Fenton

Great! These liquid/mushy days are great weight loss days, but you'll feel altogether more human once you can eat grown-up food...

Christine, this is something you can absolutely do. You know what choices you have to make - you know the right and you know the wrong. Maybe when you're tempted by something, you should feel your stomach to feel your port, or open your blouse to see your scar, and REMIND yourself what you've been through, and why, and ask yourself if the temptation of the wrong choice is worth the surgery you gave yourself. Also, the longer you deal with hunger, the easier it becomes to accept it. When you feel hungry, recognize that you've succeeded - you're forcing your body to burn fat, because you won't give it what it wants. Post more often! Tell us how it's going, and what you're thinking! Cathy, I suspect that if your son has the Xbox360, after an initial excitement with the Wii, he'll go back to playing his 360. Besides, I'm sure there'd be times when he'd be at school or at work or otherwise out of the house when you'd be able to use it! I think exercise is really the key for weight loss with the band. Or for any weight loss, really.

I hope they ask sooner rather than later, Chica, because finding the damn things is going to be 90% of the battle!

Sweet Jesus, man! Thats some impressive weight loss! My money says you have a tape worm - that's cheating!

Oh, great! Now I'm the last person in Christendom to NOT own a Wii and Wii Fit! O2BTA - that "heart attack" panic is something that I certainly shared! Luckily, I'd learned from this site that I could expect that. If it had worsened or spread to my jaw or down my left arm, if I'd started sweating and vomiting, THEN I'd have started to worry! I believe it's generally a good idea for people my size (well, for ME - I'm not the doc of you) to take preventitive aspirin; I take an 81 mg baby aspirin every day, and tell me that's going to ward off the heart attacks by thinning the blood a tiny bit, but it may just be wishful thinking...

A-Dub! If you want to see my before and after photos, you'll have to pick up my first book, then the sequel next year.... :thumbup:

Hey, O2BTA. It sounds like you're having either gas pain or some sort of local pressure on the diaphragm muscle next to the stomach - most of us experienced gas pains in that area after our surgery.

Also, I've been slowly switching over to using the powdered peanut butter, which has 75 less calories per tablespoon. That's still in progress - I can't throw out my original organic peanut butter! - but I think the shake will still work with the freeze-dried peanut butter.

I make that identical shake, except with premade vanilla SlimFast Optima, the low carb stuff. I have that shake down to an art! I freeze ripe bananas, so they'll always be ready to go, and keep the blender cup and blade in the freezer too, so they're as cold as possible. About half an hour to an hour before I'm going to make the shake, I stick the can of SlimFast in the freezer to ensure that the shake will be as dense and shake-like as possible. I also add a couple tablespoons of whey Protein powder, and a big pinch of salt - the salt is key for flavour, I think. It really has been a fun project, perfecting that shake. I bought an Oster Professional Blender ($75 at Amazon) that feels like an outboard motor on my countertop - that thing could blend rocks! But the best thing is the Oster Blend'n'Go cup, an insulated 18 ounce or so cup that you use on the blender instead of the normal blender container. I fill the cup with the frozen banana, SlimFast, Protein Powder and Peanut Butter and pinch of salt, then attach the blade assembly tightly to the cup, turn it upside down and plug it into the blender. You blend, and then you go! It's so great! It truly is a miracle of modern science.

Love is love! Take it where you can get it! Unless you're married, then you should probably be a bit more careful. Harley, congrats again - I remember how good I felt when I entered threenderland as if it were only last week! Which it actually was.

And if you go the tasty refried beans route, remember that you can get low fat refried beans!

And A-dub? The trick to my impressive weight loss is to start at a weight so high that it's almost incompatible with life! Your weight loss is every bit as impressive for coming off a smaller frame. Also: I'm really pushing it with the walking - I burned over 5,000 calories yesterday, and I reach similar numbers most days. Of course, as I get smaller, my burn rate will go down...

Woohooo!!!! And, for Texgirl, Yeeeehawwww!!!! Well done, all of ya! All of us! Cathy and Christine, hang in there. You'll get the restriction you need, but don't use that as an excuse for taking it easy on yourself, or worse, don't start feeling sorry for yourself that you don't already have the restriction that others are already enjoying. (Somehow I assume that other people share my overeating triggers, like self-pity, and an ability to rationalize eating too much "just for a little while"!). Keep a sharp eye on how much you're eating, and ask yourself why you're allowing yourself to gain weight. You can't let disappointment with your band actually drive your weight up! You're going to get there...!!!

I like yogurt with apple or pear sauce. And I spent some time pureeing soups, too, to get them smoother.

Ha! We all had to embrace some bit of denial to get where we got! For people like you and me - for particularly overweight individuals - the band really IS an extra lease on life, a true second chance. I'd say go for the filter, and I'll bet your surgeon will say the same. Anything to be as safe as possible! My understanding is that the clot reaches the filter and just gets trapped, and gradually broken down - the critical thing is that it stops the clot from reaching the lungs, where it'll block the artery and stop blood from flowing, and that's all she wrote... The filter is, of course, icing on the cake - the thinning agents (do they hold those before the surgery? I know we weren't allowed to take aspirin etc to allow the blood clotting to get back to normal) and the stockings will do a good job of keeping clots at bay. But if the icing is offered, I'd say Yes. The other important thing is to get up and get walking ASAP after surgery, and to walk as much as you can. When you sit around, the blood stagnates, and is more likely to clot, so keep moving! And you'll quickly learn that moving is GREAT for the gas pains (in the left shoulder and back) that many of us feel in the first couple of days.

FINALLY! Jeez, waiting for Rick to hurry up and get his band has been like being 9 years old and wishing Christmas would come while you're still on summer vacation... Nerves are part of the price of admission, Rick. We all had 'em, we all dealt with 'em, and now we're all banded. Except for you, ya lazy bastid! Get in there, get your band then come back and talk with the other big dogs! Everything will be fine, and then it'll get better and better.

Wait - what are you worried about? The filter is an extra safety net, and is just slipped in through a vein in the thigh, if I understand correctly. Placing the filter is not a big thing. I'd say that, unless you're, like, a researcher in blood clotting, I'd let your docs make the call as to whether the blood thinners and boots are enough to prevent clotting. Why take the risk of catastrophe? Do you think you might be dealing with some kind of internal denial about the seriousness of our condition and the significance of surgery? At our size, I think it's very important to do everything we can to make this simple surgery as safe as possible. Ask your lap band surgeon - maybe he can be a deciding opinion. Either way, whatever you decide, we're here for you.

Awww, bless you! Weighed in today - one step closer to Morbid Obesity! Just five more pounds to go...

I'd say if your pulmonologist is recommending it, you should probably go with his advice. You're a big fella, and so the surgery might take a little longer. Are you a smoker, or do you have a family history of vein thrombosis? Those might be relevant factors. The thing is, you're lying on the table for a while, not moving, and that makes it more likely for clots to form in your legs. So I think he just wants to play it safe. Which sounds reasonable to me!

Good Lord, woman! There's men here!

It actually sounds like a really great trip. And congrats on becoming Obese! I hope someday to be Morbidly Obese - I know it'll take work, but, mark my words, I'll get there in the end!

Chica, what the hell does "drink like a man" mean? We use our mouths. Plus I thought the puking emoticon after the Clamato juice, while probably honest, was a little over the top...

Bratz, Kerri - you guys are doing GREAT! Its really impressive how different you both look...

Don't sweat the surgery - it's a really minor one. Besides, they do all the work! You just lie there, and wake up banded. The first couple of days aren't much fun, but no worse than a day or two with the flu. After that, you'll recover quickly and lose quickly... Welcome aboard!

Hey, I don't know if anyone would like a few premade cans of chocolate Royale Slimfast Optima, but I'm bored of the stuff, and have some I'd be happy to give away. I have five and a half six packs. You'd have to stop by my place - I'm in the Union Square area in Manhattan - but you could do that at any time, since I'll just leave the cans with my 24 hour doorman. They were the ones recommended by the nutritionist at NYU for pre-op and post-op diets. 190 calories, 24 g carbs of which 5 g are Fiber, loaded with various nutrients, 10 g Protein. First person to send me a message me gets 'em.