bubbyli

Hello Bruce, I'm new to this site too, my surgery is scheduled on 11th June; am feeling nervous too; you story is pretty much as mine, from suffering from obesity from childhood and not being able to have fun all my youth time am 27 yo and want to spent the rest of my twenties as happy as possible. My Doctors also tried to convince me with the sleeve or the mini-bypass; but I felt same as you, why do i have to remove 80% of my stomach while still am a healthy women and just want to lose some weight. My height is 5.3 feet and 220 Ib; my goal weight is 140 Ib and am so optimistic I'll be able to reach that weight with the band. here in this site I got convinced more with the band and the results it brings, around my I know 3 people who got the sleeve but to tell you the truth they have to live all their lives taking supplements to substitute the mal-absorption of Vitamin B12, as the part they remove from the stomach is responsible for absorbing some vitamin that your body won't be able to do again after the op. Tummy Tuck is a must after the sleeve coz the weight goes off so rapidly that your skin won't catch recovering with that rapid loss, on the contrary the lab-band is slow but you still can work on your body to lift the lose skin and your skin will respond to that. for the maintainance part I agree with you it requires a lot of effort but lets us face it i required us lots of time to put this weight on; so isn't it worth it to learn new habits by eating slowly and chewing very well and having portion control. Trust me I live in UAE and lots of people here do WLS all types and I met almost people with all type of WLS, some thing I noticed the people who dropped so much weight by sleeves and bypass they didn't learn anything, they lost the weight they, looked good, but they didn't learn new habits, they still eat unhealthy food but in small portion, they didn't exercise coz they tummy tucked, so what's the point then. Lab-band = Long Hard way to healthy weight and healthy habits Sleeve, bypass = Easy way to lose weight Research as much as possible, and most important follow you instinct that always tell you what is best for you. Good luck.