M2G

Some of the others that were put into this general category were the Lounge, Rants & Raves, Technical Assistance, Clothing Exchanges, etc.

Scroll all the way to the bottom and select "General Bariatric Forums" and there you will find that some of the more GENERAL topics were lumped together instead of being broken out into the different varying forms. Crazy but true...

Looking good GG! BOTH of you looking good! WTG! And thank goodness you kept your heads on....so so so much better!

To the OP...I'm so sorry about all of your complications, that sounds really awful and I'm glad you were able to fix the damage and live to tell your story. I wish you all the best with your sleeve and look forward to hearing more about your journey. Hello to the band people reading/viewing/posting here...welcome! While I appreciate that you have had wonderful experiences with your band, I respectfully disagree that THIS THREAD is the place to go and promote how happy you are with your band. The OP, posted this in the TELL YOUR GASTRIC SLEEVE SURGERY STORY, which is an appropriate place for this. She didn't go over to the band forum and start bashing bands, and trying to scare people away. She said she will be reporting this to the FDA (and yay, it *should* be reported...) because it is HER TRUTH. Not everyone has the same experience with any of the surgeries, there are risks, complications, variations of patient compliance with EACH and EVERY surgery. I welcome different viewpoints and while I think that you all have valid points about your happiness with your bands, I just don't think this was the place to post about it. Please have respect for all of our members.

I know, right? When the guy said 5'5"...I turned around and went WHAT? He was like "oh and a quarter, I'll give you that as well" ...thanks dude for the favor. Sheesh. I think it must have been a quarter. I was all ready to DEMAND a recount right then and there!!

YES! I used to be 5'6" and when I went to my PCP in Sept they called it 5'5" and a half or a quarter or something. I guess it does make sense, but it means I'm even FURTHER away from that stupid BMI chart saying what I should weigh.

Sarsar...I LOVE this! "Seems like a lot of us are in a funk. All I know to try to do is put one foot in front of the other, take one day at a time. This is for life and we will have these ups and downs forever. I just keep trying to march forward..." Yep, we have our ups and downs and sometimes when the downs arrive they are a hard hole to climb out of. I wish this was not only a "closed" group but "private" as well...closed meaning everyone can read but only members can post and private meaning only members can read and post. Sigh. Fasting today ladies...last week I only fasted ONE day and that was after taking 10 days off from the 5:2 completely. So I REALLY need to lock down 2 days this week to fast. So far it's 1pm and I've worked out for 2 hours and my cals are right at 189...so I'm in a good spot to have 300 cals for dinner which is a good chunk. My positive to interject today is that I'm taking a women & weights class and putting plastics on hold. Now I know that weight lifting isn't going to give me the results that plastics would but it certainly can't hurt and it makes me *feel* like I'm doing *something* instead of just bemoaning the state I'm in. Plus it clears the cobwebs and makes me feel good. So I took a 6 week session, had a one week break from class and started the next 6 week session today. My instructors quote was "we are so happy you are back, you are really strong...I've had ladies who take this class for an entire year to get to your fitness level...and you don't whine or complain a lot, so I'm happy you are back!" YAY!

Haha Butter... I kept waiting for it to show up... (p.s. like your new profile pic also!!) So now I'm at 84.9 miles for the month. Started back to my women & weights class this week and the fitness center messed up and allowed 8 women (should be capped at 6) to join the group, so the instructor is mad and she is trying to get two "yoga" ladies to be frustrated enough to quit. Oh my. Talk about a punishing workout!

You look GREAT and I saw on the 5:2 thread the close up of the arms and I have to say for only being a few weeks out they look amazing! I bet you will be so happy when all is said and done!

Thank you so much!!! I had been poking around in there but didn't "see" it because it came up blank, but when I clicked the little down arrow, that is when I saw the "choices" of surgery! YAY!

THANK YOU FYE for the link! Does anyone know how to change the wording under my photo...so it will say Sleeve instead of Band?

Okay FYE...where is my blankie and protien hot chocolate? THANK GOD YOU POSTED A LINK in the Vet's forum or I would have never found this place again. Couldn't log in for several days and I *see* that I have missed a BUNCH! Aaargh! Will try to go back and read as time allows. I find it interesting that I used to have like 2,000 posts when it was the old VST and now I have like over 6,000? Everyone else seems to have bumped up by the thousands! Has anyone seen or heard that being addressed? Not that I care I just wonder if somone went around adding posts by the thousands to everyone. Gah! Plus I see that I'm still listed as LAP-BAND...really? Never had one never will! it's going to take time before I'm happy here again (girl doesn't like change...grrrrr!) OKAY, taking a DEEP BREATH here, sooooo, the OLD vst had us at like 89 or 90 pages, I came on here after not being able to log on for several days to find that there was 125 pages and I was like WHAT? The translators must have goofed up the page numbering along with all of our post numbering etc. Going to go see if I can figure out how to change the lap-band to sleeve under my profile... Oh also wondering...can ANYONE post here now? I'm thinking so...

Okay, THAT was *fun* trying to find this thread. Sheesh! I'm up to 69 miles for the month, but more importantly, I FINALLY was able to try the 1.5 hour spin class. It's offered every Sat. am but only ONE Sat. a month it's taught by my favorite instructor. So finally made it and did much better than I thought I would. It was a different kind of intensity than the 1 hour long class, but still fairly brutal. The one thing that I didn't like was that I was really tired the rest of the day. It was from 7-8:30am and I really just wanted to come home and nap. lol. But that didn't happen, of course, and so I kept thinking...I thought exercise was supossed to GIVE you energy, not take it away! HA!

Yes yes yes exactly Kim. That is exactly it. I really enjoyed the days that I took a break from the 5:2, even though I *thought* it would be easy to fast without my kids around I found the opposite to be true. Instead of killing myself or beating myself up over the fact that I wasn't fasting, I decided to ENJOY it. Yep, it was sort of hard climbing back on the wagon but once I got my head in the game then it was easy. Cheri, that is crazy! I wonder about people like that...the ones who have it all "looking" perfect on the outside, but at what cost? What is the most important thing? I think it's funny that it was the women who were all crazy-health nuts and the husbands were more on the sane side.

Wait are you still wanting the RNY? You are 225 with a goal of 195? That is do-able with the sleeve but it's going to take more effort than how easily things come off for the first 6-12 months post-op. If you are not tracking your food, I suggest trying it for a while and see if there is any detectible pattern. Free sites are caloriecount.about.com, myfitnesspal and sparkpeople just to name a few. I've found for me personally all I need to do is eat 100-300 more calories a day than my "norm" to make the weight quickly pile on. Time to go back to basics, get back on the scale more than once every month or two, (I would suggest at least weekly) increase your Water, and cut out any extra snacking. Focus on lean Protein, and measure/weigh/track your food. Also if you are exercising more or building muscle that might account for a gain, maybe not all 10lbs though. So take a look at your exercise patterns and see if you have been building more muscle. I think that losing from 225 to 195 is completely reasonable to do with the sleeve without resorting to the RNY. Just my 2 cents!

Kelly, I completely understand where you are coming from and how easy it is to regain the weight. I just passed my 3 year "surgiversary" (wrote all about it here) http://www.verticalsleevetalk.com/topic/97887-3-years-ago-today-i-had-the-vsg/ But basically for me, personally, it's quite easy to gain weight and so so so hard (and not to mention slow!) to lose it. I regained about 20ish pounds in 2012 from basically March until Dec. (well actually into Jan of this year) and so far this year I've lost about -12lbs of that regain. So that just goes to show you how supreme the effort needs to be in order to lose the regain. BUT...the good news is that YOU CAN DO THIS!!! Start tracking your food, and I'm sure you will be surprised to learn that calorically-speaking you eat more than you *think* you do. And another big thing is that you will probably find that you are not eating as much as a "normal" non-surgically-altered person. At my *worst* the days when I was really snacking and eating a lot, I would top out at about 1,600-1,900 calories. And sadly, yep that is all I needed to eat in order to gain weight. In order for me personally to lose I need to eat much much less calories. My zone is to not go over 1,400ish calories. The other good news is that you are HERE! You can stop the regain right now and start making decisions based on getting the scale moving in the right direction. Working out is definitely something I encourage everyone to do. And working out to sweaty exhaustion will also make a huge difference in your physical shape. I was stuck for a long time in the mentality that "yay I worked out today" even if it wasn't a HARD workout, I was happy that I was doing something. But now I shoot for more than something and try for some definite goals. Hang in there and check in here often...it certainly has helped me!

Oh my goodness, SO GLAD I posted in time because unleashing Georgia on me...wow, don't throw me in the briar patch! Seriously thanks for getting me going here... So because I was lazy for the first couple of days this month, I had to do a double workout today...and I accomplished a very important goal of mine, which was do a weight workout without a trainer pushing me. In fact, I took my husband to the gym with me and it was SO fun showing him all the things that I've learned in the last 6 weeks. Course he did higher weights on EVERYTHING (and made it look easy... ) but he was great and let me take the lead and pick out all the exercises. We did a 1.5 hour workout and then he had a date with a conference call for work so I stayed and did my spin class. Oh and did a mile on the elliptical while waiting for them to open the doors to spin. So between spin, walking during our weight training and the elliptical I logged an even 20 miles today.

FYE - You are awesome little lady! So happy for you! Cheri - I think that totally sucks about your dr. and I *hope* you can find someone new. What a royal PIA to have to do the dance, the circles the frustration. Gah! You sound more educated than SHE is! Hugs, I know this stuff isn't easy. CGJ - I'm sure once you are all healed, and the drains (YUCK HATE DRAINS!) are gone and the swelling is gone you will love the final result. It's just the going through the miles of poo poo to get to the awesome rainbow at the end that sucks. I think it's okay to be in a bit of a funk right now, I think it's probably quite expected, sort of goes with the territory. Brown - I do not think this sounds like a good fit for you. At my gym, they have a ton of Silver Sneakers classes for more "mature" crowds. Can you google that and see if there is anything close by that you can take a look at. Coops - I just know that feeling that bounce zone that my body is only to happy to stay in ...argh! I feel for ya but just know you are NOT alone...and someday our bodies will give into our demands that we lose and get to that new bounce zone...IT WILL HAPPEN! Alright ladies, I did it...FASTED for the first time in like 10 days or something crazy like that. Came in at 560 but I will SO take that! It was mind thing really because I wasn't hungry AND it was a double-workout day which I normally don't combine double-workout day and fasting but I backed myself into this corner by blowing my plans for a Mon. fast and Wed (tomorrow) I'm having lunch with some friends so that didn't seem like a good fast day to me. So anyway, it's done and I have to say MIND OVER MATTER!!! Hang in there ladies!!!

Freezing and fasting... That's what's shakin today!

Jumping late also: Goals for the month: 1. Miles: 175 total 2. Re-signed up for my weight class and honestly I don't have any goals because the trainer kicks our butt...so I guess my goal is to keep up and have perfect attendance. I got the perfect attendance (given to ME by MYSELF ) award last month because out of 6 ladies I was the only one who showed up 2x a week for 6 weeks! 3. This is my "off" week from weight class, so my goal is to do a weight-bearing workout at least 2x this week by myself...no trainer to push me so hopefully I will keep that strength going. Trying to be mindful of the fact that Thanksgiving means travel to visit family, so my big goal for that is to NOT be a slacker the week of Thanksgiving!

OD - Did Allen not pick up all his stuff on purpose? Or was it just too much for him to get in one fell swoop? Aargh, I know you had hoped he would be done and you guys could move on. GT - I do love Eggface stuff, the only problem is a whole 15 ounce can of pumpkin will literally make tons of mini muffins. Or I could portion it out (but I'm really the only one who likes pumpkin stuff, like pumpkin pancakes, etc.) My kids literallly GROAN if I bake healthy and refuse to eat it. Hubby isn't big on baked stuff either. So yeah Sarsar has the right idea, bake and keep and few and give the rest away? I think Cheri is big on baking also! Lots of bakers around here.

Just wanting to say a quick thank you to my fellow VETS here in the Vet's Forum for encouraging me, lifting me up, and being there for the long haul! I know several of you who went before me OD, Coops, GT, etc. and a few of you who were really close to my date as well and a lot of you were who were after me. But staying HERE at VST and being encouraging to me is awesome and I just wanted to say thanks. (If you want to see my before/afters I posted here) http://www.verticalsleevetalk.com/topic/97887-3-years-ago-today-i-had-the-vsg/ I celebrated by purchasing some new spin shoes and doing a double workout (weight lifting for a hour and spin for an hour!) I have wanted some of these for so long and a 3 year 'anniversary' seemed like a good time to treat myself! They weren't cheap but totally worth the investment and way better than cake (well, ok, *almost* better than cake...) Anyway, 3 years is a long time to be on a message board but I wouldn't be here without some of my fellow vets and for that I'm so grateful. THANK YOU!

And supersweetums...we are missing her too! Gosh ladies I just had an epic fail of a day. Pffffttt. Totally thought I could fast today and then realized I had leftovers for lunch that I couldn't just push to dinner because I was planning to make a large family dinner. Gah. So I ate my leftovers, and had some snacks and even a smidge of ice cream. I stopped short of making some pumpkin muffins because I just *wanted* them but I knew that no one else will really eat them with me. So then I would wrap them in plastic and put them in the freezer after a few days. Then in a few months I would throw them away. So I guess at some point I *will* make some muffins but take them to some people and share them because I hate just wasting food. Sarsar, I don't have SAD (well not really, with the time time change yesterday getting dark at 4:30 just truly sucked!) but I don't really suffer from SAD, maybe some others don't either...plus I live in CO where we get over 300+ days a year of sunshine, so that really does help I think. We will pull through the next few months because we have each other to lean on! Ladies I HAVE HAVE HAVE to fast tomorrow. This is getting ridiculous! I seriously need this...so LV and Cathy tomorrow, K? Who else? WE ARE ON IT!

You will probably get more answers here: http://www.sleeveplicationtalk.com/ From what I hear from most plication people is that their results are lackluster and they don't get the reduced hunger that most sleevers get. I know my surgeon ONLY does plication combined with the band, he won't do plication alone.

Hummm, sounds more like OH which I am not a big fan of... Fasting today, although my hard boiled egg, coffee creamer and hunk o cheese have put me up near 300 already. Gonna be a long wait until dinner time...