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Oh wow, you are right here! I am in NE Plano, near Allen and Frisco. If you haven't attended a support group, you NEED to come to the next one at Baylor Plano!!! I am attending THREE in this area, but that one is my favorite. Dr. Nick is one of their doctor's I think. If you don't have the information on it, or if you are interested in one of the other, message me. There is an 'informal' support group meeting this Saturday, the 23rd at 12:30. A group of patients in this area (or anyone who wants to come) are meeting for the second time at Season's 52, a restaurant at The Shops At Legacy. It was really nice last time....but we need to RSVP to the guy who started it all. Let me know if you are interested. Congrats on your loss, you're doing GREAT!!

Week 3 I think, maybe two.

LoL - thank you. I've had two cups of coffee, you'd think I'd be more aware of what I'm posting!!! I went back and corrected my mistake!!! Have a great day! BTW - congrats, YOU are doing good! It's fun, isn't it??!! What a wild ride this journey is!

Thank you for the kind words!! I am just under 5'7" and at Dr. Davidson's seminar, my first visit with him, I weighed 228. My highest weight ever, was 232. This morning I weighed 145.5 My surgery date was June 11, 2010, I'm almost three years out. I lost 23 lbs the two months prior to surgery. I reached Dr. D's goal of 150 just under five months, and MY goal of 145 a month later. I've been in maintenence for quite a while now. So, what's your 'story'?

Do you have a date for your surgery? I see you are in a 'Texas' group, so I'm guessing you are a TXN! If you are in the Dallas area, there are sooooo many great support groups. If you haven't found one or two, I can help you, at least here in the NE Dallas (Plano, Allen, Richardson, Frisco) area. Good luck. You'll look back a year after surgery and will not believe how your life has changed!!!

I take four gummys per day. Target brand, I wonder if we can switch to the normal, One A Day or something at three years out - any idea? I guess I should ask.

All y'all are welcome!

Four months at goal - isn't it a wonderful feeling??!!!! Congrats again and again!!!! Thank you for the kind words, I love to share my story with others, I know when I was just starting out or when I'd just reached goal....I loved every word I could find from others further out than I was. It's reassuring to hear that it won't just stop, go away and we wake up one morning with 40 additional pounds, or whatever!!!!! Supporting each other.....it's helpful, NOW I look for people who are four or more years out. It gets harder. Take care and keep in touch!!

Thanks Karen and OakleyGirl!!! It's great to hear from both of you. I hope your weekend has been fantastic!!!

The only stuff you really need is: chap stick a travel pillow or your own pillow to pad your tummy from the seatbelt phone and charger toothbrush and toothpaste clean undies I wore TO the hospital what I planned on wearing home FROM the hospital. Less stuff, just easier. They put you in a hospital gown and before going into surgery they put those little rubber bottomed socks on me. You really need very little. I never put on my gown or slippers. I took make up, just because I wanted to put on make up before I left.

How is maintenence going for y'all? I had gained about five lbs when we were on vacation, but three came off last week and I'm counting on losing the other two in the next week to ten days! Fingers are crossed!!! I feel like I'm pretty much living a 'normal' life, eating like a 'naturally thin person'.

Love reading all these posts by others who are maintaining. I look back on my life 3, 4 or more years ago. It is sure different. Besides being back home in TX, I'm in Dallas, where vanity rules. LoL It's nice to feel like I fit in and am not ever the biggest girl in the room. I didn't realize how uncomfortable I was having to trry and find something to wear and then walking in and trying not to feel like all eyes were on me. I KNOW it was never all about me, but y'all know what I'm talking about, that self conscious feeling. Ugh.....I love being out and about now, love shopping, a LOT. Life is good.

LoL - busted!!! I had to share it over and over again. I've been going to support group meetings for over three years and although I've learned a LOT and met a lot of people, this ONE THING seems like just about the most important thing I've ever heard. ONE TB of Peanut Butter is 100 calories!!!! That floors me!!! I hope you're feeling good today!!! See you soon!

I was recently at a support group meeting, headed up by a clinical psychologist. He broke it down like this. 100 additional calories per day, 365 days a year.....36,500 calories and that equals approx. 10 lbs a year. None of us went to bed thin and woke up fat. It happened over time, over years. One year you weigh 7 lbs more than you did one year before, but hey, it's only seven lbs, easy to lose. Then we get accustomed to it and that's that. Then the next year, 6 lbs heavier, but it's only six lbs. In two years, that is 13 lbs. That is how it happens, that is how it happened with me. I remember when I woke up weighing 180, 'at least it is WAY under 200'. OMG, then all of a sudden, in ten years I am in a constant struggle to maintain 225. Seriously!!! Let's examine this, how easy it is to do this. For many of us, we can get an additional 100 calories just tasting while we are cooking. I suspect when we are cooking a holiday meal, we can get in an additional 300 calories or more. For young moms, eating what your toddler doesn't eat.....that adds up quickly. Shoot, a Quaker lower sugar granola bar is 100 calories!! Think of all the 100 calorie pre packaged stuff we can get. In my opinion, this is why it is so important to stay on top of it, forever. Log what we eat, weigh and measure when you're at home. It's just so easy to go '100 calories' more than we should.

I am sooooo not kidding. I'd do it!!!!

That is why I wanted to be five lbs below my doctor's goal. I wanted that five lb pad. So when I do go up a little, I'm still UNDER HIS GOAL, which keeps me at a healthy BMI. You just have to stay on top of it. I weigh every single morning, I have since two weeks after surgery when I got back home. (I was living out of state and flew to TX for surgery and stayed with family a week and then in Galveston for week #2) My doctor recommends weighing daily. It is much easier to drop a few lbs...actually it is real easy.....but if you only weigh once or twice a month, losing 8 or 10 isn't as simple, and we ALL know how easy it is to gain. We should all keep in mind, 100 additional calories per day, every day, is over 36,000 calories a year and that's about 10 lbs a year. None of us woke up one morning fat, we did it a little at a time. Five or 10 lbs a year. It sneaks up on us!!!!

They are USE to seeing you bigger. You go with what you're comfortable with. I'm 5 foot, 6.75 inches and have been maintaining at between 144 and 147 for a couple of years now. I got down to 132, briefly.....for one day maybe.....and knew it was too low. MY goal was 145, Dr. Davidson's goal for me was 150. I added calories to my diet and regained where I wanted to be. Even typing it sounds bizarre, but I did NEED to gain a little bit. I had size 4 jeans that were baggy, and size 2's aren't easy to come by. Yes, I do have priorities!!! LoL I still wear a size 4, some times a 6. The 4's fit like they are suppose to, which is nice. Good luck!

I think are left with a normal sized tummy for a field mouse!!! LoL I love, love, love it!!!!

I think I'd resort to playing dirty. Tell this person that if she says that again, you will tell everyone she's had Vaginal Rejuvenation. (this is a copy and paste description) It is combined Labiaplasty and Vaginoplasty for a cosmetically enhanced and tightened vagina in one surgical visit. Tell her that folks like to believe things like that, soooooo, true or not, it will get them talking. This procedure is clearly more interesting than having WLS!!!! LOL I'm just sayin'

I personally think 'popping pills' or counting points was easier than having major surgery to remove 85% of my tummy....and still, I must make good choices. I'm just sayin'

BigDog - today's the big day. It is a life changing decision. I have loved every single minute of it since I woke up in recovery!!! It's a wild ride, hang on an enjoy!!! If you didn't take a picture, have someone go buy a disposable camera and take a picture, then take one every month on the 13th. After your one year anniversary picture, go have it developed. Laying those pictures out, side by side....it is amazing to see the transformation right before your very eyes. Good luck!!!

Hey "Luck" - I have to ask, does the one person who wishes she hadn't done it....does she wish she had all her tummy and weight back??!! You mention eating veggies first....what about Protein? At the seminar and all support groups I go to, the dietitian always says, protein first. Were they preaching something different when you had your surgery? I've never had one minute of buyer's remorse!!! I've enjoyed every single second from the time I woke up after surgery. What a wild ride.....oh-so-fun!!

You posted this a year ago. How are you now? I'm almost 3 yrs out. I'm finding it easy to maintain, but I stay on top of it. How I eat, what I weigh, measuring and/or weighing food.....it's all part of my life. It's habit. I weigh every morning. If I gain a few lbs, I address it immediately. Like you, I've never exercised. Well, I have a 5 lb weighted ball that I toss around occasionally and I have a 'band' that I picked up this morning and worked with for the first time in about five months. But all in all, I do not exercise. I knew I'd lose interest since I have the attention span of a four year old, so I made up my mind to make lifestyle changes that weren't temp like a fad diet, changes that were forever. I.E. I never keep chips in our house, other than baked scoops, which my husband eat and I don't like unless I have some guacamole to dip in. This does not mean I don't attend a Sunday school party with burgers and chips and not touch a Frito (my favorite). This just happened, I ate my burger, no bun and no cheese.....with six or seven Fritos. Loved every nibble!! I've just made changes, I try not to set myself up for failure often. I'd love to hear how you are now days!!! Any hints, tips....whatever advice you might have.

44 lbs in six weeks??!!!! That is fantastic!!! Think of it, 44 lbs, gone FOREVER!!! Prior to surgery, even though I could do the newest fad diet, or pop prescription diet pills and LOSE some weight, I always knew I would regain it, plus some, eventually. This is different, this surgery allows us to make better choices. Forced portion control plus, without the hunger, even if we 'want' something, we are in control, it is so much easier to resist. At least that is my experience for the past 33 months!

An endoscope is a camera they all use during laproscopic surgery, it lets them see what they're doing/dealing with. The bougie is kind of like a templet. It's a medical instrument the physician uses. Here is a youtube video, it's graphic, but pretty cool.