salsa1877

Yeah it was because of the steak...cause with the juice came some of the steak too. IT WAS AWFUL!! Believe me...I am not too tight. I could still eat an entire horse if I chewed it well enough!

Ewwwwww...I just PB'd Powerade Zero through my nose!!! I ate some steak for dinner and it got stuck. After about 1 1/2 hours I took too big of a drink of the juice and it came RIGHT BACK UP. It was so violent it came up through my nose too...UGH PBing cold stuff is NASTY!!! So BBK...I think you should get some steak stuck, then gulp something cold and PB all over your in-laws. That is the vindictive side of me!

Ewwwwww...I just PB'd Powerade Zero through my nose!!! I ate some steak for dinner and it got stuck. After about 1 1/2 hours I took too big of a drink of the juice and it came RIGHT BACK UP. It was so violent it came up through my nose too...UGH PBing cold stuff is NASTY!!!

Unfortunately I have NO idea. I didn't take any measurements. My waist at the belly button stayed the same i think. As you can tell from the before pics it was the 2 big a$$ rolls above and below the belly button that caused me problems. I was a size 4 before surgery and thankfully am still a size 4 now. I was hoping I didn't got down any because it is difficult to find size 2's around here. Now I can just wear the 4's without body shapers and no muffin tops. You will love your results. I know I do. If it wasn't that the girls needed lifted I wouldn't even consider the revision surgery that my PS wants to do. She wants to cut across the top of the torso and pull up to get the rest of the excess skin. Since we can do it at the same time as the breasts I will have it done, otherwise I am pleased as punch!

So these are techincally 5 days early but I will be out of town on my 1 year bandiversary so I thought I would post these now.

Today is 1 month since PS so I thought I would update pictures. Now if I can convince DH to take some pictures with my clothes ON:tongue2: I will post them on the brag thread!

Here they are. I have some comparison shots between 1 month (today) and before, as well as 1 month and 5 days after.

That's right... you are all still running. I on the other hand have to be satisified with walking. I DESPISE walking. August 7th is not going to get here fast enough!!!

I like the Atkins shakes or the Low Carb Slim fast. Also, Isopure has no carbs and it is juice flavored kind. Atkins and Slim Fast I get a Wal-mart and Isopure I got at GNC.

To be honest...I am not exactly sure what he will be doing!! He is working for a grocery distributer (sp?). So I know he will be the contact guy for the purchaser and seller. I will just tell everyone that he is in the import/export business. Now if only he made the kind of money that the mob does in their import/export businesses we would be sitting pretty!! He is also going back to school to get his teaching degree so everything seems to be falling into place right now. Well we are going to go see the movie that we didn't see last night. We decided that we would wait until the matinees today so that it was cheaper!

Fortunately I have a pretty substantial lead. And I get to start running again on Aug 7 so I guess I will be alright with more competition I love my nike+. I think I would be lost without it now. I think sometimes it irks DH when we go for a walk because I will make him walk an extra block or 2 just so that I can hit the proper milage.

Candle I feel your pain...well not literally. I hate being down for so long. Fortunately my doc has said that I can start running on Aug 7. I am looking forward to that day as much as I looked forward to my surgery day. Everyone is doing fantastic. It is not how fast you lose the weight but how much you embrace your new life. Each one of those pounds that you have lost has added to your life. Keep up the fantastic work!

Yipeeeee...DH got a job today. THANK GOODNESS! THe fill seems to be going well. PS still wants me eating low carb because for me carbs=swelling. So we are celebrating with a T-bone steak. Yummy. I can still eat quite a bit of food with the fill, but that should be fine because PS gave me the go ahead to start running on August 7. Will be the happiest day of the summer for me I think. THe hardest part of the whole TT was the inability to exercise. I didn't think that I would miss it...but holy cow...I have been miserable without it. I told her that was the only reason that I was hesitant about the future surgery. BUt she reassured me that the next surgery will be nothing compared to this one and that I should be back to exercising within a couple of weeks compared to over a month. She is allowing me to go back to exercising 1 week early because I have healed so well. My incisions are almost totally healed. I still have one little area that is still draining but otherwise everything looks great. I am hoping to post more pictures this weekend. We are going to see The Mummy III tonight and then Mamma Mia tomorrow. It is nice to be able to splurge every once in a while now.

Wow Frangi that is quick. My PS won't consider anything including revisions for 3 months! THough I will have to wait longer for the rest of my surgeries because of $$$$! Glad that everything is working out for you though. How is your swelling? I am up SEVERAL pounds but most of it is due to swelling. I did get a fill and my PS wants me to go back to low carb for a while to get the swelling under control since carbs = swelling for me.

Steph - I certainly could help you out on the science front. I have taught everything (biology is my weakest, but I still have enough basic knowledge that I could help out!) As for the fill...I don't know if it is working or not. I have been on liquids for the last 2 days. However, I am not waking up in the middle of the night and in the morning STARVING. So I guess that is definetly a plus. I have breakfast in front of me right now so I will see how it works and check in later!

Yes I am feeling much better that I got the fill. It was getting to the point that I was starving all the time, I wasn't staying full, and I could eat WAY too much food. I figured that even though I am at goal I should use the tool that I paid for! Plus with the absence of exercise the pounds were starting to creep back on! It was a pretty agonizing decision and one that took three doctors...my PS, my PCP and my lap-band doc. I got a pretty conservative fill and have another scheduled for August 11 in case we need tweeks either way. Thank you for the nice comments. You will LOVE the TT. Now that I am almost a full month out I am still doing great. I have some swelling but not too bad. I will post pictures this weekend. We have been out of town and I have not been as good with the pictures as I had hoped to be. But we don't have anything planned this weekend so I should be able to get DH to take some! On the exercise front...I get to start running on August 7...HAPPIEST DAY OF MY LIFE!

You look great! I didn't see any jiggle. Wow...you look like a lifelong professional runner! Please keep your fingers crossed that the PS allows me to start running SOON!

Sorry things have been hectic. We went out of town so that I could get a fill. I have been starving and not staying full for very long at all so I decided after three months of being unfilled that perhaps I should go in. I had gained some weight but I am not sure what is swelling and what is actually weight gain. But I wanted to nip it in the bud quickly. Healing is going alright. I am really REALLY swollen right now. I am also still leaking at the incision site. I have an appt with my PS tomorrow and will report back in then.

I am back as well, but my trip was no where near as exciting! I did get a fill which is a good thing because the scale is awful. I only got 1cc because she thought that 1.4 was too tight. (My fills are done under fluoro) I am glad you all had a great time. We hope to be there in Vegas!

You ladies look fantastic. Wish I could be there! We are leaving bright and early in the morning to go to WA. My dads birthday is tomorrow and then I am getting a fill on Tuesday. I asked my PCP and my PS about getting one and explained my reasons. They are good friends and work together often so they teleconferenced about it and talked with my lap-band doc. All three have decided that we would give it a try and if I can't maintain weight or are losing too fast that I would go back and have some removed. It was agreed that we would find a fill level that helped me stay fuller longer while allowing me to eat enough calories to maintain. My PCP was great in helping me come up with ways that I could eat "normally" without having to eat all SF, LF, FF stuff. She agreed that if I got a fill I could have normal bread with normal cheese in a sandwich, but that I would only have to eat 1/2 of a sandwich. We had a long talk and she thinks that I will feel more in control and less anxious over food if I don't have to count every calorie and buy only FF, SF, and LF stuff. It is her goal to have me move more into a way of eating that is more along the line of average weight adults. When we talked about my nutritionist's plan she said it was too structured for a "normal" person, but that someone with my personality that it was going to be too much pressure on me and would drive me insane. She still thinks it is a good idea to plan my meals but wants me to leave 1 weekend day and 1 week day that are unplanned so that I can begin to realize that I can do this. Because of the anti-anxiety meds I am on she thinks that I can handle it. Whether or not I will be able to handle more unplanned days...we just don't know. So anyways this fill decision has been EXTREMELY well thought out with 3 doctors involved. I am keeping my appt for 8/11 as well to see if we need to increase or decrease the fill. I will have a very conservative fill this time in hopes of NOT having repeats of the last 2 fills! Well I had best get to bed...we are leaving VERY early!

Steph just think...a year ago you wouldn't have been able to do that at all! Hope the sickness got better! Sleeping on a train can be tricky. We went to San Fran a couple years ago and I swear I had the biggest kink in my neck. Well we are going to a party tomorrow and then going to visit my family. Hopefully my bloating and swelling will go down. Right now the scale is not a pretty picture!

I wish that I could tell you that was true. But in all honesty...it has WAY more to do with genetics, how much weight you started with, where you carried your weight and how much yo-yo dieting you have done (this wears out the elastic fibers in your skin). Now all of what you said is definetly not going to hurt you. It may help some, but if you are like me...there was no way all the flab was going away without the hands of my WONDERFUL surgeon.

Karey...I need you to come kick some people's butts for me. There are two ladies who are very tight on my normal thread and asked people what they thought they should do. I of course used your story (though I didn't mention your name) and told them how DANGEROUS it was to only be able to get down liquids. They still think they should just stick it out. One lady said it was "okay to just be able to get Water down." AHHHHHHHH it drives me freaking crazy. I hope the nausea goes away for you. Being lightheaded is terrible too though. I am just finally getting over mine. The meds are finally exiting my system. Just had to vent!

I would say that it is imperative that you eat real foods. Being too tight can cause slippage problems. One of the ladies on the PS threads was too tight for about 2 weeks and ended up having emergency surgery because her band slipped. Her doc told here that it was a life threatening situation. I think a 10 hour round trip is definetly worth saving your band or your life! I totally get the hell that it is when you live so far away from your doc. My round trip is 12 hours and over a mountain pass. I have ALWAYS believed that you should be loose enough to be able to eat real foods. That is what your body is meant to be fueled by and that is what is going to keep you fuller longer. I know it is bad timing but at least you don't have 13 feet of snow in the mountains like I did when I was so tight. By the way... my papaya enzymes say 4 times per day. But honestly you can't OD on them. It is a natural substance extracted from the papaya. Personally I have never heard of anyone getting sick from eating too mucyh papaya!:ohmy: Try laying on a bed with your head and stomach laying off the edge of the bed. When I got WASA crackers stuck for over 2 hours this is what I finally resorted to and it seemed to work .

This third week is a bit tougher than the last couple of weeks. I am really, really tired. It is not unusual though. Some of the ladies that had PS before me and my PS all warned me that week three seems to wipe you out. And so it has. I didn't sleep very well last night so that didn't help any. I just couldn't fall asleep. I read 1 and a half books last night TRYING to get tired. I did go to Goodwill today to start replenishing my clothing. It was not a good experience. I didn't have my binder on because it is difficult to try clothes on with it on. BIG A$$ mistake. OMG I was in so much discomfort that I had to stop trying them on half way through. So I just bought them and brought the stuff home to try on at a more convenient time. Janet there really isn't a lot of pain though. It is more just a discomfort. My lap-band was MUCH more painful...though PS is more work. There is more after care. However I would do it again in an heartbeat (and I will be as soon as I pay off my lap-band). I will be putting the girls back in place and have a reverse tummy tuck...No that is not where they add the skin back on to make me look like Jabba the Hut again. They will cut a horizontal incision just underneath the breasts and pull up to get the rest of the skin off. So food wise my doc wanted me on something that would reduce bloating because I was swelling so much so we agreed to have me go back on a very low carb meal plan for a few days to help the swelling and the drainage. It has worked, and the scale is dropping like a rock despite eating over 3000 calories for the last few days. I haven't felt as hungry without the carbs, but she doesn't want this to be a full time meal plan. I go back to my regular way of eating tomorrow. I also see her tomorrow to make sure that an infection is not forming where I am leaking out of the incision. I actually feel much better being on the low carb. I think that I might do really low carb for a couple days a month just to clean the carbs out of the system. Well I am going to get ready to go for a walk tonight. It was icky hot here today. It almost felt suffocating. So I am waiting for it to cool down.