riley4183

OMG Tina how scary!!!! I am so glad you got un-filled a bit. Yes let that swelling go down and you will be right back on your game! Just have to cut out the carbs again g-friend . . . . sucks huh? No choco cake and potatoe chips for you . . You HAVE to come to Reggie's Saturday, you are bringing our veggie loaf! Otherwise I have to wait until the end of Sept. to see you, and that would SUCK I need my Tina fix!!

looks like I'm just a-typin' to myself again, so I'm going for a walk! Had 2 (tiny) slices of killer choco cake today, and 4 handfuls of potatoe chips (I thought of you Reggie!!!) and uhm . . .that was not good! Gotta go do some damage control :-)

Pearls - this presentation is kind of dated - Kaiser Fresno does bariatric surgery now, too - and SSF does the sleeve now - but it's pretty interesting and a lot of it's still applicable. The Lap-Band is discussed after the RNY. Note that all Kaiser facilities use the Lap-Band AP system now, which has much better early weight loss results and greatly decreased slippage problems :-) Kaiser Permanente Annual National Surgical Symposium Bariatric Surgery in minutes

Nicole it can totally be caused by meds, too . . . I don't know if you take anything, but I totally lost my hair when I was on depakote - I mean like 25% of it - which I was on for 2 years due to a misdiagnosis, the moron psych (NOT Kaiser!) I think it was almost worst when it grew back in, I had short pokey hairs all the freak over my head . . . for some reason the new ones were super wiry and pokey . . . I cut it into short layers to hide it, it took years to grow out! I feel your pain girlfriend :-(

Welcome Pearls!!! We are happy you are here :-) The Friday class is the informational class, a new requirement - lucky you! After that you will get orientation at one of the Kaiser hospitals that actually does the surgery - probably South SF for you, but you can actually go to any of the 4 that do it, so just figure out which is most convenient. Good luck, you are ON YOUR WAY!

Hey Candra/Jes, maybe I can meet up with you girls in Vallejo & catch a ride to Sacto Saturday? What time u leavin? I'm thinking I will treat my son & his girlfriend to Marine World, drop them off with some $ & pick them up "later" don't worry they are both in their 20s!

I'm coming Reggie!!! I miss my girls!!! Nicole how tall are you? I think I remember you being taller than me but?? I'm old and my mind's not what it used to be!

Well I have been kind of sucking on my fluid intake, and it could be almost TOM because I have been a raving beotch for the last 2 days! I am not feeling much better this morning either, and I always feel better a few hours before I start. So I did 30 oz. as I did my walk this morning, and have already pee'd 3 times this AM maybe that's it. Also caloriecount.com says I was 240% of my RDA for sodium yesterday . . . .

Good morning ladies! Query me this: A week ago tomorrow I had a fill. It was a good fill. I have just the right amount of restriction. I am eating about 900 calories a day and power-walking off about 700 of those. How in heaven's name have I GAINED 3 lbs. since last Friday morning?!?!?!?!!

Potatoe chips! Oh my goodness that sounds SO good . . . . . Tamra you have sympathy pouch!

Thanks for the link Donna! I am SO in the "green zone" now! YAY I am going to try and go to Reggie's Saturday, is there anyone else from Sonoma or Marin wants to go & ride with me??

Oh thanks Nicole, she's real cute & all but I'm DONE with babies! Go for a brisk walk anyways; it will revive your energy :-)

Good morning ladies :-) Nicole I have seriouser issues than Auds, I wake up at 5:15 a.m.! I don't slam open the door though, LOL Pam hey whatcha doing at work so early!?! Not even 7 yet girl! I'm running late today since I made soup in the crockpot before I left this morning - and walked to Safeway twice for groceries, forgot some stuff the first time! But I'm here now! And have a couple more miles 2 do b4 10 . . .

Oh and my scars are tiny, you can only see 3 of them (1 totally disappeared, and ! is up so high it's between my breasts and under my bra all the time) and they are just little pink things . . . the only one you notice is the port scar, which is about 1" - so what? I am cheap I just used Vitamin E and Tea Tree Oil 50/50 and I only used it for a couple of weeks. Actually the port sticking out so far bothers me a whole lot more than the little tiny scar does, I swear that port needs its own zip code! Of course I complained about it to Dr. Baggs - I told him it was waving to people in the waiting room - and he said that my surgeon likes it that way (!) and then agreed with my son that I complained too much (!!). When I am done losing I can always have it revised to a low-profile port I guess . . . maybe I will get another infection and have to have it replaced! I may also have the skin apron in front cut off, I have always assumed I would need that but actually it is going away much better than I thought it would. If my cars were 10x larger and bright red and would never get better, I would still have the surgery again in a heartbeat!!! It is SO COOL . . . .

OK so for breakfast this morning i SLOWLY ate a cup of sliced strawberies - pureed by my chewing it was more like 1/2 or 2/3 cup I'm sure. There was a lot of gurgling noises from the band at first, but once I had that band lubed up with strawberry juice things went fine! Ate slowly and chewed a lot. Noon rollled around, not hungry yet (breakfast was at 9:30) so I went and walked a mile - I am out front at customer service until 3 or later, can't eat up here have to eat during lunch or not until after 4. So at 12:30 I made my lunch - a little veggie chicken patty and a half-cup of spaghetti squash - heated those up - got through the fake chicken (100 calories) and I was DONE. I still really wanted to eat the spaghetti squash so I tried a bite, I could tell it wasn't gonna fit so I (discreetly) spit it out - FULL POUCH. Packed everything back up into my lunch bag to have for dinner! Sheez I LOVE this!!!! No PB, no slime, no NOTHING but full too fast! It's been 2 hours and I still feel stuffed - I did just drink a decaf SF soy latte though, why I don't know because it was too much! MAN I love this - I am green zoning girls!! Candra I was terrified, I think we all think we are going to chicken out! The Successful Surgery CD really, really helped me. So did Liz and Dr. Baggs, they were very reassuring - thank goodness!

No one has ever died on the table at Richmond Kaiser hon! Going 4 a walk type to you turkeys later!!!

Jes I lost I think 6 or 7 between my CM appt. and my surgery date, part of that was the Milk of Magnesia, LOL!! I had been losing lots faster but I kind of got the "last supper" thing alternating with the "thin flat liver" thing. Liz will tell you at the pre-op class (YES THEY WEIGH YOU FOR IT) tp keep losing, every pound that you lose will make surgery easier. It's hard though! If it was easy none of us would need the damn band! But it's real important to have your liver as small as possible, so at the very least cut out ALL carbs for 3-4 days before surgery. IMHO of course I am just a patient and a mom not a medical pro :-O

No worries Candra! We are your care unless you need to see someone . . .well you do have to see your PCP at 10-12 weeks out, but that's it - that and the Robin/Liz/Dr. Baggs things (fills) Look at the prescription bottle, if it says "SR" or "sustained release" then you need to get the plain kind (regular release) for after surgery - our pouches can't take the SR stuff. When you meet with Tom Greenwood (the PA) a few days before surgery and bring all of your meds, he will review and tell you if you need to change it. You know Tina I was thinking, maybe I ate so much tonight because I burned off so much today . . . . Robin said exercise definately makes the body want to eat more even if we are not actually hungry, and that is exactly what was happening . . .still, I would like for my band to stop me at least a little! It does the rest of the day . . . .

Paxil made me gain weight - like 20 lbs. in the first month! I got off that for other reasons that would be WAY TMI to go into here . . . . . 11 miles today girls, my counter says 1,062 calories burned today. That's more than I ate - I have to watch that or I will go back into starvation mode, that would SUCK . . . :-(

SO - I can still eat at night. BOY can I eat at night! Like a cup and a half of spaghetti squash . . . after homemade cream of spinach soup, no less! Did you know that cooked spinach has over 5 grams of protein per cup?? Who knew! Man that stuff is good for you! So here is the next thing that I have to get through my head: My band is not going to stop me at dinner. I will have to measure out 1/2 cup and stop myself :-( rats!

Hey fellow wacky girls, of COURSE we feel crazy! We are losing a bunch of fat, and where is estrogen, the crazy woman hormone, stored? In fat!!! So we lose the fat and the estrogen is running around our systems like CRAZY!!! Guess what you have to do to get it out? Drink a lot LOT of water and exercise! Work it out, seriously. Best thing for depression! Swear. Trust me on this one :-) Tina & Candra, I took Wellbutrin for years and it actually made me LOSE weight . . it was kind of speedy for me! Please note Candra or Tamra or whoever it was, if you are taking the SR type you will have to get that changed by your PCP to non-SR starting the day after surgery. And if you are already being treated for depression - which I assume you are if you are on Wellbutrin - they you are A-OK to go see someone! They just want to know that you are being treated, and do not have UNtreated depression. Cognitive therapy can only help. A huge percentage of bariatric surgery pateints either are or have been treated for depression, when I asked in the Santa Rosa class all hands but 1 went up. Very very common, so no worries! Call them tomorrow. We have counselor folks here @ the Santa Rosa facility that specialize in weight loss patients, you get assigned one based on your last name that's how popular they are! Check the health class schedule for your local Kaiser too, mine has therapy classes. I want to emphasize that it is VERY IMPORTANT to have your after-surgery psychology care in place and working for you before you have the surgery. So many of my friends have suffered needlessly because they either avoided care - who can take another 2 hours a week off for visits when we are already taking all this other sick time for our appts.?? - did not seek care because they were afraid it would delay their surgery, or did not have non-SR versions of their meds so they stopped taking them. It is tragic! It only gets worse after surgery, every single person that I know that's had surgery goes through at least 1 bout with depression afterwards, myself included! Please don't put this off - and that goes for every person reading this post! Depression happens, the change is profound, it's great but it's still massive change, and change is stressful, so count on it! And add in the damn estrogen and it's a recipe for sob-city-mania! And add pending lay-offs, jeez it's a wonder any of us government workers are even sane enough to type . . . OK I am off my rant. I lost my favorite cousin to depression - suicide - as a teenager so it's a soapbox thing for me. There is so much good help out there, just no reason for anyone to suffer through the mental crap that is coming. Just sayin'

Is it muscle milk light? I love the stuff, it is the only one I can tolerate because they process the whey protein differently . . .comes in chocolate and creamy vanilla, I get it at Longs because I don't have Costco anymore :-(

I'm not censoring anything, I am honest with Liz and Robin and I'm still a rockstar. And I'm vegetarian too so thats not it Tina!! I think Nicole was right, Liz was referring to others who have joined in with us on occasion but aren't part of our little superstar band - like folks who were at our fill but not willing to be in support groups, stuff like that. Girls, I am full. Ahhhhhh. I had a small salad with 2 oz. of cheese and a few imitation bacon bits - calorie-free Walden Farms dressing, under 200 calories all together - and I am full. FULL! I only had berries for breakfast and I was not even hungry when I ate the salad, I just did because it was time and I have a bunch of errands to run this afternoon, did not want to chace getting hungry while running around and ending up grabbing a less-healthy option. I am getting about 4 to 4.5 hours after a mini-meal before I get hungry again. And zero PB, zero stuck, zero slime, zero issues at all! THIS IS IT!!!! So happy :smile2: Also very proud of myself today, I did 8.5 miles by 11:30 this morning! My day just goes so much better when I get my miles in And now it sounds like Jes is gettin' hooked on walking too, yay! Jes they all think I'm crazy, tell them how great it feels!!! Doin' errands - c u later!

Welcome Lori! Dr. Park is a great choice, she is very kind and uber-competent! You will love her. Jes and Reggie both have her, and most of my friends in the Santa Rosa group had her too, both RNY and lap-band. She is a little more conservative on giving you fills, but talk to her about that when you meet. I think she's great! The steps: Intro class; orientation; meet with surgeon & get surgery goal weight; get to surgery goal weight & weigh in at Kaiser to prove it; meet with phychologist; meet with case manager (Liz - we LOVE her!) and get surgery date from her (mine was less than 4 weeks out); attend pre-op classes (2 in same day); meet with anesthesiologist (sometimes same day as surgery, sometimes before); surgery! Then the diet stages; they are in your binder. I have never, EVER regretted my decision to have the lap-band. I did not want RNY, period, and no one ever tried to force it on me. I have lost weight at the same pace as my RNY friends (a little more than 10 lbs. a month) and have zero complaints. with the new advanced placement technique, the weight loss stats are almost the same as for RNY and I think the long-term is going to be even better because bandsters don't tend to gain back like RNYs do. That's the bottom line for me! Welcome, stick with us and you will power on through the process too! We are the lap-band rockstars of Richmond Kaiser :-)

YAY Jes!!! Woot, woot! How exciting for you!!!! Was Liz wonderful or no, how did the "test" go???