willowcat

Dentrick, I now take my Zoloft with a smoothie every morning. I use 1 cup of milk, 1/2 cup Greek yogurt, 1 Tbs of rice Protein powder, 1/2 a banana, and a little sweetener. It all goes into my Magic Bullet blender. I take my Zoloft in the little blue 50 mg form (since I'm on the highest dose possible at 200 mg per day, I end up taking 8 pills total). The little size gets the pills passed my stoma, and the creaminess and coldness of the smoothly seem to buffer the burning of the pills once they get in my real stomach. I tried the liquid Zoloft--only ONCE--NEVER again! OMG! I would rather be fat and depressed than ever take the liquid! It was unbelievably awful! This June will be my fourth year having the band. I've been taking my Zoloft in 50 mg sized pills with the smoothie I described for about a year now--finally feel like I've solved my Zoloft problem. Best of luck to you!

I am a person struggling to become aware of my unique body's needs and to treat my self and my body with loving kindness.

Love the leg-crossing!

I can sometimes feel food or liquid passing through the band and I feel horrible pain when I am stuck or blocked.

A night spent beating yourself up is no good. Three cookies don't deserve that much power. What's done is done. What if you allow yourself three cookies and sat down with them and savored them? Just saying...

If you've been approved already and you're two weeks away from surgery, they will be glad to see you've lost weight--that can only help with the surgery--plus you've got a head start on your weight loss! Good for you!

Fifteen years ago I purposefully had my only tattoo put on the top of my foot because that was the only place I figured wouldn't be affected by weight gain or weight loss--and it wasn't (but it WAS so painful to have it done there!). Good luck.

Have you been doing any ab exercises recently? Those can make the muscles around the port hurt more than the muscles on the non-port side. Just a thought. I've had no problems with my port hurting (except when I do crunches), but others may have more experience with port complications than I do. Good luck.

Crossing my legs Fitting in economy seats on planes (plus not having to ask for a seatbelt extension) Not sweating profusely from moderate activity Wearing shoes without orthotics (I had to because of all the weight my poor feet had to carry) Sitting in any chair I want to without having to gauge whether or not I am going to fit (chairs with arms were the worst!) Eating in public without feeling like people are thinking "No wonder you're fat." Pain-free knees Wearing clothes picked for aesthetics rather than for camouflage No more sleep apnea No more insulin resistance and fear of diabetes Feeling normal Some of these I'd forgotten about. Wow! I don't ever want to go back! That was horrible! Thanks for the opportunity to be oh-so GRATEFUL for where I am now!

I slept on my side with a pillow propping up my belly on the couch. The extra support from the back of the couch helped a lot.

My first six months or so, I used to have intense pain between my shoulder blades when I got hungry. My surgeon said it was unusual but not unheard of. I guess that there can be some scar tissue near the band (?!). It went away eventually. Now all I feel are plain old hunger pangs. Also, last time I had a fill, I could feel a little pressure in about the same place--my surgeon said that the nerves near my band came from that part of my spine. Bodies are funny things. Do talk to your surgeon/doctor about it though. Everybody's body is different and it's always better to be safe than sorry. Good luck.

I also had a two week liquids pre-op diet. The only thing that kept me going was knowing that I was shrinking my liver so that my doctor had an easier time banding me...I kept telling myself that I could do anything for ten days...one day at a time. Hang in there.

Good to know! Thanks!

Sorry, I can't help. I've never had one. I guess I would look at the calories, the carbs, and the protein to help me decide if I thought they were a useful part of my journey. Good luck.

XXX to a Small! Wow! That's life-altering! Good for you! You look great (down right yummy!)

I donated everything on my way down. I also tried to buy cheap on my way down--thrift stores, consignment stores, garage sales--because at the rate I was going, I wasn't going to be wearing them for long anyway. We have a plus-sized consignment store here in town. If you had expensive clothes,it might be easier to part with them if you thought you could recoup some of your money by selling them through consignment. Personally, I hated my fat-camouflaging clothes and was happy to say good-bye to them! I think it's good psychic karma to say "Out with the old! In with the new!"

Yes--keep pushing until they find the reason. Call on the males in your life to support you and be there for you now--your pain and sickness is not a "female problem" at this point.

Plain coffee is considered a calorie-free drink. My surgeon said the reason he wanted me to be coffee-free during my two-week pre-op diet was so that I wouldn't be having coffee withdrawal during surgery. Made sense to me. After surgery, he said coffee was fine. Of course that doesn't mean you can have a Starbucks carmel cafe latte full cream with whipped cream on top (or the like)! Those yummy yummies are yummy for a reason--LOTS of calories! I have one large cup with a bit of skim milk every morning--virtually calorie-free.

Anita Renfroe has a YouTube video called "All the Wrinkled Ladies"--favorite line: "Don't be mad when you see your skin don't fit. Can't hide it so you gotta make peace with it.". Love!

The gristle in the ground beef seems to give me problems. Also, I don't seem to actually chew it up as much as I thought I did--since it comes back up pretty much the same as before I "chewed" it. Have given up on ground beef.

Kaiser Permanente--sleep study, psych eval, morbidly obese (BMI in 40s), two comorbidities (pre-diabetic, sleep apnea), PCP referral--took about four months for approval and had to pay 50% of the cost of surgery myself. Good luck!