OutsideMatchInside

@@OKCPirate Is right, loose skin and flab is what set the machines off. A TSA agent also told me when she was patting me down the an apron and using powder will set them off also.

@@Beck90 Fluids don't take up any space for me or really anyone unless you have a stricture. Fluids move right through your body, as you can see on a live swallow test. The valve at the bottom of the stomach opens basically all the time to let things pass through. Like I said you can see this on a live swallow test, and some Drs like Matthew Weiner talk about this. The reason at 4 weeks you don't have room is because you are still swollen and healing. Drinking while eating that early out is basically allowing you to exceed what should be your natural capacity, and by the time you are feeling that you are too full it is basically too late. This is because of the swelling and you are still healing. The nerves are not all reconnected so by the time you are "feeling" full, you have already over filled your sleeve. Once your sleeve is totally healed at around 6 months, this won't be the case and drinking while eating will allow you to just push food through quickly.

The next person that tells me to start eating sweet potatoes I am going to punch in the face. I don't have people comment on my surgery, but they comment on my low carbing all the time and are always trying to force "good" carbs on me.

You deserve it. I mean seriously I just over indulged myself all the time. It didn't help I had a high stress job an expense account and attended a lot of company events at 5 star hotels and very expensive restaurants. Working in the Tech field we had free lunch every day at work, catered happy hour on Fridays with unlimited booze in the office, free vending machines. You name it. I had an endless buffet of free food for years. Also no one cares if you are a fat nerd, it adds to your legend. I still deserve all the nice and exquisite things in the world but they don't have to be food based. There is a world full of shoes

@@This_IsMyRIHality I wasn't over 400lbs but I was getting close to it. @@BLERDgirl was started over 400 and has had success.

Fitbit inflates steps, sometimes wildly. They are known in the industry for vanity steps. I walked in the mall on day and watched the steps count on my app, and it was 3 steps for every one step. And I was just in the mall to walk and test it, I wasn't shopping I was mall walking because it was cold.

I'm not a Vet yet but I would like a Vet only forum, just because a lot of the newbie posts to me are like really loud background noise. I am having a hard time filtering them out for the information that is helpful to me, and at this point it makes the forum less useful for me, and I am less likely to read and post here. I don't want to leave the forum, because there is a wealth of information here, and I do like helping new people by offering my experiences. I always wondered why people stopped participating on forums soon after surgery and now I totally understand why. @@VSGAnn2014 Summed it up perfectly.

@@LA_lady Have you ever watched skin tight on TLC? They have people on there that lost weight without surgery slowly, and their skin is still a disater. Fast or slow it doesn't matter your skin is going to do what it wants. At 230lbs you will probably snapback without much issue. Take @@OKCPirate and I will add that body peels, exfoliation and high quality moisturizers don't hurt.

How many calories are you eating? At a certain point you have to increase calories because your body will refuse to keep losing at starvation calorie levels. How many calories and how much Protein, carbs per day?

I took whole pills the day after surgery. One of the pills, was large. You will be fine.

I have already had my surgery. Are you having your surgery in AR or in MO? The only person I know from this board from AR had surgery in STL. They have car faciltiies, and nurses take care of you around the clock, and they are basically the cost of a hotel room. In the US most people are released home with no follow up. Same thing with plastic surgery.

Real Love, Michael McDonald If only just tonight, girl Let me hear you lie just a little Tell me I'm the only man That you ever really loved

@@charley27 There was a lot of stuff I thought I would never eat after surgery, but in reality my diet is pretty much the same. I would probably go for carby things. When I was eating on 4th of July before I started my pre-op I had sugar things, which was weird because I didn't even eat sugar at that point and hadn't in years. I had a funnel cake, a huge thing fo fries, a cheese steak and I think I got an alcoholic drink even though I didn't drink. So I took a few bites of funnel cake, didn't drink the liquor, ate 1/2 the fries, and made a decent dent in the cheese steak. I was really too hot to eat and I wasn't even mentally in a pig out space, even though I wanted to be. What is your favorite meal?

I was a fitbit user for a long time. Fitbits start off really good but they pretty rapidly deteriorate, becoming really inaccurate. This hasn't just been my experience but the experience of several friends. We all work in the tech field and we feel it is a flaw in the components and amount of heat they are exposed to being worn on the body. Similar things happen with cell phones when the users keep their phones in their pockets all time. The more active you are with your fitbit it seems like the faster they die. And they don't really die, they just become inaccurate, giving vanity steps, simply stop recording, or won't sync. The fitbit customer service is awful. They were good when they first started but now that they are so large, it is terrible. Then they removed a lot of recording features that people were using on the website. I think Fitbits are a great way to get started and I really love the community aspect of Fibit and the challenges (even though lots of people cheat. I watched a lady in the nail salon put her fitbit on her son while she got her nails done and he ran around like a wild animal). I use a smart watch now, but I think fitbits are a great starter tool, if you get one that syncs.

I had fair type food on 4th of July. Then my real last meal was just the stock of some onion Soup at a very nice French restaurant. I was on Clear liquids before surgery, but I was going to dine in style just in case I died the next day.

Most people don't lose a lot the first week. Your body has suffered a trauma. Also 2 Protein shakes and 50 ounces of Water is basically starvation for your body. Don't expect to lose until you can get more calories in.

Yes. I did my research before I met him the first time and I had a list of questions I made him answer even though he was trying to rush me. The book I was given and the class pre-op were very informative. I still refer to my book even now sometimes when I have a nutrition, OTC med, or Vitamin question. I had the choice of a lot of programs to use within my insurance and I picked the one I had because I felt they would best meet my needs.

The way care is set up in foreign countries (are you leaving the US?), it is a lot easier to show up alone and be taken care of. The type of post op care you have is far superior to US post-op care.

You started heavier so that doesn't seem odd. Also, heavy people really carry a lot of Water weight just because they have so much additional tissue to hold water. Enjoy the fast weight loss, it wont always be this fast.

Almost no hospital in the US is going to let you leave alone, or in a cab. You need someone to pick you up. It is really stupid and discriminatory against single people, but that is a rant for a different day.

I'm really sorry about your diagnosis. If your family and friends don't understand, pay someone to and go see a therapist that can help you with this. Also, you can still be a mom just because you don't have a bio child. Some of my friends that are the best parents in the world, are parents to children that are not biologically theirs. Just think you can pick a cute one Seriously consider adoption, there are so many children all around the world that need homes. Even if you are of limited means, you can always adopt through the state.

I'm not a year out so I am not really a vet I don't think but the hardest for me was not being able to chug Water. I used to wake up and drink 18 ounces of water without taking a breath. and I used to do it all the time, all day. I can make a decent dent in water now, but I can't chug like I used to. It really isn't lady like at all, even though it is only something I did in private it was a bad habit, so while I miss it, it is for the best I don't do it. I don't care about not eating and drinking at the same time, I grew up with a Dad that made that a rule with kids so they would eat all their food, so I was used to it. Like @@AvaFern said, you don't have to do it forever. I did it in the beginning so I wouldn't take a chance on getting too full. If I am out some place eating dry meat, I will have a few sips because that is better than something getting stuck and feeling like you can't breathe. As long as you aren't using drinking to push food through your sleeve so you can pig out, I don't see an issue with it. Being patient about my weight loss in the beginning was really hard. I thought because I started over 300 pounds the weight would just fall off, but it didn't work like that. I was over 300 pounds for almost 16 years, my body wasn't willing to just let it go that easy. Even now I am low key pissed that I am not closer to 200 pounds even though my macros are almost perfect every day and I am active. It seems slow, but in reality, I would have never ever lost this amount of weight on my own. Also I am really close to my clothing size goal, without even being close to my weight loss goal, which makes me think I am going to be a lot smaller than I thought (hello Dior).

I thought for a long time I could do it myself because I would always have success for a while with low carbing. The thing that people who haven't had WLS don't know is that post WLS it is a lot easier to stick to a healthy eating plan because of the lack of hunger and mental/physical disconnect. WLS isn't the easy way out, you still need will power, but if it makes it a lot easier to resist. I would have never imagined a life without feeling hungry and having head hunger rule my life. People just don't get it. And everyone thinks they are going to be in that magical 5 % that lose weight on their own and keep it off. I have an associate who told me their Dr told them to consider WLS because their weight keeps fluctuating. They said they didn't want to give up carbs and would rather be fat. You can't help some people.

I had my follow up DEXA scan and RMR test this week. My previous testing was 4 months ago, at that time I had lost about 90 pounds. When I was tested this week I was down over 120 pounds total. First RMR since we have talked about it a lot on here recently. Calcium supplement in Dec, because it wasn’t needed. So this bonus is just from activity, not supplements or anything. Other fun things you can see with a DEXA scan is all the asymmetry in your body. Your left side and right side rarely match. A Scan breaks out the fat and lean mass for each limb, left and right. Anyway this makes me feel better about my overall health. I would be lying if I didn’t admit that I am disappointed my weight loss has been slower the past few months. I am going to try and use this information to improve that. I eat around 1100 calories on most days. I am thinking that is too large a deficit and I should increase my calories. Those RMR and BMR above don’t take into account any of the exercise I do, which means I am running at over a 1000 calorie deficit on most days eating 1100 calories a day. I think that might be too much, but I am nervous to increase my calories. I hope this helps someone else. Instead of guessing and making assumptions about what if going on with your body, let technology help you out. My DEXA scan cost $75 at my local research University and the RMR test was $50. I wanted a baseline before I start my new more rigorous workout for the summer. Now I have a scientific starting point to judge my progress from.

I was only in my clothes about an hour and a half before surgery,so I wore the same clothes home. All I needed was a fresh pair of panties. Before surgery I purchased a sports bra that clasp in the front with no wire so it wouldn't rub on my incision and I could get it on and off easily. All I needed in the hospital was my phone, charger, and lip balm. The provided everything else I needed and you are paying for it so you might as well take advantage of it all. Every hospital is different so you should ask the staff or go to a group meeting pre-op and ask people at your hospital what the hospital was like.