gnortenjones

I'm not a big fan of the Lean Cuisine/Healthy Choice meals, especially "Smart Ones" (have yet to find one that wasn't revolting). Most of the time the food just comes out really rubbery, which of course increases the odds of getting stuck. One group of frozen meals I have enjoyed though are various brands of frozen burritos in the organic section of my super-market. I don't recall the brand, but they were actually pretty good. So if your market has an organic section, you may want to experiment with their frozen foods.

I have a few friends who are really into biking (with a bicycle, not a motorcycle). In fact, right now one of them is on a 50 mile ride. After they dropped a considerable amount of weight, and hearing the stories, and seeing the pics of their rides, I decided to give it a try, and bought a bike last year. I've got to be honest, I'm not a huge fan of it. I'm not comfortable riding on roads with cars, which rules out most local rides, and the only alternative is putting the bike on the back of the car, and going to a local bike trail, which is a pain in the butt. After some soul searching I've come to realize I MUCH prefer walking, and hiking. I can listen to my ipod (something else I'm not comfortable doing while riding). Worry a lot less about getting hit by a car. Tracking calories with the go-wear fit is more accurate. It's much easier to go somewhere new to hike a new trail (no bike mounts for the car to setup). How about other people here. Those of you who have done both, which do you prefer, and why?

Rejoined recently (was a member before being banded two years ago) and was pretty successful with WW. . Do you use all your points, or try to keep to the low calorie count the lap band diet requires? I've been stalled for the longest time, after putting about 30 lbs back on. I decided to try using all my points which gave me around 500 calories MORE than what I have been eating, and immediately dropped 5 lbs in less than a week. The lap band diet outs me at around 1200-1700 calories. WW puts me at around 2200 calories. Weird.

Sweets in general, but Ice Cream specifically. I've tried getting the smaller containers, or low fat, but I've gotten to the point that I'm realizing that I can't have it in the house at all or I'll devour it.

You know what's worse? When it's a FREE meal! My company has quarterly luncheons which are usually really nice for being catered affairs. For the last three of them, the last one being last friday, I've gotten stuck after less than 3 bites, despite picking the lap band friendliest items I could. Each time I ended up running to the nearest restroom to vomit/slime, never to return. I wasnt annoyed so much at getting stucket as I was at wasting a free meal! Sometimes I think my priorities are out of whack. The weird thing is that I rarely ever get stuck. It seems my band realizes there's free food in the area, and sends out the alarm to tighten ship!

I put "Somewhat Easy", though I'm somewhere between that and "as hard as other attempts". I've been banded for a little over a year. The weight flew off at first, and within 6 months of being banded, I had lost about 70lbs since the beginning of my pre-op diet. Like many people, I then hit the wall, began dealing with tons of stress, and depression, which caused me to fall back into bad habits such as emotional eating, which of course, caused the weight to start coming back. I ended up putting around 30lbs back on. Luckily I appear to have gotten back on track, and have lost 8lbs in the last week, and hope to be back to my post-band lowest before christmas. So I'd say it's easy in the beginning, when your still psyched about your new toy, but then it gets hard if you haven't dealt with the issues that made you fat in the first place.

Another guy here. Been banded a little over a year, and am down between 50 and 80lbs since the pre-diet, which has yo-yo'd a bit. I've had mixed results with it, though my problems really haven't had anything to do with the band not working the way it's supposed to. The big lesson I've learned is that it's not a magic bullet. You still need to make the right food choices (which I struggle with), and still need to exercise (which I struggle with). Unfortunately, I discovered after I was banded that most of the food that got me fat in the first place are slider foods, which I have REAL problems turning down. So for someone thinking about being banded, I'd have to just say that the band doesn't "fix" you if you have food issues. It helps, but you still have to do the work. The nutritionist at my doctors office mentioned that she always tries to tell this to new patients, but understands that their not going to really believe it until about a year out when the honeymoon is over.

I'm seriously considering a treadmill. I actually really like getting on a treadmill for 30-45 minutes, and just zoning out. The only issue is that I live in a fairly small apartment on the second floor, so noise could be an issue.

I realized today that the biggest obstacle for me to getting exercise this winter is going to be going to the gym, which I hate. Let me be clear, I don't hate the exercise, I hate the physical act of going to the gym. My nearest gym is in a heavily trafficked mall. I hate the traffic, the crappy parking spots, having to walk through hoards of teenagers to get to the gym, waiting in line to give the guy at the desk my card, the locker room that smells like an armpit, finding an empty locker NOT right next to a naked man who always seems to take WAY too long to change clothes, and after the workout debating whether to walk through the hoards of teenagers again as I'm covered in sweat, or brave the bacteria frap that is the lock room showers. Plus, any trip to the gym needs to be increased 45 minutes at least just to factor in all this crap. Seriously, it's no wonder I rarely go there any more. I need to find a better solution before the weather gets bad. I'm committed to another 7 months in my membership, and quite frankly, there aren't any more convenient places than this. ick.

I really wanted a video of the surgery. I thought it would be interesting to see what my insides look like. The doctor said that they do make videos, or take photo's, but hospital policy was that they couldn't give them out. I offered to throw in an extra $5 on the bill, but he wouldn't go for it. :wub:

I'm in almost the exact same situation. Had mine in August, lost a lot at first, then stopped, then insane sweet cravings. One thing about my situation, is that I suffer from depression, and around the beginning of the year decided to try to go off my anti-depressants because I don't like the side effects. I'm pretty sure I went through an "episode" since then, and the sweet cravings were essentially me trying to self medicate. Fortunately, I'm self aware enough to realize this, and am taking steps to deal with it. So my only real advice is for you to try to figure out what triggers your cravings (stress, depression, boredome, etc), and try and find coping mechanisms. A few things I've tried are: 1) When I'm feeling cravings, try to distract myself. This can either be going for a walk, playing a game on my phone, or in desperate times I've put a rubber band around my wrist, and snapped it (that little bit of pain causes the mind to refocus on something other than the cravings). 2) Find something that satisfies your cravings that is low calorie. Even though my cravings are typically sweet in nature, I've found these puffed corn cakes (kind of like a rice cake/giant rice crispy), but their only 16 calories each, and make a great snack to ward off cravings. Unfortunately, there's no easy way to deal with cravings. If there was, I suspect many of us wouldn't be here. Hope this helps.

Paron me while I whine. I'm at my 1 year anniversary since starting my supervised pre-op diet, and have dropped around 70lbs total (30 pre-surgery/40 post-surgery). However, I haven't lost anything since the first of the year, and have actually put on 8lbs since then. It's entirely my fault too. After the holidays I got into a bit of a funk, and between that and the horrible weather, didn't get enough excersize in, and began eating badly. I'm still in the funk, and can't seem to get myself out of this cycle. Next week I have a doctors appointment, and get to explain why i've put on weight. I feel like I went through a lot to get this surgery, and did so well for the first 4 months, but since then have completely lost the will, and motivation to continue with it. The worst part is that I KNOW what needs to be done, and have the tools to do it. Unfortunately, I also know that it's so much easier to just eat a pint of Ben & Jerry's and sleep for 14 hours. Bleh.

I was banded about 6 months ago. Recently I've begun noticing how my perceptions of what a portion size have changed since being banded. I went out with friends the other night, and made a pig of myself. I felt gross, and a bit of a failure for stuffing myself. A friend asked if the food was ok? I told him it was, but I ate too much. He looked shocked, and said that I "had barely touched it", and he thought there was something wrong with the food. I ran through my head everything I'd eaten, and realized that even though post band it felt like I'd eaten a lot, it was a fraction of what I would have eaten pre-band. It wasn't until then that I even noticed that I'd only eaten about half of what was on my plate. I just thought it was interesting how my perceptions have changed. They still need work, but I definitely feel I'm moving in the right direction.

How do you tell if your too tight, or simply experiencing restriction for the first time? I had my fourth fill last week, and have vomited (PB'd) nearly every day. This might be a case of me being too lax in my eating habits (eating too fast, too big of bites), but I'm even having issues with some mushies like oatmeal. I don't seem to have any issues with liquids, unless their really thick like a smoothie (which I have to drink REALLY slowly to get it down). Before my 3rd fill, I really didn't have much restriction after the first couple of days after a fill. After the 3rd fill, I began feeling it more, and now after the 4th, I'm wondering if I'm simply feeling the proper restriction and need to adjust my eating habits (which I fully admit I've slacked on), or too tight.