WASaBubbleButt

This is not correct. For something as extended as your case, yes. But for the majority of dilated pouches an unfill and liquids for a period of time take care of the problem quite well.

Unicorns are fugly... neener neener!

I don't know, Tommy, I think sometimes it is okay to expect a little common sense out of people. I've seen a post where someone was having chest pain and difficulty breathing and they posted on a message board asking what they should do. Gee, you think 911 might be an option? I understand newbie posts, but sheer stupidity is annoying. As for offending people, this is R&R. It's gonna happen. If it is about religion, politics, stupid people, smart people, or unicorns, it's going to offend someone.

A 2nd opinion in my vote too. No way I'd get bypass because of a repaired hernia.

John Battersby, 19th Ave./Northern/Phoenix Thomas Feil, Tempe Dr. Feil is my doc, he's very supportive of banding and will work with you before and after surgery doing whatever is necessary. Dr. Battersby is a sweetheart. He used to be a care home physician for a care home I ran. He's one to work with people to get them what they need. Those are the two I can think of off the top of my head.

Dr. Aceves is great, you'll be in good hands. If you want to know how everything works let me know, I'll tell you anything you want to know. Ask away. You picked a good doctor!

Wow... I don't believe I have seen that before for banding. I have for bypass but not banding. I think I wouldn't want to go to a doctor that doesn't take cash band patients. The first thought that comes to my mind is that he is worried about complications and not getting paid for them. It just makes me look at that policy with a raised eyebrow. I would venture a guess that most docs take cash pay patients, it's far easier on them... no paperwork.

There are anti-christians out there. Personally, I refer to them as fundie atheists. They look as silly as fundie christians. They are both extremes and typically lack any common sense.

I wasn't trying to be rude, I was trying to make a point. You made an assumption that atheists work hard at not believing and that simply isn't the case. We don't have a belief in nothing, we lack belief. There is a difference. You spent so much time complaining about how rude I was, do you care to answer the question?

Okay, I think what you aren't comprehending is that with a God we're still left with "Where did any stuff come from including your God." What I see is that you don't know so you came up with an entity that answers the questions in your mind. Me... I don't know. I don't know where stuff comes from. Not a clue. It would be fun to know the real answers but in the meantime, I don't have the slightest idea where stuff came from but I'm not going to make up an answer just so I can say I have an answer even if it is a wrong answer.

Oh, I caught it the first time. Now, who created your god? It that one is a toughie for you feel free to say so. It's okay to say, "I don't' know," sometimes.

Just do a Google search on it. There are doctors that actually advertise that they will remove it and replace it with a band that works.

So.... who created your God?

I don't think one *can* practice atheism. If you don't believe in flying purple monkeys, do you have a practice of not believing in purple flying monkeys? See what I mean? One practices something they believe in. I lack belief in a god/s, there is nothing to do to practice or do.

Young earth... heh... bet'cha you think it's flat too, eh?

Wow... is this really the difference between xtians and atheists? You don't murder because you'll go to jail then hell? I don't murder because it's wrong and without morality. I don't worry about the consequences because I wouldn't do it to begin with. You can't be serious, this entire post is a joke, right? Morality is not a xtian concept, morality existed long before xtianity. Do you believe in purple flying monkeys? Or do you believe very strongly against believing in purple flying monkeys? If something does not exist, do you strongly believe in not believing in it? See how silly that sounds to us?

Doing my thing in life. Friends, family, my dogs (heh), my job, taking care of my patients. I have this concept that nobody knows all the answers. Some are searching, some are content that they found the answers to the world, others don't care about what they cannot control. It's all individual. Life is good!

No, I think I wrote that "many" are afraid of Christians. All they have to do is take the "prayer" part out of the moment of silence and the ACLU goes away. But nooooo, the school thus far insists on having that one word in there, prayer. I don't think the ACLU is out of line in this case at all. The school is free to have a moment of silence, isn't that the issue? I'm not familiar with the other cases, you'd have to give me more info or links. Many assume the same thing. But the concept of an afterlife existed long before Christianity so the two concepts (afterlife and Christianity) don't necessarily go hand in hand.

I remember when I was a kid, my Catholic (yet opened minded Catholic mother) was answering questions about Adam and Eve. I'll never forget it, I was in 6th grade. Science class... teacher starts off explaining that there is a great controversy about evolution but she was going to teach it because this was science class. I didn't get what the big issue was, who cares? I just wanted to get good grades. She made it clear it was theory, what a theory was based within science, etc. She asked that we all go home and discuss this with our parents in case our parents had a problem with her teaching this. (this was in the late 60s/early 70s). I did, went home and told my Mom and she shrugged her shoulders. She said that maybe Adam and Eve were the first humans from evoluation. I think some Christians are very closed minded, they throw out facts because they want to believe. My nephew is a newbie atheist, and yes... I couldn't be more proud. He's thinking for himself vs. referring to the bible to come up with his opinions on the world around him. He commented that it takes a lot of guts to be an atheist in this world. While I knew what he meant I responded that it probably takes more guts to be a Christian and believe in the impossible while covering your eyes and not seeing facts and common sense. I don't want him feeling sorry for himself because he's going against the majority, or sitting on a pity pot because someone points a finger at him with a raised eyebrow. He believes what he believes, he should be proud that he's questioning the world around him. If there is a god, and I lack belief that there is, then this god gave him a bit of common sense. He needs to use it. And by that I'm referring to the extreme nutjob types, not your typical Christian. BTW, Plain... if it takes a God to create a baby because a baby is so amazingly spectacular, who created your God? ;o)

Well, you are the one that was talking about "roots" and the roots of the US are Native Americans. And yes, missionaries they were! They abducted small children from their homes, forced them into religious training, kept them until they could no longer remember their family members, beat the hell out of them with straps and such, hired them out as cheap labor, and then sent them home with clear instructions to convert their family. They called this wonderful process assimilation. When you call it missionaries it tends to take away from the horrors that actually did happen. Such loving people! I have some quotes of my own: "Lighthouses are more helpful than churches." --Ben Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanack, 1758 "Ecclesiastical establishments tend to great ignorance and corruption, all of which facilitate the execution of mischievous projects." --James Madison, letter to William Bradford, January 1774 "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded prospect." --James Madison, letter to William Bradford, April 1, 1774 ". . . no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer, on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities." —Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, 1779 "Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear." --Thomas Jefferson, letter, 1787 "As to Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the system of morals and his religion, as he left them to us, the best the world ever saw or is likely to see, but I apprehend it has received various corrupting changes, and I have, with most of the present dissenters in England, some doubts as to his divinity, though it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the truth with less trouble. I see no harm, however, in its being believed, if that belief has the good consequences, as probably it has, of making his doctrines more respected and observed, especially as I do not perceive that the Supreme takes it amiss, by distinguishing the unbelievers in his government of the world with any peculiar marks of his displeasure." --Benjamin Franklin, letter to Ezra Stiles, March 9, 1790 "All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit." --Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason, 1794 "I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church." --Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason, 1794 "Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the Word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind." --Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason, 1794 "The question before the human race is, whether the God of nature shall govern the world by his own laws, or whether priests and kings shall rule it by fictitious miracles?" --John Adams, letter to Thomas Jefferson, June 20, 1815 "The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter." --Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823 "History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance, of which their political as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purpose." --Thomas Jefferson, letter to Alexander von Humboldt, 1813 "Man is fed with fables through life, and leaves it in the belief he knows something of what has been passing, when in truth he has known nothing but what has passed under his own eye." —Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Cooper, 1823 I don't know, maybe it was like Hitler. Hitler was no more Catholic than I am but if he would have told people his true beliefs, he would have never been put in a position of power. Perhaps the same holds true for some of our founding fathers.

Actually, many believed that the main purpose was to practice their religion, whatever religion that may have been including paganism. Roots? What roots? Native American roots? If you really want to be clear about it we should be smoking peyote and doing Native American dances. Perhaps when speaking of roots you should refer to your own and not those of everyone else. You are free to worship the Cookie Monster if you wish, you may not use tax dollars to push it on others or force it on innocent school children. That really is not asking too much. By "you" I mean your roots, not you personally. When xtianity comes up with a theory worthy of science, it might just be taught in school. Until then this is more proof that we are not doing a good job of teaching basics in school, such as basic science. We have adults that don't understand scientific theory. That is a shame.

I think you might have your emails confused. I just saw this thread a few hours ago and I certainly did not email you about it. Perhaps you received an email notification that someone posted in this thread?? Besides, I was responding to another poster, not you. I too, went to Aceves and am very happy.

And I can see how that would have been a legit concern! I do. People should have the personal right to worship anything they want. But some Christians have taken that to a bit of an extreme throughout history and that is a problem today. We are still working to undo that one. I have no problem with the gov't protecting those rights, I think the gov't should protect those rights (vs. grant them), but that doesn't carry over to any single religion can do any darn thing they wish. And that is the extreme that many within Christianity have taken historically.

Did you see the latest? Dr. Haucuz claimed to earn FACS behind his name. When he completed the OH stuff for his profile (which has since been removed by OH) he claimed he was Daniel Huacuz, FACS. I called the college of surgeons and you know what? They never heard of him. They said he is NOT a fellow regardless of what he claims and they were pretty annoyed that he was making such claims. I contacted OH and asked them to verify, they would see he is not a fellow of the college. Not sure if it was my email or the FACS but within 24 hours FACS was removed from his name on OH. ;o) Yes, what an ethical man. He let that stay up there for over a year and never did anything but promote the lie. Then I get PMs from his patients claiming I am mean and evil because I'm taking food off his family's table and how? By telling the truth about this man. What about the guy that is dying RIGHT NOW due to Huacuz? Who will put food on HIS table and take care of HIS family? Yeah, I guess that doesn't matter.

Heh... if he has done 1800 bands they sure aren't Inamed or J&J bands. Those companies have not sold him that many bands. And if he is so darn busy placing bands why does he need a day job and then go to his clinic and operate at night? http://www.lapbandtalk.com/f11/dr-daniel-huacuz-he-inamed-certified-11940/ The above is an interesting thread. Know what else is interesting? When Dr. Huacuz signed up with OH and paid them for advertising he claimed to be a fellow of the ACS, that takes some serious work to be a fellow. I called the ACS a few days ago and they have never heard of Huacuz but they were not happy that he was claiming to be a member, let alone a fellow. They made it very clear that he is to remove those initials after his name on OH (F.A.C.S.) immediately and I happened to contact OH at the same time and son of a gun, within a day the FACS was gone from his name. He's such a liar. Check it out for yourself, go to Welcome to the American College of Surgeons. See if he is a fellow, he isn't.