enterprise01

Hey, guys! I've been MIA for a while because of work and a lot of personal crises. My weight loss has stalled, but in all honesty, I have not been trying - not even a little bit. In fact, I'm eating whatever I want and not worrying about it. I did get on the scale today and am down a few more pounds. Without the band, I'm sure I would have gained 15. Seriously, I'm eating cookies, brownies, chocolate, etc. Jen -- I'm so sorry to hear about your complications. You're the first slip among us January Bandsters, aren't you? I hope your recovery goes quickly. Sunshine -- Good luck with the knee. Give us updates when you can. I haven't been able to read back through all the pages of posts but am trying to get caught up with you all. Just being on this forum is helping me get my motivation back. The personal crises are not over yet, but I've finally reached the point of acceptance and that has given me some inner peace. Among other things, I'm dealing with a very sick elderly cat, who I've spent a lot of time and money on, and I've finally accepted that his time to pass is coming soon and I need to stop fighting it -- for his sake and mine. I've been on constant vigil with him, trying to make him as comfortable as possible, so I haven't given any thought to my weight lately. But getting back on this forum is a good start to getting back on track.

Sunshine, you should be so proud of yourself. There's such an amazing difference in those photos. And not only are you shrinking, but you're looking younger, too!

Mine were closed with dissolvable sutures and then covered with steri-strips for extra reinforcement. My steri-strips stayed on for about 10-17 days. The sutures has dissolved by that time.

I'm now 20 lbs less then my boyfriend and it feels wonderful. Sunshine, you said it just right, I feel more like a woman now. I also started wearing shorts again last week. First time I've been in shorts in about 8 years. The hellishly hot weather in Houston is much more tolerable if you can dress appropriately for it. But I think I'll need brachioplasty before I can wear sleeveless tops.

There have been a couple of times since being banded that I kind of lost control and started to binge eat. Notice I said "started." When you have proper restriction, the lap-band simply does not allow you to overeat like you did pre-band. After a moderate amount of food, you're physically incapable of continuing to eat. When you've had too much, it just comes right back up. And that's why I love my lap-band.

Gotta agree with Julie on this one. I try to stick to around 800 cal most days. Anything more than 1000 cal per day and I won't lose weight at all. It's been that way for me since I was 14 years old. I've found that eating different foods from week to week helps with the weight loss. If I eat the same thing all the time, it's like my body gets used to it and then I hit a plateau. I once heard a nutritionist say that fat people need nutrients (Vitamins and minerals), not calories. If the starvation mode was a reality, I don't think we'd have those doctor supervised, liquid fasting diets that so many hospitals sponsor. I tried one of those years ago and they put me on 600 calories a day (three 200-calorie Protein shakes a day). I lost the weight fast and consistently.

Julie, it's good to hear from you. I sympathize with the butt thing. I have a definite crease where the back of the thighs meet the butt, although "crease" is an understatement. I tend to sweat a lot there, too, which makes it twice as worse to deal with. I still have at least 30 lbs to go before I can do plastic surgery, and looking back at your pictures makes me more anxious than ever. How do your scars look now?

Never heard of milk in plastic bags. In the US, it's in cartons, plastic jugs, or glass bottles. Yes, we have potato chips in lots of flavors, including sour cream & chive and salt & vinegar, but I haven't seen any curry flavored ones yet. I've only been to Canada once. That was a trip to Thunder Bay a couple of years ago. Absolutely loved it there. I went in May and it was about 50 degrees which was a welcome change from the 90 degrees in Houston. The people were very nice, but they looked pale and sickly compared to Texans. There also was a noticeable lack of wealth in that town. Maybe one of these days I'll make it to Toronto or Montreal. Back to the issue of shoes, although we gets lots of rain in Houston, my shoes only get wet, not muddy. It's a very urban environment, so I'm always walking on concrete. In fact, due to the heat, I'm rarely outside at all. I go from my attached garage at home to a covered garage at work and then I walk through tunnels to get to my office or to some place for lunch. I can't even remember the last time my shoes were wet or dirty. And certainly they are never muddy. I might feel different about the shoe issue if I were dealing with mud and snow all the time.

It seems to be a little different from month to month, but generally I seem to be looser the few days before my period, but the first 2 days of my period, I'm tighter. Stress from work seems to make it tighter, but when the stress escalates to panic, it gets looser. It's very weird.

Yes, going from 3.5 to 3.8 was a huge difference. With 3.5 ccs, I could eat anything and it went right through. At 3.8 ccs, hardly anything goes down. I had a venison snack stick for lunch (it's about the size of slim jim), and I couldn't eat another bite. It feels like it's still in my throat and I ate it more than an hour ago. I have to be very, very careful now. I'm sticking with smoothies and soup for the most part. Solid food is very unpredictable. Some days I can eat a small amount of a solid food and it's fine. The next day I can eat the same thing and it comes right back up. That's been the hardest part for me -- not knowing what's safe to eat from one minute to the next. And as BabyGotBack recently commented on, stress and TOM affect restriction, too, and you don't know which way it's going to go -- tighter or looser. Every day is a struggle trying to figure out what to eat. But I guess that's a better struggle than trying not to eat everything in sight, which is what I was dealing with until this last fill.

Thanks, Sunshine. Even though I've lost more than half of my weight, I look at the "after" pictures and my first thought is that I'm still incredibly fat. Yes, I look much better than before, but I still have a long way to go. I'm just such a pessimist. A group of my friends had a pseudo intervention with me yesterday about my skewed body image. I'm so sorry you're having such a hard time. What kind of fill doctor doesn't have omnipaque?!?!? Do you have to go to this guy? You need someone who will listen to you and work with you. I just got to my sweet spot with my last fill, so I understand your frustration. Without proper restriction, it's almost like the band isn't there and it's tough to stick with the diet and exercise when you're not getting the help from the band that you need. I might have missed this in a previous post, but why didn't you go back to your surgeon?

First 2 pics were taken two days after surgery and the last two were taken 6 months later (i.e. today). I'm down 55 lbs and have 45 more to go.

Another issue with people taking their shoes off is disease. What if they have athlete's foot or plantars warts and are walking barefooted on your floors? My doctor suspects that I got a plantars wart from having to walk barefoot through a security checkpoint at the airport since that is the only time I've ever been barefoot outside of my own home in the past 10 years.

Don't leave expensive things unattended in someone else's home (or in a public place).

Sunshine - I went from 3.5 ccs to 3.8 ccs and it made a world of difference. At 3.5 everything went right through and at 3.8 I can barely keep anything down, so let us know how it goes for you. Here are my before and after pics. The before pics (the first 2 below) are from 2 days after surgery and the after pics (the last 2 below) were taken today. I'm down 55 pounds in 6 months. I'm 45 pounds from goal.

As an American, I find this to be such an odd question. Floors are meant to be walked on by people wearing shoes. I don't want people taking off their shoes in my house unless they are good friends who came over to lounge on the couch and watch a movie with me. If a workman came to my house and had dirty shoes, I'd ask him to wipe his shoes on the doormat before coming in. God only knows how stinky his feet may be, so I certainly don't want him taking his shoes off! There's a funny episode of Sex and the City when Carrie was asked to take her shoes before coming into a friend's house. The friend wanted to keep the house free of allergens and pollutants because of her overly protected children, so she made everyone leave their shoes in the hallway. Of course, Carrie was wearing outrageously expensive Manolo Blahnik shoes (like $500 or something) and they were stolen. There's a lesson for you. And, yes, like others have stated, I would be insulted if someone asked me to take off my shoes before coming into their home. I'm not dirty and I know how to use a doormat.

Love your avatar! City on the Edge of Forever is one of my favorites, but it makes me very sad. Lobster is a very rich food and if your digestive system hasn't seen that type of food in years, then it's probably just in shock and having a hard time digesting it. I suspect it will get better in 2-3 days. The same thing happens to me when I eat my mom's shiskabobs. She marinates the beef in Italian dressing for 2 days and it's so rich that I end up with intestinal cramps for a good week. She only makes them about once a year and they are really tasty, so the cramps are worth it.

Sunshine - I hope everything is OK with your band. Please let us know what's going on as soon as you can. I have to admit I'm having a very rough time since my last fill. Nothing stays down except soup, brownies, and cookies. Needless to say, I'm not losing weight since I resort to the brownies and cookies more often than I should. Also, because I know nothing will stay down, I've gotten into this bad habit of eating whatever I want and then PBing all night long. Last night I had about 4 bites of chicken pasta parmesan and PB'd 6 times. I know I have to stop doing this or I could end up with a slip. I really don't want an unfill since this is the first time I've really had restriction.

That you are far too judgmental. Perhaps you've been blessed with resilient skin, but most of us haven't been. You might be singing a different tune if you were going through this weight loss journey at 41 or 51 instead of 31. While plastic surgery is rarely necessary, it can greatly improve one's quality of life and that alone makes it OK in my book. I was desperate enough to undergo major surgery and have a foreign object placed around my stomach in an attempt to improve my quality of life, so I'm sure I will have plastic surgery for the same reason. Mental health is as important as physical health. And when I look in the mirror everyday and hate what I see (the boobs hanging unevenly at my waist, the skin drooping from my upper arms, the flab on my inner thighs), if it's within my power (and my budget) to change those things, I will when the time is right. I still have another 40 or so pounds to lose, but I know plastic surgery will be necessary for me to regain my self-esteem. I envy people who can feel good about themselves with the loose, sagging skin, but I'm not just one of them.

I saw her not too long ago on some pseudo-news show like Good Morning America or something. She was saying that her daughter was embarrassed by her after she put on the weight and that was her incentive for going on a diet. How shallow is that? She's a drug addict and a skank and constantly makes a fool of herself in public (anyone see the MTV awards where she harassed Madonna?), but her daughter wasn't embarrassed by her until she put on 40 extra pounds. That's Hollywood for you.

For the past 3 fills, I've numbed the area myself before I go in for a fill. I have a prescription for Emla cream -- it's a topical anesthetic. I put the cream on 45 minutes before my appointment, cover it with saran wrap, and tape the edges down (kind of like a saran wrap bandage), and leave it on until they are ready to put the needle in. It works wonders -- I never feel a thing.

I'll see if I can get my BF to take a picture this weekend. I'm a little more than halfway to my goal. I've gone from a size 18/20 to a 12/14. Yes, it does seem to go slowly, but then again, it has been more effortless and less torturous than the other times I've lost weight. I think this is the first time I've ever lost weight without being completely miserable. It's also better for our skin if we lose slowly.

Sunshine and Sula -- Thanks for reminding me that pre-band I would have eaten a pan of brownies, so I shouldn't be too upset about eating only one. Newlou -- Welcome aboard. You're doing great. I'm also trying to get to 120 or lower. It seems so far away. I can barely remember the last time I weighed that. About hiccups.... I get them quite often, too. However, I don't just get them during or after eating, but I get them if I go too long without eating. I also get that nasty shoulder pain when I'm too hungry. Some people say the shoulder pain and hiccups are signs that you've eaten too much, but I tend to get them when my stomach is empty and growling up a storm. I wonder if the movement from the growling is causing the band to press on the diaphragm.

By spicy, do you mean "hot" like jalapenos? I have problems with spicy foods, like hot salsa, because I need to drink a lot of water to cool the burn in my mouth. And we all know bandsters aren't supposed to drink while eating. If you just mean spicy in the sense that the food is cooked with a lot of different spices, like Indian food, then no I don't have any problems. It passes through the same as bland food.

That's so true. The band is just keeping me from getting totally out of control. The dieting and losing weight is still all up to me. Stress from work has been taking its toll on me these past couple of weeks. I ate a huge brownie yesterday and could have kicked myself afterward. Oh well, today's a new day, and I'll try to do better.