SpecialK

Welcome octoberfest. If Mt. Carmel is on your In-Network list for your insurance and your employer hasn't excluded Weight Loss Surgery coverage, its just a matter of jumping through the right hoops. Most of us had to do a 6 month supervised diet requirement, which made that the longest path to getting banded. Others found they could get approved and in the hospital in as little as 3 months. It really varies on your insurance plan. The one recommendation we all have for you is to stay on top of where things stand with the surgeon's office, a lady named Charlene, was the only one processing things and it caused things to get slowed down but they had promised to hire an extra person to help. Just keep calling the office and asking...it pays to be the squeaky wheel in this case.

I'm walking three miles this morning for the American Heart Assn downtown at COSI/Genoa Park. Its a little bittersweet to be walking for my stepdad but I'm glad I had decided to help be a team leader for my company, get this exercise in, etc. Hope everyone has a great day.

Thanks MacMadame for the info to help me learn more about it.

Hi Christy! Nice to see another from central Ohio area. If you check under the USA Local Support Groups thread of this site, there is an Ohio section, then under Ohio, there is a Columbus section. You'll also find there is a monthly get together at a local mall where we welcome and support each other in person - all different stages of banding, pre op and post, longer term and newbies, folks from Riverside, OSU Mt. Carmel and self-pays. Hope to get to meet you sometime soon. :smile2:

Welcome Pataskala! My Mom's right there in your neck of central Ohio! Please give it a try to see the USA Local Support Groups section, under Ohio, then under the Columbus thread and you'll find lots of support close to home.

Mandi, I don't know alot about Vertical Sleeve but I've tried to get educated about it and it looked to me like they took the stomach and cut a vertical tube shaped pouch maybe the diameter of a hotdog (picture that size in your mind), and then stapled off the whole long side of that pouch away from the rest of the stomach (which I've been told to picture it the size of a Nerf football), and then they REMOVE the entire rest of the stomach so there is no going back. That non-reversible factor was a major reason I went with the lapband. I am concerned for you that if you are forcing food with your egg shaped stomach pouch formed from your lapband, that you may still be a eater that forces food in your new tube shaped pouch and you could break open the incision line if that is the abuse situation you can't stay away from. Also, given that RNY or gastric bypass patients can stretch out their new smaller pouch, I have to believe its possible to stretch out a vertical pouch too which would lead to regaining. With your lapband, you can continue to get adjustments even if you have been unfilled and want to then start over and try again. Please discuss your eating habits and your past experience with your surgeon and see what he recommends. If you haven't considered counseling, I would do it and I have and it helps. I wish you all the best.

Yes, what you are describing sounds like the chest pains from the surgery gas that is moving and escaping upward in your body. I felt that moving helped me and it did go away. Hang in there. Just to be safe though... If you have serious lung/breathing difficulty, get to your doctor as that could be a sign of a blot clot issue. I hope they gave you post op instructions on how to contact them but go right on back to the hospital's ER if you need to.

That is absolutely not true that most insurance companies don't cover it and its absolutely not true that Blue Cross/Blue Shield in OHIO doesn't cover it for other companies and employers because I know someone who works for the Post Office in the Columbus area and they covered her surgery. So, get the facts together on how the complications rates on lapband are drastically different that gastric bypass and go back and see that HR person and ask them to reconsider based on the FACTS. Best wishes ....but if all else fails, check into Self Pay... its worth your health to do what you have to do.

Hammer, I love all the supportive folks who joined in to uplift you here and I wanted to add my "Amen" to all those who gave you a pat on the back for going to the doctor for a fill to try to restart and re-energize your weight loss journey - yes, for me with 180 total pounds to lose, it will be a marathon, probably at least 2 years of dedicated effort, but I want to get healthy - not just skinny for vanity reasons, though I feel better about my appearance with each pound, but I want to live a high quality life and I couldn't do that at my starting weight. Never lose sight of the fact that your health was a primary reason for losing weight, and losing weight will help with depression as I have first handle experience with that, and then it circles back around that improvement in depression helps keep us motivated to keep losing, and on .... So hang in there and congratulations for taking control of your life and keep up the good work. Second, I formed a local support group in my city using contacts I met on this website under the Local USA Support Groups, for my State and then posted under the one for the Columbus area and we got brave and asked each other if we'd like to meet in person some time. It took 3 brave ladies, Heather, Debbie and I to get it started and we met at a Mall food court - where we could meet in a public place. I brought a helium balloon and made a poster for the table to show where we'd meet. It was the greatest blessing besides this website I have found. We represent lapbanders from all stages now, pre-op, post op, those succeeding in leaps and bounds, and those whose weight loss is going slower than they hoped but we have "banded together" to support each other and its free! I'm sorry a hospital support group wanted to charge you to get the support you wanted. Best wishes on finding some local bandsters in your area to give each other mutual support and hugs in person...its great. God Bless, SpecialK

I posted under the Columbus thread but in case you don't see it there, I really appreciated all the prayers and well wishes for me and my family at the loss of my stepdad. I think I did ok, not great eating-wise, but that is behind me and I certainly wasn't able to overeat in Quantity (though I did eat too many calories) to deal with my sorrow, so that is a good thing that my band was my helper during this time too. Katie, I would still like to connect up with you if you still have any size 24 clothes you are looking to get rid of. As you can see I got distracted and didn't get with you and I thank you for the offer. PM me or call my cell # if you still want to.

I am amazed over and over about how supporting this March group of Shamrocks has been to each other since we 'met' in early 2008 when we found out we had March surgery dates. Your many blessings and wishes of peace and comfort were tremendous and I say thank you. I did eat a crazy diet these past days but I don't think I've gain which is a NSV for sure. I do believe stress makes our bands and restriction tighter but I found room for a donut this morning before the funeral (ugh!!) and a dish of ice cream (at least it was only 1 scoop) before the funeral calling hours yesterday. Okay Fenton, we both have to get back on the wagon or whatever saying the English or Parisians say to get our butts in line again with eating. I'm starting tomorrow when I wake up and start a new day. Again, many thanks for all my Shamrock Support!:thumbup:

Rhonda, are you a teacher? Best wishes for the new year. and.. Congratulations on the great news that you know where you stand with getting through the 6 months of diet and follow up. It will go quickly. Take care. Kathy

Thank you to all of you for your prayers and well wishes. We got through this initial hard part and I'm looking forward to each day getting easier for me really now but keep a good thought for my mom as she had been caring for him 24 hours a day for more than 5 years with many illnesses but the worst was Alzheimers like dementia which is so devastating in my mind even worse than his heart disease and other physical things that he struggled with. He is in a better place now. God bless to all and Thanks. Kathy

Well, it could be different to each person but my experience is this: When I eat a couple bites past when I should have stopped, I will get a very heavy pressure sensation dead center on my chest, between my breasts, just above that a little, and it feels like a ball is there. It is definitely uncomfortable and if I am at a table with friends or family, I imagine I have an unusual look on my face because I'm trying to hold it all together...literally. If I immediately stop eating and just sweat it out for a few minutes, maybe 30 minutes, the pressure starts to resolve and I'm fine. If it is too much pressure, I will have some productive burping, PB'ing, bringing up saliva and very finely chewed bits of what I've eaten. I can either swallow and try to keep it down, or spit it out in a napkin, etc. Now, a couple times since I've had this third fill, I experienced what I'd call 'sliming' which was I took about 2 bites of very dry pork/chicken past my stopping point without realizing it and there was no room for my saliva to go down and stay down so I was burping up fairly large amounts of just saliva for about 15 minutes until the food started digesting and going down. I had to spit the excess saliva out, it wouldn't stay down. Thus, I am learning to think, okay, how much have I eaten, should I stop now or can I take a few more bites. If there is any doubt in my mind, I'm trying to stop right then.

Hi friends. Just a quick but sad note to let you know my stepdad passed away yesterday (Saturday) while I was there with my Mom and I've now experienced probably what so many of you nurses and folks that work in the medical field have but its very emotionally draining. I stayed with my Mom overnight and took her to confirm the funeral arrangements today. At this point I'm running on 36 hours without sleep and I'm going to go crash now. The funeral calling hours will be Tuesday and funeral Wedsnesday so I will covet your prayers and good wishes for my family and my Mom.

Hi friends. Just a quick but sad note to let you know my stepdad did pass away yesterday (Saturday) while I was there with my Mom and I've now experienced probably what so many of you nurses and folks that work in the medical field have but its very emotionally draining. I stayed with my Mom overnight and took her to confirm the funeral arrangents today. At this point I'm running on 36 hours without sleep and I'm going to go crash now. The funeral calling hours will be Tuesday and funeral Wedsnesday so I will covet your prayers and good wishes for my family and my Mom (Ellen).

Hi friends. I need some prayers for me and my mom in the next few days as it looks like her husband of 13 years (2nd marriage after losing her first husband after 35 years) is going to pass away this weekend. I knew this was an inevitable thing because he's had heart disease, Alzheimers, and other problems for a long time and my mom has been doing 24 hour a day care for him at home. Its a sad story about how many senior citizens can't afford to put a loved one in a nursing home due to the cost and Medicare not covering it (Medicaid actually) unless you turn over all financial assets you have (burn through all savings) to pay medical bills before Medicaid will help out. Anyway, I've been her emotional support through all of this and his death will definitely hit her hard. I feel close to him but he wasn't my dad and I've just tried to be really good to him myself due to my mom. Unbelievable as it sounds, he has two daughters in their 50s that are never around, don't visit, don't ever offer to help my mom with anything, etc. They will be the ones mourning and wailing the loudest at the funeral home (ugh...) but they haven't been there for him. Okay, I know this is a depressing little post but its on my heart today as I think this could be his last and I had trouble sleeping last night. Just say a prayer for me today in the upcoming days to be strong, eat right, and not use grief as an excuse to eat the wrong things. My mom can be a person who really drains all the energy from me for her needs when its a crisis so I know I need to stay strong. Thanks for listening.

Well band buddies, if trying to keep myself on the straight an narrow for my eating and exercising isn't enough, I have a little added stress that I've been holding out on telling about...I have to sit and pass something called my PMP exam this month as a requirement for my job - and its a bear of a test I've been studying for since January. I kept saying I'd get serious after my surgery in March, then I had another knee surgery in April, then vacation in June so I finally made myself really buckle down and get serious about this. I finally called and scheduled the exam date and its August 27th so I just have 2 weeks of study stuff left to go and then I'm hoping I'm free again to not worry about this work stuff on my non work time. For those of you who don't know what PMP is, it stands for Project Management Professional - I lead massive computer systems projects that can sometimes take years and a few million dollars to pull them off. The one I'm working on planning now could be about $20Million and involve oh roughly 200 or more people! Its a skill putting the schedules, people and managing it to within a budget. I guess I've flown by the seat of my pants for too long and this is just making it formal that I really can do my job. Okay, enough thinking about work but I did just finish about 2 hours of studying. Now I need to go watch some exciting Olympics for an hour to distract my mind before bed. I also like to read mystery novels before bed for the same mental getaway but nothing too scary...

Congratulations Greg on the 60! Way to go! You might check with Dr. Choban next time she does an adjustment because what I believe Dr. Miller does is extract the existing fill level to check how much is in there and then adds total amount back in plus what he's adding. It wouldn't surprise me if you find you really are at 8 cc's as Dr. Choban said as I'm at 8.5 cc's now.

Hi Mt. Carmel bandsters and anyone listening in... I went to the August 4th support group meeting and Melissa Webb said they are trying a new more informal format where they ask everyone to sit pretty tightly grouped in the front center part of the auditorium and she facillitated a sharing session of those who wanted to share their successes, both RNY and Lapband stories, Post Op patients who wanted to share questions or suggestions for others, then Pre Op patients who had questions and wanted to ask any Post Ops what to think, etc. Different than just having a speaker and not as much interaction from the audience. Next meeting they are bringing in someone to share about Overeaters Anonymous in terms of what that offers to those of us who are overeaters and will always need to strive to not overeat. I also posted a link under the Columbus thread about Walk from Obesity and this is something Melissa supported and said its being led by the Riverside Fresh Start program this year, sounds like the different bariatric programs share who hosts it and she encouraged us to participate. Google on Walk from Obesity or look under this forum's Columbus thread for the link to the info. I think I will plan to walk in this.

Sarah - interesting to see that some of us are starting to cycle through some unfill adjustments (Heather this week too) so I hope you can heal and get back to your sweet spot soon. Congrats on getting your tushie into the doctor ASAP when you thought something was not right -- a great example for all of us.

Here's a good opportunity to join a walk for a great cause and burn some calories to boot. There are walks planned in lots of locations. The Walk from Obesity - Join a Walk

Columbus, OH (2008) - Home Check it out...I think I'm going to sign up for this walk if anyone else is interested to walk too.

Nurse Niki and BNL -- Looks like we are all lining up in a row... BNL 9.5 in 14 cc band SK 8.5 in 14 cc band NN 7.5 in 14 cc band Yes, I'm also finding the quantity I eat is getting more restricted than I ever imagined but I do still get hungry after maybe 4 hours when I eat a tiny lunch like we're talking about. I had maybe 1/2-1 cup of vegetables and small pieces of chicken for lunch (chicken stir fry) and that kept me going for 4+ hours. I knew I just was too hungry to go to my Water aerobics class for an hour where she really kicks our butt the whole hour so I went and got a small dinner before class! I'm tracking carefully online and found I had eaten about 1100 calories total and according to my food/exercise tracker, an hour of water aerobics counts for -400 calories or so, so that puts me at a net of 600 calories for the day. Last night I was really hungry for dinner and scrambled 3 eggs and found I could barely finish 2. I'm going to have to learn to fix less and then if I'm still hungry, fix one more. I did the same with fixing 3 small turkey sausage links (3" long each and the size of an index finger around) and found I could only eat 2. I'm with you that when I go Sept 2 for my next dr. appt I'm probably not going to need a fill if this level of restriction hangs in. Hope that sharing food portion things at a certain level of fill helps others compare.

Heather - I'm so glad to hear you are going in to see the doctor. Definitely keep us posted and I will be praying for you.