Thinmint

It has been 2 Years since the sleeve went in. I was 311 and today I am 168 and will never look back. I find that I chew my food until it becomes vapor, eat very slowly and stop as soon as I feel anything. By the way I eat all day long..... Love it Love it Love it. I call this success. I don't often come back to the website so I may not see the comments but for those who are interested this is the best thing you can do. My boss had it done as well but I believe he continues to stretch it and has stopped loosing weight and needs to loose more so you can cheat it if you want my method is working with excellent results. I went from size 50 to size 32-34 the skin is starting to respond some and tighening up but I would be in 32 on everything if it were not for the extra skin....

I am getting ready to go to a Family re-union and no one knows I have done this - it has been hard to hold back but in a few more days they will have some EYE Candy. Last time we got together was about a year ago, and I was at my heaviest. I have sense lost 105 lbs with only 11 lbs to go to reach my 2nd goal. The first goal was 100 lbs. 2nd goal is to weigh 195. Check out the pictures from last week. I think I am going to tell them I was on the biggest looser and they should watch the show to see me next season. Pull the string some until it is time to go. I will let you know how it goes. :thumbup::thumbup::lol0:

Don't worry about all the rules you see, the reason for the water limitation is you will just get full quicker, so what you might have to eat smaller meals more often. I am in week 22 and eat whatever I want and drink with my meals and I have lost 101 lbs as of today. If you go to my blog and read my story of having the surgery you will see what I went though. Short version I never felt the surgery ever, in and out in the span of 4 hours. I would do it over in a second all the thoughts I had about not doing it were not founded. This is truely the way to go..... Good luck in your journey and take lots of pictures and you will see your self melting.

I have reached the 100 lb mark and only have 15 more lbs to go for Goal #2. It is harder to loose now that I am close to the goal, but I am loving it. I will get those 15 lbs and be at 195 lbs where I was when I got married 28 years ago. I love working out can't wait for the day to start. I found that if you workout first thing in the morning your day is awsome, yes it is hard at first because that means getting up about a hour earlier and going to bed and hour earlier but let me tell you how great it makes me feel everyday. Can't tell you I loved it at first (whole month) but now you could not pull me away from it. Hope everyone is doing great, if not hang in there and try the morning exercise.

The best decision you will ever make - I studied the choices for a year and this is the best. It was actually created to help those get down to a safe weight to have the bypass..... but lots of them never came back to get the bypass because they were doing great. This process has not been around that long. It is predicted to soon replace the band as a better choice.

Can't wait to see what you do......

Remember this is for the rest of your life so don't stress about it. You can eat whatever you want and I do..... just not very much. I had a cake donut today it took half a day to eat it but I sure enjoyed it. Also you can view the surgery on line to see what they do - if you listen very closely to the doctor doing the surgery you will note that what he says aobut how normal you should be when it is done. [nomedia=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcYH5lWa9Rk]YouTube- Laparoscopic Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy[/nomedia]

I was self pay as well and my doctor did a pre diet consult with me. Protien shakes in the am and Noon then a normal lean and green meal. However with the lean and green meal take my watch off and put it on the other side of the plate and make everything last 1/2 hour so whatever it takes to make the meal last 1/2 hour do it. So I cut things up very small and ate very slowly. What I found is I was full before I finished what use to be the 1st round. See my picture album and you will see side by side picture every week pre surgery through 17 weeks now and I am at 95lbs lost so far and feeling wonderful. It will not be as bad as you think the protien somehow makes you feel less hungry and trust me after the surgery you will feel full very quickly and that is a true blessing.

My doctor said eat what ever you can stand and don't worry about all the pureed foods and replacement meals. I have never pureed any food since surgery. I have had great success and eat whatever I want. Of course I can only eat small amounts but at least I feel full and that's the success part.

I am at 17 weeks and have lost 95lbs and don't have any muscle issues - is that common??? I am working out 6 days a week so that may be helping.....

It should be OK because they will load you up with antibiotics because of the surgery. I was also sick but my surgery went fine. By the way if you have acid reflux please get an acid reducer because you will notice the acid more and sooner. I thought I would not need the acid pill any longer but that is not the case. You can read my blog on (I did it) to hear the story from start to finish on the surgery itself.