WASaBubbleButt

I don't know, I have to say that anyone that goes to the effort of putting a doc's web site address in their sig is suspect to me. However, I trust very few people here as I agree with you, more and more patient coordinators are posting, posing as patients, not telling anyone they work for doctors, it's getting wayyy out of hand here. I don't even KNOW my doctor's website address, I have to look it up if someone asks for it. I am not sure why anyone would advertise a web address while claiming to go to TJ weekly to meet with these doctors if they did not work for the doctors. So, who DO you work for? Just the one in your sig link? Or more? We've caught coordinators before with more IDs than they have a change of underwear. We we catch them they just abandon their IDs and come up with a whole bunch more. F.A.C.S.: For the most part I agree with you but that does not promise a skilled surgeon. One of the worst surgeons in Mexico has FACS behind his name (for now). And JFTR, Mascareno is not the only FACS surgeon in TJ. If you are going to push a doc on your sig link at least be honest about other surgeons in TJ that are also FACS. And speaking of your surgeons.... Basic Package P/U and Return to AirportYes 3 nights in 4-Star HotelYes Pre-Op TestsYes Post-Op Surgery MedsYes Free Fills for LifeYes Total Complete Fee$8,500.00 Notice free fills for life, right? Check this out, same web site different page: The adjustments are free to our patients. The Clinic charges us 200.00 U.S. dollars for the use of the Flouroscopy equipment. Non Patients fee is 275.00 US Dollars only. Reciepts will be available. Now, if they were working out of an actual hospital I can see the HOSPITAL charging for fluoro, but they are using their OWN equipment, THEY are charging $200 and claiming the act of poking you with a needle is free. Also, they claim throughout the site that they use a hospital, it's not a hospital. It's a clinic. They claim it's a private hospital. Hooey, it's a privately owned clinic. What can I expect from the facilities at Hospital Lityen The Dr.s of Getbandednow provide first class facilities and top of the line medical equipment and this is what you can expect from Hospital Lityen. This hospital has all private rooms, each equipped with a private bathroom, a pull out bed for a family member or companion, and cable TV with remote control. English-speaking doctors are on call 24 hours a day. Here they claim it is a clinic: You are taken to the clinic and before starting the protocol, you sign the surgery authorization form, by this time all questions are cleared and you have authorized the procedure. For better understanding, the surgical consent forms are in plain English and easy to understand. You are encouraged to read the form thoroughly prior to signing. They claim to have done 2000 bands. So where are their patients? Anyone with 2000 bands has plenty of patients posting, not these guys. Check this out: We will pick you up and return you to the San Diego airport for an 80.00 fee. $80 for a ride from the airport to the clinic? Most docs do this for free. So a fill is $280. That's more expensive than many places in the US. I can get a fill from my NP here in Phoenix for $100. Yeah, she's crappy and I wouldn't go there but she's still $100.00. One of the biggest issues I see is that they do not advertise Inamed. They offer the Midband, J&J, and BioE. Never heard of BioE, I'll have to look it up. I'm not even sure what Mid Band is. Most US patients have Inamed because that was the only US FDA band approved in the US until last fall when J&J became FDA approved. If you get a mid band or Bio E, how would you get fills? Most in the US won't touch a non FDA approved band, and I don't blame them. They also do not appear to do the tricky stuff. They don't do sleeves, bypass, revision, none of it. Only easy banding. Why? Are they not capable of tricky stuff? That's a big question in my mind. The big stuff... clinic and not hospital but they claim it is a hospital. No use of Inamed, that is a concern, are they only using cheap bands? They don't do anything tricky, just easy stuff. That makes me question skill. I question if their stats are inflated since they hardly have anyone posting! It makes no sense. I haven't even talked to them yet. This is just what I got from the website. I actually called them and left a message twice trying to help someone research them. When they found out why I was calling and who I am (BubbleButt the one pushing research on the boards) they declined to return my call. Funny thing is, until that point I had heard positive things about them. The person that was asking me for info was totally gung-ho for Gutierrez, he sounded great. He appeared very honest on the phone to her, he was kind, professional, the works. Of course, then he told her that while they have done some supposed 2000 bands they have few people posting because they don't want the advertising. Hello? Who posts here to advertise other than patient coordinators? Why WOULDN'T a doctor want his patients posting and exchanging info on life as a banded person? They don't have many people posting because they don't have many patients. I would love to verify the claim of 2000 bands but I can't because when they found out I wanted to do some research on them, they declined to return my phone calls. I've been trying to find out how many of each brand band they have placed so I can call the band manufacturers and verify they have actually purchased this many bands but... they don't want to talk to me. BTW, are you Mario from their office?

IF you can get it done together that seems to be most beneficial. You go through everything together, pre op diet, post op diet, fills, etc. Please understand, I'm only going by what I've read here. My husband is a bean pole.

Weight-Loss Surgeries Compared

I'm going to copy/paste my blog from another forum (it doesn't fit on this forum). I think it might answer some of the thoughts going through your mind. It was actually an email response I wrote to someone else but much of it fits you to a "T". on February 3, 2008 4:51 pm People have been after me for a long time to add a profile. I didn't really journal my experiences during the weight loss phase, but I think I am going to write down information for newbies. I'm going to copy/paste/edit info I have written before in hopes that it will ease some fears and concerns we ALL have before and during weight loss. Much editing needs to be done on this so understand, this is a work in progress. I'm not done, there are typos, etc. My first thought is for newbies that just had surgery. If you haven't reached the point of regretting the fact that you had surgery, just know you will. If you are a normal, typical, average WLS patient you will very likely go through a phase where you regret having the surgery. You ask yourself what the heck you just did to your body! Just know, this is common. It WILL pass! Give yourself time. Most of us feel that way, it usually happens right after surgery and might last for a few months. But it will pass. Give it time. The following is something I wrote to a person struggling with weight loss and are my own random thoughts: There are a lot of head games that go with weight loss surgery. We are accustomed to large quantities of food, and the type of food that does not work well for weight loss. I was the fast food queen, ate it twice daily every single day. Burgers, onion rings, tons of diet soda, the works. I ate so much fast food that my band will pay for itself in fast food savings and soda savings in 1.5 years. Isn't that horrible? I'm talking $7800 for the cost of my band! You know those reformed smokers? They smoked like a chimney for years and when they quit the rest of the world must quit? They suddenly claim to be "allergic" to smoke? They are rude, insulting, obnoxious, and believe they are doing a good thing? That's the way I am about fast food. I am a reformed fast food junkie. I don't think many had a diet as horrible as mine before banding. One can be obese and malnourished at the same time and that is probably a good way to explain my own pre-band eating habits. It was that bad. I explain this so you know I fully understand food issues. BTDT a million times over. Some people seem to struggle with white carbs such as bread and Pasta (me) and others seem to struggle with sugar and sweets. Those are the big ones. Some struggle with alcohol but I'm not sure that is primarily a WLS issue but more an alcohol issue that gets in the way of weight loss. Some claim to eat mostly veggies and they just don't know why they are obese. Is there a better example of denial than that? ;o) Having WLS does take much of the joy out of eating. I don't think it matters which procedure you have, much of the joy is taken out of food. The non stop chewing, small quantities, food limitations, the works. In many ways I think that is a good thing. It's the joy of eating that got us fat. We can't imagine a time when we would ever prefer not to eat because it is unfathomable to comprehend that food might not be as fun someday. We can't comprehend that it might not fill a need somewhere. The need to inhale food - large quantities of food. We like the taste, the texture, the full feeling... we like it all. We eat until we experience extreme discomfort from eating so much yet we want to continue doing it. Doesn't make a lot of sense, does it? Another obese person would understand this but a thin person would think we are crazy. I don't know, maybe we are crazy but you know what? It is what it is. When you have any weight loss surgery (bypass, band, sleeve, whatever) it takes much of the joy out, what we are used to. We are used to inhaling anything we want. We are used to that chocolate cake calling our name and we have to wait until we can stuff another bite down before we can inhale that too. We are like a food vacuum cleaner, we suck it ALL up. After surgery you realize you can't do that anymore and it's frustrating. You see and you want to eat it but you know there isn't a chance in the world it is going to go down. Think about it, when you were pre-surgery and dieting when you grew sick of the diet you could cheat. WLS doesn't permit you to cheat in the same way and with the same quantity of foods and it gets old in a hurry. This is the time to continue reminding yourself that this is a lifestyle change. This is it, we are here, living it, choices have been taken from us. We intentionally took our own choices away from ourselves because we couldn't achieve goals without it. Food choices, our choice in eating habits, it's gone. Never to return. That's one if the biggest head issues we have to deal with. There is no turning back. I think it's kinda typical to start eating around the surgery during these times so you feel as though you have control over the procedure vs. the feeling that the surgical procedure has control over you. You have to get to a point that you accept it isn't a control issue but a tool that you need to lose weight. You can fight it, but it isn't going to work. But you know what? We try anyway. Then comes more frustration. I think this is the point that we need to give ourselves a reality check. We all have to accept that this is it, do it or don't. Most accept it and move on with weight loss and a small minority do not. My best friend is a prime example. She eats her 800 calories a day in good food and a whopping 3000 calories a day in Chocolate. If you are not losing weight I suspect you are going through a phase where you are sick of dealing with weight loss, you are sick of chewing chicken to a liquid, you are sick of it all and I think those phases are normal. Let's face it, it's a great deal more fun to maintain weight vs. losing weight. That's why I wanted it over with in a hurry and kept calories at 600 daily and busted my butt doing hard cardio daily. And no, Dr. Aceves did not approve of my caloric methods but I wanted the fat chapter closed once and for all. I was sick of a battle all the time of losing weight. I felt like I was fighting the world and in reality, I wasn't. I was fighting the lifestyle change. When I accepted that this is my new world, my new reality... I was able to move on and get it done. Have you noticed that your world revolved around food a lot more pre-surgery than it does now? Now you have days where you put off consuming food because it is a chore. Did you ever put off consuming food pre-surgery? I don't think this is a bad thing. Pre-surgery we can't comprehend the thought that food will not rule our lives. Our world revolves around food. We eat Breakfast and while we are eating it we wonder what we'll have for lunch. When we eat lunch we think about what is in the freezer for dinner. When someone mentions the name of a restaurant we immediately have a vision of the menu and know full well what we will order and it will be the largest portion sizes on the menu in all likelihood. Have you ever been asked to go to dinner with someone and you didn't want to eat your usual portions in front of others so you eat before you leave the house so you can pretend to eat small portions while dining in front of others? Ever go to a fast food restaurant and pretend you are ordering for more than one person? In reality, it's all for you. Food ruled our lives pre-surgery. Post-surgery we wonder what we should be doing with all the extra time where we are no longer consumed with food issues. Not sure if any of that resonates with you, but I think bits and pieces might. Wine... I think you'll find many experienced WLS folks say that if they drink alcohol it will stall weight loss a great deal. It shouldn't, the calories are incorporated in your daily count but it still stalls weight loss. At least it does for me. I don't drink much now that I'm at goal. It hits me too hard, too fast, and even with just one glass of wine I'm not at my best the next day. But that's me, not everyone is the same. But again, I think you'll find many experienced WLS folks saying alcohol stalls weight loss every single time. And let's be frank here, if you are in the weight loss mode you do not need or require a couple of glasses of wine a few times a week. We are only permitted limited calories daily. If you drink a couple of glasses of wine you either are going over in calories or you are not getting good foods in. Either way it simply isn't good. Are you eating soft foods? Liquid calories? Cottage cheese and creamed Soups? Congrats to you for getting Protein in, but it's the wrong kind of protein for your surgery type. I know it is easier to get cream of chicken Soup down vs. solid chicken, but you know what? This is the game we signed up for. This is the lifestyle we paid a lot of money to obtain. So change from soft foods and liquid calories and get back on track. A half cup of roasted chicken is going to have fewer calories than the two cups of cream of chicken soup you are consuming now. Are you cooking your own chicken? Are you cooking it so long it is dry and hard to eat? Or is chicken just not workable with your band? Try going to the grocery store and buy a roasted chicken. Eat a small piece and see if it goes down better than what you make. If it does it might be that you are overcooking your chicken and it's simply too dry. Canned chicken soup has some of the most overcooked meat around and even cream of chicken has pieces of solids in it. If you can get that down, you can get roasted chicken down. If you are eating the right foods and have appropriate restriction you really shouldn't need Snacks. That quickly become habit and if you snack too much you mess with your 800 calories (or whatever your doc suggests) daily that you are allowed. Then you don't get the appropriate quantity of food necessary for meals and you will be hungry sooner. Ice cream... hello? Need I go further with that one? ;o) How are your teeth? Are they in good condition? It's a serious question and quite important. One thing I don't think many realize is that if your teeth are not in super great condition you may not be able to chew the bandster/sleeve/bypass way. If your teeth need work, get it done. Are you tracking calories? Many times it's easy to put off tracking calories if you are eating ice cream and wine. Seriously, we don't always want to know the number of calories we are consuming. Then we'd have to be honest with ourselves and that can easily be a hard pill to swallow. If someone is losing well and feeling good there is little reason to track protein and calories. But if weight loss stalls it's time to take a long hard look at what is going in our mouths. A few ways to do that are to run anything you are not absolutely positive of through: Nutrition facts, calories in food, labels, nutritional information and analysis – NutritionData.com It will give you a very complete food label for any food item or total recipe. Then track that information on: Calorie Counter, Diet Tracking, Food Journal, Nutrition Facts at The Daily Plate or... FitDay - Free Weight Loss and Diet Journal or... Free Diet Plans at SparkPeople See what is actually going in your mouth on a daily basis. Be honest, nobody will see it but you. So cut out the wine, ice cream, and candy bars. Make this new lifestyle a habit you prefer and amazingly, that really does happen over time. Your tastes change and you prefer the good stuff. You look at ice cream and think that sounds so good. Today after almost 15 months of banding I think the SAME thing about a salad. Crazy... I know. But it does happen. Bump up your exercise. We have biological and emotional reasons for overeating, we have no excuse for not exercising. None. Change the liquid calories and soft foods to solid Proteins. When the scale starts moving like crazy you will find all kinds MORE motivation. Buy new clothes that actually fit vs. hanging off your body. That is very motivating as well. You can do this, but you have to do your part. No more excuses. Accept this is your lifestyle and use it to your advantage. Good luck!

HA! I stand corrected! ;o))))))

Isn't working with a band that isn't working yet kinda like driving an expensive car with flat tires? If your band isn't working yet due to no fill, why would you think it should work? ;o) I hate cooking too. I'm horrible at it as well. My dog will eat Mickey D burgers but won't touch a burger if I cook it. I buy roasted chickens, I'm learning to use tofu, I can make tuna salad, veggie salads, etc. One does not have to be a great cook to make healthy food.

You created an account, came here as a newbie, and just ran into this thread and you just happen to have information on vitamins and Protein Shakes? You saw this thread on your very first post? You know, Alex sells advertising here. Just thought you'd want to know.

I think someone should shoot it and put it out of our misery.

Very true. The food is the least of the cost. The other overhead is what is expensive. The building, staff, A/C or heating, insurance, taxes, the works. There was a person on OH that went to a buffet and since she doesn't eat much she was eating off her husband's plate. The staff told her they could not share one buffet meal. The poster threw a fit, acted like a child, complained to management, etc. That makes all of us look like idiots. I don't get it, we wanted WLS so that we wouldn't stick out, we could be like everyone else, yet when it comes to money people have no problem sticking out, showing off port incision, etc. It's silly. I've yet to meet a person that asked to pay more at a buffet before surgery when they ate more but they feel they should pay less today. How is that fair? Naturally thin people don't ask to pay according to what they eat, it makes no sense to ask for discounts at a buffet since we eat enough for one person now instead of three.

Gahhh... no thanks. Lemon flavored fish oil is not appealing.

Other than airfare, that amount should cover it. If you were to go to Mexico it's usually around $8K for the better doctors. Please see my sig link for details on how to research a Mexican surgeon.

My vote is to hold off. Restriction takes time to get used to. Being in a social environment is not going to be easy when it comes to eating the right foods, eating slowly, chewing well, etc. And if you have a problem who will unfill you? If you do get a fill before the trip DO get a special Huber needle from your doc to take with you in case it is necessary. The ship's doctor should be able to fix the problem if one arises. But I can promise you he won't have the type of needle necessary to do the job. So take one with you.

I have to laugh, I could have written this post. Well, except the "smartdogs" ... I don't know what that is. You are working the band the right way and it is paying off. Congrats to you! I wanted the fat chapter closed once and for all. I kept it at 600 calories, watched every bloody thing that went in my mouth, overhauled my eating habits, busted my butt in cardio, it was ALL worth it. Congrats to you!

I don't think I ever believed WLS would help so reversible was appealing to me. I was pretty floored when it did work. If I had it all to do over again I'd get as sleeve without a doubt. It's essentially like a band with perfect restriction all the time. No fills, unfills, restriction issues, slips, erosion, port pain, port flips, etc. I wish I would have done as you are and considered the option of a sleeve before surgery. BTW, **after** the initial 30 days of the procedure complications drop dramatically for sleeves over bands. Your risk for problems is much less with sleeves vs. bands, virtually no follow up care, etc.

No, sadly if you want to go to Dr. Rodriguez you are stuck with Belite. Same with a few other docs. Just remember, Belite isn't going to do your surgery, Dr. Rod is. He is very good.

I still refuse to use my card, I don't even know what I did with it or if I still have it. I didn't ask to pay more when I ate more, I absolutely refuse to ask to pay less now that I eat more like a normal person. It doesn't seem fair.

That would have been an easy mistake to make to be honest. If he didn't use quotes I can see how that happened. Quotes are our friend, Isuza! ;o)

Usually erosion doesn't have many symptoms, most don't realize they have it. The biggest one is they tend to gain weight. Esophageal spasms feel like a heart attack many times. You can be walking across the room and suddenly find yourself doubled over in pain. It's like a charlie horse in your esophagus. Slips... often times you can't even keep Water down, you barf everything. Think of an hourglass, the top half being very small and the bottom very large. With a slip usually the back half of the stomach slides up through the band and the top half gets bigger and flops over to one side cutting off the pass through for food and liquids. You might feel a loss of restriction, very big and noticeable or an inability to keep anything down. I'd go to your doc and see what is going on with you.

I'd love to take it but the capsules are too big, the liquid is too stinky, and I really can't bring myself to try the fish in a pudding thing. Gahhh...

HA! The colon cleanse people are trying to sell a product and they fib. There is no such thing. If you talk to a GI surgeon they will tell you that they are working in colons all day long and they've never seen such a thing. It's another gimmick to get you to part ways with your money. I would worry about electrolyte imbalances and washing away good bacteria with such products.

We are going to have to agree to disagree on this one. Also, I missed the post that Isuza claims to be a proctor, do you have a link? I don't agree with Isuza's information, Wiki links, etc. But I saw nothing to show s/he was posing as another person. It would have made much more sense to come up with a new ID if that was the case than to change names.

No, it's not ego... it's just money. They are annoyed that patients are going to places where banding is reasonable. Just because someone is a doctor that doesn't make them bright. Word of mouth is the best advertising around. I'd be sure to spread that docs name around with a caution NOT to go there for banding. ;o)

And again, good luck to you!

My writing style is very blunt. I am not all sweetness and light, it's not me. When I try to post that way it comes off as fake, so I write like me. You aren't looking for that right now. It's more than clear you don't want to hear what I have to say. Fair enough. Good luck to you.

Okay, I give up. Not sure what I can do to help. Good luck to you.