I have my final pre-surgery nutritionist appointment on Wednesday and my paperwork is being submitted to Aetna after my final pre-surgery consult with the surgeon on January 6th.

I have been reading these boards almost religiously since September to get an idea of what to expect. Surprisingly, it seems that many of the people that been banded have more questions than I do.

I've put together a list of pet peeves I have on this site. If one or more of them sounds like you and you are offended; frankly, I don't care. Save your breath. :thumbup:

1. The following 3 questions are asked all of the time and there should be a canned response:

Q1: I've had my band for a while. Why I am not losing weight?

Q2: Will I lose weight after I get fills?

Q3: How long after I get banded will I start losing weight?

2. This is the latest I have been seeing and I just want to strangle the posters: "I'm afraid I will have loose skin."

3. Another favorite: "I was recently banded and can still eat as much as I want."

4. "I cheated on pre-surgery diet"

5. Women replying in the men's forum.

I better quit before I get in trouble

O.K., one more and perhaps the most minor of them all; we do not "loose" weight. We may have loose skin after losing weight but we do not "loose" weight.

Thinking about changing my name to "The Bitter Bandster"

Hi, I'm a BITCH a female dog. I do not even know where to find the mens chat room, I do the self talk just like you and by the way it is healthy to do this kind of blogging. Keeps my paws out of the cookie jar. I answer all the same questions as you did. I just want to say that what ever you say here my help others "lose" weight, or it my NOT. If you have to lose as much as I do I know I will have "loose skin" I will deal with it when the time comes!

I have been banded for five and half months and many day's I feel like "the bitter bandster". Enjoy where you are it is an amazing journey and I miss, truly miss eating the amounts of food I use to. That is when I get bitter. But the fact I have dropped five sizes and over 68 pounds in five and half months is also truly amazing. Being Banded has changed my life in such a healthy way. I must eat slower and chew, chew, chew to beat the band. Playing well with my band is probably the most important thing I have learned on this journey. May your gift to yourself be just as satisfying. Best wishes. imaluckydog

LOL I agree w/all of your peeves. I mostly feel sad, though, for the people who are soooooo stressed out because they don't drop a ton of weight right away. My surgeon and her staff gave me such good pre-op education. In fact, they say not even to expect a loss the first month. She says my job the first month (before my first fill) is just to heal and she also warned me that you can gain 10 pounds of fluid just from the IV fluids they pump into you while you are at the hospital. I'm so glad my expectations were set properly so I am not freaking out like a lot of people in their first month. They talk about 'bandster hell', but I think it is just due to unrealistic expectations and lack of information on how the band works.

Funnily I agree with most of the things you have said,and am banded 7 months and having a great journey with all it's ups and downs,but......

Like childbirth you can prepare for it , talk about it do everything you can but.....

Until you have done it and walked it those shoes wow its a very different thing.

Hope you don't have to eat your words. Would they go down? lol Good luck on your journey

Chooky (spell check????)

I have a new pet peeve this week. Adults who use the word "tummy" when talking to other adults.

I have a lot of lose skin on my tummy, and I still have some weight to loose. *sniggers*

OK, I'll admit I groan a little inside when I often read 'I weight myself...'

Thanks for the laugh! My kids call me the 'grammar police' and they would be horrified to read my blog. I'm the queen of ...(dot, dot, dot) when I'm blogging (no time for punctuation when the words are flowing LOL). I'm sure it would drive me nuts to read my own ramblings, so I try to be forgiving.

I try to send those 'uninformed' posters to the Stickies. I know I read all those when I started here...your blog here would be a great Sticky! -BG

LOVE your list

I couldn't agree more! I've pretty much kept to just blogging as the forums irk me and make me want to break out my red pen. Not to mention the fact that it's glaringly obvious that 90% of the people on here did absolutely NO research and just decided to get this done so they can lose weight.

I researched this for 5 years prior to deciding to have the lapband. Extreme? Some may think so, but there's not much I don't know when it comes to being banded. Now that I actually have my band, I'm learning through experience for myself what of the research I did is valid or not valid.

I cringe every time I read the repetative posts about loose skin, not losing, cheating, etc... I just want to leap through the screen at them and shake them. But alas, I'm committed to always walking in love, so I keep my comments to myself and close the forum or go blog. If I didn't I would end up a lot like this:

Love the cartoon YM!

After seeing somebody start the "Do some research" thread yesterday and seeing the responses I have gotten here; I realize it is not in my head and I am not the only one concerned.

I'm not even banded yet and it seems I know a lot more than a lot of the bandsters. I know I will still have a few questions once banded and I hope there are enough qualified people to give me good answers.

"Don't worry, once you get fills you will start losing weight" is NOT a good answer!

Keep on reading and you are bound to commit one of my peeves.

This week's peeve is adults that think they have to explain themselves to their young children as if they were equal.

HAHAHA!! This week's peeve is adults that think they have to explain themselves to their young children as if they were equal.

I started to do this the other day with my oldest son. "I checked your text messages while you were gone...because your phone was going off and it was getting on my nerves and I thought it might be someone...okay, really, I checked your text messages b/c I pay the bill and I bought the phone and I don't need an excuse to check it b/c I'm your mother and I can do whatever I want in this house b/c I pay all the bills and LET YOU LIVE HERE."

Whew...