jmw0424

So yesterday was my second fill. My doctor doesn’t seem thrilled about my weight loss progress. He says it is "ok" but could be much better and wants me to really focus on measuring food and working out. I know I can be doing better, but hell if I could do 2 shakes and dinner (what he wants me to do) then I would need this damn band! Hopefully the 1cc he put in (bringing me to 6.5cc's in a 12 cc band) will help me to feel and stay full from the shakes. he did say one thing to me that makes total sense and it's something I have thought of in some way or another for a long time and need to be actively thinking about it more. he said in America we say we are hungry or we are full. in countries where the population is more thin like France they say "je faim" ( I'm hungry) or "Je n'ai plus faim" (I am no longer hungry) they don’t need to feel FULL, just not hungry enough to go 3 hours until their next small snack. not a radical concept but one that I am having a hard time implementing.

looks good

the left shoulder is a referred pain site for the stomach. if you are too gassy or have an irritated stomach it will hurt. I find that taking some gas x when it hurts helps a ton. good luck

For me as a child was was very thin then as a teen I quickly grew a large bust, but everything remained in check about a size 3 then in high school I was about a sie 10-12 but I played softball vollyball and hockey so I was just just muscular. then after highschool i didnt play sports and didnt work out much and still ate big portions Over the past 10 years I just kept gaining until topping off at 237. while the loss is going slow so far, I do feel good that I am on my way back down and for good this time

right after surgery i remember the nurse telling me that i couldn't eat gum anymore because when people swallow their gum it sometimes gets trapped in the upper pouch. just wondering if anyone else has been told this.

so here is my issue. i forgot about this because i was just out of surgery and still had foggy brain. no one else ever said anything about no gum, and i have chewed gum about 3 times recently swallowing it each time. this is the reason i don't chew gum often to start with, because i forget i am chewing it and the next thing i know it just isnt there anymore. i know it sounds stupid, but i just swallow it with out thinking. now that means all three pieces have been swallowed 2 of them in the last few days. i dont have any pain, but i am wondering if this is going to cause a problem or if it was going to would i know it already.

honestly i say do a combo of things. first go to another doctor and tell him you are an inch or two shorter then you are then you wont have as much to gain to meet your BMI requirement. I am not usually a fan of gaining to get surgery, but you are very close and 237 is a very unhealthy weight. it's what i started at so I know where you are coming from. I am 5'5.5" but i jsut said I was 5'4"....................ended up being private pay anyway so id didnt really matter much, but that loss of an inch put me at the right bmi zone

I am still pretty new at the band thing, but my advise is that you will loose quick for a few weeks depending on your diet progression (mine was clear liquid 1 week, full liquid 1 week, soft one week etc) then when the swelling goes down and you are eating solids the loss may stop. at this point it is pretty much like you dont have a band because there is no fill. just eat healthy and it will start coming off again after your fills :thumbup: good luck and congrats on being banded

I read mostly everyone say it was no big deal, but I was still a little nervous. I didnt worry that he would miss the port, because I can feel it under my skin, but I was afraid it would hurt. I have never had a "shot" in my stomach before. I hardly even felt the pinch so I was worried for nothing!!! It did feel very strange when he was putting the fluid in though like a tightness in my chest, but he said that was normal. I ended up with 5.5cc's in a 12cc band. My doctor said he does the first fill by "feeling resistance" IDK what the means, but hopefully it give me some restriction until I go back in 4 weeks. He also told me that my weightloss was pretty good to date but he would like to see me loosing 5-10 (closer to 10) lbs per month for the first few months. So he gave me a diet that is much like a meal replacement diet that non-banded people use to loose weight. He said that he finds it helps to jumpstart his patients and also helps them with portion control (which I have trouble with) So hopefully the fill and the new diet will get me on track and loosing. I would so love to be able to wear a tank top this summer with out my monster arms hanging out :thumbup:

sounds like you are hungry girl. 1/4 of a cup is nothing. I was allowed 1/2 - 1 full cup and as time went on with out a fill even this wasn't enough because as the swelling goes down it is like you have noting around your stomach. my doctor told me that if after 20 min I still feel hungry then eat another 1/4 cup meal and wait another 20 min. call the doctor and see what he says. good luck

ok your body has long since absorbed the gas that was inserted during surgery, so it is more then like a eating/drinking error. I had this problem so bad to the point that I was getting left chest and shoulder pain about 3 weeks post of from gas. I was belching CONSTANTLY!! here is what I did and I have seen 100% improvement and only belch once in a while.....close to ebing how I was prior to surgery. First I took gas x for a couple of days to help clear out the gas in my stomach . I also started taking very small bites even using a toddler spoon and fork. I took very small sips and never used a straw. I gried to make sure that when I swallowed I didn't gulp so that I was taking in as little air as I could. This has solved the problem for me. I have stuck to this and have had no problems since. Good luck hope this helps

I dread the thought of exercie, but once I do it then I feel great for the rest of the day and even sleep better at night. What I have to do is plan it into my week and block out a time. Then I just go and do it no matter how much I don't want to. My gym has a carido theater so it makes it a little less boring when I can watch a movie at the same time I am working out I hope that one day I will simply love it and feel bad if I miss a day, but until then I think of it like an OBGYN appointment...........no one wants to go but you just gotta :ohmy:

dang 18guage!! they wanted to make sure they could get some blood through there if they needed to LOL you'll do fine :thumbup:

only have the band, but have heard that the band over bypass has large success rate for patients who have lost restriction with the bypass. Most doctors have patients drink clear liquids for a time prior to surgery to shrink the size of the liver so that is not uncommon at all. Hope things go very well for you and good luck

I had 10 days off. I am an ER nurse so I wanted to make sure things were secure in place before I started lifting people. I felt well enough about day 5 to go back, but even at day 10 I was tired and couldnt move as quickly. If I had a desk job I would have been fine with a few days. Incision pain is not always the worse thing you can have, I ended up with severe left shoulder pain the day I went back to work because I was drinking out of a straw and got very bad gas pains. That was way worse then any surgery pain so be careful :thumbup:

2.5cc is not much of a fill and I wouldnt think it would give you much if any restriction. From what I gather restriction usually happens for "most" people with band that size at about 5-7cc's you prob felt restriction at first because of some mild swelling. Maybe you will have better luck at your next fill.

my doctor said he isnt stingy with first fills lol he doesnt want people to get discouraged because theya re still hungry 2-3 months into the process. He said he can get most people very close on their first fill and just has to do minor adjustments after that. said on avg most of his patients hit sweet spot in 2-3 fills. I am just doing liquids right now, but I can tell a difference because I dont feel like I could just chug water as I did before. Hopefully when I start back on solids I will notice a major difference.

the needle looked to me like a 22guage IM needle..........much like the a butterfly needle only a little longer. I assume you are a nurse also by your user name so I thought this discription would be easy for you to relate to :thumbup: didn't hurt a bit so don't be worried at all. 2lbs a week is about 8lbs per month so that would put it in the range of what my doctor is hoping for. Honestly I thought he would be thrilled by my progress, but he was like "um thats alright, but you can do better. Lets get you jumpstarted" I like that attitude though keeps me motivated. Good luck and let us know how it goes for you

I had my band on march 2nd and like you I lost 15lbs right away. I was loosing about a pound a day for a while then when I reintroduced solid foods I stopped loosing and just stayed the same give or take a couple of pounds. I had my first fill 5.5cc's in a 12cc band. Not sure what level of restriction it will give me yet because I have to be on liquids for 48 hours but I am hoping to get some decent restriction because prior to the fill I felt like I could eat like I did before the band.

well they can't put it in empty they have to add some fluid to prime the tubing so to speak otherwise when they only did those little 1cc fills it would just go into the tuning that connects the port to the band. I don't think that would require 4cc, but hey maybe this way you can avoid STARVING while you have to be on liquids post op :thumbup:

Just an FYI many people have stomach upset if they take vitamins on an empty stomach. for that reason my nutritionist had me start taking mine at week three when I could take in soft foods. I take a chewable and liquid calcium, but I can swallow pills just fine.

I have a hard time tossing out the uneaten food, but it is not because I cam fromt he clean plate club as a child, but because my mind tells me that I am still hungry or that I want the food. So I have to throw it in the trash the moment I am full or I will wait a few moments and then try to stuff it in. I never realized what a mental issue I had with food unill I got the band. No wonder I couldn't diet my brain was plotting aganist me LOL

great post I was wondering pretty much the same things. I am about 6 weeks out and have my first fill on this wednesday. My diet was week one clear liquids, week 2 full liquids (thin enough to dring through a straw), week 3 softs (Cream of wheat, pudding, cream soups) week 4 non red meat protein, week 5 fruits and veggies, week 6 read meat, bread, pasta. So for me HELL was week 2.5-3 because I was starving. Now I am ok, but I know I am eating too much. I too can eat anything with no problems and find my self finishing my plate instead of slowing down and waiting for my full sign. I was measuring everything but my doctor told me to stop doing that and wait to feel full, but after my fill I am going back to measuring again and cutting my self off...............If I had to ability to feel full and not over full then I guess I wouldn't have been 236lbs right :thumbup: Good luck and best wishes.

I think it is a great idea. I wish I would have done something like that. I am almost 6 weeks out and I have not had my first fill. Changing the pace and portions of my eations had been the hardes thing to do. I am so used eating fast and I know once I have restriction that will HAVE to stop. I also caused my self some major gas pain about week three because I was simply drinking to fast. I too am having a hard time with the no water with meals thing so like the other user said get into practice of doing that also. Good luck and best wishes to you sounds like you have a good medical staff on your side :thumbup:

That is wonderful!!!! My husband and I are taking our children in Aug and I am hoping that by then I will be down a few sizes too and able to fit into all of the rides with out worry. We went to kings island this past summer and I fit on all the rides but some were a tight squeeze. There were a few I avoided at Cedar Point because they had the seat at the front of the line so that large people could make sure they fit before they waited in line. OMGoodness like there would be anything worse then trying to squeeze my big butt into a small seat infront of tons of people!!! no thanks :cool2: Anyway congrats on your success I am looking forward to my future loss :thumbup: