JustWatchMe

Congrats! Take care of yourself and let us know how you're doing.

Love it! I've got a ways to go before I'm anywhere near sexy. My BFF told me at our Aqua Zumba class this week that she could see I'm losing weight because I'm "jigglier than before". Huh? "You're not as solid as you were in the Water a few weeks ago." It cracked me up. Leave it to your best friend to give you the weirdest compliment. My body shape has never been an hourglass, even when I was briefly thin years ago. My mom has always been overweight, but she had a small waist and wide hips. She hated her body, and I hated mine. She always told me I had thin legs, which proportionally, I do. I wanted her shape and she wanted mine. Go figure.

Can I ask why they gave you a fill the same day you got stuck? I'm new at this, so bear with me. Isn't getting stuck a sign that you're already too tight?

I hope they figure out what happened. Good luck and keep us posted. You're not a failure! Hang in there.

@@tmposton, ask your nutritionist if you can puree soups in the blender. Your options are wide open then, as you can buy regular soups and add some exra veggies, etc., as long as you liquefy them. My full liquids stage was six weeks, and that saved me.

@prettyandbrwn, thanks for the tip. I had a Protein shake for lunch so that I wouldn't have any problems. Well, today was GREAT! I'm so excited. I got my first fill of 4.5cc in my 14cc band. She started with 5cc, but the barium swallow went down slower than she wanted, so she removed 0.5cc and retested, and then it was fine. I watched it all on fluoroscope. Pretty cool. My band is exactly where it needs to be, my port site is healing well, and the needle didn't hurt at all. I also found out that I can take the Tylenol caplets I was afraid to swallow, so that will save me the aggravation of crushing them or drinking the cherry-yucko-flavored liquid stuff I got from my pharmacist. My next visit would have been two weeks from now for another fill, but that's right before my trip to Italy, so I'll go back in a month instead. Sounds like they fill every two weeks until you get to your green zone. But the best part of today was that I got on the doctor's scale and hit the "50-pounds-gone" mark today! My surgeon stopped in to congratulate me and called me a superstar! LOL. I told him it was all willpower up until today, and he said, "Now your band is going to start helping you." I came home, walked my treadmill, had Soup for supper, and feel fine. Better than fine - GREAT!

Sharpie, you've been inspiring me since I came on here. Thanks for all your honesty and encouraging messages!

Cccv4, it's so good to read your posts. You've come a long way in a few weeks. Hang in there. We're gonna do this!

Ok, I prepped and planted my veggie garden today. Small garden, so it took only 45 minutes. Yes, I was sweating and tired and sore (arthritis) when done, but when I calculated the calories burned on MyFitnessPal and another calc site, it came out to way more burned than a mile of walking does on the treadmill at 3.0 mph. I found this weird. Does anybody else consider gardening to be exercise? (Maybe because of all the bending and digging.....?)

My pre-op was five days of clear liquids. I drank Isopure every morning and it was quite unpleasant, but I got into the mindset of "I can do anything for a short period of time." And I did. That same attitude helped me get through six weeks of post-op full liquids. If you do it without cheating, it actually gets easier as the days go by. That said, I hope I never have to do clear liquids again for a long time.

@@redlove1446 Soups: I live in the Chicago area. I went to a few local restaurants in my neighborhood, but also some fast food places. Also, a few grocery chains have some good soups too. The key at lunchtime for me was even If I ordered a soup with chunks, I didn't eat the chunks. At home I could puree anything in the blender, but on my work lunch break that wasn't an option. So I had to exercise self-control and only drink the liquid and discard the solids for fast food lunch takeout. Here were my staples for six weeks, pureeing when possible to avoid waste: Buona Beef cheddar broccoli Subway cheddar broccoli Mariano's lobster bisque (high in calories - be careful) Mariano's potato bacon Jewel (Albertson's) Culinary Circle soups Panera Bread tomato basil Local restaurant's lentil soup taken home and pureed Local Greek deli cream of chicken with lemon Potbelly tomato Progresso New England clam chowder Whole Foods tomato basil Whole Foods roasted corn poblano soup, pureed Local Chinese restaurant hot and sour soup Local restaurant's split pea My NUT said any soup pureed was allowed. Progresso had several more I like. Just experiment!

It's hard but it will be over before you know it, and things will begin to improve immediately. Even before surgery, I was sleeping better. A few weeks after surgery I was off of one of my blood pressure meds. I'm exercising daily. I couldn't walk the one and a half blocks to church four months ago without my knees and back hurting so bad I could cry. Today I walk on the treadmill every day for at least a mile, sometimes two. I'm only six weeks post-op and just started solids a few days ago. First fill is Monday. The weeks up until now helped me build discipline and good monitoring habits. I feel wonderful. Good luck and keep your eye on the goal. It's all worth it!

Yes, yes it was. Delightful.

My gas pains were from the air injected into the abdominal cavity for surgery, not intestinal gas. So Gas-X was useless for me. Walking helped, and for shoulder pain, karate chops a few times a day. It took most of a week for the gas to be reabsorbed into the tissues.

Noise and diarrhea are normal. If you can't tell if it's hunger or pain, it might be normal postop irritation, but if it gets worse instead of better each day, call your doc.

That's great to hear! Day by day, things will continue to get better. I'm so happy I made this decision. You have a new life ahead of you!

I found one! Online, at Blair. It came today, it FITS, it's not expensive, and it looks lovely on. I am promptly ordering another one a size down in the other color so I have something for the end of summer (see what I did there?). Here's the link: http://www.blair.com/p/womens/swimwear/slimming-swimdress/pc/1361/sc/1434/35909.uts# Don't I look adorable in it? Har!

Thin and not creamy.... Minestrone, strained? Mexican tortilla soup, strained? I discovered Chinese hot and sour soup this month and loved it.

Think of soups you normally like, buy them and strain them through a colander. Give your dog what's left or freeze it to make pureed soups for your next phase, or just toss them out. A can of soup isn't that wasteful, and you're only doing this temporarily. As for work, I absolutely had to have protein shakes handy, if you're allowed them. I prefer Atkins dark chocolate for work, and Unjury chocolate for home because I have to mix that one. Good luck!

Yes, it was definitely a special occasion. I think it's the first time I've ever gone there without ordering the Bloomin' Onion. And the portions are huge, which I never realized until I was monitoring my food. I knew exactly what I wanted, and I had the right portions. I have lobster maybe once a year, so the drawn butter won't be a recurring thing. LOL.

I dreamed about this meal (DINNER) while on my six-week post-op liquids phase. Granted, it's double the calories what my recent meals are lately (I'm trying to stay under 800 per day and usually succeed), but for the day yesterday, this brought me to 1,062, which I consider okay. This meal itself was 621. A lot? Yes. Worth it? Yes. I also brought home more than this as leftovers. My point is, if you use MyFitnessPal, just about everything is in there and you can easily plan ahead. This is steak and lobster and a wedge salad. I had moderate portions of each. I obviously will only be eating this way once in a blue moon, but yesterday the moon was blue, so there you go. (Note: the drawn butter killed the counts, but made the meal.)

Skinni(er) jeans! They're not skinny jeans, but I got a little bit skinnier, and these jeans I haven't worn for years fit today -- loosely! I'm also pulling blouses and tops from the back of my closet that fit again. I almost got rid of them about a year ago when I was depressed and needed closet space for bigger clothes. Thankfully, I never mustered the energy to go through the closet back then. I won't make the same mistake with my too-big clothes. Those are going to be donated pronto!

@ nailed it. I had a long post-op liquids phase by most standards (6 weeks), after a five day clear liquids pre-op. Talk about cleansing your system. It was hard, but doable. I'm glad it's over, but grateful for the benefits it gave me.

Ivyh, thanks for posting this, it's something I need to remember. Congratulations on your fantastic achievement!

Just discovered something new a minute ago. I had my lunch, nice small portions, no hiccup, no burp. I stopped anyway, since my lunch was measured out for work. I sat there and surfed the web on my phone for another fifteen minutes. Then I got up and walked over to my desk, sat down , and Burp! And Hiccup! LOL, a two-fer! I'm convinced that standing up and moving triggered those soft stops. So when in doubt, I can always stand up and sit down again.