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Hey, I thought I'd put a list together with everyone's name, date of pre-diet start and date of surgery, so we can keep those people in mind on their special day. Here's who has shared their informaiton to date: If anyone wants to add their name to the list, just post in this thread, and I'll be glad to keep the list updated (every day or so) Brenda, pre-op diet March 26, surgery April 4 (our first surgery of the month - good luck, Brenda!) Woodslass, pre-op diet March 21, surgery April 5 Spot, pre-op diet March 22, surgery April 6 Bandit!, surgery April 13 emptyNest, pre-op diet March 30, surgery April 14 MissMelo, surgery April 18 TerriF, surgery April 20 Musarion, surgery April 21 Peaches78, pre-op diet April 5, surgery April 26 JoanneD, pre-op diet March 30, surgery April 26 Jessica, pre-op diet April 15, surgery April 29 mgottbeg, surgery end of April

Hey, how great to find a group of people who are on the journey the same time as I! My name is Joanne. I'm 43, with a wonderfully supportive husband and the world's best 10-year-old son. I call him Munchkin (but try not to in front of his friends). I'm scheduled for surgery in Winnipeg, Manitoba, on April 26. I have to travel for my surgery (I live in North Vancouver, BC) because the private clinics here are limited on the patients' BMI. There are no such limits in Manitoba. So my husband will be travelling to Winnipeg for three days for surgery. I'm a regional manager for a restaurant chain. A fast food chain, no less. I have and will always have daily challenges when it comes to my work, but I have loads of colleagues who do the same job and are not overweight. I will emulate them, and bring my lunch when I visit my restaurants, or order the salad and grilled chicken breast. I share others' frustration with fitting into tight plane seats (I fly to Northern BC and other locales every second week, at least). I've reached the point where I'm not embarassed at asking for an extender. The day I don't need one any more will be a huge milestone, and I'll be celebrating that one for sure. I'm also excited at shopping at more than one store (Penningtsons, here in Canada). The thought of having hundreds of stores to choose from makes me giddy, and greatly worries my husband. He has threatened to take my credit cards away from me once I lose enough weight to need a new wardrobe. . Oh, and I remember being able to cross my legs properly just one time, and I loved it. Can't wait to have that happen again. Finally, I've started my pre-op diet. I'm on day 4, and today I could chew furniture I'm so hungry. But I'm dealing with it with good humour, and we're laughing about it. Whenever I look discouraged, my husband makes me a cup of tea. So my pre-op diet (2 shakes, 1 Protein bar, 2 cups of veggies) will actually be 4 weeks long. I'm told that this is one of the worst parts of the process, so I'll just get through this part without whining too much, and move on to the next step on the 26th. So now I have to figure out how to do that weight ticker thingie, and I look forward to getting to know all of my future bandsters much better!

I was banded 3-29-11 I was very scared, it was my first surgery. I arrived at the hospital around 6 am. I checked in and a few minutes later the nurse came and got me. I changed into the gown and got on the bed. The nurse did her thing... started IV and fluids, etc etc.. asked me a bajillion questions. The CRNA came in and asked me questions and he asked if I had any questions. I said "Are you really going to intubate me?" He looked at me with the most seriousness and paused and then said "Yea, I am". The Anesthesiologist came in and had me sign consent. Next thing I knew my surgeon was coming in and that's when I knew it was real. It was about to happen. The CRNA gave me something to calm me down because I started tearing up. I remember being wheeled to the OR and saw a line of people wearing green (the surgical staff), I said "Hello people" and then I went into the room. I remember them telling me to scoot onto the table. They had given me more drugs and I spaced out but I happen to remember them putting a mask over my face and saying "this is oxygen". I remember thinking "theres nothing coming out of this" Next thing I know I'm in the PACU and I'm hurting and feeling so sick. And I was burning up! So.. to skip all this other blah... I am 4 days post-op. I have been to the emergency room once and to see my doctor twice since getting banded. I have been feeling very nauseous and the doc gave me some meds to help counter-act that. Thank God it's helping... I just want this nausea to go away!!

If anyone has had the experience of swapping one addiction for another. ie: food to alcohol Post it O.K.... This is really quite common for some people "NOT ALL". Point is these are people that have known addiction all there life, "FOOD" so when they get over the food addiction, lose a great deal of weight., they have already picked up another addiction. This way it keeps them from going back to their food addiction. The pattern continues. I have a son who has given up the bottle, only to discover that he loves to eat everything. He's 36, and has been very thin, and a very picky eater all his life. But the bottle was a great life to him. Now he totally loves food. I keep telling him, remember me! I no what a food addiction is... He agrees, he said he would rather be fat then a Drunk. I agree to that thought, but,,, I told him don't get to fat ! It's to hard to get off. He doesn't look fat, just thickened out. But still you have to watch... What's not fare about a food addiction "I THINK" is you need food to live, it's a must. So to tempt you every day is rough! Booze and Drugs are your own choice. You don't need them to live. I met a lot of people like this at Band Meetings. The one I will never forget was a man that lost over 400LBS. with the Band. He was also a memember of A A & N A. He was my first experience as to swapping addictions..

I had my surgery on May 23. It went fairly smooth. I had the heprin shot to the tummy I really didn't feel it. Rolled into the surgery at 9:30 and was rolling out at 10:30am. Was in the recovery for 1 hour then off to a room. I was lucky didn't get the sore throat I was expecting. Once in the room I was basically left alone. Slept off and on till about 3pm. Then had to ask for help to get up. Waited awhile before some one showed up. At 4pm finally got up and walked the halls. Felt sore and some discomfort but not terrible. Walked the halls three more times. Had very little Water because wasn't thristy but I knew I had to drink. Left the hospital at 7pm and was in my own bed by 8:30pm. I had the option of staying but was not really impressed with the nursing staff. Better treatment from my hubby. Today, still some discomfort walking around the house and out to the mail box. Took half a gas-X table because of some gas. Stopped it right away. Been drinking fluilds and trying to get the Protein in. Found a chocolate milk 1% with 17 grams of protein only 210 calories. Hopefully everyone has a sucessful surgery and recovery

I had my surgery on May 13th and I don't think things could have went any smoother....I got to the hospital at 5am and was prepped and taken to the OR at 7:30. The doc came out and told my hubby that everything went great at about 8:30. I rested in the room and went for my xray at about 1:00. I went home at about 6:00 that evening. Unfortunately I didn't get to rest much after I got home. My mother had a brain tumor and really took a turn for the worst on the 14th. We stayed at her bedside until she passed away on the 19th. Thankfully, I had some gas pains that were pretty tolerable. Most of my soreness was gone in about 10 days...I haven't had any problems at all and as a matter of fact, I ate my first "meal" today. I had a small piece of salmon, some cottage cheese and blended broccoli, cheese and potatoes. It was wonderful!! I hope you all had as good of a surgery as I did..God, I'm sure, made sure I would be able to be there and tell my sweet momma goodbye love to all,

May 21st was a long day, but I think it went well. We were supposed to get there at 7 a.m. for a 10 a.m. surgery slot. DH was worried about being late, so we got there at 6:30 a.m. We checked in, and were taken to a small walled-in room where the nurse went over my vitals with me. I changed into the ultra-fashionable gown, opening to the back, as well as the socks with the tread design. Once I laid down on the gurney, they put the massaging things on my legs, and connected the air. A scopolamine patch was placed behind my ear for possible nausea. It's supposed to last three days. The IV of saline was started, and we waited. Julie, Dr. Clark's Physician's Asst, came in to check on not long before 9, and said that they were getting ready to do a bypass, and that I was next after that. She also gave me a goody bag. The goody bag had several items from On-Q, a pain moderating apparatus. I had it when I had my last intestinal surgery, and wondered if I would have it for this, since this was going to be laproscopic. She said no, it was just some goodies she wanted to give me. On-Q is an IV type set-up where thin lines are run on each side of an incision to deliver morphine right to the incision, instead of having the morphine affect the whole body. I really liked it how it worked, but I'm glad I didn't get it for this surgery, and I don't think I needed it at all. The items in the goody bag were a pedometer/FM radio combination and a set of pens, and a Water bottle, all embossed with "On-Q". The nurse gave me a shot of Heparin in the leg. That stuff burns going in! It's not unbearable, but it does sting. The IV was turned up pretty high to really pump in the saline, and I got up at about 9:30 to pee. The nurse said that they do this so that the patients will void their bladders, since they want empty bladders for surgery. After I got up, they turned the drip rate down. Dr. Wong, the anesthesiologist came in, introduced himself to me, and he told me what would happen once we got to the ER. I've been operated on before, so I wasn't worried about that part. I ended up getting wheeled into surgery at 10:52 a.m. Dr. Wong put a strap over my forehead that held monitors for my sleep rate, and my arm was stretched out to the side. An injection was made in the IV, and I could smell the taste (if that makes sense). He said that most people just comment that they can taste something in their mouths once they get that injection, but I felt that I could actually smell what it tasted like since the taste seemed to be right up at the top front of my mouth. The oxygen mask went on, I was instructed to take deep breaths, and the next thing I knew I was back in my little walled cubicle. I think I recall being in a recovery room, and getting my mouth swabbed, but I couldn't swear to anything that happened there. After I was more awake, but still groggy, I was taken down to radiology for the barium swallow so they could check the placement of the band. Once we got there, I sat up on the edge of the gurney, and sat there for a while because I was light-headed and felt nauseated. The nurse waved an alcohol swab under my nose to help with the nausea. I finally felt ready to go in for the swallow, and they handed me a large glass full of thin barium. I almost dropped the cup, but was able to warn them before hand, so they took it from me, and gave me another minute to stand there. I finally managed to get a few drinks down, and they decided that it would be better to by-pass the standing x-rays. They put the x-ray bed down, and I laid down on it. Then the meanie doctor made me roll over a couple times. I told him that I was going to moon him for revenge for making me roll, and he just laughed. The rolling was uncomfortable, but I managed. Everything looked good, and I even got to see the screen to see what the band looked like on an x-ray. I was then taken back to the cubicle, and could definitely feel every bump when we crossed the elevator threshold or any doorway thresholds. I didn't feel them on the way down. My throat was really dry, so I was able to have ice chips and a popsicle, and that really helped. I was also given a dose of the liquid lortab, and was really happy to have that popsicle as a chaser to get rid of the taste. I was given my choice of what I wanted to try to eat. Out of the cream-of-wheat, scrambled eggs, cottage cheese, cream of chicken Soup, mashed potatoes, and pudding, I chose the eggs and potatoes. No problem getting that down. I was allowed 2 medicine cups full of food. I was finally let go at about 4:30. As I was getting into the wheelchair, I told DH that I thought he should drive home. The nurse looked startled for a minute, and then she realized I was joking! We're looking for a car for our daughter, and since we were in Indy where there are several car dealerships within a few miles of the hospital, we decided (I insisted) that we not waste the opportunity. DH stopped and got me a bottle of Fiji water to sip on for the drive. He drove through several lots so we could see what was available. If we saw anything that looked like a possibility, he got the details from the salesman, but no test drives. We just wanted to see what kind of prices are being asked. I had no problems being in the car for that extra hour that we spent driving through the lots. Anyway, I slept most of the way home. We stopped to fill my prescriptions on the way home. I was given liquid lortab, Ursodiol (to prevent gall stones), and Protonix (for acid reflux). The pharmacy had to make the liquid lortab, so that took a little while. Not that I really noticed, because I was asleep in the car. Once I got home, I took another dose of lortab, and then rested a while. I went to bed at 11, and had to make a wedge to recline on using my pillows, since lying flat was not comfortable. I woke up at about 9:30 this morning. I'm still sore, coughing hurts even with a pillow against my abdomen, and it's a bit painful to take deep breaths. It's definitely bearable though. I am planning on wearing my binder for at least one week, since it feels good to have that support. Good luck to everyone else!

If you say so, Elfiepoo. *sigh*