ssankofa73

hi Chim. You're post about doing the walk didn't phase me 1 bit. Actually, it gave me the idea to ask my sorority chapter to start training in September for the local Breast Cancer walk in October. I only try to take everyone's posts as inspiration and yours did the trick for me.

Hi Everyone! Today was a good day. I walked for 38 minutes (yes, I count every minute!! lol) around the neighborhood and sweated off hopefully at least a pound. Later in the evening I blended 1 cup of campbells turkey pot pie soup with 1 serving of 2% milk cottage cheese with a hand mixer and oh my lawd!!! I was in heaven. It was the best soup I've ever had and when I counted up the protein it came out to 30% of the protein I needed for the day. It was rich and delicious. Win win situation ya'll, lol.

Hi New CC! Since being banding I feel like I could burp a symphony! I'm hoping that this is just a phase.

Ja9 I knew I wasn't going to be perfect through this journey. I just didn't know my imperfections would come out so early in the game. They say that the slower you lose weight, the longer it stays off and you have a better chance of having more of your skin snapping back instead of hanging. These 2 reasons help to make the Lapband an better choice for me than gastric bypass. Yes, I wish the weight was melting off of me like it does for the RNY folks, but the majority of the research I've done says bandsters catch up with RNY's weigh loss stats about 12 to 18 months post op. Those are great stats to me.

Only4me I'm trying to read some "pb-ing" and "stuck food" horror stories so I can be "scared straight" and not go after the solid foods. I ended up finishing the second Protein shake and had a 1/2 cup more soup. I'm gonna try to drink a little more tonight. I'm sorry to hear about your bout (sp?) with acid reflux. A call to Dr. Geiss' office is smart. I hope he has good news for you. Hear are some tips I learned in school re: Treating Acid Reflux: -drink skimmed milk and suck on tums (both add Calcium and and are chemical bases that counteract acid in the body) -sleep while propping your head and torso up on pillows at about a 30 to 45 degree angle. This allows gravity to help keep the stomach juices down -forget the tomato soup or other food/soups made from vegetables that have seed(they are full of acid) -stop ingesting food 1/2 before bed time I'm wondering if my recovery is normal or not because I noticed at the hospital that I was up and about a lot more than the other patients on my floor (Part of this was due to the night nurse, Delia. She damn near forced me out of bed at around 2 am to go walking in the unit). My poor roommate was in major pain and it seems as if she was suffering more than I was the whole time. All in all, I expected to be in worse shape than this but I feel blessed that I'm having a good recovery so far. I don't have any kids and I'm not working right now so I have a lot more time to sit and relax. You have a full fledged family to tend to so it may take you longer to heal. I'm sure your recovery will pick up its pace soon though.

Only4me - I spoke too soon. I didn't even finish the 2nd shake yet. I don't know why I'm put off by them because its not like they taste bad. Maybe I need more variety. I did have a bowl of egg drop Soup with a little extra Protein powder in it though. I went for a 30 minute walk and had 1/2 a bottle of Water. My neighbors were bbq-ing so I stopped and had 1/2 cup of pickle salad (sliced pickles, olives and bell pepper) and about a 1/3 cup of potato salad (I'm really craving the salty stuff for some reason). Before the night is over I'm going to try to finish my 2nd Protein Shake. BTW, 1 of my steri strips fell off and I have a little clear thread hanging out of my incision. Thats gotta be dissolvable suture. Do you know if they used glue, staples, stitches, etc. on you? I hope your having a good day.

How soon after being banded did you start having sex again?

1 ounce per sip is waaaaaay too much if your pb-ing or even 1 or 2 days post op. Try using a medicine cup. It should hold about 2 tablespoons of liquid. As per 2 of the nurses who helped me during my hospital stay, you should have 2 to 4 sips from the medicine cup over the course of 15 minutes. Its just enough liquid to hit different parts of your mouth and trickle down your throat after you swallow. Try this and let us know how it turns out.

Well everyone, I made it thru the bbq without incident and I have even better news today. I was able to finish a carnation instant breakfast drink in about 15 to 20 minutes today!! (lots of burpings but that comes with the territory I guess). I think i may be one my way to actually doing what my dr's nutritionists said I'm supposed to do (4 to 6 Meal Replacement drinks per day plus 2 bottles of water). We'll see how the day wears on......

Most of the pain I feel in my chest travels up to my chest from my belly and I burp it out. I think the pain is normal as long as it "moves." I'm being cautious but its tough because of this "will to chew" thing I've got going. Not to mention the fact that I returned to my parents house today because they're bbq-ing. My sister's friend came in from out of town and she made fresh guacamole right in front of me. She turned to me and said "do you think its missing something?" I took the tiniest piece of tortilla chip off of a bigger chip and had a fingernail full of guacamole. I chewed until the cows came home and said, "more salt....but my tastebuds have been off lately." Half of the people coming to the bbq don't know I've been banded. So, I've armed myself with a carnation instant Breakfast and I'm hoping for the best.

This is a late response but.... I understand this man's concern for wanting support from other black men. He may be from a family or community where certain foods and customs lend themselves to a heftier lifestyle. While the African -American community is certainly not extremely different from others in our world, fat acceptance and food preferences for African-Americans don't always go hand in hand with the lapband lifestyle.

Maybe a local doctor who does lapband surgery would be able to help. I don;t know how we would find out that info though. Thats a good question. Does anyone know what we would need to do if we had a band related emergency? I wouldn't feel comfortable just going to the regular emergency room if my doctor wasn't available.

Only4me My appointment is on the 17th. The alba 77 shakes are good. If you can, try to add a little Protein powder and more skim milk to it to increase your protein intake. Remember how I said I was gonna suck on a meatball last night? Well get this..... I ended up eating 1 1/2 meatballs and 4 olives over the course of an hour. Yes yes, I know....I'm pushing it but I had an odd craving for them so while sucking on them, I chewed them until they were pulverized. They went down without getting stuck but meanwhile I must have chewed so much that my jaw was tired. PLEASE DONT TRY THIS. I'm telling you this because I feel like I needed to confess. I told my friend who's a doctor and she said that I was probably lacking sodium and that's why the craving happened. 503-250 I already got caught in the high cal/low cal carnation instant breakfast web. I bought the 1 that said it was twice the protein of an egg thinking that it would be better for me. It turns out that it only has 1 gram more protein in it than the regular carnation drink but it has about 90 more calories!! I have 2 more of them to go and then I'm done with those.

Hi Susa! I only had to do clear liquids for a couple of days but here are some suggestions. popsicles (preferably sugar free but the sugar free ones taste bad to me so I went with bomb pops instead) italian ices crystal light tea flavored bottled water

Star Jones had gastric bypass surgery and then a ton a of plastic surgery.

I plan on only telling the people who need to know for now. That means, family and close friends. The only other people I feel comfortable discussing it with those aquaintances who are very overweight and need help like the rest of us on here. This, just like any other health problem, is personal and the world doesn't need to know. Star Jones is another story. She's a celebrity who's opinions matter to her fans. She says "go buy payless shoes" and her fans will do it. Meanwhile, she knows she doesn't wear payless, lol. She damn near lied about not having surgery and gave a lot folks who follow her false hope of being able to lose a lot of weight without surgery. Her responsibility is very different from ours because she is a public figure.

Hi Only4me I just read your Lucky 7s post. The list of whole liquids that I was given was short too. I just looked around on our website to get ideas from other people as to what we should have during this phase then I bought what I saw in the stores instead of ordering the drinks. My issues now are trying to get in all the food, keepoing motivated for excersising (sp?) and dealimg with the gas pain...to be quite honest....I miss chewing, too. It got to the point where the other night I took 3 fat free potato chips from my sister, sucked on them and spat them out just so I could have the taste of real food in my mouth. I might do that with a meatball in a few minutes, lol.

Only4me Eventhough Lisa, the nutritionist from Dr. Geiss' office, told me only about medifast products, I haven't bought them yet!! The reason why is because of the expense. Plus, I realized that she has some sort of deal with medifast because I was told to order them and mentioin her name. Here's what I've been drinking: Carnation Instant Breakfast Slimfast Nutrament (high in calories though) Designers whey (unflavored mixed into the following soups) egg drop soup (I'm chewing it like crazy) lipton's creamy tomato soup lipton's cream of chicken soup I hope this helps.

Hi Only4me! We were banded on the same day by Dr. Geiss and we're both having the same fluid intake issues. I only had about 1 glass of juice mixed with water today in addition to 2.5 carnation instant breakfast shakes and 1 cup of soup. I feel like my pouch can't hold any more. I'm going to try to focus on the protein too. I was wondering if you were on the same floor with me. There were about 4 or 5 lapband patients where I was. Let me know how you're doing.

Hi Caz. I would have gone with an extra large so that I could where it on my way down to my ideal weight. I'd rather have it baggy when I'm thinner then tight when I'm fatter...but thats just my humble opinion.

Thanks for the encouragement Unruly! My motivation was orginally to help get rid of the gas pain plus my butt hurt from all that sitting.

I dd it! 20 minutes on the treadmill (very slowly).

Hey guys! I'm contemplating whether I should try to get on the treadmill for a 10 minute stint. I got banded 4 days ago. Do you guys think its too soon to do the treadmill? I've been walking around my parents house and the only pain I have thats due to movement is when I try to climb the stairs. I have the regular gas pain, stitches pain thingy going on.

I agree with everyone's list of goals. I don't remember who posted their dr's advice, but it was really good re: how much to eat, etc. Keep the advice coming guys!

Jackie 506<br /> <br /> the full feeling I have is a weird kind of full that lacks the satisfaction of actually eating. Trust me...I'm not complaining but my mouth tastes funny while my belly is full so the full feeling is like an annoyance in a way. I'm hoping that it will serve as aversion therapy for me and make me not want to feel stuffed. I'm trying to look at it as a blessing eventhough its paining me. <br /> <br /> <br /> In the past, I have eaten to the point where I was uncomfortable or in pain. I felt satisfied that I finished the food but would curse myself because then once the food was done I had to deal with this overstuffed, Thanksgiving Day, barely able to breathe feeling. Thats how I ate roughly half my meals when I wasn't on a diet or trying to "be good." Its an odd thing that I've done to myself all these years and this is the first time that I have been able to actually think it totally through. I'm hoping that soon Ill get to the point where I'll be able eat a little food, feel full but not painfully so and be able to move on without wanting more. <br /> <br /> To ALL who have welcomed me....<br /> Thanks for the well wishes and good luck for allof us who have been banded or will be banded.