I was banded three weeks ago today. I lost 13lbs on the pre-op diet of optifast. After surgery I also lost around 5 more lbs the week after and than another 2lbs the next week. This week I actually gained 2lbs back! I am so upset! I just started eating real foods agian after being on liquids and than mushies for the first 2 weeks. I ate alittle more after christimas but still not anywhere near 1000 cals a day. i had a few days last week that I ate alot somewhere near 1800-2000 cals. I realized this and started to count my points on Sunday. I have been starving but have stayed around 20-25points which is like 1000-1400 cals a day. And I am up 2lbs. What is wrong with me I feel like a failure!

Yeah, that sounds about right. It is very normal to gain weight at this stage. My surgeon said that most of his patients gain between 5-10 lbs. at this point. You were on a very restrictive diet and now you are adding higher calorie more solid foods and so putting on weight is normal. You have not begun to really use your band yet so you certainly are not a failure. You are in the healing stage, soon you will start getting fills and that is when you will really start using your band. I do understand your frustration and I remember how aggravating this stage is (around here, it is called Bandster Hell) but it is all just part of the process.

I have to eat less than 1000 cals to lose or not gain. Although I had 800 yesterday and gained 1 lb back. I think that might be "Aunt Flo" weight (I hope).:thumbs_up:

I have to eat less than 1000 cals to lose or not gain. Although I had 800 yesterday and gained 1 lb back. I think that might be "Aunt Flo" weight (I hope).:thumbs_up:

Once at restriction the band controlled my food intake, I just make healthy food choices and let the band take care of how much I eat. So I don't really count calories, fat grams, carbs etc. although I did count calories in the beginning and I found that my weight loss slowed if I went too far below 1000. I have seen folks here mention that this is because our bodies go into "starvation mode". I wasn't convinced of that at first but found that being too restrictive did slow my loss.

1, 2 or even 3 pounds is nothing to stress about. Our bodies fluctuate that much within a day.

sometimes you go up or down 1 or 2 pounds i kept doing that and my dr gave me water pills

Well I'm on week four and I've noticed that I've gained some weight back. I haven't found a scale I could really ever trust though. Some weigh me less some weigh me more so I'm not really sure where I'm at. After the first week I lost 14.5 but I also wasn't eating anything, they ended up taking out the fluid that they used to "prime" my band so there is nothing in there. I hope my first fill will give me some more restriction. I'm like you I'm extremely frustrated at this point!