kiz

It's measured in volume, not weight. 4 oz = 1/2 measuring cup.

240 ml is one cup. (Here's a basic online conversion calculator I like - >:: World Wide Metric ::<)

cborg is right about bandster hell right now. After your first fill you may have varying degrees of restriction from none to too much. Hopefully, you'll get somewhere in the middle, but a lot depends on how much restriction your doctor wants you to have right away, and to how your body reacts to a fill. You may have swelling the first few days up to a couple of weeks. Some doctors like to proceed cautiously, while others will be a little more aggressive in their fills. So, don't get discouraged if you don't feel restriction right away, and be sure to let your doctor know how much your eating and how quickly you're getting hungry between meals.

If you're having trouble with solid protein then your band is too tight. I've read over and over people having trouble with solids, and then falling back to soft foods which don't give lasting satiety and are often high in calories. Then a vicious cycle evolves where there's soft food, quick hunger, soft food, followed by weight gain. That might not be the answer, but after reading your post, that's the first thing I would consider.

bc, that's the PITS. I have a raging cold now (although, I don't think it's worse because of my band, but the wet cough has kicked in, so we'll see), and a cold is no comparison to the flu. I've only had the flu once in my life, and that was enough to make me a believer in the flu shot. I have read several instances where with the H1N1 flu people have experienced vomiting, which makes me even more worried about this particular strain of flu with the band. I wonder if your surgeon could call in something for you for the nausea. I hope you're over the worst of it now and are feeling better very soon!!

Well, I can answer for myself. I was a grazer, so although my meals weren't huge, I ate throughout the day, so I didn't really give myself an opportunity to be ravenously hungry. Now that I have great restriction with my band, hunger doesn't consume my day. With the discipline of three meals plus one healthy snack a day, and the hunger control the band provides, my munching habit is under control. Now, I only get true hunger after approx four hours or more after a meal. Before good restriction, and with trying to stay with the band meal plan, fighting true hunger was a battle, that's for sure. It does get better.

You don't say how long ago you had the unfill, but maybe it's time for another fill. If you're not feeling restriction, and two weeks have passed since your unfill I'd make an appointment for a fill for sure. You may only need .5cc or 1cc to get you to your sweet spot. Often times a small amount makes a big difference when you get close to your sweet spot. I only needed an extra .5cc at my last fill in August to get me from okay restriction to great restriction. I'm glad you're going to start taking time for yourself, you deserve it.

Think of your stomach as an hour glass and the center as the banded area (stoma). The sand in an hour glass should flow through at a slow and steady pace, but if a chunk of sand gets stuck in the middle, it has to either work its way through or come back up. The food you eat should flow in a similar manner. With good restriction your food should not be getting stuck. The flow of food should be reduced to give you a feeling of satiety. The nerves that send your brain the signal that you're full is at the top of your stomach, so that nerve has to be simulated.

My self pay fee included everything except the psych eval. I chose to pay that out of pocket, because I didn't want to have it on my insurance record. The surgeon's office gave me a list of psychologists to chose from, and their fees varied by several hundred dollars. One only charged $100, and if I remember right, some of the others charged as much as $500. Needless to say, I went with the $100 doctor.

I'm so glad they worked for you! When they work, they're worth their weight in gold. What relief.

GM and MP, I'm glad you found the article useful.

I've heard that some doctors don't like to tell their patients how much saline they've put in, because they don't want them to obsess over the numbers, but I've never heard of a doctor that didn't keep track himself.

tpntx, as a mother of two sons, your post brought a lump to my throat. Obviously, you love your mother and are very concerned for her health. I think the best thing you could do is to gather information to present to her, if she's the type of person that would accept it in the loving manner that it was given. You might want to find out who does gastric banding in her area, dates and times for the seminars (surgeon's info session), etc just for her to consider. Or, you might just want to approach the subject cautiosly, and let her know that you'd be glad to do some research for her, if she's interested. I know I had to let the idea of surgery peculate in my head for six months or longer before I took the plunge to go to a seminar. Once I attended, I was excited about the idea, but it totally had to be my decision. I'm very close to my kids, and I know I would not take offense to their concerns for my health, but only you know how your mom may feel about it. Be ready to take her rejection to the idea without getting upset.

It seems most doctors aim to put it on the left side, just as you described, and that's where mine is too, but some prefer the right. Doctors also take into account past surgeries, scar tissue, and the shape & size of your stomach. I asked my surgeon prior to surgery where he would place my port, and he took a look at my abdomen, and said he would go left, a couple of inches below my rib cage (that's where the incision scar is located, and the port is below that). I've read some women have woke up to find their port right on their bra line..ouch.

Welcome to LBT, Kimberly. I couldn't agree with Humming Bird more. There is no way that getting a gastric band or other WLS is giving up on yourself. I was self pay as well, and my band is worth every penny, and I'm worth it as well. I think it's a rare individual who makes the decision for WLS without trying multitudes of diets before making this decision. To me, it was accepting the fact that I needed help, and there's no shame in that. The recidivism rate of regaining weight after dieting for the morbidly obese is staggering. Some studies show it as high as 98%. You'll read this over and over again on LBT that the band is a tool, but you have to work with your tool. It's not a free pass to indulge in high calorie foods, for one thing. Although it might be possible to get to your goal weight without exercise, I haven't heard anyone say they've done it. Gastric banding is not a passive WLS option. With the band, to lose weight, I make very healthy food choices (my meals consist of 1/2 cup servings three time/day plus 1/2 cup snack), so making healthy choices is a must. I had to break the habit of grazing (which is how I ended up obese). Others had to learn not to eat huge meals. So, this is not to say that WLS is the right answer for you if you're not committed to it heart, mind and body, but it can be the best investment in yourself and for your family that you can make.

For me, ideal restriction is that I can eat almost all foods comfortably and the restriction doesn't diminish quickly over time. (That has to do with losing the fat layer around the stomach too). Also, not eating teeny tiny bites and not chewing to a liquid mush and no pb'ing or sliming. That's not to say I won't make an occasional mistake and swallow something too fast, but it's my mistake, and not a routine occurrence because my band is too tight. My doctor leaves a 4 oz pouch, so three 1/2 cup meals, in addition to a 1/2 cup healthy snack, keep me satisfied for 4+ hours. It took me a long time to get to that level of restriction, possibly do to my anatomy or who knows what, I had to get more than 9cc of saline in my 9cc band. Also, along the way, there were short periods of good restriction (sometimes a week to a month), and it wasn't as if I went from no restriction to ideal, but it took several fills to get me there. Once I get to my goal, and go on maintenance, we'll try to find the fill level that allows me to eat one cup meals while not gaining weight. Well, that's what I consider ideal restriction. One of the best things about the band is that it's adjustable, so what I consider ideal may be different from someone else, but we can, to a certain extent, find our own sweet spot.

Here's a good article (a little on the technical side though) that describes why some people have shoulder pain after laparscopic surgery. shoulder pain following a laparoscopy

Libby's right. You'll still be able to drink wine. You're not supposed to drink with your meals, and some people experience pain when drinking with a meal, but others don't. So, chances are, you won't get a negative response from it, except for all the additional calories. I'll have to warn you, that if you have a food addiction, some people transfer their food addictions to other addictions like alcoholism. If you think you're possibly a borderline alcoholic or if you exhibit addictive behaviors, you need to seriously address this before surgery. Good luck to you, and I hope it all works out for you.

I also went to sleep on my back and woke up on my left side (port) first night after surgery. I never had trouble sleeping on that side, but the port area did remain tender for a couple of weeks, and then sporadically for awhile after that. I had to laugh at myself about sleeping on my side. After I had lost maybe thirty pounds or so, I woke up feeling pain on my side, and I figured I'd lost enough weight that maybe my port was going to start bothering me when I was sleeping on it. After I fully woke up, I realized I was laying on my right side, and what I felt was my rib cage. I guess it'd been awhile since I'd had that sensation..lol

Another option for your mac & cheese craving could be cauliflower (cooked until very tender) & cheese. It's not the same, but I also would hold off on macaroni.

Staying VERY well hydrated between meals is probably the biggest help for me in not needing to drink during eating. The second is the knowledge that I'll have longer satiety by waiting to drink. Not feeling like I'm starving between meals is such a freeing feeling, that I really don't have a desire to drink. Positive reinforcement is a good thing. When I'm home I make sure I drink a large glass of Water before meals. When I'm out, and the water is on the table, I drink small sips, but altogether, not more than maybe 1/4 cup in total. The doctors have said in our support group meeting that if you must drink during a meal, drink small sips and not more that 1/4 cup, and that works for me.

I imagine your doctor will give you a fill at your appointment since your weight loss has slowed to less than 1 lb/week and you're able to eat large portions, unless your portions were very small prior to surgery. It is possible to lose all your excess weight without a fill, but it's unusual. I think it would be helpful to measure the size of your meals so you can give your doctor an accurate gauge of the size of the meals you're eating. Congratulations on your weight loss so far.

You need to put the ticker link in your signature. Go to your control panel (User CP, which is on the upper left) then go to Edit Signature and save it there.

I'm sorry that your grandmother died in such a tragic way. You may have answered a lingering question I've had as to what might be different in our anatomies to cause someone like me to need such a higher amount of fill to reach their sweet spot and someone else to have trouble just taking in fluids at 2cc. I know some has to do with fat around the stomach, but at a certain point, that fat should be minimal. Esophagus size just might be the reason.

I have the 9cc Realize Band, and I had to take it up to 11cc to get optimum restriction. Even at that, I have very few foods that give me trouble (namely stringy vegetables - celery for one, which I don't care to eat anyway, so I feel pretty lucky).