WASaBubbleButt

Your band turns to dust. ;o) Just do the best you can. Try your very best to get it all in, it gets easier.

It's really not a good idea to tell someone to do something different from what their docs says and then tell them they'll be fine. I could not have taken Tylenol tablets four days after surgery, it would have been a horror. Newbies should always use liquid or crush tablets when possible.

Ahhhh, I misunderstood. Heh... 400gms of chicken is enough protein for two people! OP... how much milk are you drinking? How much cream cheese? How much chicken? What kinds of Soups are you eating, what is their protein content for lunch?

There is no way we can answer that. Every doc is different in what they want you to consume pre/post op.

Actually, your Protein intake looks really good to me. But question, you can eat a piece of chicken bigger than the size of a can of coke? That's a pretty hefty portion. Are you tracking calories? Calorie Counter, Diet Tracking, food Journal, Nutrition Facts at The Daily Plate. See what you are consuming daily if you are not losing weight.

Hi Health has a brand that is made into a pudding. I'm not a brave soul, haven't tried it and don't wanna.

Great, sounds like an interesting read without the slaughter house part. I really want to go back to veggie ways, I can't stand chewing meat to a liquid anyway, it's disgusting. Thanks!

Boca, Morning Star, and Gardenburgers don't claim to be vegan, do they? Don't they just claim to be vegetarian? Morning Star buffalo wings are pretty good with honey to cut the heat. They are a bit too spicy for me.

This is a book I'd be really interested in reading but someone mentioned they talk about slaughter houses. I just can't read that stuff, it makes me sick. Is it a single chapter that I can avoid or is it discussed throughout the book?

I do my own version of Atkins. Low carbs, adequate Protein. I eat all the veggie carbs I want. I do use full fat dressings/mayo, it makes tuna slide down easier. I started out with low fat/no fat and that didn't work. My skin was dry, food was horrible. Changed to full fat everything and I lost weight with no problem. But for me the key was cutting out all white carbs. I eat as much as I want in good carbs.

About 20lbs ago I was verrrry tempted to say "enough" and stick with where I was. Then I decided that I was in this for the long haul so I continued. It's worth it to get down there, it's fun buying cute clothes.

They don't actually remove intestine, they bypass it. Most of the better surgeons can do it by lap procedure in about 2.5-3.0 hours.

Bert... Nahhh... we are going to have to agree to disagree on this one. If we really want to overcome our issues a bit of honesty is in order. As I explained carefully previously, there is a difference between saying, "I know my doctor wants me to do "X" and I am well aware that if I don't follow "X" I may pay for it later with a slip." Vs.... "I know more than my MD, I know my body, I know far more about medicine that he does and he is simply wrong." One is honesty, the other is changing beliefs to fit a behavior. Losing weight and getting to goal does require honesty with self. If we don't face our issues, it ain't gonna happen. I don't buy into the kind of support where I pat heads of people doing things that could harm their weight loss and harm them period. Sometimes support means a bit of reality. People who make "nice nice" talk and support bad choices are not supportive. They are usually justifying their own behaviors as well. I'm quite sure they mean well, but it doesn't mean they are supportive.

There is a plastic device that comes with the J&J band. It looks a lot like a glue gun. The port is anchored to the bottom of the glue gun looking thing and it has staple like things on the bottom of the port itself. The doctor, with the port attached to the glue gun looking thing, places the port where he wants it. He works the mechanism of the glue gun looking thing and the staple looking things grab hold of a hunk of tissue and hang on for dear life. It's very aggressive looking. Of course, "glue gun looking device," "staple like things," and "grab hold of a hunk of tissue" are all legit medical terms commonly used in hospitals today. :eek: The Inamed band is carefully stitched into place exactly and precisely where the surgeon wants the sutures to be. The J&J port looks like a thick quarter, there are no holes to thread sutures to as the glue gun looking device is used in place of sutures. The Inamed port has more doily features around the edge, holes to run sutures through. I was pro J&J band due to the other features it has until I saw it being placed surgically and after clutching my own port in horror and sympathy pain while watching the staple things grab a hunk of tissue, I went back to personally being pro Inamed. :smile: Much of what J&J is saying (fewer slips, fewer erosions) really haven't been proven to be true yet. No LARGE long term studies have been done yet since the newer features make the band a bit newer. It's not exactly the same band as the Swedish were selling previously. So with the new features time will tell if the fewer erosions/slips are a sales pitch/theory, or simply true. I hope they are making progress in fewer complications, I hope their theories are correct, it would be another advancement in banding. Pizzaman: My doc is conservative, 2 weeks of clears, 2 weeks of full liquids, 2 weeks of soft foods, then solids. The nutritionist follows the MD orders, she does not come up with her own orders for a post op diet. Her job is to show you how to follow your doctor's orders. So they are supposed to be giving you the same post op instructions.

Do the doctors in your sig link even place US - FDA approved bands? I'm interested in your stats about complications. Have any links?

A greater majority of the time there are two surgeons in there. There are typically five incisions. There is a stand that holds one of them (fills your belly with gas) and it takes two surgeons to hold the other 3-4 trocars in your incisions. Just a bit of... trivia? :welldoneclap: Is that the right word?

NSAIDs, but not all docs agree with that thinking. It used to be thought NSAIDs caused erosion, now they know the problem is mostly for those on long term use or for those that it upsets their stomach anyway. My doc permits Motrin type drugs if you take the liquid version and chase it with lots of Water.

Huh???? There is scar tissue but unless you are revising to a new procedure many docs will just leave the scar tissue. Really, the only common reasons to remove a lap band is BECAUSE of the lap band. Slips and erosion. IOW, if you didn't have a band there would be no complications at all. Reversible isn't all that great when you throw a bit of reality in there. Bypass is pretty drastic for a 38BMI. There is no going back with that one. Theoretically it can be reversed but that would be some seriously tricky surgery, 100x more difficult than removing a band. Removing a band can take as little as 20 minutes, reversing bypass would be huge and major, not all can be reversed and they typically are not. Look at the people with severe complications from bypass yet they are not getting them reversed. Why do you think that is? The scar tissue makes it close to impossible to do. This is why if I had it to do over again I'd get a sleeve. Newbies like the idea of being able to reverse it but once you get a band, reversing it (removing the band) is like losing a limb. It's a sheer horror. I don't think I thought the band was going to work so I wanted reversible. I think I had been on so many failed diets that I wanted to be able to remove it when it didn't work. If I knew then what I know now, I'd get a sleeve and be done with it once and for all. No malabsorption, no port pain, no infections, no fills and unfills, no restriction issues, none of that. After the initial 30 days after surgery you are done. You lose weight and go on with your life. Don't listen to a psychologist regarding banding and bypass technique, honestly... this person has no clue what they are talking about. The psych doc may know about personality disorders but I'm telling you, they don't know squat about band vs. bypass.

Do you mean trauma team? They are available if one goes to a hospital vs. a clinic just like in US hospitals vs. surgicenters. Trauma teams are not typically available in surgicenters because ambulances don't typically bring traumas into a clinic setting. A trauma isn't usually someone with a complication in OR, traumas are more like someone with a leg hanging off from an auto accident. Surgeons take care of mess ups in OR.

Banding is the easiest procedure in bariatrics to do. With that said, there is a learning curve. The sutures can't be too tight, they can't be too loose. The band can't be too high, it can't be too low. The sutures cannot be too many in number, nor too few. Once the learning curve is over things are fine. But complication stats (erosion, slips, etc.) are indeed higher for newbie surgeons. Something as simple as scratching the back of the stomach can possibly cause erosion years down the road. That is the biggest reason I wouldn't personally go to a newbie surgeon. This was my last shot at weight loss and I wasn't going to screw it up. I gave myself every opportunity to do this the right way. It's kinda like crocheting. The first project is probably pretty fugly, not even. But with practice it's just about perfect. Same concept applies to the band. I can't say that I would go to anyone with less than 250 bands myself. If someone didn't have any money at all and having a newbie do it was the only shot they had it might be different. I wouldn't do it, but many would. Another issue is aftercare. Fills are an art, not a skill. Anyone can measure out a cc or two. But to get good restriction without absolute misery is hard to do. The problem with banding is that all the bad stuff usually happens after surgery or after the fills. It's not like a minor complication in OR that you fix right then and there. Our complications often times don't happen (from surgery) until down the road. So you have to weigh money vs. skill. You have to do what is right for you.

food choices. You can eat a cup of food and due to your food choices that cup can have 300 calories or 3000. The band limits the quantity of food, not the quality, that part is up to us.

Usually outpatient for US docs, inpatient for Mexico.

Ohhhh, please read my sig link. It's for researching Mexican surgeons but it will apply to US surgeons as well. Personally, I would never go to anyone for a band unless they have done at least 250 of them. But that's my opinion.

Might want to check out my sig link.

Can you be more specific? What procedure do you refer to? The process of dealing with insurance? I'm not good at that. The surgical process? I know that. Life after banding?