GeezerSue

Disclaimer: We should all follow our own doctors' recommendations. Now: Many of the very, very experienced surgeons have far more liberal schedules about resuming eating. When I got my band, my surgeon had done over 1400 band placements and his diet was ABOUT a week (total) on clear then full liquids. Then progress little by little, to purees, then mushies then solids, over the next two to three weeks. BUT...I don't think ANY surgeon would want you on solids, no matter how well you chew them, two weeks post-op. This time is all about letting the band area heal with the band in place. (I'll do a separate, whiney post about how the surgeons undermine our efforts with unrealistic dietary restrictions.) Good luck, Sue

Cannot answer from personal experience, however...I have read about that phenomenon over and over again. It makes sense. For those inclined to retain fluids, those fluids are retained in all the cells in the body, including in the area near the band. More fluids = smaller stoma. Sue

Background: Before I was banded, I always ate Breakfast. I always ate everything. Since banding and getting good restriction, I have been unable to eat until give-or-take three or so hours after I get up. So, after forty years of drinking black coffee/nothing added, I'm now drinking half nonfat milk-half coffee with some no sugar added vanilla flavoring. Concern: I'm working on my eating behaviors and my counselor told me that breakfast is important and that drinking coffee eventually sets us up for being really hungry later. (If I've got that right.) She told me to try to eat breakfast and it might be a matter of learning a new habit...start with little portions, etc. I'm wondering if I am being my usual resistant-to-change self and just don't want to try to eat when it might be difficult, or if I should just re-explain to my counselor that banded folks have real physiological eating-in-the-morning issues. Questions: (finally ) Since banding, how do you deal with the first meal of the day? SPEAK UP, PEOPLE!

October 15th of THIS YEAR? If so, you are supposed to be healing from the surgery, not losing weight. Immediate and enormous weight loss is the result of RnY, not the LapBand. I hope somebody made that clear to you before you had surgery. Your weight loss begins after the healing and after you experience restriction. This is not supposed to be immediate, and to put that kind of pressure on yourself will lead to disappointment. Sue By the way, I don't know you're post-op dietary restrictions, but the sticking to the diet is also about healing, not losing weight. You need to give you band time to heal in place.

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Very helpful, shellyj! Had good regional info, most places don't. Thank you.

Yes, it's totally normal...at least based on my experience it is. But it will not last forever, and you probably won't starve in the interim. Do keep up on the protein, though. Without it, you'll start to feel less good. Sue

Here's a link to some relatively recent info on the immunizations. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002025.htm Please read and discuss....:cheeky Sue

GET ONE! If you have a band and do not get a flu shot, you are playing Russian Roulette with your band. Go get the shot. I get them; my 80-year-old mother gets them. Anyone who CAN get one and does not is needlessly exposing him/herself and his/her loved ones and neighbors and co-workers to a disease that actually causes many deaths each year. They could end up costing themselves a new surgery to repair band damages. GO! NOW! GET YOUR FLU SHOT! Thank you and have a nice day! Sue

Alexandra, because I've had really scary (mycoplasma) pneumonia and know what THAT kind of coughing can feel like, I'm thinking that the severe non-productive coughing spasms that sometimes accompany the flu can jeopardize the band and/or port placement. (If I'm wrong here, let me now so I can stop nagging.) Nothing is wrong with your logic, except maybe the following: I rant and rave until my healthy, young (28) daughter gets her immunization because she has a mother with COPD (asthma, bronchitis and emphysema) and an 80-year-old grandmother she visits. I think my daughter would feel awful if she got a "light case" of the flu that ended up being severe for me or my mom. For the same reason (love) I had to suffer through whatever illnesses I had while pregnant without medication, she can do her part by not exposing me to stuff I can't handle. Sue

Let us know how you're doing! Sue

Day 1--4...my tooth hurt, so my surgery felt like nothing. Day 2--3...had root canal Day 3--3...flew home I don't think I took three pain pills. I was tender but never in any real pain. Sue

Aha! Sue (And the arrogant little prince isn't MY doctor...although he messed with my fills to the point I had to go back to my doctor.)

THAT'S WHAT I FORGOT...this senility thing is such a pain. Yes! My counselor advised me to try a Protein type shake or smoothie or yogurt some such thing. AND, the band surgeons tell us (or me, at least) to refrain from Protein shakes or smoothies or yogurt, because they are liquids! In fact, I recall one (rather arrogant, young) Mexican physician (you know of whom I speak) actually YELLING, "Yogurt is a liquid! You can't have liquids!" Alrighty then, now I think I've got it. So, I guess I'm wondering who is "right." (I know, they probably are both right.) I probably need the protein and I probably should stick to solids. And I am definitely resistant to change. KEEP ON TALKING, FOLKS! I'M SEEKING WISDOM HERE! Sue *getting older by the minute*

From my perspective, getting DOWN to a BMI of 35.5 would be wonderful! So, from MY perspective, having any wls when one is not MO or almost MO with serious co-morbidities, is a little (not a lot, just a little, it's done in other countries all the time) extreme. OTOH, I remember how bad I felt when my BMI was under 35 but over 30. I felt huge. I felt enormous. I felt hopeless. And maybe if I had done something a little extreme back then (not that the band was available back then), I would never have arrived at a BMI of over 50. I will ask this: Have you worked with the emotional issues yet? After banding, when you can hold less, those issues will still be there. And in your case, with so little (from my perspective) to lose, those issues will be in the foreground very soon. Good luck deciding... Sue

I realize that we all have different emotional needs, and that somebody has to go first, and that you have to be an experienced laporoscopic surgeon before you even start doing LapBand, BUT I WOULD NOT PAY TO BE PART OF SOME SURGEON'S TRAINING EXPERIENCE. I feel that those first, few proctored patients should get a free ride! The research shows that the overwhelming majority of complications occur within the surgeons' first fifty surgeries. The "problems" start to slow at about 30, and then level out after 50. That, of course, does not mean that every surgeon will have complications with every patient in the early surgeries...but it does mean that when those complications DO occur, they tend to be within the early surgeries. So, I'm glad you wen't elsewhere! Now, it that surgeon experienced with LapBand?

I changed to childrens' chewable Vitamins, with minerals. (The Sav-On/Osco/Albertson's brand, with essential minerals.) Post-op I used liquid (children's) liquid Advil/Tylenol when I had a complicated root canal. They also have the disolves-on-your-tongue variety of several meds. If I need them now, I just use a pill cutter and take a little at a time. However, a recent antibiotic about did me in...but the nurse told me that some antibiotics have as high as 40% of patients who take them having esophageal irritation. So, watch out there! Sue

My last fill, I, too, stayed in town an extra day...just to be sure. It was fine, but i was glad i took the time and made sure.

Donali, If I had this tatooed across my forearms (where I can see it), would it be big enough to be legible? Sue

I don't know which posts you're talking about, but I suspect you're reading posts from people recently banded, especially as far as the "feeling the port" issue goes. As with any appliance--braces, a dental bridge, boob implants (but I'm guessing on the last two, really)--these things take time. Then, they become part of you. I CAN tell you that this surgery was a big, fat nothing compared to a c-section and a hysterectomy. Then, "problems with the fills." Do you mean GETTING fills? Okay, if you're doing this in country, you need to find out your doctor's idea of when a fill is necessary. It varies WIDELY. I don't consider my situation as a "problem" as much as it is an occasional source of frustration. If I want a good fill, from someone who isn't worried more about malpractice insurance than my band, I have to hop on a plane and fly to my surgeon. I knew that going in and I'm okay with it. His fees are covered, but the radiology place charges about $100. This is in Monterrey, Mexico. In the US, most surgeons include at least a few fills. Here's my take on the fills: They are a necessary follow-up to the surgery. But the doctors make their money on the surgery. Why would any doctor want to bother with adjustments on someone else's surgery patient? In the time it takes him to do two adjustments ($300-600 in his pocket), an experienced surgeon can do the surgery ($5000 in his pocket). I know which one I'd do. And I suspect there exists a certain level of resentment that the out of country doctors do the surgery and expect US doctors to provide fills to their patients. Only YOU can make the decision. And you need to be prepared to hear that even if your insurance DOES approve LapBand, several US doctors will not perform this surgery on people over x-years-old or over a BMI of over-whatever. At that point, your options may have to be reexamined to include going out of country and/or paying cash. But cross that bridge when you get there. I sure know about being tired of being tired. I was barely moving and I was walking with a cane two years ago and I retired medically. I slept at least 18 hours per day. If my husband wasn't home to cook or go for take-out, I lived off of Cereal or Peanut Butter sandwiches, because I was really unable to do any more. I "desatted" (ran out of oxygen) after walking just a few yards, and we had to move because I wouldn't leave the house because I was afraid I could not get up the three steps to get back in. I've lost only about half my excess weight so far, and I am now a whole new person. A functioning person. Would I rather feel my port or feel how I used to feel? I LOVE MY BAND! Good luck on your decision-making, Sue

Wade, I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, but--once the healing process is over--you will most likely want EXACTLY the same foods you want right now. That's why people often wryly comment that "this is abdominal surgery, NOT brain surgery." Before you have surgery, make sure you are clear on this. You will be physically restricted from eating the portions you are eating now. But if you are anywhere near as crazy as I am, you will be in a battle with yourself over stupid things, such a "just one more bite," and wanting to eat more, even though you absolutely know that if you eat another bite you will make yourself sick. About "wanting" foods...I'm half Italian and half Mexican and, since banding, cannot eat Pasta, or tortillas, or masa (the stuff between the corn husk and the filling in a tamale). Trust me, I still want those foods--and more--and I've been banded a year. Good luck and ENJOY those meals! Sue

And, oh yeah (I'm senile and repeating what Donali said...I do this a lot) ONE can of soup will likely contain 70% (or more) of the sodium she needs for the day. So if she's taking in two or more cans of soup per day, she is consuming way too much sodium, and that's the cause. I'm very sensitive and on diuretics for edema because of weight, heart/lung issues old age (?) etc., but she MAY have some of these issues, so...how are the shoes fitting? And rings? Puffy ankles? Simple cotton socks cause ribbing lines in her feet/ankles? All of those soups are just turning her into a sponge. I think from now on I'm just going to write "What Donali said." Sue

I'm thinking that your twin is experiencing the weight gain that is indicative of being overfilled! Also known as "soft food syndrome." When we cannot handle solids (which we need to make the band do its thing), we start eating soft and liquid foods. And we gain weight, because we are "eating around the band." Some people need a day or a few days post-adjustment to let the trauma of the fill (or unfill) subside so that the mucosal lining of the stomach is no longer swollen, and then they can return to solids. Sounds to me as though your twin either has an EXTREMELY sensitive stomach (how long post-op until she was able to eat?) or she is overfilled and will continue to gain weight because she will have no choice but to "eat around the band." Sue

Mello_One, First, are you talking "vomit," as in when we have the flu? Or are you talking about being unable to deal with your own saliva or more than a teensy sip of Water? These are very different things, and which one you're going through would make a big difference. Besides all the very wise posts already here, I was wondering...have you had a general anesthesia before? I ask because, for some people, it can take quite a while for the demons that anesthesia brings on to exit the body. And then there's the whole healing thing, too. Our daughter had breast reduction surgery this summer. Three weeks post-op was her absolute worst week. She wasn't in so much pain; she was just miserable. Everything was wrong. And besides that, nothing was right. And she really just needed to whine and keep telling us that--although she was back to work and wasn't in any severe pain--she sure was not her old self and that was just not okay. Don't think I'm dismissing your recent misery! Just remember to factor in the post-op blahs. Keep us posted, Sue

Joanne, I'm not generally a "this is happening for a reason" kind of person. This time, I'll make an exception. The BMI is only a "general guideline" to the body's well-being. I have the frame of a linebacker and always have. Not long after I finished Basic Training in the Army, I got married. (Just a hint here, people who have just made it through basic are generally as slim and trim as they are ever going to be.) My wedding ring was sized up to an 8. Yup, e-i-g-h-t. Big, big bones. No chance of bone density issues as I now head toward my sixtieth birthday. Yet, women with smaller frames, who were the same height as I, weighed much less and had much lower BMI's. I go through all this nonsense to point out that your doctor's preoccupation with a number is IMHO pretty silly. And, given my experience watching how these things go, he may just prove to be just as anal about your fills. If so, you will be one frustrated cookie. So, in this case, if things don't work out with this guy, this time, it may not be the worst thing that's ever happened. I DO wonder how experienced this surgeon is, as the more experienced out-of-the-country guys don't even balk at a BMI of 50, and do them all the time. I hope you get the surgery--and the follow-up--you want and deserve. And I hope you get it sooner, rather than later. But missing this particular opportunity may simply be the opening to more promising opportunities. Good luck on the whole thing! Sue