Jachut

I exercised the next day after surgery but it was mild - walking. It would have been 2 or 3 months before I started running. Take it easy, there's plenty of time and if you feel well when you do it you're more likely to continue, so dont push if you're not up to it yet.

First and foremost your baby needs nourishment, NOT calories. If your body loses some of its fat stores, that doesnt affect your baby at all, your baby can still grow big and healthy. But if you restrict your food intake and thus the nutrition available to the baby then yes, that can affect birth weight. I wasnt banded but lost 10kg through my third pregnancy with the blessing of my ob. And Eliza was 9lb. Take your pregnancy Multivitamins, eat as well as you possibly can, get an unfill if you need to and consider some sensible liquid calories if necessary. And dont do high protein/low carb whilst pregnant! Eat some good carbs, your bowels will need them anyway.

I can handle bread so I like to eat sandwiches. I've never liked sandiwches much but I find when I eat one for lunch, I stay full for hours and hours and I dont eat half as much at dinner either. It really is my top weight loss tool. I usually just have a small filling - even Peanut Butter. Other than that, I like things on crackers - cottage cheese, hommus, cheese and tomato, avocado and tomato, vegemite (lol) and some fruit. Or one of those gourmet yogurts (the greek style with pureed fruit) and a piece of fruit. Soup. You could make a big batch and freeze, or buy it in tins.

We have a thing in Victoria (Australia) called Celebrate the C. Basically on the kids school reports, a C means they're right in the range where they should be. Its a good mark. An A or B means they're up to 3 years ahead of where they should be. But of course, the kids parents are all conditioned by the old A B C D system and every term, there's loads of upset parents because they're A and B students have dropped to Cs. Its been in since 2005 and still causing chaos!

Blund, my third pregnancy was like that, Eliza was high and breech and I got full on hardly anything. Being banded for me is very like that!

Oh, you make me feel sooooo old. I'm 40 and that was my adolescence. And the trouble is, I actually SAY those things. To the 20 somethings at uni, lol. This generation Y, in Australia they've had it so good. Low interest rates, jobs abounding, they have these expectations of life that are so darn unrealistic, and they expect everything handed to them on a platter. They turn up their noses at living in an outer suburb (they'd rather rent and spend their money on designer clothes) and laugh outright at the quaint notion of actually saving up cash for your new couches. Grumble grumble.

I cant see Apple Lady at the top, there's a big banner ad in front of her. I like slender, I'm 5ft 10 tall and I like the tall, thin look. I think bones are beautiful, not skeletal, by any stretch, but I dont really aspire to still be somewhat chunky. There's a difference between curves and chunk - to me curves are quite toned and carefully created and you dont get them just by not quite losing all your excess weight. Jillian to me is more toned than I'd like to be. That sort of look calls for VERY low body fat and an amount of work whcih I just dont care to put in and dont think I could maintain. I dont really like the look of big muscles on women, I like tone, and the hint of muscle under the skin and the shape that muscle gives, but with a reasonable layer of fat over the top to soften it. I think some of the supermodels of the late 80's, early 90's had great bodies, before that super thin look came in, they were curvy, toned and healthy looking without huge muscles. Cindy Crawford and Rachel Hunter come to mind, now I know that in real life they were much thinner than they looked in magazines, but their magazine look, perfect. In every day life, I dont really care about a bit of cellulite either. I've got it, I'm 40, I'll always have it. I'm pretty happy with my actual body shape, I think nature was kind, I'd rather be pear shaped like I am than thicker round the middle. If I were to tamper with it, its going to be boobs. I think I"ll have a breast lift, truth is I'd love a small teardrop shaped implant to take me back to a good DD, but I'm really afraid of the health implications of breast implants and I dont like the "fake" look.

Bearing in mind my avatar is a deceptively good pic, and very small, lol, I really wish I could shave another 10 or 15 off my rear end and thighs. If I try to lose that, I'll get severely bony around the chest and arms - you can already see my rib bones in my chest - and what's left of my boobs will disappear. I know I dont have a pannus like others end up with, but I'd really have to consider PS to achieve my ultimate figure goals - I'd need a lower body lift because most of my sag is on my backside and i'd need to put some boobs back to balance out top with bottom! All of us look just SO much better and I think it helps to look around you and give yourself permission just to be normal and not try for supermodel!

Calm down. You are right to a large degree, eat less and you will lose weight. Eat less even if its crap and you will lose some weight! I have never done a "diet" whilst banded, and I dont do Protein shakes, end of story. I am very ANTI low carbing. I eat a normal, healthy diet with plenty of carbs, and I've lost 115% of my excess weight. High protein is NOT the only way to lose weight and there are plenty of arguments around to support that you do NOT need 80 grams plus of protein a day. I have all my hair, my skin and nails are healthy and I have plenty of muscle! I supplemented my reduced food intake with a good dose of fairly hard exercise which I have been diligent about. Be realistic though, I mean in Australia its still possible to get a fairly good diet without going out of your way to do it. When people on here start talking about whipped cream in cans (which is OK because its low fat and artificially sweetened right?) and chicken in cans (which I find unbelievable) and the one that still has me gobsmacked - multipurpose DOUGH in cans (sheesh, how hard is it to make pizza dough for crying out loud) it makes me realise that many people's diets are so far removed from what it should be and people think its OK because its all low fat and artificially sweetened. YOu really need to get your body back to FRESH food - food that you can still recognise because it actually resembles what it was in nature. Ditch the cans, the packaged meals, the boxes, the packets and eat natural. The band will take care of the portions, its your job to make sure its healthy. If you want some fruit yogurt for example, put some darn FRUIT in some plain yogurt! Add some nuts! You get some actual fibre and none of the crap that goes into commercial fruit yogurts. And again, although our cultures appear to be different and I would never tell someone to go against what their doctor tells them, it is ENTIRELY possible to lose weight with a lapband eating carbs, never drinking Protein Shakes and never even counting protein! You dont have to diet, you do have to choose foods wisely, save some for occasional treats and do some exercise.

How much exercise do you do? It can really help. I dont have a lot of issues with skin so if its excess skin you have, the ladies above make valid points, that no amount of weight loss will remove it, you may need to consider PS as the other half of your journey. I have found the opposite, I have exercised like a fiend to get my weight off and I'm half the size I previously was at the same weight, much tighter and more muscular, although I would say the best way to describe my body is that my body is a size 8 and my skin is about a size 9. There's really no way to return to perfect, some of us are more afflicted than others with skin issues etc but you really do have to learn to take great pride in what you have done for your health as well as simply focus on how you look. Good luck!

Me too. Enough to make you barf really isnt it?

Oh boy, I couldnt do that! I weaned myself DOWN off so much caffeine over about six weeks becuase I knew that post op, I wouldnt be able to waste all my stomach space on coffee. I was down to just one cup of caffeinated coffee a day. I missed the habit, but I didnt miss the caffeine.

What's that smell?

Well, I see the DS hasnt improved your disposition, still all sunshine and light! Shit on the liver maybe? Is that a side effect?

I dont have issues as a rule, but because less goes in, less comes out. And maybe I'm a tad more prone to getting slightly constipated, but never enough to need a laxative or anything, just every now and then I'll pass one that seems to have teeth! I do make sure to keep up the good carbs, the wholegrains although they can be work to eat.

Yeah, I think its perhaps a tad inconsiderate. I wouldnt have cared personally, I was so full of enthusiasm and excited about my new life that during that early post op period, those things held no attraction for me anyway, to be honest, I've NEVER missed them. But that's no the point, its the lack of consideration for you that is. I might make a narky comment or two, lol.

Its happened to me at times, and recently, no definite change on the scales - I'm at goal and only fluctuate - so I'm just at the low end of my normal 3lb if that makes sense, but suddenly, my boobs have gone, lol! My bras are all looking weird under my clothes because they're too big, the cups are denting - nice look, NOT. My jeans are all falling down too. At one time though, I didn in fact go down a whole dress size with no change in weight.

My average daily diet is mainly BASED on carbs. I do not cut them out, count them or avoid them in any way. All I avoid is white, sugary carbs like white bread, rolls, processed cereals, biscuits and cakes, muffins and I dont really drink fruit juices and definitely never soft drinks like coke etc. An average day for me would be: Breakfast - oatmeal, muesli or wholegrain toast with Peanut Butter Mid morning - some fruit or yogurt lunch - a sandwich on wholegrain bread - tuna, chicken or cheese, salad vegetables. Hard to eat, takes a long time, high danger of getting stuck and I usually dont finish it. Mid afternoon - this is often when I'll have a bought coffee like a skim milk latte Dinner: often meat and 3 veg type meals, the other night we had corned silverside, mashed potato/sweet potato (I just mash without butter) and steamed broccoli and carrots. We often eat things like a lamb curry on brown rice, or Pasta meals such as spaghetti bolognaise or a home made lasagne (which I make a low fat version of). We would hardly ever eat fatty, creamy pastas and would only eat take away like pizza or fish and chips maybe once a month. I find all that bread/grains during the day REALLY keeps me full and keeps me going. I cannot function without carbs, I get lethargic and slow. Carb loading is not really anything scientific and its something you would do mainly for really long distances like a half marathon, it simply means the night before you eat a meal of something like pasta, and early before your race make sure you have some toast and jam and a banana or something. It fuels your muscles full of glycogen, to provide lots of energy for your run. It really doesnt follow that if you dont do this, then your body will burn fat instead, your body always uses a mix of fuels. I also tried in my long race yesterday (14kms) a gel at the 10K mark, which is really only 100 calories of sugar/amino acids but it REALLY worked for me, it was amazing. I finished the race strong and felt I could run more (which is good coz I want to do a half marathon in July) whereas at the end of races I'm usually staggering!

I do as much eating out and socialising as I ever did, I just eat less.

I get hiccups if I get a bit stuck on something. I'll get discomfort, then sliming (lots and lots of saliva) and then suddenly really violent hiccups. The hiccups seem to clear the blockage.

I dont know what its like there, but the difference here between pre school teaching and primary school teaching is mainly to do with curriculum. In my state in Australia we have VELS (Victorian Essential Learning Standards) which I have to learn inside out, back to front and sideways. But as a preschool teacher, you can teach early primary grades. I think really that it has to do with what age group you really want to teach. I've had preps (five year olds in their first year of school) every single teaching rounds I've been placed on and I find the younger kids VERY difficult to work with, without prior literacy and mathematical knowledge, its so hard to teach! I see myself with 10 year olds, 11 year olds, that kind of age group. Not that you get a lot of choice about it all the time. But to teach preschool you really need to love little children and although I have my own kids, I dont goo and gaa over little children, and I dont particularly want to wipe snotty noses and that sort of stuff either. Secondary doesnt appeal to me in the slightest. Teachers are all underpaid severely in Australia and its almost impossible to score more than a one year contract. To get into the private system would be a dream.

Like FairyFacade, I think I probably look now like I thought I looked then, lol. I never truly saw how fat I was but I must have known it on some level or I wouldnt have been banded. Its not complete denial, its just refusal to really look. My body image *is* catching up with my body, but if you pointed out someone 5ft 10 and 155lb to me, I'd be a bit stunned I think and I'd rationalise it with "oh, they are a different body type than me though". Some things bring it home to you, I did a fun run yesterday, and I saw a variety of fat bums stuffed into running tights (something I"ve not bought myself yet) and a lot of cellulite jiggling on some very thin thighs of some very athletic people. I thought "what am I worried about?". I'm completely and utterly normal - as distinct from perfect! - and I dont need to be ashamed. The longer I've stayed at goal the more I'm coming to terms with my body.

Hmm, coffee *can* upset my stomach too now. I find I drink way less milky coffee - like cappucinos and lattes. It might be the milk, but I do now just prefer a long black with cold milk in it. I even find myself specifically going to McDonalds in the food court for coffee becuase I can get an ordinary filtered coffee, not a super strong espresso like all the coffee bars make.

Are you still breastfeeding? Becuase I wouldnt try it if you are and are keen to continue. For a month or two it probably wont hurt you, but you wouldnt want to live like that long term. personally I wouldnt do it. I did this to eat better, not exchange on form of disordered eating over another. I dont mean disrespect by that, I just mean that the goal is to get well and healthy, and living on Protein shakes is not an easy or enjoyable way to live your life.

Yep, insane, lol! I just ran 10 miles this morning in a fun run and right now I feel like I've had my knee cartilage sucked out through a straw, my spine compressed and my hips filled with ground glass! But good luck! The physical agony (and probaby premature aging) is well worth the feeling of accomplishment.