minou

Just wondering if anyone else has experienced this? When I'm doing ab exercises (especially torso twists) I get a really sharp pain on my left upper stomach area. It tends to vary in intensity, but it happens every time I'm doing ab work. It sort of feels like something is being pinched inside, but that may just be my imagination. Anyone else experiencing this?

Thanks guys, like so much after the surgery, I just want to know that it's normal! It's not like massively painful, just sort of pinches when I twist to that side, or when I really crunch up. One of those things that until you hear others have the same thing going on, just makes you a little uneasy.

I've been having a similar problem, only I'm still on liquids and they're coming up even! I've found that if I drink something that's warm before I eat that the food will go down a little better, I've even managed some mushies that way. So, I've been sticking to hot teas, etc. for all of my fluids, otherwise everything comes back up. As for the swelling, you're dealing with very sensitive tissue around your stomach. When the band is filled, it's going to irritate that area and cause swelling. Your stomach doesn't want to be constricted like it is. My vision is to think of a ring around your finger. If you put on one that is slightly tight, but still goes on and leave it for a few hours you're going to find that your finger has swollen and it will be very difficult to get the ring off again. The same thing happens in your stomach, only even more so. After awhile the swelling should go down, but it may take longer than you think. I was thinking about having some Fluid out of my band, but hey last week I lost 7 lbs. I figure if I lose enough weight the band will loosen on its on and I can just wait a little longer for my next fill!

I had my fourth fill on Tuesday of this week. I now have about 8.75 ml in my 14 ml band. Up until this week I felt zero restriction (the only time I noticed a difference at all was if I ate too quickly and took too big of a bite, then I'd get a PB). So, b/c of the lack of restriction they put in a bit more fill than normal. At the doctors I drank a whole glass of the barium stuff (blah) and a glass of warm Water, it felt fine! Before I left the doctors, I tried to drink a glass of cold water, but it was really slow going down and eventually about half of it came up. I figured I'd already had about 8 oz. of fluids, so I might just be full and we went home. After I got home, I tried to eat, and made some watery mashed potatoes, I was able to eat about half a cup of it and felt so excited that I actually got full on such a small amount of food! Then when I woke up, I realized things were a lot different, now I can have about two small sips of water, any more than that and it's coming back up. It takes about 5 - 10 minutes for that water to go down. For lunch I was able to keep down two spoonfulls of Soup (no solids). I tried to spend my day sipping on water to avoid dehydration, but even after a whole day of doing this I couldn't even get down 15 ounces of water . This morning, I'm showing some signs of dehydration, dry mouth, etc. It's not severe yet, but I'm getting worried. My question is this, I would guess that the reason it's different is swelling, which in the past has lasted about 2 - 3 days. So, do I stick it out and see if the swelling goes down, or go for an unfill now?

Angie, I think the swelling happens because of the irritation from the band gaining more Fluid. If you think about what would happen if you put on a ring that was too small, initially your finger would be ok, but if you left it on your finger would swell. I've been trying to tough it out, and it's definitely better than it was those first few days. I can get down hot fluids, so I've been drinking a lot of tea (decaf), but I still haven't been able to keep down solid food (regardless of how little I bite or how long I chew). The good news is that I lost 5 lbs last week, so I think I'm just going to keep going on and hope that as the weight reduces I'll find a more comfortable level.

I just had my fourth fill, up until then I felt zero restriction. If you read around this forum, you'll see how much the variance between what works for different people is, you just have to find your own sweet spot. However, you have to give it a little bit of time to know for sure if you need more fluid. I know that my doc will only do a fill once a month, give yourself a few weeks and see how you feel.

AF here too, Barksdale AFB, Louisiana Ramstein AFB, Germany We keep getting extensions here in Germany, looking now like we'll be here til 2010, yay! No clue where we're going afterwards, my fingers are crossed for Hawaii though

I agree that you should form your own opinion, he just reminds me of a really old fashioned doctor, the kind that doesn't feel he needs to inform his patients on anything, yet can feel free to blame them for anything going wrong. I have a background in medicine and am one of those people who has to understand what's going on, so for me getting the blow off when I had a concern about pain was a big deal. I would not take that from a doctor in the states. I also had a similar experience with my fill, it wasn't Prof Weiner, but his surgical assistant who did it, he stabbed me at least 20 times before he found the port, I'm actually still sore from it 3 days later! He initially only put 2.5 cc extra in, but I was feeling zero restriction so asked him to put in another 4.5 so that I have 7 total now. Btw, if you call tricare, I think there's someone in Landstuhl who does the band too, I was given a choice when I got approved, but chose Prof. Weiner b/c I'd heard such good things.

Hi there, I just came across this thread and my heart went out to you. I went through a very similar thing w/my husband several years ago. The reasons for it happening are so individual, but one thing I've learned from the experience that sometimes it truly is just a mistake and they really do want to make things work. It took 3 years or so, but now I trust him again, and honestly I think things are better than they ever were. At first I reacted like you did, anytime I couldn't get him on the phone, or he was a few minutes late my mind went straight to him cheating. We would have crazy blowups every few months, but he always stayed calm and reassured me that he'd brought on the suspician by what he'd done. Honestly, it's amazing that he dealt with me being as crazy as I was, but I think it's just part of the healing process. It sounds like your husband is genuinely trying to make amends, just keep assuring him that if he's sincere about repairing things in time it will get better, but that in the meantime he has to be willing to account for his whereabouts and deal with what may be irrational behavior from time to time. If he can deal with the pressure then you know he truly wants to be with you, if he can't, kick him to the curb, you're beautiful and deserve a partner who values that!

Hey there, just thought I'd get in on this thread. I was banded on June 3rd and since then I've lost 19 lbs. I know it's slow compared to some of you guys, but for some reason that's just how my body is. Even when I lost weight by myself it would take 4 - 5 months to lose 20 lbs. So, definitely going faster than I could do on my own!

God, I'm so glad I'm not the only one having problems w/Prof. Weiner! I went yesterday with some concerns and to get another fill b/c honestly I have really been struggling, and I felt like he was mad I was there. I asked him about the pain I'm having on my left side and he just blew off my question saying it was normal but not explaining why. I kind of feel like he doesn't like doing the band, he thinks it's unsuccessful and he feels like we're all going to fail and just be back for bypass at some point anyways. So, he doesn't give us any help or advice b/c it's like he doesn't think it's worth his time or something, blah!

Just beware, I ordered mine a month ago and it still hasn't made it here :cool2: I don't know why but for some reason things like that seem to take a long time to arrive.

Hey there, I'm near K-town too and was banded on June 3, 2008.

I've been having the same thing with being able to eat way too much. I stop myself usually, but sometimes I'm just so hungry that it's hard to keep up the will power! When I went back the first time (July 9) I'd lost 16 lbs and they did the fill, but I pretty much had to demand that it be done. Call Prof. Weiner's office and tell him you're hungry and want a fill and they'll schedule you another appointment. I'm going back this afternoon for my second fill. I'm a bit worried that I've done something to the band though b/c I've got this intermittant pain in my port area and can feel something hard beneath my skin on my left side (not the port).

You know what's funny, we've all heard the same things over and over again, we all know how ridiculous they are, yet we've all still let them bother us! I have three stories, the first was when I was about 15 years old. I can remember stepping on the scale in front of my grandma (who was 5'10" and never weighed over 135) and it was at like 132 and she flipped out on me telling me how disgusting it was for someone my height (5'5") to be over 120 lbs. The second was my freshman year of college, I weighed in at around 125 (yeah, definitely not fat considering I wore a size 2 pants, but I had really big boobs so wore a size 16 top, should've been a guy's dream right?) and my bf at the time told me "my fraternity brothers say you're cute but too chubby" as a reason why he didn't think we should be exclusively dating anymore. Turned out later that the fraternity brother in question actually was trying to date me and was putting that in his head so he would dump me and the other guy could swoop in, both of them...pricks! For some reason I thought I was in love w/the first guy and stuck with him, slowly gaining weight b/c of the low self-esteem I had. Eventually I woke up, saw him for what he was and dumped him when I was about 150 lbs. He called me a few months later and said "now I can only date fat girls though, b/c you ruined me, skinny girls just don't do it for me anymore". Talk about a backhanded compliment. The third thing didn't happen to me, but to a friend who is a bigger girl too, she came to visit me here in Europe and we went to Paris for a few days. We were sitting in the park beside the Eiffel tower and this beggar woman came up and asked us for money. We basically just ignored her, and she got mad and started saying things to my friend like. "Vous Mangez tout" (you eat everything) and then just started shaking her head in disgust saying "trop gros" (too big) over and over again. Luckily, my friend has a great sense of humor so she just looked her in the eyes and said "at least I can afford my own food". I've also gotten tons of the "you'd be so hot if..." comments or the "god you're good looking for a bigger girl" ones. For some reason I also get the guys who want to tell me how much they like a girl with meat on her bones, like yeah, that's how to compliment a girl!

I just wanted to introduce myself. I had the surgery on June 3rd and am going in for my first fill tomorrow! So far everything has been going well, but I feel a bit in the dark as to what I should be experiencing so decided it would be a good idea to join a support group. The morning of the surgery I weighed 233 lbs. and so far (according to my scale) I'm down to 216. The surgery itself went really well (performed in Germany by Prof. Weiner), and I had lost 10 lbs. before I left the hospital. They didn't offer any supplements from the doctor here, just instructed me to follow a liquid diet for the next 5 weeks until my appointment for the first fill. So, I've been eating a lot of cream of potato Soup (only thing I seem to have a taste for). I didn't have any appetite at all for the first 2 weeks, but then suddenly I was ravenous. I've always been a bit of a calorie counter and it's a hard habit to break. I realized that the first two weeks I was eating less than 300 cals/day. The next week I ate around 500 calories, but felt like I was constantly starving. I pushed the calories up to about 700, but started gaining weight so tried to start doing a little more intense exercise. Still gained weight, which seems so crazy on just 700 cals/day! Talked to some nutritionists who recommended I go to 1,000 cals/day, counter-intuitive I know, but I figured it couldn't hurt to try so I did and wow...suddenly the weight just started coming off. I weighed myself every day for a week and was losing about .5 lb/every two days. I'm sure this is just like any other form of diet control where everyone has to find what works for them, but I thought I'd share what's working for me. Hopefully all will go well at my appointment tomorrow, but I'm a bit nervous as to how I will feel with the fill and also whether or not I'm going to go crazy once I start eating real food again. I hope I find the support I'm looking for here! Katie

I'm definitely trying to get as much Protein as I can, I've mixed some Protein shakes and things since day 1, but I just can't eat very much of one so the amount I'm getting is minimal. I'm a little bit vain about my skin and hair so I've been really making sure I had a balanced nutrition intake the entire time. Thank you for pointing out the numbers to me! Most of the other patients at my doctor's had the RNY, so when I went back for my checkup they had all lost somewhere between 30 and 60 lbs. The NP said I had done really well, but I just didn't know for sure. I know it's just like any normal weight loss attempt in that everyone will lose differently, but thank you for letting me see that it's a normal range!

I actually asked my surgeon this. He said that light cardio activities were good, I was back on the elliptical the 2nd week after surgery. He did tell me not to lift weights for 4 - 6 months though. Although, I'll probably be asking him if light weights for arms and legs are ok if I just avoid abdominal activities. Be careful though, as advised above, stop if you feel pain and it's probably a good idea to wear a heart rate monitor to make sure you don't push it too hard. When I got back in the gym I could only do about 30 minutes of cardio rather than my usual 60 - 90 and my heart rate skyrocketed way higher than normal, so just be aware of your own body.

Hi all, I'm sure I could find the answer to this if I just read enough posts, but I'm slightly ADD and just can't seem to keep sitting still long enough to do that! I had my first fill yesterday 3.5 cc. Afterwards I drank my Water, no problem then went to eat. I ate very slowly and chewed my food for what felt like forever. I also waited awhile between every few bites to see if I got a delayed full reaction. After a little bit I did feel a slight bit of pressure in my stomach and it finally quit growling, so I stopped eating even though I didn't really feel full and certainly still had a desire to eat. Today it's been pretty much the same story, no real full sensation, but I've stopped myself at around 1 cup of food. Right now, I'm totally reliant upon will power to reduce my eating, which I can probably keep up for awhile, but the reason I chose the band in the first place is because I needed a bit of extra strength to keep me on the wagon so to speak. So, I have a couple of questions... 1. How long does it take to "feel" your fill? 2. What does restriction feel like? Will it be a true full sensation or just no longer a ravenous hunger? 3. How often can you get a fill? My doctor was in meetings when I was at the hospital yesterday, so I saw his assistant instead. (I had my surgery in Germany, and while everyone speaks English, sometimes my questions aren't entirely understood and it's hard to translate!). She said I should come back if I felt like I needed another fill, but couldn't really describe what I should be expecting or how long I should wait before deciding that I did need more, so what do you guys think?

I too thought I'd be denied, my bmi was 37 and I have no co-morbidity. However, no one ever gave it a second glace, everything went through just fine, from my doctor to the insurance to the surgeon. Almost too easy, I kept waiting for something to mess it up!

I did my band in Germany and the recommendation was a liquid diet from the date of surgery until the date of the first fill (5 weeks later). However, even the hospital provided cream Soups as soon as I was allowed to eat food at all (day after surgery). Once home, I ate nothing but cream soups. After 3 weeks I was going a bit nuts so I started looking around online to see what other doctors had recommended for their patients and saw that most people could eat real food after a few weeks so I added in mashed potatoes and mac n cheese just so I'd be satisfied. I went back for my fill yesterday and everything was fine. Like the above poster said, every doctor has a reason for his dietary recommendations. Maybe you should ask yours why he wanted you his specified plan. If he doesn't have a specific reason I think it would be fine to eat those things.

I can't give you many answers either as I've only been banded a month and my doctor has me on a diet of liquids until today actually, but so far I've been sated. At first, I had zero appetite. Here, they keep you in the hospital almost a week to monitor you and make sure you're eating small amounts and not just ripping into everything. I could barely eat what they brought me, I'd have a spoonful of Soup and that was it. After about 2 weeks suddenly I was ravenous, I could've very easily gone out and just eaten everything in sight, but I kept reminding myself of what I was willing to go through to change my habits and I soon realized that most of that was just psychological hunger. That's been the biggest thing I've noticed, with the band it's a lot easier to tell what's real hunger and what's just in your head. It took me another couple of weeks to figure out how much food I needed to eat to keep the real hunger away. The one thing I liked was that my doctor kept stressing that the band isn't really weight loss surgery. He wants people to see it as a diet aid, that it will help you feel full and not overeat, but you still have to make the choice of what food to put in your mouth. And just like any weight loss attempt, everyone's body works differently, you have to find what works for you and stick to it.

Yeah, I was a bit surprised too, but it's the way it's done here in Germany. You're on liquids until you return for your fill. I've had to break down and eat a few semi solids though, like cottage cheese and mashed potatoes. They also don't supply patients with any kind of supplement, we're just instructed to go home and only eat things you could drink from a cup. I had to buy some diet shakes from our grocery store so that I could keep my protein numbers up, but it wasn't cloase to what they prescribe to US patients. However, things seem to have gone fine, I've lost almost 20 lbs and feel good, not hungry really, my scars are healing, my skin and hair looks pretty healthy, so maybe it's not so imperative to get the high protein.