DecemberSleeve

Sorry to hear that you are suffering with this. I would try to see a gastroenterologist and see if they can do an endoscopy to see if there is something wrong with your pouch. I hope you can find a solution to this.

Ask your surgeon what his/her rate of leaks is and what their approach is to reduce the risk. It is not that common, but yes it does happen and is one of the most serious possible risks that can happen with this surgery. You'll know something is wrong if it happens.

Yup, I get genuinely hungry too. It's much easier to satisfy my hunger now than it was back in the old days, but it feels like real hunger.

Yes, formerly obese people absolutely do have to work harder to stay skinny than naturally skinny people have to work to stay skinny. For example, you may have heard recently about a study looking at contestants on the show "The Biggest Loser". This article explains how that study showed that when an obese person loses weight, their body fights hard against the loss. A formerly obese person's metabolism slows down in an effort to try to pack on weight: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/02/health/biggest-loser-weight-loss.html That's why most of us had the experience that no matter how hard we tried to lose weight before surgery, eventually we put the weight back on. It's not your fault. It's just natural that our bodies try to protect us from "starvation". If we lived in caveman times that would be a good way to survive harsh conditions. Unfortunately, trying to protect us from starvation doesn't work well in modern society where fattening food is so plentiful.

I am sorry to hear that you received this awful news. Unfortunately I think many of us can relate to turning to food in times of emotional pain and in the end it just adds to our problems. I think it is good that you recognize what's happening. Perhaps it would help to let your mom's oncologist know that you're having a hard time taking in this news and asking if they can refer you to a counselor who works with cancer patients and their families. I suspect they probably can help you find someone.

It might be easier to just eat ahead of time and if anyone wonders why you're not having any food at the wedding say you don't feel well.

I am a new sleever, but I have been a vegetarian for many years, so just wanted to give a shout out to my fellow veggie. My doctor's nutritionist is totally fine with me being a veggie post-sleeve fortunately.

Aw, I didn't mean to freak you out again. I just want to make sure people know that the lap band has some major downsides that may not be readily apparent. If I had known then what I know now and had the option to get a sleeve gastrectomy instead of the band (back then it was not as widely available as it is now), I definitely think I would have done better and felt better with the sleeve to begin with. The other side of things is that there is risk in choosing to avoid surgery too. "Morbid obesity" implies that one's weight has reached the point of being a health risk. I was actually doing ok health wise other than the band-related problems before I had surgery - no diabetes, high blood pressure, or even much joint pain - so a part of me wondered if I should just live with being fat. However, one thing that helped me find the courage to follow through with getting the sleeve done is that I looked up the risk of death for people with BMIs as high as mine and realized that even though it didn't feel like a risk, I WAS taking a risk with my life and health by choosing to stay fat. It's not easy making the decision to have surgery. I wish there was an easier way. Even though I am now feeling pretty good, with little pain and doing ok on my post-op diet, I still wish that science would give us a pill to take or something.

I was lucky that my insurance company approved me easily without any kind of fight just on the basis that the band had slipped. The surgeon who did my sleeve works with a nutritionist so it was standard protocol to see the nutritionist just to talk about what the diet would be like with a sleeve, but that was it. No psych eval, no attempt to lose weight preoperatively, or any other kind of rigamarole. That was a relief, since I did fine with the band WHILE the band worked. It wasn't my fault that the band decided to slip.

I had my Lap Band put in 13 years ago by one of the most experienced band surgeons of the time. I did lose a decent amount of weight with it (around 140 lbs!) and for a while I loved the band. However, I've been living unfilled for several years now because of a band slippage, and subsequently regained 70 lbs. or so. I am excited about getting the band removed, because I am tired of the problems it has caused, but so scared about the sleeve revision. I am scared of suffering any more problems - because I have indeed SUFFERED a lot from the band. My port site has always been tender (it was worst when I was at my lowest weight since there was less "padding"), so I had pain from that on a daily basis for most of the time I had the band. While I was pregnant, it was extremely painful at times but in a weird way the stretching of the pregnancy seemed to break up some scar tissue and now it doesn't hurt as much. I have reflux at night even with the band unfilled. I have pain and a sense of fullness in my chest at times from the band. Back when the band was filled, I had so many episodes of food getting stuck - sometimes resulting in hours of pain as I waited for the food to pass. I am grateful that the band is reversible. I am grateful that, while the complications have been unpleasant, at least they can be fixed and won't kill me. I know I am better off than some of the pioneers of weight loss surgery who suffered much worse complications and even died. But, still, I am disappointed it turned out this way. Back when I got the band, I did a LOT of research. I read journal articles about the Australian experience with the band, since it was available in Australia for some time before it came to America. At the time, the information coming out of Australia made the band look good as a viable long term option. I was part of some support group email lists where most people seemed to be doing well and complications were rare. Yet, in spite of all that reassurance, now we know that the lap band operation turns out badly for most people who have it. That's why I have a hard time trusting that the sleeve is any better. I see the sleeve has a lot of positive stories and data, but so did the band back when I had it done. A part of me wants to tell my surgeon I have decided to cancel the sleeve plan and just want her to take the band out. And yet, there is a part of me that feels like I should take the chance on the sleeve. Realistically, I know I will never lose that much weight again on my own without some help - statistically, that just doesn't happen for the vast majority of fat people. I know obesity kills. I know that IF the sleeve goes well and IF I lose weight again, I will be a much happier and healthier person. It's just that if the sleeve doesn't go well, I'm afraid that it could ruin my life. The one good thing about the band is that at least it IS something that can be taken out. So often on bariatric sites, I see people focused only on weight loss. My experience with the band has taught me that quality of life means a lot more to me than pounds lost. I would be happier living as a normal fat person than suffering any more bariatric surgery complications. In a way, it will be kind of a relief to me if the surgeon decides she can't do the sleeve and just takes the band out since then the decision will be out of my hands. However, deep down, I still have hope that maybe I will be as fortunate as some of the happy sleeve people on here. I hope to update all of you about how it goes once I feel up to it. Prayers and positive thoughts are definitely appreciated if you are so inclined.

Just a few days ago I had my lap band removed and converted to a gastric sleeve. Personally, I can't say that I think the lap-band is a good option for most people. If you want to know why I don't recommend the band, I'll try to explain my experience : I totally understand being scared of how drastic the gastrectomy seems. I was very scared of it too before I did it and had thoughts of backing out up until I had the operation. ANY weight loss surgery is drastic, so it is always good to make sure you really have tried everything before you go through it. Even though the band may seem less drastic, if you look at long term results (for people who have had the band for 5 or 10 years) you'll find that many people have, like me, had problems requiring additional surgery because of problems with the band or port. Having the band inserted will cause scar tissue and adhesions to form inside your abdomen, so even though you can remove it, your stomach will never be quite the same as it was before the band was placed. When I had the band, I had episodes of food getting "stuck" in the band and then either causing me a lot of physical pain for a few hours until the food passed through, or having to vomit it back up. When I lost weight, the port stuck out and it was tender whenever I pressed on it or laid on it. It felt weird using my abdominal muscles for things like sit ups because I was aware of the port being stitched on my side. My abdomen was actually visibly slightly uneven when I was naked because of the port! Since your band needs "maintenance", it is a big hassle if the doctor who puts it in you retires, dies, or you move away. When I moved away from my original banding doc, I had to start paying $600 PER FILL to a new doctor just to have a PA do fills for me. Sadly, the PA did not recognize how serious it was when I had a nasty slip. She just unfilled me without bothering to get imaging done to confirm that the band remained out of place despite being unfilled.Well, at least that allowed me to eat again (I couldn't keep food or Water down with a fill in) but then the weight came roaring back and I regained half of what I had lost. Yet, I was one of the "lucky" ones since my slip was not an emergency. There are stories out there of people who have to have emergency surgery because their band slipped and then cut off blood flow to their stomach or caused them to be unable to eat or drink even unfilled. I was so fortunate that I walked around with the slipped band for a few years without anything awful happening - yet in the back of my mind, I knew something wasn't right and that weighed on me all the time until I finally had the relief of getting the band out. Sadly, even now, I have to be a little worried because having the band means that I am at a higher risk of having a dangerous post-operative leak from the gastric sleeve than I would have been if I had just gone with the sleeve to begin with. If you really feel that you need some surgical help to lose the weight, I personally think the sleeve is a better choice. I feel much more "normal" with the sleeve, even just being a few days post op, than I did with the band. Many doctors no longer do bands because the long term results aren't great. Even though there are always pros and cons with any surgery, i think it says a lot that the sleeve has been around for a long time (although originally as part of the duodenal switch) and seems more popular than ever. The band definitely is not as popular now as it was back when I got it.

I opted to just get the sleeve done since I would prefer to avoid the side effects of malabsorption if I can. It is possible to have the sleeve converted to a duodenal switch later on down the road if you decide you need it. I think it comes down to - how much weight do you have to lose? How concerned are you about the potential for nutritional deficiencies vs. potentially losing less weight? How much would it bother you to have a revision surgery down the road if you decided you needed to lose more weight?

Now that I am bouncing back from the surgery, I feel SO much better than I did prior to surgery and I am really glad I went through with it despite my anxiety. The constant GERD after the band slipped was horrible, and while I know that I might have GERD in the future with the sleeve, I hope and pray that the sleeve never causes GERD that bad again. I also had this constant sensation of being "aware" of the band and while it wasn't unpleasant exactly, it feels more "normal" now that I have the sleeve. I think this is how it felt back when I had a normal stomach - easy to just forget about my stomach. I also now realize that the pain I was having in my neck and shoulder that my PCP and I both thought was due to a pinched nerve must have actually been referred pain from the band, since it is now significantly improved with the band removal.

I am a lapband survivor too - and I think that is a reason why I have chosen not to tell anyone about my sleeve revision. It was kind of embarrassing to face the people who knew I had the lap-band when I regained weight after the slippage and unfill. I don't want to deal with any scrutiny or questions this time. When asking for the time off, I chose to be vague about needing medical care and needing to be out of the office. I do not feel anyone is entitled to more detailed info about my health than that. After all, if I was having a gynecologic surgery or hemorrhoids removed, I probably wouldn't want to tell the people at work details about those kinds of surgeries either, so people should know better than to pry. If people ask about the weight loss I'll just say that I am eating smaller portions and being more active (which is true after surgery for most of us after all). I had my sleeve revision Dec 29th and I am returning to work tomorrow (Jan 3rd). I do feel ready for it, thank goodness (the first two days after surgery were really tough but I felt significantly better after that and each day has been better since). My job isn't extremely physical though, and I was fortunate enough to not have any complications that made recovery slower.

I just had my lap band taken out and converted to a gastric sleeve on Dec 29th, after several years of living with a band slippage that caused me a lot of problems with severe reflux and pain, so I definitely sympathize with your dilemma. I hope it turns out that you just need a little tweaking of the band because going through a surgery is never fun or easy, but if it does turn out that you need to have the band taken out, I hope it helps to know that a lot of people seem to feel like living with the restrictions and quirks of the lap-band makes living with the sleeve seem pretty easy by comparison. I am still on my liquid/puree post-op diet so I can't say for sure what things will be like when I'm healed, but already I feel a sense of relief that i no longer have that constant awareness of the band I used to have when it was causing havoc for my stomach. Living with these kinds of problems isn't easy. I hope you find health and happiness again soon, whatever that ends up meaning for you.

Wow, I had never heard of something like that happening before. I agree that it sounds like it must have come undone from all the anatomy shifting that pregnancy causes. I hope everything is ok for you.

The sleeve isn't supposed to cause that to happen, but I have heard that sometimes there is scar tissue left over after lap band removal that still gives you restriction as if the band were still there. I would definitely talk to your surgeon about what you are experiencing and see if s/he wants to investigate why this is happening to you before your revision.

I am truly happy for those of you who have done well with the band and I hope that continues to be the case for life. Unfortunately, just from my experience and what I have seen of other long-time bandsters, I don't think most people have a good experience with the band over the long run. It seems to me that, sooner or later, most bandsters need to have another surgical procedure to fix or remove the band/port. If I had really understood that when I originally had surgery, I would have made a different choice. Going through multiple surgeries just isn't worth it to me and the problems I had with the band stole a lot of quality of life from me until I had the band removed a few days ago. I lived with my band for 13 years, and for the first few years, everything seemed fine. I lost a lot of weight and felt decent. Unfortunately by the time I had it taken out several days ago, I had ended up with a major slippage of the band and had gained a lot of the weight I originally lost while I was living with an unfilled band due to the intolerable reflux. I feel like sometimes the social stigma against fat people causes people to be too quick to blame bariatric patients for surgical failures. Sometimes, even if you follow all the rules and don't binge or abuse your band, your band may still not stay in place, may cause intolerable reflux, or may make it impossible to eat healthy food without being uncomfortable. That's not anyone's fault. The problem lies with the fact that science is still trying to figure out the best way to help obese people, not the character of the innocent people who sometimes are hurt by these surgeries.

I am hanging out at home with my 9 month old son after getting sleeved 3 days ago. Thankfully, by the time they let me out of the hospital earlier today, I felt well enough to be able to keep up with the little guy as far as just watching him goes. The main thing I could see being an issue is that most surgeons advise not lifting anything heavy for several weeks post-op, but if you have people around who can help with picking your child up while you recover you should be fine from that side of thing. Breastfeeding seems like it could be tricky, though I'm not trying to breastfeed right now myself. I think you would definitely want to try to build up a supply of stored milk to carry through while you are recovering in the hospital. It is a major surgery and you will likely be tired out and sore - I literally couldn't find the strength to even write a text message to my family to tell them I was okay when I first woke up from surgery, so I can't imagine how I would have found the strength to try to breastfeed that first day. I also would wonder if the severe calorie restriction you would experience post-operatively would make it hard to keep up a good supply.

Thanks for the supportive comments. I did go through with getting sleeved. The first day, I felt lousy enough that I felt like I had made a mistake, but once I got past the initial nausea, grogginess, and soreness from being freshly post-op things have been much better. I am feeling much more optimistic now. Fingers crossed that things continue on a positive path!