I had my first appointment with my GP on Oct. 1. Because of my insurance I have many hoops to jump through in order to have the surgery covered. So far I have gone to a seminar explaing both lap-band and RN-Y, met with a dietician (with another appointment scheduled for January), signed up for some phone life coaching thing, and met with 2 psychologists. Psych #1 said I had emotional eating issues that she wants taken care of by psych #2 before I have surgery. I now have 3 more appts. with psych #2 in the next month and a half. I still have to meet with a physical therapist (missed first scheduled appt due to a freaking root canal), and lose 12.5 pounds by April 13. Anyway, I am starting to get cold feet about doing all this. I LOVE food! I have tried to make dietary adjustments suggested by the dietician, and did well for the first 2 weeks, but now I am falling back into old eating habits. If I can't stick with the diet plans that they are suggesting to me now, how am I going to do it after surgery? I am sure as hell not going to go through all this nonsense (using a boatload of my already limited sick days) and not be able to lose the weight!! I don't want to sound like a Negative Nelly and I know the surgery isn't a "magic bullet" but will the surgery work if I am already having so many issues with my diet? I was so ready to have this done 3 months ago when I started making appointments and talking to the doctors but now I am really questioning whether I can do it or not. HELP!

By the time I scheduled my surgery I couldn't diet if you paid me a million dollars. I joined WW with a friend as my last attempt before resorting to surgery. I didn't make it 3 weeks and I quit. I think I had truly hit some kind of emotional wall. I was just so OVER dieting.

Don't get me wrong, I love food too and I still enjoy it, just much less of it. The band is successful with a huge percentage of people. You'll be amazed how much easier it is when you aren't fighting that hungry tiger all the time.

Willpower is not the way to lose weight. That's like trying to push a rock up a hill, how long can you do it before it overtakes you. You need a permanent solution and lapband, IMHO, is the best thing going!

Good luck and let us know how you are getting along. I'll be cheering for you!

I feel that there are certain changes you have to be willing to make and changes the band will force you to make. I love food too. The thought of giving up Coke and bread was scary. I love them both and usually had them together. I am AMAZED at how easy it was to do without either. You can sabotage the band. Eating and drinking high calorie things that slide right through will cause you to gain weight. The band will force you to eat less. Remember weight loss is all math, and the band helps in the subtraction. In the past I was a 20 mcnugget kind of guy. Now, 6 fill me up. That is 500 calories or so before and 200 now (not sure if those amounts are correct). You get my point.

You've started jumping through the hoops...keep jumping. You can always change your mind before they give you the gas :tongue2:

Thanks for the support. I guess what's bothering me the most is the fact that they expect me to lose weight before surgery. If I had the ability to do that I wouldn't need the freaking surgery!! If one more person tells me surgery isn't a "magic bullet" to weight loss I am going to lose it! I just want to make sure that if I go through with all this it won't be a waste of time and money.