I have noticed that my muscles aren't as hard anymore... I was being all vain and looking into the mirror and noticed that when I flexed my arms they seemed flabbier with less muscle since last week. Has anyone experienced this?? I was banded this past monday and am thinking about lifting 5 to 10 lbs of weight in the mean time because I do not want to lose the tone of my arms :sad:!

I think you're probably imagining it to a degree, you will lose muscle with weight loss but if you eat appropriately and exercise, it will only be muscle loss commensurate with the lesser amount you need to support your lighter body. Everyone experiences this, no weight loss is every 100% fat. But what you do and how you lose can affect how much fat v muscle you do lose and you want to MINIMISE the muscle loss which will usually entail some pretty serious exercise to keep as much as you can on your body.

It is exceedingly hard to build significant muscle on a weight loss diet, you need loads of calories and Protein to build muscle, well beyond what bandsters (especially women) can usually manage. Some people on here have managed it, men have a natural advantage of course.

But you dont lose enough muscle off your body in a week to significantly affect the way you look. In the week since banding, probably what you have lost is a load of Water, a little bit of muscle and a little bit of fat. But I doubt you've lost 13lb of muscle!

Relax a while, its too soon after surgery to worry about getting in shape, concentrate on the eating part now and then worry about getting back into shape. Let yourself heal. It will be even easier to get back in shape after dropping 40 or so. For the first time, my legs now look like they did when I was 18. Now, I just need to remodel the front porch.

Remember, too, that when you do start lifting weights again, your muscles have 'memory'. It wont take long at all to get back your definition, not like what you had to do to get that definition there in the first place.

Great advice from Jachut (as usual). Once you have clearance to exercise focus on cardio with a few strength training sessions per week and you'll keep those muscles in good shape while weight loss is ongoing.

Good luck and work hard!

Brad