Jachut

Aero is a chocolate bar that has either a milk choc or peppermint choc inner that's all aerated so its got air bubbles, its very light and very yummy and they make little dessert pots with the same flavours. You dont need a translation for spag bog do you? Spaghetti Bolognaise - spaghetti, meat and tomato sauce - most often made fresh but comes in tins too. For future reference, tim tams are chocolate biscuits (and biscuits are cookies), vegemite tastes just fine, culturally we tend to be more "British" in Australia in our terminology and food habits, Smarties are like M&M's only WAY better, fish and chips are battered flake (shark) and hot chips - chips are fries, only thicker but also crisps, Maccas is McDonalds, chicco rolls and dim sims are best not considered too deeply since there are many urban myths abounding as to what's actually in them but they're basically meat/cabbage in a kind of skin that's deep fried, muesli is granola, jam is jelly. Jelly is Jello! I can image sometimes you have NO idea what the Australian contingent is talking about.

Well that's a huge step taken Fee. I have an appointment this morning - I ended up with 2 referrals because my GP didnt actually know anyone who did the procedure. The other surgeon wouldnt even see me but I'm tossing up just turning up this morning, to at least have a chat about it. Bummer about the other op you have to have though.

Interesting. I wouldnt feed my kids artificial sweeteners in a pink fit. Most food that contain artificial sweeteners are crap they shouldnt be eating anyway - like soft drink, cordial, etc. They have moderate amounts of sugary foods as treats and otherwise I encourage them to eat real food - vegie sticks and hommous or rice crackers, fruit or toast as Snacks not artificially sweetened, artificially flavoured, artificially coloured chemical food. We buy lovely organic fruit and vegetables and it's barely unloaded from the box before they're into it. We dont really have a need for artificial sweeteners.

Nothing would make me give up wine or coffee, lol. I'm no lush either but one of the greatest pleasures in life is a nice quiet glass of chardonnay after a long busy day. And a couple of good strong coffees in the morning. I'd rather give up food, honestly!

Oh the GP referred me, it was he who put the wind up me, rabbiting on about my sky high cholesterol and pre diabetes - um, he had someone else's bloodwork in MY file, idiot. I'm heavy but healthy as a horse, BMI 34 and not a comorbidity to be seen. I'm OK with it, I'm grateful I dont have any problems and I'll just plug away at it myself. I'm not sure it would be quite the right thing for me at this stage. But when I put on 10kg more than I lose after this round of dieting I might qualify, lol.

Havent been banded but am 5ft 10, 108 kg (about 240 I think?). Size 20 - thats a US 18. Kinda fat and dumpy but not fat enough, surgeon doesnt want to see me, so I have to go it alone. I've lost a bit over the last few weeks, losing motivation a bit now though. I should be around 154 (70kg). That was the weight I maintained for a long time and felt great at.

I would guess (guess being the operative word) that it depends on your physical size (as opposed to how overweight you are). Everyone doesnt have the same sized internal organs, a 5ft 3 woman will have a smaller stomach than a 6ft 4 man for example. Also a man of that size will require many more calories and have different nutritional requirements than the woman. You would need to be able to eat more like 1500-1800 while dieting rather than a dainty and feminine 1000-1200, lol. Does that sound too farfetched?

I could NEVER give up coffee. I would rather have coffee than food and that's the honest truth. I'm like a smoker I guess - I know its bad for me but I dont care. It punctuates my day, its warm and comforting, it doesnt make you fat (I just have a dash of skim milk, no sugar), its sociable, it ends a meal, I just love it. I did cut down to 3 cups a day though and I drink decaf other than that because there was a time when I was sipping my way through seven or eight cups. I felt sick for weeks, SUCH a headache, but I couldnt figure out the bad taste in my mouth, till I realised I was also pregnant! So I cut down at the right time. First three or four months of pregnancy, bleuch, cant touch the stuff but it doesnt save you the withdrawal. At least I had my withdrawal BEFORE my morning sickness!

Ooh I dont think I could do it. I had surgery on my eye for an infected corneal ulcer a few weeks ago and I dont think I'll ever let anyone near my eyes again, I was totally blind for 3 days. It was truly awful. Granted that was on my actual eyeball but I have a phobia now. You look lovely though.

Maybe its an Australian thing? We're definitely advised against the heimlich here. I cant see why a band would affect a breathing tube either.

Dont they advise nowadays that short sharp smacks on the back are often more effective and less dangerous than the heimlich manouvre anyway? I've read somewhere about problems inserting a breathing tube in banded patients and having to do a tracheotomy instead. If that's true you'd need to wear a medical bracelet.

Some foods I think are only worth eating in HUGE quantities, lol. I find with some things if I cant eat my fill and only have a little taste, I'd rather have nothing. I confess I had pancakes for Breakfast (its my birthday) and I've stuffed myself, need to poke it all down with a plunger coffee. But I cant eat one pancake!

Wow, I'm a very lucky person, some of you have had hard hard lives and I'm really sorry for that. My food issues arent so extreme, I'm not really a binger and I dont have any real problems, I'm just a chronic overeater. I've always been 10 to 15 kilos overweight, but never obese till the last seven or eight years. Most of my excess weight came on inexplicably - whilst I was breastfeeding each of my three kids I just piled it on and on and on, without noticeably eating more, but that old adage that breastfeeding makes you lose your pregnancy weight wasnt true for me, luckily I actually lost weight during the pregnancies to give myself a bit of leeway, lol. I'm a disorganised eater, meaning, I hate grocery shopping with a passion, I'm frantic and flat out and trying to raise 3 kids and do a university degree and I suddenly raise my head at 6.pm and realise I have nothing for dinner and its either bundle them all up in the car and race out or order in and for a while we've been ordering in an awful lot. I get up and am busy getting the kids ready for school and dont find time for breakfast and then suddenly get starving at 11 am (when I'm normally out) and so then its a huge muffin and a big cappucino so of course I'm not hungry at lunchtime so I dont eat and then when I've gotten the kids home from school that afternoon is yawning before me and I"m hungry again and so are they so I eat more crap. If I actually ate at mealtimes I would eat appropriate food. I dont ever sit down to eat an entire packed of biscuits, but I cant eat one or two, I have to eat till I"m full as if I ate a meal so its four or five or even six and then I'll just pick at them one by one over the course of hours and voila! whole entire packet gone. I like good food too much too, I love entertaining and cooking up something gorgeous but then I feel because it took so much effort I have to eat heaps of it, and then I'll serve a cheese platter and eat a ton of that, washed down by lots of (very good) wine. I eat when I'm bored and I reward myself with food too. I eat without thinking about it first and I eat too fast and dont even taste it half the time. I dont think my bad habits are really a case of any underlying disorders, I think I just need to slow down and think about it a bit. I find it hard to maintain changes in habits because the pressures in life that cause me to be like I am dont go away and I suspect if I did have a band I'd still be doing the same bad things only in smaller quantities.

How many have overweight or obese kids too? I never know which is the best way to tackle this problem. My kids arent fat but my oldest son most definitely has a lot of potential to be. He's pretty lazy and he loves to eat. I've found at time when I've been rock bottom and just not motivated in any way to look after myself properly then my kids' diets suffer too. Over the past year I've made the utmost effort to feed my kids well, as a family we eat really well. I'm quite strict with what they're only allowed to eat on a very infrequent basis, takeaway, lollies etc. We never have biscuits or cakes in the house, but they do like their school lunch orders and the school offers only rubbish, they do eat chips for their morning tea, overall I think they have a good balance between getting everything they need and still having the stuff other kids get. They play lots of sports too. But on the other had at 10 and 8 both boys know the concept of dieting, they like to weigh themselves, they compare their weight to others. Last night when we all went swimming and Doug and I took a turn each to mind the kids for 40 mins while the other did some laps, both boys did laps in the big pool saying "I'm going to get skinny too" rather than play in the smaller pools with their sister. Is it even possible to raise healthy well adjusted kids with NO weight issues and NO tendency to connect weight with self worth. Can they grow up without the concept of "good" and "bad" foods? Are we raising our children even from toddlerhood to have food and weight issues?

A tim tam is just a chocolate biscuit. They're not that terrific actually but something of an Aussie icon. Although you can bite off one corner, then the opposite corner and suck your coffee through it, then you cram the whole thing in your mouth while it dissolves from the coffee. Not a habit I'd recommend taking up though, lol.

We've got a thing going with a forum I've been a part of for 3 years or so, my girfriend's hubby is regularly in Sydney for business and he picks up boxes for everyone - literally 15 or 16 boxes. I actually dont like them, I dont get what the fuss is about, give me a Donut King donut any day! I think they're strangely tasteless and not donut-y at all, more like white bread with glaze on it. Which is good since they're opening one here in Narre Warren next year! Good on you though, my vice is bikkies. Cant have bikkies in the house.

Hehe, I once did have a habit of reading diet diet magazines and eating mars bars or tim tams at the same time, lol. But I've been good on here, I'm preband because I'm giving it one last really good shot and I realised if I didnt do that I would indeed have a pre-band last ditch eating fest for several months and would end up even worse off. I find my capacity for stuffing myself stupid greatest when I've lost weight and am in the gaining it back phase. Once I've hit a new high, my appetite disappears remarkably and I go back to the type of eating that if I maintained all the time I wouldnt be fat in the first place. So I generally find dieting (because you do it when you're really fat) pretty easy, its keeping going after you start feeling comfortable again that's the hard bit. Oh and keeping on eating that way. I took a good hard look at myself and realised if I was going to have a preband eat fest, then I wasnt in the right headspace for the band. I was thinking of it as the end of something, not a new beginning. My dilemma was that if I started right now, I would fall well below the recommended BMI of 35 and I cant even pretend to have any real comorbidities. Of course, I've lost a couple of kg's and indeed am not a candidate for a band in this country, but I find it very motivating to come here all the same.

Dont hate yourself, think back. You've gone on diets before havent you? Stuck with them for a few weeks at least and lost a little weight? I would consider this period before your first fill as one where you are still for all intents and purposes unbanded and are going to have to "diet". Youve taken a big step, be a little kind to yourself and start right now to think hard about what the band can and cant do for you. YOU are going to have to change, so start right now. From what I gather it takes several fills for lots of people to really reach a good level of restriction so for now you must impose those restrictions yourself. And what you ate is hardly 3 packs of Tim Tams and a large pizza! Its not that much! To be honest, I decided for now not to get a band because after hanging round here for a little while I realised that in my heart of hearts I was really wanting it to be a miracle cure. Once I realised just how much work I was going to have to do to get weight off, I decided I may as well tackle it alone. You have a little "helper" and if you work with it it WILL work for you.

My friend who was banded two weeks ago was told (after the initial day or two of clear liquids) that anything that would go through a straw was OK and not to worry at all about calories etc because it was hard enough to live on a liquid diet as it is. She was also never on a liquid diet pre surgery. I'd say each doctor is different, but of course, she lost hardly any weight before her first fill.

If you're eating 1200 or so a day you'll get enough protein as long as you choose real food.

How does one handle special occasions like Christmas Day, birthdays, special dinners out? I'm not fussed by the thought of going out to dinner and only eating 1/4 of what's on my plate, I'm talking about drinking with meals. I understand why that's not advised but can you do it on occasion? Like on Christmas day etc you're going to want a champagne or two and when you go out you normally have wine with your dinner and finish with coffee right? Is that impossible to do? Does it just wash the food through quicker so you're less full for less time or does it overfill you so you puke in your handbag, lol? That wouldnt worry me to be honest, evening has never been a hungry or picky time for me and I dont mind going to bed hungry, but surely you wouldnt be anyway as you'd still have a reasonable quanity in your bottom part of your stomach? Funnily enough, this is one of the things worrying me most. Stressful as it feels to think about not being able to use food to soothe myself when I"m overwrought (Like when Eliza has covered her entire bedroom AND the new carpet with talcum powder), I worry about the many enjoyable social rituals of food. I can give up overeating and I want to gain control of those occasions but I'd like to be able to "normal" for little snippets of time. I dont know if I can never be "normal" again.

I'm in Australia too and the dietary guidelines I've read about here seem a little different to me too Loopylou. I think we must have a lot more focus on fruit and veg here in Australia and the high Protein diet is a little less common. I've got a friend who was banded about 2 months ago and she's been told pretty much what you describe. I think basically our Australian way of eating is healthy and that you'd do pretty well to eat what you consider a normal diet in much smaller proportions - ie. a small piece of protein, a small serve of starch and half the plate vegetables for a main meal, a salad with some protein for lunch and good quality Cereal and fruit for Breakfast, with fruit as Snacks.

Desi80 you want fat to be a health issue, not a moral one. I never want my kids to feel worthless if they do get heavy and I would never want to see them judge someone else that way. I also want them to have a healthy attitude to food, not a morbid fear of it. Its a very difficult balance to strike isnt it?

I guess I would look at the time between now and when this is sorted out as a period when you're going to have to purposely "diet". There's no reason not to lose weight if you artificially impose your limits, count calories, however you like to do that. It might be very hard but there's an end in sight, you only have to do it till you get a proper fill. YOu can do it!

One thing that would concern me which I've learned over the last week or two is how little some people are eating. Rebound weight gain would be a problem despite people having retrained their eating habits but because who could stick to less than 1000 calories a day forever without some sort of help? Your body would immediately say "i need more food" surely? And your metabolism could not be unaffected by living on so few calories for so long. But perhaps you could have gradual unfills until you reach a point of stability? Just guessing of course.