M2G

Congrats on your loss and wow you hardly look like the same person! It IS happening over here...I gave up on OH a long time ago because I like how things are "categorized" over here. Been here nearly 3 years (in Sept 2010t) and sleeved almost 3 also (Oct 2010) Welcome back...check out the (new) Vet's Forum for those of us who are little further out from surg... http://www.verticalsleevetalk.com/forum/352-gastric-sleeve-veterans-forum-new-forum/

Well, I guess it can be "official" I finally broke my stall and now since July 16, 2013 I have lost... -10lbs Woo hoo! I teetered on the the -9lbs thing for a loooooong time. So I'm hoping this sticks. I did see a smidge lower than that (-11) last Fri am after my 2nd day of fasting and then the weekend came and there was a dinner party and some lovely Tuaca to drink and that new low-low quickly vanished. But I'm going to call it official since today is my weigh-in day for the 5:2 way.

Just need to jump on the bandwagon here...FYE, there is just NO effing way I would believe that you are 60. Nope. You are beautiful and I love what you said about dragging out the old pics. Funny, besides a few odd clothing items that I kept (for that same reason) the photos are all that I have to remind me of how far I've come. Well, that and memories. OD - hope your Headache is gone! Dee - love this. Burning daylight...yes yes yes...no reason to dwell on negative thoughts/behaviors...accomplishes nothing BUT burning daylight! Great analogy! And you are so right, THIS is ALL a GIFT. Thank you for reminding us of that! Welcome ilegal...funny I wanted to type iLegal...um, iPhone, iPad much? LOL! Congrats you are doing awesome! Coops - wondering the same thing...ice slice...I'm guessing it's NOT just a slice of "ice" ...maybe like an ice cream cake? I do so love your BritSpeak and I love trying to decipher the things you post. :wub: GT- Love the Christmas tree story...horrifyingly sad as a child to read (burned him really? argh) but such an important message. So I fasted yesterday, and came it at my lowest I think to date. 514 (or 518...my calorie count app on my phone and on my laptop are supposedly 'snyched' but from the phone I was 514 and from the laptop I was 518...gah!) Today is feasting and my goal is at least 1,200 cals.

S ~ you look amazing! We've talked about this before and how beautiful you were BEFORE the VSG and how amazingly beautiful you are now. I know you have put in the hard work to stay in your weight range, and we all know how easy it is for some weight to come back on. You have done not only an incredible job pre-and post-op with your weight loss but you have inspired and lifted up many people here at VST. CONGRATS my friend on your 3 year anniversary...cheers to the new and improved you! ~S

OMG, GT, LOVE this! Really I do. I so wish I could go back in time and have a little ole chat with my former self. Gah. No looking back, no regrets, only moving forward. LOVE THIS ALSO. Omgosh that is some good stuff right there. Exactly. The grass is *always* greener, the *next* thing will make me happy...blah blah blah...embrace the here and now because living in the past is no good, living in the future doesn't do any good...being present HERE and now, such a good reminder. Sooo, fasting today. And I start classes again today (already have my bachelor's degree but that was soooooo long ago, trying to brush up on some skills...going for a certificate) and my brain is SO NOT ready for summer to end and school to start.

Welcome and CONGRATS! That is awesome!

Wow, deep thoughts going on around here! I agree we all need to be kinder, more gentle to ourselves. Some of us have reached a goal, only to have it cruelly snatched away due to pregnancy, medication, our own doing, and some of us have never even reached that goal, sitting by watching others climb down the scale getting their victory. Goal. What is that? Was it to wear a certain size? Or look fabulous? Or was it to stop the obesity cycle and have a fighting chance to live a "normal" life, uncomplicated by the risk factors that obesity brings (edited to add that a certain size or looking fab are definitely a bonus!! Can't deny it!) And while we all get the "idea" behind what surgery promised us...none of us knew what would be waiting for us at the finish line. Would we trade all the fat in the world for loose skin and less hair? We said YES (knowing there was a good chance of that happening) but we also said "we don't care we are sick of being THIS BIG, living this way..." But the reality of living with what we are left with after the initial high of losing the weight is gone, well that really is testing the mettle. I admit that self-sabotage was part of the way I lived when I was morbidly obese. And sometimes I have a hard time telling that voice to SHUT IT. Because let's face it, I knew I was not going to come out of this perfect. Better, yes...perfect, no. So I have to remember how miserable I felt when the obesity hung around my waist, my thighs, my every organ. It's not fun to live like that, which is why I had surgery. I wanted to have fun in life, instead of sitting around waiting for it to get better. Surgery was the brass ring on the carousel...my last chance. So did I ever get to goal? Nope Will I ever give up? Nope When I do get to goal (my goal, not my surgeon's, not the BMI calculator's version...MY goal) will I sit like a Queen on her throne eating bon bons? NOPE Life is for living, not waiting for the "next" best thing to come along. If I could go back in time and have a little chat with my high-school age self who THOUGHT she was fat, OMG...what would I say? I would say LOVE WHO YOU ARE. Look how tiny you are and you don't even know it! Enjoy yourself, love yourself, be kind to yourself! We all need to remember this. Buuut, it doesn't mean we can't vent or whine here because let's face it loving ourselves is not always easy. So we need that reminder once in a while.

Good to see you around Jenn! I remember when you had the plication done...I'm sorry it didn't work out for you and glad you got the sleeve. Best of luck to you!

If it wasn't so heavy I would send one to ya!

OD, you ok? That would be a scary fall after what you just went through with your wrist. And then you fell again? Gosh I hope everything is ok...that is too many falls in a short time period. Java is a programming language and I have trouble here (long running script message) when I use explorer to log on. I do better on Firefox or Chrome here. I think Java is used to create a lot of the flashing ads on the site and I'm not sure about all the specifics but Explorer and some of the ads don't play nice and then while you are trying to read the forum, things get glitchy and the scripts cause everything to timeout. Maybe try to re-download Firefox or try Chrome. Cheri- that would tick me off to high heaven...I hope you get a resolution that doesn't involve drugs.I agree if you are done having kids, time to look into more options (but I hear what you are saying since you are military the care...etc. Ugh. Sorry!) FYE - wow your dad sounds very strong and amazing, I'm glad you could be there for him, and I hope he is healing nicely. And wow about the waist measurements...holy cow that is awesome. I have not taken measurements in a long time because they were pretty much the same always. Ms.S - how was your day? I hope you were able to accomplish your goal. I hate when I find myself eating and it's not because I'm hungry. GT - I know lots of post-ops who eat oatmeal...but I don't also because of the carbs. Maybe someone who does can chime in. I know my NUT always says to stir in a bit of Protein Powder to it, to boost the Protein content.

I know a few people who have that scar and (yes they are years out) but it's hardly noticeable. But I think I would feel exactly like you do. So feel free to whine and vent. And this is interesting...the whole topic about what keeps "us" here. My husband is sleeved (2.5 years ago) and has zero desire to join "message" board to interact with other post-ops. For myself, I've been to so many physical support groups, offered by my surgeon, I've lost count. When I do "drag" him with me to group on occasion, I can tell it's not his bag. And it's not a male vs female thing (although I'm pretty sure women outnumber the men here and also in the support groups I attend) but I just wonder about those of us who need support vs those who don't. And in case you are wondering, he lost about -70lbs and keeps his weight within a +/-5lb window easily. Much more easily than myself. But it's all good. We support each other but obviously we gain support in vastly different ways.

Coops, welcome back and I'm so happy about the bikini...you probably rocked it and since you bought that flat tummy by God the sun should shine all over it! Sweet...I'm so sorry that you are in a tough place. Awareness is such a good thing, and it sounds like you are not trying to sweep everything under the rug. Single parenting is hard when you have a good partner who normally is pretty helpful and you start feeling overwhelmed not having that extra person around. Going back to work after staying home is a huge adjustment. Don't stress about your eating right now, you can always buckle down once things settle. LV...sorry the first week has already brought issues. We just finished our first week also and I'm so tired and I wasn't the one who had to go to school (not yet, that starts next week for me...ugh.) Ms.S...I love that while you are encouraging SS you found that you needed to take your own advice. Great thing about these forums... So yesterday was a fast day...ended at 546. Today was a feed day and I decided to make Cookies and pulled a frozen pizza from the freezer for dinner. So far logging my cookies and pizza (oh and I made a salad to go with my pizza) I'm at 1478. I couldn't finish the whole slice of pizza which is good, but still it was quite expensive calorically speaking. Oh and I saw a new low on the scale but waiting until tues to see if it 'sticks."

Butter...GREAT article. Wow. Thanks for posting. Even though we don't have a "pouch" and the mechanics are slightly different, I think there are some great takeaways from this really informative article. Thanks for sharing. I don't know that I need to fluid load to keep hunger at bay (though it's worth trying) but when I wait about a hour (and setting the timer on the phone keeps me accountable, otherwise it's easy to "forget" when you last took a bite, etc.) I notice that the food I eat definitely lasts longer in my sleeve and keeps me full and keeps hunger at bay. YES! This IS important and I too had gotten a bit lazy. I still never eat and drink together, (I tackled that problem from day one) but I had gotten sloppy about timing. Did I finish my meal at 12:30. And it's 12:45...okay to drink? Hard to remember with every meal. So I find that keeping myself accountable on this really helps a ton! It's just one of the rules that is easy to not pay close attention to, but it makes a huge difference IMO. Lynda, thanks for sharing this. I will admit at first, seeing all the numbers and charts and jargon were an instant turn-off for me. However, this article is well worth the time it takes to read it. And it DOES address the hunger issue that has been cropping up in this thread. It also does have 2 cases of being resleeved due to "fundus regeneration" so again going back to a physical complication with their sleeve. (The article does a good job explaining this also.)

Well, I had "lack of hunger" for a good two years post-op. Now that I'm getting closer to 3 years, it has (sadly) returned. But like BTB said it is NO where near the level it was pre-surg. and it is definitely manageable. When I eat carbs/sweets/crap, the hunger rears it's ugly head. When I eat on plan, notsomuch. The 5:2 also really cuts my hunger down tremendously. Interesting ...that eating triggers more eating. While fasting...seems to promote less eating. Oh and I have recently extended my time window for drinking. I had gotten a little lazy about drinking too soon after eating. Like my window had been narrowed down to 15-25 minutes and in the last month or so, I will set the timer on my phone and NOT drink any Water until I'm at least 45 minutes past my last meal. Sometimes I go longer but my new minimum is 45 minutes. It makes a huge difference in physical hunger to me.

:lol:

In your OP I thought you were saying the article talked about hunger but I was confused. The hunger coming back came from a diff. source than the article...

Exactly what I have seen/heard before also. There was someone here who was left with basically a large sleeve (can't remember exact details but like 60% or something of their orig. stomach) and she was looking to be re-sleeved. I know of another blogger who described having a "malformation" of her sleeve and was looking to be re-sleeved but as far as I know she hasn't gone through with it.

LV- JUST re-read your OP. Sorry...the hunger thing was from the bariatric surgeon's office...sorry!

"Over 5 years of follow-up, 77.9% of patients developed Vitamin D deficiency, 41.2% had Iron deficiency, 39.7% had zinc deficiency, 39.7% had a vitamin B12 deficiency, 25% had a folic acid deficiency, and 10.3% developed anemia. These deficiencies occurred "despite routine supplementation, in a higher rate than we had expected," the researchers wrote." That is a little disturbing. I'm wondering how consistent supplementation was? And if they were deficient before surgery or it developed strictly after? Bah, not loving the article I must say. But, LV, I didn't read anything about hunger level. Did I miss something?

Yes, that is how my brain unscrambled their damn medical code. LOL! I just like to "gloss" over things that include mathmatical equations, or something that would require me to look up a conversion chart. So I just read it as BMI of 35....

That is how I would translate that. Pretty crappy way of saying it though. They should just stick with excess weight, IMO.

K, I'll bite. I believe what they are saying is that almost 35% (of the group who were virgin sleevers) and 50% of the band-revised-to sleeve group were still with a higher BMI after 5 years. Basically that they never reached a goal weight that would put them out of the range of "risk" factors associated with having a higher BMI. They were still considered medically obese.

Is re-sleeving really an option? I know you can do a RNY after the sleeve (and of course you can to the DS after the sleeve) but I was under the general impression that re-sleeving is super-tricky. The place where you have been cut, stapled, and some of us oversewn, that would be considered a weak spot in the stomach. So what do they do, take the remaining 15% of your stomach and cut another 5%? Or would it have to be more like 10% and then you are left with 5% of stomach? I just don't think this seems feasible.

Shoot. If you lived closer I would buy you a jar. If you know someone who has one just ask them to pick you up a jar. I swear the same size jar at the grocery store is about $17!! I just went and checked mine at it's a 26oz jar. It lasts a long time because I'm really the only one in the family who likes it.