LindaD

Hello, I'm Linda. I don't have a band yet but am pursuing it. I've been reading a lot on your board and it makes me feel even more confident that the band is the right choice for me. I hope you don't mind me asking stupid questions every now and then. My first one is what is an NSV? I hope to be hanging around here regularly, if you'll have me. I've been looking for a good WLS message board for some time now (I just can't get into the format at Obesity Help and I like and am familiar with vBulletin which is what this board is built on). By way of intro, I am 43, married, with 5 children. My brood is made of all girls and they range in age from 3 to 24. Nice to meet all of you.

I hope you will indulge me here. I am early in my journey. Well, early in the planning/doing portion (I've been in the Thinking portion for a long, long time). I have sort of read enough message boards and blogs and such to understand how the surgery changes your life in a practical manner... eating and drinking and Protein and small bites and PBs and tightness and exercise and support groups and fills and unfills etc. I was hoping some of you would be willing to tell me the story of how this changed your life in other ways. Aside from the eating and such, what else is different? Confidence? Abilities to do things you couldn't before? Sex life? Work life? Tell me a story.... Thanks.

That's great news. Wow. You were right about where I am. Six months, huh? Very inspirational. (And now I'm going to read about your WL Journey...)

I'd be tempted to tell a white lie here. I'd say that due to a medication I take, the smells from the lunch room cause nausea and I needed to move away from them so I didn't feel sick all day. Is that possible?

Can you scratch itches you couldn't reach before??? Right now, I have an itch and - dammit - I can't reach it but I just know if I was 150 pounds, I would be able to. Do bras fit better? Sexy push-up underwire bras - will I once again be able to pick one off the rack and have it look awesome? When I tie my athletic shoes, will the bows be in the middle instead of all the way over to the side because I had to cross my leg over my knee in order to be able to tie it? BELTS - will I wear belts? Cute outside of my shirt/top kinds of belts? Will I be able to put a napkin in my lap and have it catch any food spills - is it possible I will no longer have to worry about the front of my shirt always being the culprit when I am not as careful as I should be at meals?

I just want to cry for the want of it all, reading your replies. I want the energy, the libido, the quality of sleep, the knees that don't hurt, the lap for my daughter, the ride in the rollercoaster. I WANT IT ALL. Why does it have to be so hard, so time consuming, to get it. My job is so busy, I'm out of town so often, I just keep missing appointments. And I know I'm going to have to go on the wild goose chase to get approved by my insurance. I wish I could just pay someone to do it all for me because I don't know how I'll be able to get it done. But I have to do it now because my current insurance will cover if I meet all their criteria, so there's that, but my company is being acquired and by January I might have all new benefits/insurance. Thank you all for sharing. You all touched on what I wanted/hoped out of this journey. It makes me more determined to find a way.

I remember the first time I was called fat, I was 5 years old. It was by my older sister. She went on to tease and call me fat for years and I was oh so certain that she was right. When I look back on picture from my youth, it's clear I was not "fat" (although I wasn't as thin as my siblings) but I absolutely was mentally fat from the time I was 5, and physically I was larger than my peers. I suppose my current body is sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy. (Hi, I'm new.)