Wheetsin

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I speak Swedish fluently but with a terrible accent, French semi-fluently, and a little Greek. My husband is from Sweden & learning the language made our visits a lot easier. I learned mostly through immersion (I spent several months there at a time) or studying the dictionary, trying to communicate with the in-laws, etc. I studied French for 7 years in highschool/college, but it's fading fast. My family is Greek and I learned it too through immersion - I've never studied it.

I can second pfunkem. I went to an info seminar 11/05 and wasn't even sure I wanted the surgery, but went as part of my research. Even when I submitted all of the paperwork, medical records, etc. I wasn't sure -- I just figured that I would rather submit everything and have stuff "ready to go" if/when I was ready to go through with it, than linger & debate, decide I wanted it, and have to start from zero and do all that waiting. Is the 6 month delay is enough for you to think about not doing it, ask yourself - why? Why would 6 months change your mind on a decision that will impact the rest of your life? Is something going to happen with your physical & mental status in 6 months, that will make the band no longer applicable to you? If you found all of this out 6 months ago, how would you feel today -- and do you think you'd feel that way 6 months from now? If the wait is that big of an issue, can you self-pay?

Your loss is nothing to be discouraged by. What were your expectations? Quality of food is IMO mor eimportant than quantity. Each an ounce of ice cream or 4 ounces of grilled chicken. One is a whole lot better for you. What types of foods are you eating? Are you exercising? Not only does it help with burning fat, but if you've recently started a routing you can gain weight (keep in mind weight is not the same as fat). Do you have restriction? What do you eat in a typical day?

Oh, different Rockin Robin! Dang I was confused. There's another user on here with that name, spelled differently, who also recently had surgery - to place a port. The best advice anyone can give is to follow Dr's orders.

DH and I are going to a nice dinner get-together this weekend with other couples we're friends with. It's not a formal dinner, but we do it "nice". I've signed up for 2 salads and a desert, and could use some recipe ideas for a "dignified" desert! Edited to add: I'm thinking hard about making a batch of homemade baklava, but it takes sooooo long to make. Looking for good alternatives. :eek:

I used to be a serious athlete. Played state & national championships, had 7 full-ride scholarship offers, I led a clinic for younger players, and had been invited to join & actively playing on an Olympic scouting league team for about 8 months. Two weeks before my highschool graduation I completely blew the meniscus ligament in my right knee, shredded the cartilege, and dislocated my kneecap. I begged for an operation so I could keep playing. They scoped me, but all the doctors and surgeons said no, you're too young, and this isn't your career, operating on you at your age is going to cause you too much long-term pain, plus the operation doesn't guarantee anything with this type of injury - it could heal itself and you'd never have a problem, or you could have surgery and 3 days later you take a step and *rip* everything falls apart again. Come see us again when you're in your 30s, or when it starts to hurt you so much on a day-to-day basis that you can't stand it. It's hard to go from the metabolism of an athlete, to the metabolism of someone stuck on a couch in an immobilizer, and not make the dietary changes that need to come hand in hand. So I started gaining some weight in college. Not a lot, but enough. I was far from MO though. Then I got married. DH had a good job and didn't want me to work, and I wasn't particularly attached to my job so I quit, and found that I had nothing to do all day. I'd clean & clean, and it would still be early morning. So I'd go shop & shop. It got to where I was spending more than I'd be making if I was working. And I found myself spending WAY too much time on the couch in front of the TV eating whatever, because that's what you do when you watch TV. And when dinner rolled around, you eat dinner whether you're hungry or not because that's what you do at 7. And on, and on... There's no joy in behavioral eating. You do it because it's what you do at this time, or during this event, or when you're in this setting.

Oh you're killing me. Diet Coke was my #3 drink. I've always drank more water & tea than soda, but for the first LOTS of weeks after surgery, I was craving carbonation like no one's business. Not a particular soda, and a drank caffeine free anyway, but just something carbonated... I wanted to feel the burn!

Normally I'm a "go buy buy it" kind of girl, especially if I have dessert responsobility, seeing as how there's a Panera and a Cheesecake Factory very close to work. But these dinners are a sort of tradition with our group of friends, and one of our oldest "rules" is no store-bought. Everything is a little hoity-toity in our little "dinner club". The bananas foster sounds good, I've seen it on menus but never actually had it... but we'll be on a boat for dessert so I'm not sure how the ice cream would fare... but hmm... sounds delicious... may make it for DH anyway. Hmm... hmm... HMM...

I stay out of things like this as a rule, but I own several messageboards and have dealt with civil unrest on some of them before, a lot of unrest on one in particular, so I can see both sides of the story. So posting as a messageboard owner... (as a user/bandster, I'm still staying out of this stuff because none of it has anything to do with why I personally come here, and opinions really are like assholes). So wearing the hat of board owner... Messageboard users see the resource provided as "their" resource, without realizing that in all actuality, it's personal property. It's a public resource, privately funded, and in personal property. Someone owns this board. We're just guests. The house analogy above is very accurate. And contrary to what a lot of people think, messageboards are not democracies. Just as users voice the opinion that they have a right to free speech, the admin/mods have the right to delete, edit, ban. Sometimes you can forget that you're the guest, and act according to the rules you keep in your own house, until the person who pays the mortgage has to ask you to take your cigarette outside. To the best of my knowledge, no one here is charged money for their membership. But boards cost money. A lot of money, sometimes. VB (what this board runs on) is not free, nor is it particularly cheap, so someone (I assume the admin) is paying a decent chunk of change out of his/her own so that you can have this great resource to use. If that means something gets locked or deleted, well - we probably all have bigger & better things to spend our time worrying about. In the end the board belongs to the admin and he/she has full say in how it's run. The people who really hate this idea will usually go elsewhere, where the bickering is even worse because it is overlooked (the terribly truth of really getting what you ask for), but for the most part people stay, things calm down, and life goes on. Takes about 3 days, usually. It's also thankless. Provide a free resource at your own expense, and that goes by-and-large unnoticed... but watch the complaints come flooding in when someone doesn't like what you do with your resource. Just my 2 cents from the other side of the tracks, worth exactly what you're paying for it.

I stay out of things like this as a rule, but I own several messageboards and have dealt with civil unrest on some of them before, a lot of unrest on one in particular, so I can see both sides of the story. So posting as a messageboard owner... (as a user/bandster, I'm still staying out of this stuff because none of it has anything to do with why I personally come here, and opinions really are like assholes). So wearing the hat of board owner... Messageboard users see the resource provided as "their" resource, without realizing that in all actuality, it's personal property. It's a public resource, privately funded, and in personal property. Someone owns this board. We're just guests. The house analogy above is very accurate. And contrary to what a lot of people think, messageboards are not democracies. Just as users voice the opinion that they have a right to free speech, the admin/mods have the right to delete, edit, ban. Sometimes you can forget that you're the guest, and act according to the rules you keep in your own house, until the person who pays the mortgage has to ask you to take your cigarette outside. To the best of my knowledge, no one here is charged money for their membership. But boards cost money. A lot of money, sometimes. VB (what this board runs on) is not free, nor is it particularly cheap, so someone (I assume the admin) is paying a decent chunk of change out of his/her own so that you can have this great resource to use. If that means something gets locked or deleted, well - we probably all have bigger & better things to spend our time worrying about. In the end the board belongs to the admin and he/she has full say in how it's run. The people who really hate this idea will usually go elsewhere, where the bickering is even worse because it is overlooked (the terribly truth of really getting what you ask for), but for the most part people stay, things calm down, and life goes on. Takes about 3 days, usually. It's also thankless. Provide a free resource at your own expense, and that goes by-and-large unnoticed... but watch the complaints come flooding in when someone doesn't like what you do with your resource. Just my 2 cents from the other side of the tracks, worth exactly what you're paying for it.

Leener, if you need extreme help, go to extreme measures. Cut everything up into small pieces and eat with a toothpick until you get used to taking in your food over longer periods of time. May sound funny, but it would work. You could only pick up a bite as big as you had cut, and anything mushy - well - you're going to have to eat that slowly b/c a toothpick only holds so much.

The babies may make it yet, esp. if you live in a warm climate. Depending on how old they are, and when they were last fed, temperature can be the bgigest factor. My parents used to breed birds (not professionally), and I had a breeding pair of cockateils. I was often surprised by how long the babies could go, if warm.

Keep in mind that most pre-op diets vary slightly. I've done "a" pre-op diet, but maybe not "the" pre-op. Mine was a breeze - sugar free Clear Liquids for 2 days before surgery.

Weighed in this a.m. and 4 more pounds gone, which put me at 314. Very soon only single digits will separate me from the 2s. :dance: Oh yeah, that's per my home scale, so who knows!

I've only had the impresion people were uncomfortable a few times, but I wouldn't say uncomfortable so much as wanting to make sure I'd be taken care of. Pre-op when we'd visit my parents we'd always take them out for dinner, and during our first post-op visit when we got there, they'd taken out stuff to thaw because they weren't sure I'd be able to eat anything. I've found that in my case, it was just a matter of educating them a little - helping them see that I could eat just about anything, I'm jsut going to eat a small amount of it. Now when we visit, they just ask, "Where can you eat?"

DH and I were considering a ROP policy a few months ago. I have the advantage of working for a major insurance provider, so I asked someone in my building to give me some no-nonsense information about the pros/cons. Here are the sites she sent me to: ROP site 1. ROP site 2. Nothing a Google search won't pop up for you, but it was some peace of mind to me to know that some of the top pros in the business recommended the sites as good guides to determine if ROP was right for us.

30 things you don't say to a naked man... 1. I've smoked fatter joints than that. 2. Ahhhh, it's sooooo cute. 3. Why don't we just cuddle? 4. You know they have surgery to fix that. 5. Make it dance. 6. Can I paint a smiley face on it? 7. Wow, and your feet are so big. 8. It's OK, we'll work around It. 9. Will it squeak if I squeeze it? 10. Oh no... a flash headache. 11. (giggle and point) 12. Can I be honest with you? 13. How sweet, you brought incense. 14. This explains your car. 15. Maybe if we Water it, it'll grow. 16. Why is God punishing me? 17. At least this won't take long. 18. I never saw one like that before. 19. But it still works, right? 20. It looks so unused. 21. Maybe it looks better in natural light. 22. Why don't we skip right to the cigarettes? 23. Are you cold? 24. If you get me real drunk first. 25. Is that an optical illusion? 26. What is that? 27. It's a good thing you have so many other talents. 28. Does it come with an air pump? 29. So this is why you're supposed to judge people on personality. 30. Nevermind

A man sitting in a bar orders his 10th shot of tequila. The bartender, amazed, asks him, "Wow, I've never seen a man drink like that...what're you celebrating?" The man replies, "Well...indeed this is a cause for celebration. I just gave oral sex to a woman for the first time in my life tonight." "Damn...you're right that's cause for celebration, let me buy you a shot, on the house!" The man accepts and immediately downs the shot of tequila. "As a matter of fact," states the bartender, "Since that's such a fine reason to celebrate, let me buy you a 12th..." "No thanks," replies the man. "If 11 shots can't get the taste out of my mouth, 12 can't..."

A man walks into a bar with a flamingo and a cat. The guy says, "I'll take a beer." The flamingo says, "I'll take a beer." The cat says, "I'll take a beer. And I'm sure as hell not paying." They drink their drinks and leave. The next day the same trio walks into the same bar. The guy says, "I'll have a rum & Coke." The flamingo says, "I'll have a rum and Coke." The cat says, "I'll have a rum & Coke. And I'm sure as hell not paying!" The bartender asks the guy - "For two days now you come in here with your flamingo, and your cat... what's the story?" The guy replies, "I ran into a genie who granted me a wish." "What'd you wish for?" asks the bartender. The guy replies, "A chick with long legs and a tight pussy." A guy is impressed by the midget playing piano in a bar, and asks the owner where he found him. The owner tells him there's a genie in the alley behind the bar who grants one wish to anyone who frees him. The guy doesn't believe him but has to pee, the bathrooms are full, so he goes in the alley to relieve himself and trips on a bottle. A genie comes out of the bottle and tells the guy he can have one wish for freeing him. The guy says, "I want a million bucks!" The guy hears a deafening noise above and looks up to see a million ducks flying across the sky. "No! I said a million bucks!" His hopes smashed, the guy walks back into the bar and tells the owner what happened. The owner replies, "Do you really think I'd wish for a 12 inch pianist?" Two guys are getting dressed in the gym. The first guy bends over and the second guy notices he has a cork shived up his butt. "Hery - dude, what's that cork for?" "Well, I was walking down a beach the other day, tripped and fell over a bottle. A genie came out of it and said he wanted to grant me a wish, and I asked him, "No shit?"

Q: What do you call a black man flying a plane? A: The pilot, you stupid racist.

Hi sarabluebell, there is a KS board here you might want to check out. I'm in MO but was banded in KS.

Two guys walk into a bar. Stupid guys, duck next time. Knock knock. Who's there? Little old lady. Little old lady who? I didn't know you could yodle... A dog hobbles into town on three legs. "Can I help you?" asks the sheriff. "No," says the gimpy dog, "I'm looking for the man who shot my paw." Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy takes out his phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps: "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator says: "Calm down, I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a gunshot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says: "OK, now what?"

I hate vomiting. I've only done it twice in 20+ years. PBs aren't quite on my "Things I Enjoy" list, but I can deal with them. Worst part about the PB is the pain before it's over. Last time I PBed I actually found myself HOPING I could hurry up and "chuck" the stuck, because that makes the pain stop.

I have to say - anywhere BUT Goodwill. I used to work for their corporate offices. Trust me, you don't want your donations going there. :eek: Here are a few other suggestions: How about donating to a battered women's shelter? There are plenty of plus-sized women there, and most have left a lot of their clothing behind and are in need. Sell them on Ebay. Use the $ you get to put toward new clothes. I put a few things up just to see what it would be like and I got more than I paid! Put them in a consignment shop. If you have a local support group, suggest a clothing swap night. Someone out there will want your sizes/clothes. Your worst will be someone else's best, vice versa.