I don't mean to steal the thread, but wanted to say to Subie66 that your friends who are eating all carbs and not exercising are probably losing a lot of muscle, are not any healthier than when they started, and probably have that weight-loss-lose-skin "turkey neck". You look incredibly healthy. It's harder to do the right thing but it's always worth it.
NatalieB, you need to do some tough love on yourself. I can eat what I want on any given day, but most of the time I choose not to. It's hard. The band was not designed to make you not eat the things that are bad for you. You have to decide to do the hard work because you want to be healthier, period. I almost died from an obesity related problem, so maybe I'm lucky that I actually got the wake up call and I get it, I know why I'm doing this. I have 2 kids and I don't want to die young. I still ate 2 cookies yesterday (and would have had chocolate if I could have found any in the house), but I also ate a lot of protein and exercised.
About 6 months after surgery, I found myself putting almost as much food on my plate as the rest of my family. If it is on my plate, I am going to attempt to eat it. It took me a while to get back into the right mindset and start serving myself small portions again. I found that if I have a small portion on my plate, I will eat that and stop.
You have to decide that you are worth the tremendous effort you have to put into making this change, and then do it!