HeavyHeartland

I can relate to this. As I mentioned elsewhere, when I found out I had to do a 10-day pre-op diet, I scheduled my surgery for 12 days after Thanksgiving. Might as well go out with a bang, you know? I made a mental list of foods and checked them off one by one as if I was saying goodbye to friends. Pizza? Check. Fajitas? Check. Taco Ball? Check, check, check. I can also relate to this. I kept everything a secret for as long as possible. Up until last week my wife was the only one who knew, but I finally had to spill the beans and let my parents and immediate co-workers know. Let's face it, I'm 6' and 388 pounds. I expect to attack weight loss with a vengeance; when I start dropping weight, people are going to notice so I decided to go ahead and let the news 'slip' on my own terms. I think it is different for us men than it is for women. I don't mean to generalize but all the women I know at work who have had the surgery have announced it to the world. They are all supportive of each other. Maybe it is more embarassing for men or something. (I think this is going to be the subject of tomorrow's blog.) Right now I am in the middle. While I did let those co-workers know, I did register here under a fake name so I'm still a little 'in the closet' so to speak.

My wife was banded in March of this year and she has lost 133 pounds. I am scheduled for surgery December 4th. I think things will be a lot easier when we are both on the same page. It's so hard right now when I want to go to a buffet and she can only eat two or three bites of something. We have talked about splitting meals before. Like some of you guys I think it would make me feel cheap, but maybe if we get something to go and then split it once home or something it wouldn't be so bad.

They've got an entire area set aside for everyone getting banded in December -- myself included. Come join us! http://www.lapbandtalk.com/f100/

During last week's diet consultation I was handed a piece of paper that detailed what I was allowed to eat during my pre-operation 10-day diet. A few ounces of meat here, a helping of vegetables there ... it all sounded okay until I realized the list covered what I was allowed to eat for an entire day -- I thought it was just for one meal! Okay, I didn't really think that, but prior to this diet I'm sure there have been many meals during which I have eaten more than I'm eating now in an entire day. Totalling up the food amounts, we're talking 8oz of food for lunch (split between meat and veggies), another 8oz for dinner, with some meal replacements and suppliments thrown in for good measure. Let's say we're talking a total of 24oz of food, or 3 cups. I can guarantee you that on many, many occasions I've eaten at least twice that in a sitting. I'm not talking about Thanksgiving here, I'm talking about a normal lunch, maybe at a Chinese buffet or something. Once you put a pencil to the numbers, it is amazing both how much I was eating, and how little one actually needs to "get by." Note I said "get by" -- not, "get stuffed." The most ironic thing about the 10-day diet so far is, the less you think about it, the better off you'll be. That being said, it's impossible NOT to think about it. For starters, I'm eating something every 2 to 3 hours. Breakfast at 8am, protein snack at 10am, lunch at noon, afternoon snack at 2pm, dinner around 5pm, another protein snack at 8pm ... not to mention a few sugar-free popcicle and jell-o snacks throughout the day. It's tough not to think about food when you're being forced to focus so intently on it. Yesterday, the first day of the diet, I did okay. Today, breakfast was tough. The wife and I took the kids to McDonald's this morning. My wife, who was banded earlier this year, had an order of scrambled eggs. My kids both had cinnamon rolls and chocolate milks. I had (drum roll) decaf coffee. Oh, and for dessert, I had a multi-vitamin, followed by a vitamin-c pill. And who says I don't know how to splurge? I already suspect eating "normally" (however normal a banded person eats) around friends and co-workers, especially in social settings, is going to be the hardest thing to tackle. I'm not sure how I'm going to react the first time everybody says, "hey let's go do Chinese!" before looking at me and saying, "oh, wait ..." The last thing I want to do is be someone else's burdon. I'm doing this surgery for me, not to affect anyone else's lifestyle. Alright, gotta run -- lime jell-o's a-callin'.

During last week's diet consultation I was handed a piece of paper that detailed what I was allowed to eat during my pre-operation 10-day diet. A few ounces of meat here, a helping of vegetables there ... it all sounded okay until I realized the list covered what I was allowed to eat for an entire day -- I thought it was just for one meal! Okay, I didn't really think that, but prior to this diet I'm sure there have been many meals during which I have eaten more than I'm eating now in an entire day. Totalling up the food amounts, we're talking 8oz of food for lunch (split between meat and veggies), another 8oz for dinner, with some meal replacements and suppliments thrown in for good measure. Let's say we're talking a total of 24oz of food, or 3 cups. I can guarantee you that on many, many occasions I've eaten at least twice that in a sitting. I'm not talking about Thanksgiving here, I'm talking about a normal lunch, maybe at a Chinese buffet or something. Once you put a pencil to the numbers, it is amazing both how much I was eating, and how little one actually needs to "get by." Note I said "get by" -- not, "get stuffed." The most ironic thing about the 10-day diet so far is, the less you think about it, the better off you'll be. That being said, it's impossible NOT to think about it. For starters, I'm eating something every 2 to 3 hours. Breakfast at 8am, protein snack at 10am, lunch at noon, afternoon snack at 2pm, dinner around 5pm, another protein snack at 8pm ... not to mention a few sugar-free popcicle and jell-o snacks throughout the day. It's tough not to think about food when you're being forced to focus so intently on it. Yesterday, the first day of the diet, I did okay. Today, breakfast was tough. The wife and I took the kids to McDonald's this morning. My wife, who was banded earlier this year, had an order of scrambled eggs. My kids both had cinnamon rolls and chocolate milks. I had (drum roll) decaf coffee. Oh, and for dessert, I had a multi-vitamin, followed by a vitamin-c pill. And who says I don't know how to splurge? I already suspect eating "normally" (however normal a banded person eats) around friends and co-workers, especially in social settings, is going to be the hardest thing to tackle. I'm not sure how I'm going to react the first time everybody says, "hey let's go do Chinese!" before looking at me and saying, "oh, wait ..." The last thing I want to do is be someone else's burdon. I'm doing this surgery for me, not to affect anyone else's lifestyle. Alright, gotta run -- lime jell-o's a-callin'.

As I begin my 10-day pre-op diet before Lapband Surgery, I find myself thinking, "how did I get to this point?" I mean, it seems like most of the people around can either control what they eat, or can eat whatever they want and not gain weight. Why am I blessed with the ability to gain weight simply by looking at pictures of food, much less shoving it into my mouth? Throughout my childhood I was always heavy, but never obese. As a little kid I can remember always demanding to be one of the 'shirts' in a game of shirts vs. skins, or refusing to play. I can't remember anyone ever seeing me with my shirt off, except for my mom and my doctor (and neither of those were willingly). I grew up here in the heartland, where most things are available deep-friend and everything goes better with gravy (brown or white, your choice). Skinned knees were healed with cookies, and every major holiday involved seriously large meals -- sometimes more than one. I graduated high school in the early 90s at roughly 200 pounds. Quite frankly it was hard for me to track my weight after that, as I didn't own a scale that would weigh me. At a physical for a job I took a few years after high school, I weighed 260. In the late 90s at a doctor's appointment I weighed 327. These numbers stick in my head like bits of bad news. Many people remember where they were when Kennedy was killed or when the Space Shuttle exploded -- me, I remember the first time I topped 300 pounds. In January of 2006, I weighed myself at the health clinic at work and discovered I weighed a whopping 394 pounds. That year I and several co-workers had a weight loss league, and throughout the year I lost a total of 60 pounds. The victory was short-lived; we celebrated my win at Chili's, in fact. Did you know a Triple Play has 2,700 calories? I did, and didn't care. Over the past year I've 80% of the weight back on. My weight losses -- what few I've had -- have always followed this trend. All I can think about when dieting is the reward of a banana split waiting for me after its over. Sometimes, that's the motivation that keeps me going. Sick, I know. In March of 2007, my wife (who is also blessed with the lovely title of "morbidly obese") had lapband surgury. In the eight months since her surgery, she has lost 133 pounds. This of course piqued my interest. Here I am, starving half the time, exercising and still gaining weight while my wife eats, is full, exercises occasionally and is wasting away. How could I not be interested? Six weeks ago I attended a Lapband Seminar and I was sold. I've attended all the mandatory meetings (some of which I'll be blogging about as well) and started the pre-op diet. Mentally the surgery seems far off in the distance -- however, seeing as though I'm on the second day of my 10 day diet, logic dictates I'm only 8 days away. While everything up to this point has been talk, starting the diet is my first 'action' -- it feels like my first real step toward this life changing event. I'm looking forward to it. My starting pre-op weight is 388lbs, which is more than anyone in the NFL.

As I begin my 10-day pre-op diet before Lapband Surgery, I find myself thinking, "how did I get to this point?" I mean, it seems like most of the people around can either control what they eat, or can eat whatever they want and not gain weight. Why am I blessed with the ability to gain weight simply by looking at pictures of food, much less shoving it into my mouth? Throughout my childhood I was always heavy, but never obese. As a little kid I can remember always demanding to be one of the 'shirts' in a game of shirts vs. skins, or refusing to play. I can't remember anyone ever seeing me with my shirt off, except for my mom and my doctor (and neither of those were willingly). I grew up here in the heartland, where most things are available deep-friend and everything goes better with gravy (brown or white, your choice). Skinned knees were healed with cookies, and every major holiday involved seriously large meals -- sometimes more than one. I graduated high school in the early 90s at roughly 200 pounds. Quite frankly it was hard for me to track my weight after that, as I didn't own a scale that would weigh me. At a physical for a job I took a few years after high school, I weighed 260. In the late 90s at a doctor's appointment I weighed 327. These numbers stick in my head like bits of bad news. Many people remember where they were when Kennedy was killed or when the Space Shuttle exploded -- me, I remember the first time I topped 300 pounds. In January of 2006, I weighed myself at the health clinic at work and discovered I weighed a whopping 394 pounds. That year I and several co-workers had a weight loss league, and throughout the year I lost a total of 60 pounds. The victory was short-lived; we celebrated my win at Chili's, in fact. Did you know a Triple Play has 2,700 calories? I did, and didn't care. Over the past year I've 80% of the weight back on. My weight losses -- what few I've had -- have always followed this trend. All I can think about when dieting is the reward of a banana split waiting for me after its over. Sometimes, that's the motivation that keeps me going. Sick, I know. In March of 2007, my wife (who is also blessed with the lovely title of "morbidly obese") had lapband surgury. In the eight months since her surgery, she has lost 133 pounds. This of course piqued my interest. Here I am, starving half the time, exercising and still gaining weight while my wife eats, is full, exercises occasionally and is wasting away. How could I not be interested? Six weeks ago I attended a Lapband Seminar and I was sold. I've attended all the mandatory meetings (some of which I'll be blogging about as well) and started the pre-op diet. Mentally the surgery seems far off in the distance -- however, seeing as though I'm on the second day of my 10 day diet, logic dictates I'm only 8 days away. While everything up to this point has been talk, starting the diet is my first 'action' -- it feels like my first real step toward this life changing event. I'm looking forward to it. My starting pre-op weight is 388lbs, which is more than anyone in the NFL.

Put me down for December 4th.

I'm feeling good as my date approaches (12/4). In the back of my mind I'm wondering if I'll regret not eating more of the foods that I'll never be able to eat again. Like sushi! I keep thinking things like, "aw crap, I should have had a really big steak last week!" I'm not really too afraid of the surgery, although I'm sure I'll be changing my tune the closer the date comes. My wife had lapband surgery last March and she's lost 130+ pounds, so I know that you can get some dramatic results through lapband. I am inspired by her but I also know us well enough to know we are competitive and so I'm also thinking, I hope I do as well as she did or else I'll be thinking, what am I doing wrong? I guess you could say I'm mostly excited with just a hint of nervousness.

My doctor requires a 10 day pre-op diet, so I scheduled my surgery date so I wouldn't have to start the diet until two days after Thanksgiving. So far it's not too bad. I had a pretty serious caffiene addiction going on as well (maybe a six pack of Diet Cokes a day). I cut back the week before the diet started, but I am still experiencing some wonderful headaches on day two of the diet. I suspect this will get better over the next couple of days. My program is very Protein intensive. I am eating lots of New Direction Meal Replacements along with Protein Bars as suppliments. So far all the New Direction packets have been really tasty except for the chocolate pudding one (not sweet enough). Everything else including the regular chocolate, the strawberry, the hot cocoa and the chicken broth have all been really tasty. I also got a Cookies and Cream mix from another company which was a little watery, but much better when mixed with skim milk. The first seven days of my diet, I'm allowed 4oz of meat at one or two meals so that's helping. The Jell-O and sugar-free popcicles help quite a bit too.

Hello all, first time poster here. My surgery date is Dec. 4th.