Raine

What was the hardest habit for you to break? Giving up coffee and Diet Mt. Dew. LOL loved my caffeine. Now that I am allowed a cup of coffee a day, my taste buds revolted and I no longer like the taste, go figure. What was the hardest habit for you to adopt? Chewing a million times before swallowing and making my meal last 30-45 minutes. I still am having issues with that and I am 6 weeks post op now. But try try again!

Yes you are allowed to freak out and everyone goes through a freak out here or there big and small. To those that were being mean, get over it. She is doing what needs to be done and if you can't give constuctive criticism rather than calling names then you shouldn't say anything at all.

Ok, so I think you will need to get a new bathing suit soon It truly shows the difference especially on how the skirt sits between the three shots... Shot one, I thought the skirt was a V shape and in shot 2 and 3 well I see that is not. Also, where as in shot 1 and 2, your booty is peaking through and in shot 3 well girl it got a little camera shy!! You can also see clearly how much your tum tum has gone down! Way to go you are really doing great! Congratulations!

I agree with you about people being jealous if they are heavy too. They do see that you are doing what they want to do and haven't been able to or haven't come to the life changing decision to do so. So never mind them, they will see it but probably won't say anything until it seems rude not to LOL. I also think the second is true too, a lot of people that aren't heavy don't know what to say when they see that kind of weight loss. Great job and keep up the good work!

Now THATS the way to work the sleeve! Congratulations you are doing wonderful!

Great Job! The full liquids should help with the energy level. We promise we won't tell that you started a day early

I will look that up because if there was a status box for couch potato I would have to check it LOL

I can believe that. Dr. V is a wonderful surgeon and person, but you are right the staff is a bit disorganized at times. I actually waited in the waiting room for 45 min one time without anyone telling me an ETA. Told the girls up front I had to go back to work and needed to know when he would be ready, they said not for at least a half hour. I told them to reschedule me and left.

Nah, doesn't bother me a bit. You want to make sure that the people that do join are from NC so that it stays true to its name.

4/27/2011 -13 on the 2 week pre op -17 on the one month mark +3 over the past week Dont be discouraged. I know what I am doing wrong. Got on reg food and went a little nuts after having nothing but liquids and mushies for the past 6 weeks (2 weeks pre op/4 weeks post op). Getting right on that band wagon again though. I am only going to change my ticker once a month though so I have time to lose those 3 again and hopefully plus some on top of that. Good Luck!

I'm in a stall for 3 weeks now and its killing me. I am 6 weeks out. However, I know EXACTLY what I have been doing wrong. Too many carbs and basically too much food. To jump start things up again and most people will say this is wrong but I think I need to train myself again to get off of the carbs, I am going to do the shakes and yogurt during the day and have a meal at night. I am able to eat a lot more than most people on the board, but I do still feel restriction when I over do it. Hopefully this will help me move it again, along with putting in some sort of exercise! Good luck!

DO THE SHIMMY SHIMMY SHAAAKE! hahah you had me laughing! Great job!

Ok, so I misunderstood your purree'd stage. Keep in mind guys that your docs just want you to get used to food at this point. They are not counting on the foods you consume just yet to have your daily Protein intake yet. I would go with the mashed potatos with the carmelized vidalia onions (no chicken). Any meat I pureed was just gross so I depended on my shakes and greek yogurt for my protein. I would eat the mashed at dinner time and with the onions it adds a little extra flavor. Believe me you will love it! I also made mashed sweet potatos too. The refried Beans and chees with a little picante, sour cream and guac was alson a favorite of mine for those two weeks. Again no meat. You can have oatmeal and grits as well. I know the carbs are a little high in these but then again you shouldn't worry about those until you get to the softs. Make these for dinner and do your shakes and yogurt during the day, it gives you something to look forward to. I only had to do 2 weeks of the mushy stage, a month seems a long time to endur to me too. But every docs plan is different!

Kelly, I wasn't allowed to have softs until 4 weeks out. Prior to that everything had to be liquids or mushies. Once I started on the mushies after week two I did get that feeling and it was a bit weird. I am now at 6 weeks and I am able to eat a lot more than what I was able to eat while on week 3 when mushies started. You are probably still swollen and that is why the feeling of being stuck. I get that feeling still when I push it and "over eat". Mind you over eating is 4 oz instead of 3 or more than a cup of food at a time. I do get that feeling when I eat 2/3's of a can of tuna with mayo. If I eat half then I am ok. Give it a couple of more weeks and you should be fine. My advise though is to stick to the liquids for another week and then start on the mushies/softs after that to see how it goes.

Seems your mushie is a combo of softs and mushies. This is what I had last night for dinner: Mexican Night: Bare burritos: Ground beef mixed with taco sause, refried Beans, on the side in three little dollops, one of quac, one of salsa, and one of sour cream so you can just dip a little for added flavor. By the end of the meal, I didn't even use a 1/4 of each dollop. Another is: Since you can have chicken, mix chicken in with the ricotta bake. Also, I tried this from the World According to EggFace: Her bites! Make them as you want they are great. I made ham, cheddar, onions and peppers. Cooked the onions and peppers realy well but was still good for Breakfast, I was able to eat 3 of them that I made in a normal sized muffin pan. That night for dinner hubby made chicken tenders cooked in marinara sauce and I had two more with a drizzle of sause and two tenders. You can do a mexican version of this and put a little sour cream and salsa on top. You can do an italian version of this too by using italian sausage out of the skin with onions and mozzeralla cheese and top with a little marinara sauce. You can also do this as a chinese version and call it egg foo young lol add chinese veg cooked well and a little ff brown gravey mixed with low sodium soy sause. Another thing I liked doing is mashed potato and mix in carmalized vidalia onions and ground beef or cut up chicken tenders. Hope some of this helps, when I got out of the mushie stage (mine was only basically mashed, refried beans, and such, nothing with chuncks and had to be a paste consistancy or thinner) I tried soooooo many things. Good luck!

Congratulations! That is a great accomplishment.

you are averaging 10lbs a week, in my eyes thats pretty damn good. You are doing fine, everyone loses at their own rate.

Hi Kim, What doctor in Charlotte did you decide on? Did you look into Dr. V?

You made me cry. Happy tears of course. I lived that experience with you and am a better person for it. Congratulations! And yes she sure is a mini you...absolutely beautiful.

I believe she has kept it in mind by sensoring what was written. As she said it was much worse that what was stated. Regardless of pre-ops getting scared if her situation doesn't apply then it doesn't apply and they will read it for the information. If it does apply well then they have a better understanding and knows to take further precautions. From what I have read Dr. A's team was informed, not if, of her complete history.

I think you are a shoe in.

Ok, I have kept pretty quiet about this from the get go. But now I'm starting to get ticked off. Not once did anyone mention that Dr. A was a bad surgeon, not once did anyone say that the hospital was a bad hospital. All Lynn and Renee and Sarsar are relaying was their experience. People come here to be informed and informed is what they are getting. It sucks a big one that Renee went through what she went through and it serves as a reminder to anyone who is going to go to Mexicali for their sleeve that has her conditions that additional steps need to be taken. Like she said it was sugar coated here and I have no doubt that it was a terrifying experience to go through, it was her experience and no one should chastise her account of that experience. On the other side of that Sarsar was there at the same time and had quite the opposite experience. When I had my sleeve here in the states, I was puking blood for two whole days because of internal bleeding, and not once in my wanderings did I read anything about that happening to anyone. I am sure I wasnt the only one. I posted my story so others would be informed that this could also happen. In a perfect world there are rainbows and unicorns and fairies and such, but hey people we are here on earth and not everything is perfect. Renee I am glad you are on the mend and dont let anyone or anything stop you from your main goal, getting healthy.

I have no doubt you will get there!!! Congratulations!

Hi Regina! I am Lorraine "Raine" for short by my sisters both and blood and otherwise Married to the most supportive man in the world and we have a 13 year old son who is just a great kid, but hey I am not biased at all LOL. I was born and raised in Brooklyn NYC and have lived in Charlotte for the past 6 1/2 years.Yes, I am a damn Yankee I love it here and wouldn't move back. Mind you I love to go back and visit but Charlotte is my home now. I was sleeved on 4/27/2011 and am down 30lbs since the 2 week pre op diet. I love the sleeve and what is has done for my health and over all quality of life in this short amount of time. I would do it all over again in a heart beat. Sports, well I am a stands fan and will route for the home team but I don't follow stats and couldnt for the life of me tell you who is who on what team etc. I love martial arts, specifically, Jeet Kun Do, which is Bruce Lee's style of Martial Arts. I plan to go back in a couple of weeks after I get back from my sisters wedding. The doc gave me to go ahead. I figure if I have to exercise it might as well be at something that I like doing. I am a high red belt now and have 3 browns to get to my black belt. I had to stop because of my job and well to be honest it was getting too hard with the weight climbing once agan. Glad you started the group! Raine

That is great keep us posted on him!