on prepared foods. I was shocked at how little nutrition was to be found in a can of vegie soup! eggs, on the other hand, are loaded with goodness and are low in calories.

As for fattening anti-depressant type meds, ugh! I have been there. For awhile they put me on Risperidone and Effexor and the results were disasterous! You have all my sympathy.

Thank you all for your kind responses and especially for the wealth of information! You are all great!:clap2:

You know, it's weird being fat and hard to explain. If I were to show you a photo of yourself thin and a photo of a cake... which do you want more? You want thin more than you want a piece of cake but for some odd reason, we all seem to reach for the cake even though we want thin more. It makes no sense.

food is an obsession and a compulsion. We would rather be thin but we reach for the food that satisfies some weird internal 'thing' instead. No rhyme nor reason.

With a band you finally find a little control over the obsession and compulsion. I don't think it ever goes away completely but you finally reach a point where you have control over it vs. it having control over you.

You just have to wait it out. This is a ride that you will be on for a long time. You will have your good days and your bad days. For me the key was not justifying the bad days anymore. I have little excuse for sucking down a bag of chocolate anymore. My last Chocolate binge was when I bought a large carton of Whoppers and a mega size Dove Milk Chocolate bar. I ate about 4 or 5 Chocolate whoppers and one cube of the Chocolate bar and got rid of the rest. A year ago I would have eaten the whole thing. Those days are over. Not to say I won't binge again, I probably will. But today if I want to stop it badly enough, I can. I can't say that was true a year ago.

When your thinking changes the pounds will follow. If you want it bad enough, it will happen. But you really have to want it and you have to want it bad enough to make the changes. You aren't striving for perfection, you are striving for control over food. It's much more doable than you might realize.

Give it time, the pounds will go.

Thank you all again

The preopt reason my doc said the liquid is because I have to defat my liver as that makes the surgery easy. I keep thinking that when I go to reach for something. I don't have a fear of the surgery, but want to make it as smooth as possible and strangely enough, that thinking has been working. Now if it works until surgery, that will be great.

Hang in there and take one day at a time. Go to bed and say, "yes, I made it through day___, only ___days to go".

Success comes one pound at a time for me... banded April 2, 2007 and should be down 100 pounds by Christmas day! Some days I win... some days I fail!

hi bert99, i was feeling the same way before my surgery. i never thought that id be thin and healthy again. but, its been two years and im down 120 and feel great. the band forced me to change my eating habits and behavior.... i eat so little now. soup and salad is my main diet. i assume you will go through the same stages as most of us...... it takes time but it will happen. hang it there and im glad you are able to have this done. some people cant afford it.. so good luck. keep us posted.

Thank you for your comments. I am feeling a bit better now as there is a light at the end of the tunnel....8 days!

Hang in there Bert! Wasa pretty much said it all, but I want to let you know we have all felt the same pain. Getting the band really can help if you do your part. I no longer stay at home and hide, I am back out there living my life. You can too. Good luck, Donna

Before I was banded (one short month ago) I was crying all the time. I had nothing to wear to anyplace we went, I didn't want to go anywhere because there would be food and I would eat more and get bigger. I was miserable.

One short month later, I have lost 16 pounds, some clothes are already too big and I have found some old things in my closet that now fit again. Ok, so I'm not really ready to go out to eat yet, but that time will come.

For the first time in about 10 years, I am under 200 pounds and I actually have real hope, that this time I can keep this weight off! And you can do this, too!

I did get thru christmas with no problems. Hungry ,yes (not completely restricted yet) but enough restriction to allow me control over all the food available. I just ate soft food choices available in small quantities.

We have ALL been where you are. Please read some of the posts and the weight loss successes.

Good Luck.