brandyII

Ray, I'm assuming you're not from the states as you're using the term kilos, but we have a show here on cable called "Big Medicine" and it's a father/son team that does lap band surgeries in Texas. Anyway there was an episode where this man had gotten an infection in one of the incision sites post surgery. The older surgeon was checking him out because of the infection and decided that it needed to be cleaned out. He actually took a pair of scissors and poked into the man's incision to clean it out. It was the most awful thing I had ever seen and I felt so bad for this man. The man was crying out in pain and the surgeon is like "are you crying, you're such a big fellow, I'm sorry I didn't mean to hurt you....." something to that effect. What did the surgeon expect when he's poking a very tender infected incision, "thanks doc, that's a wonderful feeling"? I'm just telling you this because you brought up the fact that you were a male and had cried, it's okay, you're allowed, brandyII.

AthinnerD, I hope you're dog is okay? brandyII

Ready, Of course, who better to quote from than "Mike Brady"!

FL/OK, That doesn't sound too good, did you go to the doctor? If I lost 60% of my hair I'd be freaking up a storm! Sounds like you're getting no nutrition and have a Protein deficiency. You can't drink either that's not good, go to your doctor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Please

A wise man once said "...you know by tattling on your friends you're really tattling on yourself. By tattling on your friends you're really just telling them that you're a tattletale. Now is that the tale you want to tell?:crying:

Knotta, thanks, I also found tortilla chips and chili con queso do go down quite easily for me also, I forgot to add that to my repertoire, lol. But come on I didn't get the band because I was eating too many celery sticks, lol! I remember going out to dinner after being banded and still having probs with the protein and it was an Italian chain and I think I drank 3 lemoncellotinis or whatever they were called and that's the last time I drank my dinner as opposed to eating. Actually I just don't go out that much anymore to dinner because for the amount I eat it's not worth the money to me anymore. Maybe that's a good thing. brandyII

Gloucester, Colin Firth!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But then again he's no Dr. Phil, lol!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

Peachie, You're not alone here. I had the same problem but never got to lose as much as you. I don't know what other issues you may have that contribute to it. Are you a sweet craver like I am, do you have other physical problems like diabetes etc... It's definitely harder if you have to self pay everything on top of it. I started at 253 lost about 25 after doing the medifast liquid diet a month prior to surgery and now am up to 250 again and never lost after the band. The sweets just went down too easily and chose them over the healthier stuff. Do you have specific info you can give us like hard time eating protein etc..., think your fill is too tight? There are a lot of people here who are great with helping people so don't get so down on yourself you found the right place to come to and start chatting with people so that we can help you figure out what to do, brandyII.

Gloucester, It's hard to deal with overweight kids, it's not that I wanted mine to be overweight but they are. A lot of my thin sibs ended up having overweight kids too. I know that my kids had it rough at school also, especially my youngest as she's also 6 feet tall so it was twice as hard. I don't remember being teased that much by other kids, I went to Catholic School so that was pretty much frowned upon back then. I mainly felt it from relatives like I was the black sheep of the familily or something. I've been very up front with my daughter's issues at school though and believe it or not I'm usually a pretty laid back and shy person but if an instance were to happen like all kids getting weighed in front of each other at school and I knew my daughter was freaking about it I'd talk to the teacher. I may have contributed to her problems but I really tried to do the best I could and be supportive and help her with whatever she wanted, needed. We can only do the best we can for our kids and loving them is the first thing. I'm far from perfect but I didn't want them to get that bad feeling from me as I did from my mother you know. I can't change the rest of the world I can only change myself, Nancy.

Ready, Unless you like Brit movies, you might find Howards End a bit boring. It's stars Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson and Helena B.C. It takes place in the Edwardian era, I think. Let's just say if my husband is watching it with me he's snoring within seconds! Did you like Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility those kinds of films. It's a bit different, different author, not Jane Austin and different time period but still very British and an interesting story. It's hard to explain but see if you can rent it and if you do let me know what you think. I love Emma Thompson so maybe that's why I liked the film, she's one of my favs.

Dananah, what did Dr. Phil say now, never mind I don't want to know he annoys me too!

Gloucester, I know exactly what you mean about confidence, that's why I like having plus size roll models in TV etc... it brings us out in the open and says hey world we have lives too and we're not perfect but still we want to enjoy life like everyone else! I was envious and almost confused when I was younger and saw girls who were my size but they HAD confidence and I felt like it was all drained out of my body. I don't know what it was that gave those girls confidence when we didn't have it. Do you think it was parenting? I think if my mom accepted my weight, and trust me when I look at pictures of myself when I was about 12 I wasn't that big, or not as big as I felt in my "head". It just seemed like I was the odd ball in the family because everyone else was thin except for me and my father but he wasn't overweight until his 30s or 40s. He was pretty ripped as a teen life guard. Even now when I go home for holidays etc... I'm faced with the fact that everyone is thin and their husbands/wives are thin and beautiful and I'm like "was I born into the right family, maybe switched at birth" or something. I hope one day it gets easier because it causes a lot of head stress even now!

Ready, I have not seen Sweeney Todd but of course my daughters were at the midnight showing when it first came out. I'll see it when it's on DVD or when my daughter downloads it, lol. They love Johnny, he's so French and he smokes and he's wicked cool! I was really impressed with him in Cry Baby, I liked his voice a lot. He and Helena B.C. look like they could be brother/sister in Sweeney Todd. She's a great actor too and was good in Howards End, I love my Brit movies. Oh took my 19 year old to her first weigh in today after a week on the liquid diet and she lost 12 pounds! I can tell she's really happy even though she's not a jumping up and down type of person. She's doing the Gastric bypass so won't be able to join our group but I had to give her a little cheer anyway!!! And we listened to the soundtrack of Hairspray on the way home. Isn't cable great, what would we do without it! talk to you later Nancy.

Suz, I'm laughing now because I read what you wrote about the beans and the tuna. You sound a lot like me. I tried canned chicken and it tastes just like tuna so I won't eat it even though I know it's really chicken! Listen, I don't want to be one of those "preachy" types of people and as you know I am no where near where I should be with this band but right now I'm more concerned because of two of your major conditions. First I know you live in the country, I do too but I'm lucky that it's just a 45 to one hour drive to my surgeon's office which is associated with a hospital. My surgeon will actually do my fills if I ask him and schedule an appointment even though they've grown quite a bit and he's the head honcho now of the practice. I'm worried about your sleep issues and the part they play with your carb intake and your diabetes. I know sleep apnea is the new baby of the medical world and everyone has a sleep clinic opening up but I was the same way as you. I was taking sleep meds until they stopped being effective on me. If I hadn't gone through all this pre-op business I wouldn't have known that I had sleep apnea. You don't have to be overweight to have it. The man my brother runs with has it and trust me, no fat on either of them! And he sleeps with the machine too. I had headaches plus the uncontrolled eating which was much worse prior to using the machine. I was sent to a pulmonologist after they found my oxygen level was too low in my blood. Then did the sleep clinic which is difficult for everyone! I think because I really wanted to sleep and I was tired of being tired all the time that maybe I adjusted to my mask better than some others. I don't know. But there are so many types of masks out there to try if one is difficult for you. I don't know how long ago you tried this. But I just feel with the connections between the carb overloading and sleep deprivation besides it can have an affect on your heart which I remember you said you had heart problems too right? You should probably focus on that aspect of your health first before worrying about the band. Also I don't know if depression and anxiety play a part in your sleep issues. I'm on clonapen for anxiety and that helps when I take one prior to sleep also. And I'm on an antidepressant too. Those aren't always helpful when comes to weight loss but trust me I'm a much better person on them fat than off of them and thin, lol! I feel so much better now that I've gotten the fill taken out of my band so that I can eat normally again, but have a bit of restriction. Just a bit. I still have cravings during my PMS times and I still suffer with PCOS and that's the other thing I was thinking that maybe you should get together with an endocrinologist if you haven't been seeing one already. We're both at the age when we're either pre or meno or post meno and that doesn't help our case either. So anyway you have the band but you also have so many other issues that you're dealing with that can totally sabbotage the band and if they're taken care of I don't know if the band situation will work. I hope I didn't sound too preachy, I try not to be but I'm worried about you and I know that a can of beans ain't gonna do it, lol! Anyway think about it, I know making so many appointments with so many different doctors is a real pain in the ass, but if one of these issues is keeping you from losing weight on the band it's worth it, and you are too! Good luck and let me know what you think. Also someone here directed me to a wwwCPAPTALK.com when I have had issues with my CPAP machine, it's a great group of people if you'd like to check out their forum. Good luck and let me know how things are going, Nancy.

AthinnnerDenise, I don't care where the thread is, I just keep answering questions from my last post, to be honest I don't remember what was the first thread anyway! brandyII

Thanks, but I tend to be the type of person that seems to know what's going on so maybe I gave that impression and they went with it. I know what you mean by getting too much info as opposed to not enough. My daughter does have a different surgeon who actually volunteered in Iraq and came back to the group. My daughter feels very confident that she's getting a lot of info from her. But you know in a way too I knew my daughter really wanted the surgery and I wanted to go through everything first, kind of like a guinea pig for her just in case there were probs I didn't want her to have them first I wanted to make sure I survived before I let my baby do it. Anyway thanks, brandyII.

plain, I originally started the gastric bypass surgery pre-op stuff about 3 years ago before my surgeon even did lap bands. Then all these things started happening like my dad got ill and my sister got cancer and my dog died, sounds like a country song but it's true and I put it off because I felt like I was needed elsewhere. Then two years later I decided to take the time for myself since everything in my life seemed fairly calm and I went back and then found out they were doing lap bands now. I started pre-op again for the gastric bypass and had it all approved and I changed my mind, I kind of chickened out I'd say and wanted the lap band because of two reasons, one I knew it could be removed if need be and two, I wouldn't have the bad side effects you get from gastric bypass surgery because I knew I'd end up cheating once in a while with ice cream. And also it wouldn't be as traumatic on my body. I think a lot of people feel that way. Anywho, I had already discussed the post op diet with the nutritionist for the gastric bypass and had done everything else and called the doctor made an appointment because I wanted to tell him I wanted the band instead. This was about one month prior to surgery. I was never told those things and maybe it's my own fault because of the way I had changed things in the middle and maybe something (info wise) got lost in the shuffle. I swear it's the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me God. I'm not a soda drinker, I'm not much of an alcohol drinker but I like me some ice cream and knew that would be an issue. But because it was so much easier to eat the yummy cakes and cookies and pies and ice cream and candy instead of protein I tended to go that route because I found out it went down no problem. I think I learned that at Halloween. My dad was an alcoholic and I take after him, except I'm not dead and I'm not a male. I tend to choose sugar foods over alcohol but there very similar in a way. I'm ate a salad today for the first time in a long time because my fill is reduced and I also had almost a whole sandwich with Weight Watcher's bread today and that was so weird to me. Anyway I have to learn to stay away from the WW desserts though because I'll end up eating them instead of the healthier foods. I don't blame my surgeon, they have a good program here and they have an orientation first and then you meet with the surgeon, you go through a lot of pre-op testing and get screened by a psych of their choosing. I'm not a dumba...s but I guess to a lot of you I appear to be. I just have issues with certain foods that the band won't catch and didn't know it ahead of time. I'm still working on it just in a different way now. So wish me luck, brandyII.

Readysgo, Sorry I didn't mean to assume you weren't aware of John Waters I guess I was dating myself and figured you might not have seen his movies. My daughters have because of me. My favorite is "Polyester" with Divine. I think he did "Cry Baby" too with Johnny Depp, that was pretty good, did you see that one? I'm one of those great moms who introduced my kids to "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" because I was a teen when it came back into theaters and became such a big deal in the late 70s. I saw Hello Dolly on stage when I was pretty young so I really only remember it by the movie. but my eldest daughter is about 2 years younger than you and she did community theater for a while and really enjoyed that. It wasn't as political as high school theater, do you know what I mean? I'm sure you do. She's very into musicals still and always has the latest soundtrack to whatever is out! It's good to have passions like that. I also know that through "drama club" kids tend to fit in where they may have not before. I was like that when I was in high school and that's when I made my best friends and felt the best about myself. I was pretty lucky then. Those were the good ole days! Anyway keep your strong spirit, you are influencing younger and hopefully older people with your voice in many ways! brandyII.

Readysteadygo, You have to see the original Hairspray by John Waters with Divine and Ricki Lake, it was pretty crazy. John Waters has always had fat people in his movies and they're considered cult films. I still don't like John Travolta in the movie Hairspray, he just seemed so weird to me, they should have used a real fat man! Not that John is a twig but I guess I just like the original movie better. Anyway I agree with you whether or not people with WLS or considering having WLS agree with that point of view of loving oneself no matter what size they are is so important. Trust me this is coming from someone who thought her world would begin when she lost weight when she was 20 and then gained it all back again. It can be quite detrimental to your health, sanity-wise! brandyII

Gloucester, Just curious, when did America go through the "fat is beautiful" phase, I must have missed it! Seriously though, brandyII.

I speak from my own experience as I've actually had the lap band. Not everyone has "willpower" and that's why they got the band. It's a tool but if we had will power we'd be able to lose the weight without the band right? People who have sugar/carb addictions will definitely have a harder time with the band and I didn't know a head of time what foods went down quicker, if I had, I probably wouldn't have been banded. I've gotten a lot of the fill removed now so that I don't compensate for lack of food by eating slider foods and that's making it much better but I can say personally that the band isn't the main tool right now, it's me! brandyII I love me not the band!

Readysteadygo, You are wise beyond your years and that's a compliment! Some people will never reach that level of understanding no matter how old they are. Your parents raised you well and that's important because being raised by fat haters raises children who hate themselves if they are fat and even if they aren't they can still hate their bodies. Unfortunately I was raised by a fat hating mother. Loving your body no matter what size will make for a happier life no matter if you are thin or fat! brandyII.

Yes, we were talking about losing weight but there's always something that sets off a food thought and when you say Memphis I think ribs, I can't help it!

Okay, Went to my primary today and he's a pretty busy doctor and guess what? I'm his first lap band patient, okay only lap band patient. I went to discuss possibly going back on Metformin again because I had gained back all the weight I lost prior to surgery (25 lbs). I don't know if I broke my ticker or not, I think it's a little depressed though:huh2:. After speaking with the diabetes group here and also the PCOS group some thought that the Metformin might help but as my doctor pointed out when I was on Metformin prior to surgery it didn't affect my weight so why would it now. He wrote me a script for complete blood workup though. Anywho :sad: tomorrow morning I meet with my surgeon for the second time since my surgery 8/07 and will be discussing my issues/probs and see what we can come up with. If I hear try another fill I may :eek:. My doctor thinks that since I still have the weight, the diabetes, the thyroid prob, PCOS, the sleep apnea that maybe I may possibly be a candidate for a reversal and/or gastric bypass. I wish he would call the surgeon and tell him to:smile2:. I had those few fill problems in the beginning with no fill because they thought I had the small band and then the 10 hour vomiting festivis (sp, from Seinfeld) and that was on 3/11 and haven't seen the surgeon since. He's a busy guy too and it's hard to get to see him for an appointment these days. So I'm going to ask for a flouroscope (sp) or whatever they can do to actually take a looksee at it in case it was damaged in some way or moved. Not that was the only time I have vomited but it was a major event.:tongue_smilie:(that's the closest one I could find to looking like it was getting sick). So wish me luck tomorrow, I've been a bit :sad: for a while and don't want to give up but it's very depressing:sad::sad::sad::sad: and it's also:blushing: embarrassing. I feel like people must think I'm such a reject because I went through all of this to get the band and totally F'd it up!:frown:. I wish I could be like the rest of you and go through this with flying colors, I didn't expect a quick loss but I expected a loss and only gained:sad:. So anyway I talked long enough and I'm sure you all are pretty :thumbup: so I'll go now, thanks brandyII.

Tina, No wonder you're so nice you're from Memphis, not that I've been there but watch a lot of travel type shows and it looks like a nice area to live. I'm just lucky where I live that I don't have good southern food! I'm up north in a small town area and I'm used to living in a metropolitan area, near DC where there were great places to eat everywhere. I watch a show called Nealy's BBQ on food Network and I live vicariously through it, lol! Thanks, Nancy.