Wheetsin

appto Bismol is known to cause it (actually it's a reaction with Pepto's active ingredient). I don't take it but DH takes the pills occasionally, and it says on the bottom that it may cause temporary -- tongue blackening. Did you take Pepto? If you didn't, did you eat anything extra high in Iron? If not, and even if so, mention it to your doc. It can be a symptom of some other issues.

Umm, I sound like a real dumb-dumb above. I don't mean "did all your hair fall out at once?" I mean - the first time you noticed it was falling out, was it a handful? Or did it start with just a few strands in the beginning, and over time progress to being a handful?

:D I have really thick hair, I actually get it thinned when I get it cut - I guess I need to tell my girl to stop doing that! Dang. Did it fall out that much all at once, or did you start with a little loss that increased more and more as time went by?

THey have options now that look just like regular jewlery. I bought my mother a new medic alert bracelet last year. She hated wearing the big red symbol, and could never find any that looked decent. I ordered one for her from a local chain jewlery store. It's a gold bracelet with a gold face, and instead of the red symbol it has one engraved into the gold in a matte finish. You know those name bracelets some people wear? Looks kind of like that, only it's medic alert. I personally was worried that a medic might see it and not think it was an alert, so I bought a little charm that hangs off the "badge" area, that's a small gold emblem with the red symbol on it. Total was about $550 but could have been done more cheaply if I hadn't had it customized. I got her "MED-2180" with a custom chain (bought a chain at the store and had them splice the emblem into it) from the first link, and "MED-6" to hang off of it, from the second link.

I'm type A too. I'd imagine most of us are. One if these days I'll do MBTI with you guys. Or one of the other 30-something personality inventory models I use. Look at learning styles, or people styles, or personality structure... (yes I'm a :nerd:, but I can't help but love this stuff). We can do the pottery thing or skip it. I'm going to do it at some point in time, so if you're interested let's go, but if you could take it or leave it, let's leave it.

Wow, you lost that much? I've been noticing a small bit each morning when I was my hair. Maybe 5 - 8 strands, nothing like a "clump". But I'm just today 5 mos out.

Still stuck at 92 lbs lost... it's very much "like me" (now) to lose consistently for a month, then go a few weeks with no movement. I'm still keeping my fingers crossed for 100lbs down @ 6 mos post-op, but if I don't make it, who cares. I would have never dreamed I'd be where I'm at today. My best hope was 100 lbs at 1 year.

I really haven't faced much adversity. My family's perspective was pretty much, "We know you can lose the weight, but you have a ahrd time maintaining. We know you aren't the same person you were when you were thin. We miss that person. This is probably what it's going to take for you to keep the weight off, which will give us our Wheetsin back, so we'll support you in every way we can." Co-workers have all been REALLY curious. They want to know all about it b/c most of them have never heard of it. They want to see my scars, they want to know what I can/can't eat... etc. No bad reactions at all. In fact, three of the girls upstairs have gone to my surgeon's seminar, and are in the process of filling out their preliminary paperwork. DH at first was against it, but he didn't understand it. He knew what RNY was, and assumed all WLS involved similar reconstitution of the organs. He went to info night with me, got a little educated, and decided that if it's what I wanted it would be OK. Now - that evolved, and the closer surgery came, the more "for it" he started to get, until one day I asked if if HE wanted me to have the surgery and he said "As unselfishly as I can possibly make this sound, yes. I want you to be healthier so we have more years together." Now that I'm getting my body back, my confidence, esteem, etc. - he's thrilled. He tells me all the time. Now, all the warm fuzzies out of the way, here are the things I kind of expected people (not my family) to say (which is another way of saying, "here's what I'm telling myself"): 1) "That's the easy way out." To answer this one, here's something I posted in another thread: <!-- / message --><!-- sig --> 2) It's so unlike you to give up. But you can look at it at least two ways: a desperation move, or a control move. Are you desperate and this is your only choice, or are you tired of playing the game and this is you stepping in and decising enough is enough. 3) You're not that fat. (I did hear this one). I'm sorry? My BMI is 50. I'm 200 lbs above my "ideal" weight. How am I not that fat? (answer was - "Well, you carry yourself well. You move well. You don't act fat.") LOL 4) Isn't there another way? Sure there is, but this is the way I've chosen.

Is that baby wearing a loincloth??

Also sounds like you're getting by on nearly 100% carbs. Carbs don't do good things for your glycogen stores. Try upping your protein. My program suggests 80% protein to 20% carbs. I have mixed success getting there, but it's a good starting point.

I bought a digital one at Sam's that I *think* is accurate up to 400, but it may have only been 350. I don't remember. You'll probably have a fairly hard time finding one for >350. I would suggest trying ebay, though. I know lots of people have bought higher capacity scales from there, and been very satisifed.

I would check with the psychologist's office.

My family is the same way. My mother was diagnosed with melanoma (on her foot) and had to have part of her foot cut out, from just under the ankle bone, back to the start of the heel, and down to the start of her sole. About 1.5" deep. She was showing me one day and I told her it looked like Chinese food. From then on she's had the nickname "Lo Mein". My family has had so many struggles, losses, challenges... that we're to the point of having to laugh at it, or we'll cry.

The flipside of the kicker is that full "retail" according to what ins was charged would have been over $36k, and I'm guessing most self-pays don't get anywhere near there. The way the insurance discounts work, as explained to me (by a medical underwriter) is essentially "volume discount".

Ok Jack. Aikido. BSU. Anything else?

Can you put the bed on the wall where the cable outlet is, head against the wall, angle the armoire in the corner that would be bottom right of the bed, place a chest of drawers across on the wall that is parallel to the right side of the bed, and then the final chest can go across from the foot of the bed? Hard to visualize w/o knowing room/furniture dimensions. Now get a warm camel color on the walls to bring out the warmth of the furniture finish, some burgandy drapes, and start shopping for the house the furniture actually fits in. Isn't that the way we do it? No mutual consensus here. Not much anyway. We just finished painting his bathroom, new faucets, new lights, etc. and his say in it consisted of answering, "Which of these two paint colors would you prefer?" He really doesn't care, and knows the interior design of our home matters much more to me than him. The way he sees it is, "If our bills are paid, there's food on the table, and I can have my electronics, I don't care how much you spend - as long as you really want it."

Are your measurements, etc. changing? What's your calorie intake vs. BMR? I had a 6 month stall on Atkins, then lost about 25 lbs in 2 weeks. *shrug* It sucked!

Doesn't sound like you have anything to worry about. 4lbs can be a matter of needing to poop. It can take a while for your PMS fluid retention to go away (for one), and for two - a change in diet can (turning a long story very short) make your body retain fluids. A lot of people experience a gain when they transition to solids, too. What's your fill level, current/capacity? Are yu eating, or eating when you're hungry? What types of foods are you eating?

Croatica, find out what your doctor is smoking and send me some! :smoke

LOL VinesQueen. bandedshopgirl, calculate your current BMR. You can use a site like this one to do it. Then count up your average daily caloric intake, and see where you're at in relation to your BMR. Your BMR is what you require just to exist in a completely sedintary state, so an intake lower than BMR puts you in a caloric deficit. You could be eating half of what you did before banding, but still eating more calories than you burn in a day. Not saying it's happening, just that it's a possibility.

I don't see it either. At all. I see someone wondering if he'll have to forego certain activities post-banding. Just like many of us did. I know I was on the horn with Inamed re: scuba diving many times before my operation.

I get them two times. 1 - usually while I'm waiting to PB, like it doesn't hurt enough without my diaphragm throwing a temper tantrum. I've not had them before I'm well into the pain of a stick that isn't going to clear. And 2 - if a stick clears. If I have something stuck and it clears on its own, it's usually *hiccup*, *burp*, *all better*.

Oh yeah, I told you guys I'd post this when we were talking about how the insurance network discounts work at dinner. Breakout is charged / what I paid / what insurance paid (according to my insurance statements). I can post network discount rates too. Surgeon: $228 / $20 / $80.77. Hospital: $116 / $20 / $58. Anesthesia: $200 / $20 / $100. Anesthesia: $165 / $20 / $79. Anesthesia: $330 / $20 / $79. Psych: $165 / $20 / $50. Radiology: $42 / $0 / $15.84. Hospital: $29076.25 / $0 / $1674. ?: $18 / $0 / $0. Hospital: $23.50 / $0 / $12.22. Anesthesia: $1347.98 / $0 / $0. Surgeon: $4000 / $0 / $1014.97. Radiology: $35 / $0 / $13.20. So it looks like my out of pocket was $120, but I really only remember paying $80. Too bad I don't get network discount rates at Talbot's!

That's funny! The first time I met would-be MIL was xmas-ish of 96. I was there visiting for 2 mos (long story, but we'd known each other about 2.5 years at this point -- met in '94 on a trip I took there with a German exchange student friend of mine) and he asked if I'd go to his parents' with him for xmas. His parents pick us up at the train station, drive us to their house. They don't say a word to me. We get to their house and I've just taken my coat off and MIL walks up to me and says something (in her broken English) like, "So are you just here to be a slut? You just want to sleep with all the European boys?" I just kind of looked at her, trying really hard to surpress what I wanted to say, and just walked away without responding. And that was the start to our relationship. DH (remember, not DH at that time) comes after me telling me all about how it was "just a misunderstanding, she just doesn't know English that well..." *sigh* He gave up trying to defend them about 6 years ago when he realized that the "language barrier" argument only gets you so far, and it really started to dawn on him how inappropriate they were being. Now when they call I don't even answer the phone, I wait for DH to get it, because I know the drill. "Hello?" "We want to speak to our son." "Okay, here you go..." or my favorite... "Hangon, we just got done having lots of dirty sex and he's in the shower..."

Sent you a PM. :hug: