salsa1877

I run everyday wearing my spanx like garments. Actually I think they are called Assets. I got them at Target and they are made by the same lady that created spanx...but I like them better and they are WAY cheaper. I have worn other ones that are "sturdier" and they do help the jiggle in the belly more, but I get nasty chaffing. Make sure that they are TIGHT on your thighs and that you have shorts or pants that cover the legs so that if your thighs do rub together that there isn't something that is going to rub your leg raw. There is a wonderful picture of my chaffing on my blog (addy in my signature). As for being difficult to run in...I wouldn't know. I have terrible back pain from my extra skin so if I don't wear them, I am in more pain. Therefore ever since I have started exercising I have been wearing the support garments. One of the MANY reasons I am looking forward to my TT. Good luck in finding something.

Here is an example menu. I made this for someone who was shooting for 1200 calories a day. If you are going lower than you will have to eliminate something. If you go to the top of the second page of this thread I have posted several recipes. What types of foods are you eating? If you post some of your favorite recipes I can try and make them healthy for you. This is what I did for the most part. I took my favorite foods and eliminated/substituted ingredients. Hope this is what you are looking for!

That was nice of him. And I don't think the dress is too fancy at all. I think it is beautiful and should work just fine. Believe me...you can't be overdressed in Vegas. I might be able to swing Vegas if you go there next year. All depends on DH's job situation. Friday is his last day and then...we have no idea what he is going to do. Fortunately I got that teaching job at the university and an extra week at my school before school starts so that will buy us a couple more months. I just hope he can find something. Right now he is in kind of a funk. He has promised me that he will go to the other 2 temp agencies on Monday. Keep your fingers crossed that he finds something there.

My band always tightened up about 1-2 weeks after a fill. I would honestly suggest that you get a slight unfill. There should never be a time when you can't get liquids down. You don't need to have much taken out .02cc's is sometimes enough. But you don't want to compromise your health. Speaking from experience, being too tight can sometimes lead to slower weight loss. Good luck

Yeah my friends at home are a little concerned that I am going to be under anesthesia for so long and then going home the same day. When I questioned the doc about she said that if I lived a long ways away that she would consider it. I am having the surgery done in the neighboring town and my local hospital (at which she has privelidges) is about 2 minutes from my house. My WONDERFUL DH will be here with me and fortunately I have the 4th of July weekend where he won't be working and will be able to stay with me for 3 full days. Plus I think my brother (who took care of me after lap-band surgery) will be coming down the following week. I don't have a recliner but I did purchase an "anti-gravity" chair that is an outdoor lounge chair. However it takes almost zero energy to recline it. It has locks to prevent it from moving. It was the only thing that I could afford and that would fit in our VERY tiny apartment. It is very sturdy and I hope that it will do the trick. I am getting very excited...though I have to say that for right now I am more excited about the half-marathon. It is one week from tomorrow. I am of course nervous because I have some tendonitis going on in my left achilles tendon, but I am resting today and tomorrow. Then I am going to take it for a 3 mile spin on Sunday and see how it feels. This will be the first Sunday in months that I haven't run or walked more than 10 miles. I can't wait to not have to wear the heavy duty compression garments when I run after the TT. They cause major chaffing and open sores on my legs when I run for long distances. Also, the tightness makes it a little hard to breath. I know how different my activity level is with all the weight gone... now with the excess skin going to be gone...I can't even imagine what I can do. Thanks for all the well wishes!

I have been resting. No runs today or tomorrow. On Sunday I am going to do 3 miles and see how it feels. There is acutally zero pain today, but I have been icing it and taking it easy. So easy in fact I didn't get out of my PJ's today! I did get an interesting email from the local university here. I am having one of their student teacher's in my classroom next year and now they want me to teach one of the their classes for them. So I will be teaching students how to teach Chemistry. I get paid 1600$ for 5 Saturdays! SWEEET! Janet - On the strip there are A LOT of little mini stores. I think there are about 4 or 5 Walgreens on the strip itself. Plus, push comes to shove you can take a taxi to a local grocery store. If you like outlet shopping and you have some time you can go to the Las Vegas Outlet Mall near Blue Diamond. Vegas is all about image so you should be able to find some sort of healthy food. Well I am 500 calories short on calories so I guess I had better eat up!

A baked potato is not a bad choice. Even carb-scared me ate a baked potato every once in a while. Yesterday I went for a long run (10 miles) and pulled up with a slight injury. I have tendonitis in my achilles tendon so doctor now has me on rest until Sunday and then no long runs (nothing more than 3 miles) until the race. If I had been running the half marathon I would have run through the pain, but I stopped before I had finished the full 12 miles that I was going to do because I figured there was no point in injuring myself during training. Another good news, my insurance did cover my cymbalta and it is only 20$ a month. First decent thing my insurance has done!

HOLY COW! 51???? No way...those legs are SMOKIN' HOT!:biggrin::thumbup:

Thanks for the info. I will look for those pills. I am not having any lipo except for in the "private" area, but I am sure that there will be a lot of bruising. I will be going to GNC anyways to get some Isopure, so I will look for the pills there.

LV NICE JOB! You are so going to make your challenge! I ran a 5K this morning and then went for another short run with DH tonight. The 5K this morning was up a volcano. Nope...not kidding. I am going to post a picture of it tomorrow on my blog. The addy for it is in my signature if you haven't visited it. There is some deep stuff there...along with the pictures of my hideous belly!

The unfill is going alright. I do get hungrier than I did, but that is a good thing becuse I need calories. I still can't eat a whole lot. More then when I was filled, but I seriously couldn't be training and have a fill right now. I still get tight when I am under stress. Yesterday I couldn't eat my eggs and toast because I was too tight. But even today...I am under calories AGAIN. I am just not hungry enough to eat the amount of food that I have to. This is what I have eaten today. 1 cup of Cereal and 8 oz of yogurt (220) Tomatoes (30) Sandwich (150) Protein Bar (150) 2 bean burritos (140 tortillas, 200 beans) Protein Bar (190) Spaghetti with ground lamb (400) 4 WASA Crackers (120) 300g Strawberries (100) 5 Lite and Crispy WASA Crackers (100) Do you see how freaking much food that is????? And I just forced myself to eat the last crackers. I feel like I have to graze all day just to get my calories in. This is only 1800 calories. Optimally I would like to get to 2000. Though the doctor did say that if I lost a few more pounds I would be okay, but that she would like to see me plateau soon. Yeah...me too! As for the pain pump...it isn't in my arm. It is a sack that has two tubes that run on each side of the tummy and come out near the pubic area. The sac is on the outside but the tubes are under the skin. I don't want to be pulling that out myself. DH would definetly do it...he is kind of morbid like that. I get a little squeemish. Denise I have been to make me heal, but when I asked my doc about the stuff, she didn't think I should waste my money. She said neosporin will do the trick. She said if there is a problem she has stuff that they use in the office that is part of my after care. I have scoured those boards looking for someone that looks like me. I have never found anyone...it is depressing. I have no idea what I am going to look like. Well I ran a 5k this morning that was completely uphill. I ran what is called pilot butte. I am going to post a picture of it on my blog tomorrow. Right now I am going to get ready to go to bed. I am still trying to figure out this whole sleeping schedule. I don't want to get up until 6:30 or 7, but my body naturally wakes up at 3:30. So then I am tired and go to bed early and the whole cycle starts again. GRRRRRR

I would assume it would be because of my incredible muscle tone. The same volume of muscle weighs more than the same volume of fat. I have a low body fat percentage from all the running I do. I run 30+ miles per week and am training for a half marathon. If you go to my blog (addy in my signature) you can see me in my size 4 pants.

Thank you. Believe me...it is a lot of hard work. And work that I am still doing. But it can be done and with determination, hard work, and the great family that I have here at LBT, I am very proud of myself and very excited about the weight loss. Good luck with the insurance thing. I was a self pay, so while I didn't have to jump through insurance hoops, I make a 700$ monthly payment for the next 2 years. I already have paid 1 year!

Sorry I didn't respond. I haven't been on much. Here is something that I have sent to a couple people about what I followed. First...you do need a combo of exercise and food, but I didn't start REALLY exercising until I had lost 50 pounds. My secret...I followed every rule! 1. I NEVER, EVER drink while eating. 2. Proteins first, veggies next ...and then I was pretty much done! I put 1 cup of food on my plate and I ate that. I never learned to stop when I was full. So I still have to treat myself as a 5 year old child. I give myself what I can eat and that is all I do. Yes it takes a lot of self discipline, but the empowerment you get from telling yourself NO will change your life forever. It has made me a better wife, sister, daughter, teacher and friend. I would overwhelm myself in the past and spread myself to thin. Now I can confidently say no, and things are much better. 3. I never deprived myself of any food so as to eliminate any cravings. The only thing I eliminated was rice because I just can't eat it any more. It gets stuck. And milk and ice cream...gone as well...I became lactose intolerant. I would have spaghetti...mostly with just sauce and ground chicken (my secret ingredient in everything), but I would have 6 penne noodles, just so that I didn't feel like I was being left out. 4. I had chocolate everyday...in the form of a pure Protein bar(that is the name of the bar...but I would stay away from the fruit ones...I thought they were disgusting.) It is low carb, high protein and cut the cravings for sweets, because I had one everyday. I get them at wal-mart. Make sure to look for the 190 calorie ones...not the 300 calorie ones! 5. I ate at 4 distinct times everyday. For my schedule (I am a teacher) it was 6:30, 10:30 (my prep period), 2:30 and 6:30. The 2:30 was the Protein Bar. 6. Shhhhh...don't tell...I did NOT focus on Water. I am a scientist...you dont need 64 ounces of water everyday. Drinking makes me hungry, so I only drink a half hour before I eat. I have to drink more now because I am training for a half-marathon. 7. Exercise...Once I added it, I did walking, strength training, elipticalling and now running. In fact yesterday I just ran 10 straight miles. But that has taken me since January to do that. Take it slow...injuries will sideline you for a long time. Don't over do it because you will get angry at the amount of time you have to spend and stop. Start slowly and start to kind of like it. I still will never LOVE it, even though I train 6 days a week. 8. Set attainable goals. Little things that you can Celebrate. 9. Find what works for you. Not everything I did here will work for you. Find what does and you will have solved the mystery for yourself. 10. Make a menu for yourself for the week, and eat only what is on their. On Friday, if you have followed the menu exactly give yourself one food that you would not normally have, but that still fits in your calorie count. Make sure it is not something that will cause you to binge. I have 1 bag of popcorn.

Gosh ladies...sorry to hear about all your troubles, but please do continue to whine and share. It helps those of us that are coming up behind you to know what to expect. I went to my pre-op yesterday and will be starting my thread shortly. I have been lazy and not wanting to do anything except run. If it involves my brain...it isn't getting done! Stay down and know that we are all thinking of you. Stay on the pain meds if needed. And Frangi...watch that temp!

I know I haven't been around a lot. I have just been lazy. Not in the running sense, but just my brain. It doesn't want to think and my fingers don't want to type. But I did want to let you know what the doctor said yesterday. So as if the whole world did not already know, my surgery is set for July 3 at 7:30AM. I will have to be to the surgery center at 6:30. To the dismay of many around here, this will be an outpatient surgery and is scheduled to last 6 hours. Here is what the doc said yesterday. 1. I will have 2, (possibly 3) incisions. One that runs hip to hip (about 3/4 of the way back on the hip), 1 that runs vertically from groin to breast bone, and then possibly one that is horizontal just underneath the bra line. She won't know until she sees how much puckering there will be at the top. 2. She has no idea how much muscle repair I will need. She said she wouldn't know until she gets in there. 3. She may or may not move my port. It depends on how much of a fat pad there is between my port and the muscle. If there is not a lot, she will leave it. If there is a fair amount, then she will unstitch the port, remove the fat, and resecure the port to my muscle. Lovely...port pain again! She will not be changing the location of the port and has the complete support of my lap-band surgeon. 4. She will lipo the mons area and lift as well. This is being thrown in as a bonus. She said she is not going to charge me for the lipoing of the mons area because she didn't originally think I would need it, but now she thinks it would be better. She said it is not enough to justify recalculating the fees. 5. I will be receiving a pain pump that will last for 48 hours. She gave me the option of showing me how to remove it myself (WTH!) or to move up my post-op and come in on Monday and have her remove it. I opted for the second! I am not a biologist/doctor...that is what I pay them the big bucks for! 6. She is so excited that I am running the half-marathon before surgery because it will cause great circulation and put me in the best shape of my life. She was not concerned about the weightloss because of my muscle tone. She didn't want to see me losing a lot of weight just due to low calories and poor nutrition which can be a problem for healing. But after seeing the muscle tone in my arms and legs she is EXTREMELY confident in my ability to heal quickly. They took a bunch of pictures and I got my prescriptions for surgery. They are all liquid as this was the only thing that my lap-band surgeon suggested. I did not want to get a pill stuck and be throwing up! So I will just gag from the flavor instead. Liquid pain meds and liquid antibiotics. Sounds like a party. I can sit in my recliner like chair with a straw and party umbrella in my medical cocktail and feel like I am sitting on the beach...with my new "bikini body"!

I did 6 miles yesterday. Today is my rest day... and I need it. Tomorrow will be a 5K in the morning and then another 5K in the afternoon. Good job everyone! LV nice job on 5.25 miles! Way to go!

The best place to find out about my surgery is through my blog. I will be updating it often. There is a link to it in my signature. I am a little nervous about the surgery but not too much. I have my half marathon to worry about instead!

So I have been up since 3:30...I guess old habits are hard to break! On the weight front...I dropped another 3 pounds. I had been hovering between 150 and 151 for the last several days before we left to go camping. While we were camping I didn't count calories and just ate. I even had a smore. Though I couldn't eat it with the chocolate...it was took rich. So after I took two bites of that and realized I didn't like it, I just had a marshmallow with some graham crackers. This morning when I stepped on the scale...147. I guess I am only 2 pounds away from a normal BMI. However, now I am going to 2000-2100 calories. Well I am going to try and go back to sleep for a few more hours.

Hey all...I am back from my camping trip. It was sooooo nice to be away. I finished for the school year on Friday!!!!! I have my pre-op in the morning and then I am going to the half-marathon course to walk part of it with a friend. I would like to walk half which would end up being a 12 mile round trip, but I don't know if my legs are up to it. I ran 12 straight miles today. Not a bad time either 2 hours 22 minutes. I would never have thought even 2 months ago that I would be able to run for almost 2 and 1/2 hours straight. This is a true testament to what hard work and dedication can do.

I made it back from camping and I ran 12 miles this weekend! I am exhausted. I have a pre-op appointment tomorrow morning. I will report back when I get home. A friend and I are going to go to the half-marathon course and walk part of it tomorrow. My legs are sore though, so I don't know how far we are going to go. My plan was 12 miles, but I don't know if that will be possible. The hyperventilation has almost gone away. I think it is a combo of meds, school being out, and the doc reassuring me that I am not crazy! Well I am off to bed.

Good to hear. I think this is how it is going to be. I have surgery on the 3rd and see the doctor on the 9th. I will not be staying overnight. My tummy tuck will be done outpatient.

We have been camping all weekend but I made DH drive about 35 miles so that we could get service on his blackberry to make sure that Frangi made it out of surgery. We are all so connected, I didn't think I would be able to sleep if I didn't know how my friend was doing. Becky, take it easy and keep up with those pain meds. My doc will be leaving my pain pump in for 2 days, but I don't know how that will work, because 2 days after surgery is a Saturday!

I did a 5K run last night and a 12 miler this morning. I will chat more later, but I am exhausted!

I too am going out of town. Going camping. I'm FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE