As I sit here, (pre-banded) eating my leftover, cold, 1/2 price sonic burger for lunch, I wondered if, once banded, you guys can take a "bite" out of something or if you have to cut it up first? It sounds like a silly question, but trying to mentally prepare for this surgery, I pretend like I am banded to see how I would eat - and for the life of me, I can't imagine taking a bite off of a fajita, sandwich, rice cake, burger, anything. So what do you guys do? Cut it into pieces first?

I bite things all the time. This for me is no different than pre-op, other than I normally have to cut off a portion. Bites themselves, if it's bite food I bite, if it's cut food I cut.

Uhm... Post-op.. and pre-good restriction.. I could eat like a Chili's burger (which are huge) if I took one side of the bun off. And then I would eat it with knife & fork and only could get down a couple bites. I tried to eat a Big Fish from Burger King and failed on the first 'bite'.

Since good restriction, the thought of biting into a burger is kind of scary. A tiny piece of chicken gets stuck, so 2 pieces of bread and whatever is in between it are not going to go anywhere in my body. Even if I chew and chew, it would be too much to swallow at once, so I'd have to break it apart in my mouth and swallow smaller pieces at a time.. and bread chewed up a lot is pretty nasty.

It will all depend on your restriction and you individually. I can't eat a 'bite' of something like a burger or taco or burrito.

I bite my food all the time. In fact, I find myself taking smaller bites than pre-band, but still rather larger bites than I probably should. When I do that, I make sure that I chew really well, and swallow very small amounts at a time. Less and less frequently, I can still get myself in trouble by taking too big a bite of something and forget about my band, not chew well enough, and/or swallow too much at once, and I get an instant flaming golf ball.

So I would suggest practicing taking very small bites.

I just take small bites. You'll adapt.