NotSoLittleMermaid

After healing drinking is fine in moderation and as long as it is within your calorie budget. While some disagree, it is generally NOT recommended to have any carbonated drinks. This could stretch the stomach. If I ever have anything like that-it would be a few months and I would let it go flat for a few days to a week before drinking. I love carbonated drinks but decided it is not worth the possibly of stretching my stomach.

Hi I am still in mushie stage but I get hungry every few hrs. I talked to nurse and they said that in the beginning that is good because stomach is small and still healing. I can tell that it would be easy to snack all day and not loose weight. However I am determined to make sure I don't let myself get out of hand. Atleast I have a smaller stopping point than 2 large platefulls of food. When I get hungry I try a few bites of fat free cottage cheese or a yogurt drink.

1 here

Just thought I would pass on what helped me stay SANE during the PRE-OP and I also have some of this in POST-OP. Of course, consult your doctor to make sure it is OK for you and your plan. My doctor had me on a liquid diet 800 calories or less. The mainstay of my diet is fat free cottage cheese - a powerhouse of low calories & Protein. Fat free Greek yogurt is another one of my main staples. I also love a yogurt drink called Keefer from Publix that I can have a few sips if I don't have time to eat and it fills me up for few hrs. Lasagna - fat free cottage cheese, spaghetti sauce, small amount of Parmesan cheese Mexican - fat free cottage cheeses, salsa or nacho cheese Spicy Yogurt - fat free Greek yogurt, salt, pepper, red pepper (or Toni's seasoning) Rice pudding - fat free cottage cheese, Truvia sweetner, cinnamon Tomato or other Soup w/melted cottage cheese for more protein Diet protein Soups

I am a newby and still in the very restrictive part of the journey, so of course I should be loosing weight. I was very much wondering if I would feel like I miss out since I can't eat a huge plate or two of food ( I don't.) Wondering if I would loose my love of food. (I didn't, still love it, but when full I am completely satisfied which is new.) .. I LOVE LIFE NOW! I was 190lbs a week before surgery (before pre-op). Now, (about a week and a half after surgery) I am down to 174.4 am SO happy I had this- it is changing my life and giving me and my husband hope! It even encourages me to work out/walk because I know that it will actually DO something and make a difference. Before it felt like I could never work out enough to make a dent in my calorie/deficit ratio..like I could NEVER get ahead with weight loss unless I worked out 2-3 hrs a day which is unrealistic. This is EXACTLY what I hoped it would be..small amounts of good, satisfying food with moderation and no deprivation, with exercise as being help. I do not feel deprived at all. Since I am in the mushie stage, the mainstay of my diet is fat free cottage cheese - a powerhouse of low calories & Protein. Fat free Greek yogurt is another one of my main staples, despite having a dairy intolerance to milk if I have over a cup of milk-I've always been able to have all the cheese, yogurt etc. I want (before surgery) I find anything goes down just fine so far-no problems. I also love a yogurt drink called Keefer from Publix that I can have a few sips if I don't have time to eat and it fills me up for few hrs. Here are few cottage cheese & yogurt recipes I came up with that helped me stay on my pre-op diet (consult your doctor to make sure it is ok) and help me now eat mushy low carb. Lasagna - fat free cottage cheese, spaghetti sauce, small amount of Parmesan cheese.Mexican - fat free cottage cheeses, salsa or nacho cheese.Spicy Yogurt - fat free Greek yogurt, salt, pepper, red pepper (or Toni's seasoning)Rice pudding - fat free cottage cheese, Truvia sweetner, cinnamonTomato Soup w/melted cottage cheese for more protein Also love Malt-o-meal with Truvia - smaller granules than oatmeal (grain so only have for post op mushy stage) No more shallow breathing problems from asthma. My stomach/incisions still hurt when sitting or walking - the ones by my belly button on the right tend to hurt more. My bandages are still on except the top one, it came off and I put some Vitamin E oil and a band-aid over it. I've done a few days of 20 mins, and 2 (30) minutes walking/secessions sometime with small bit of eliptial machine. The next day, my abdomen is sore, but I rarely take pain meds now. Sometimes my shoulder acts up, but it is not a problem. Fluids are going down easier, but I still struggle to get much down, but doing better. I have cheated a little bit with a couple glasses of wine, 1/4 piece of milk soaked cake and a couple very small bowls of ice-cream but I know that I've got to limit it to loose & maintain the weight. As far as hard stuff, I ate some melted cheese and had some soup soaked croutons, but have not ventured into anything harder. So far so good! There is nothing that bothers me. I am sick of Protein shakes and I seem to have lost my enthusiasm for juice and crystal light, so I mostly drink Water or sometimes coffee or tea. I eat tiny amounts at time - (probably about 1/2 cup of cottage cheese or yogurt, and it took forever for me to eat a poached egg.) Sometimes I try to get in the habit of waiting an hr to drink after eating which is supposed to help us feel fuller for longer. Have not vomited at all after surgery. Once or twice I had short lingering pain/nausea after eating and I drank a little liquid and was fine. I am guessing that I haven't pushed the limits of my stomach too hard due to no vomiting and usually I guess I am full when it it hurts a tiny bit for a second or two and then I feel it go down and I am fine. That is probably more than you wanted to know

I was a pretty fast healer and I am a week and a half out and find that my abdomen is still a little sore when sitting up (which is essentially being bent over or L shaped.) Standing and laying down or sitting up REALLY straight almost with my butt out helps stretch out the abdomen and feels better. (I have a computer desk job too.) I would also add that I had surgery on Friday, left hospital day after surgery, and flew home on Sunday. It was ROUGH without pain meds. I worked from home the week after, emailing from bed. If you have vacation time, giving yourself a week off would really help.

Congrats! I wish you the best! So far it has been a great experience for me and I fell great about it.

Thanks so much Karen! I look forward to reading about your sucess too!! Do you have a blog? or Post here I can follow?

Oh, I also forgot to add that one of the reasons why I chose Dr.Watkins is because his incisions are tiny. He uses surgical glue also. What I didn't expect is his awsome idea of hiding most of them in my fat crease. You can see that he put them in between my fat rolls, on the wrinkle so that they would be disguised.

Here is my post with my experience/photos with Dr. Wakins. I just had my surgery done on Friday. http://www.verticalsleevetalk.com/topic/9758-my-great-gps-experience-with-dr-watkins/page__gopid__100437

Here is my post with my experience/photos with Dr. Wakins. I just had my surgery done on Friday. http://www.verticalsleevetalk.com/topic/9758-my-great-gps-experience-with-dr-watkins/page__gopid__100437

Here is my post with my experience/photos with Dr. Wakins. http://www.verticalsleevetalk.com/topic/9758-my-great-gps-experience-with-dr-watkins/page__gopid__100437

Here is my update so far.. I was finally able to have Gastric Plication Surgery! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYY!! I had it last Friday and here are the notes on my experience.. and photos of the hospital/surgery facility. Dr. Watkins called and touched base with us to see how our flight went and to make sure we had no other questions for surgery the next day. (We went and met with the staff last time we were in town, so this time we went right into surgery the next day.) The next morning, we went to the surgical hospital, where they had me put on the hospital gown where they can blow in warm air, although for once I wasn’t cold. The worse part about this experience for me was getting the IV put in. Typically they do not want it in an area that bends (like the elbow). Last time I had it my hand and couldn't WAIT to get it out right after surgery. I explained that I knew it would be important to have it after surgery and for recovery as well but the hand hurt so bad last time, can you please find another place? They kindly acted on my request and put the IV in on the side of my wrist and I was fine the whole time I was there, and I really don't have any bruising from it. It SO GREAT that here, YOU DON'T HAVE TO WEAR COMPRESSION HOSE! They have booties that go around your calves and puff up with air and gentle massage your legs. (See the picture with white/orange booties.) I felt like everyone was there for me; there was a staff about 5 people on/off there in pre-op and they were ALL SO PATIENT and CARING. I followed them to the Operating Room and laid down on the table. They had 2 anesthesiologists, and they were great. One was so sweet she held my hand when they sent me off to sleep in the Operating Room and Dr. Watkins said his comforting true statement, "We will take EXCEPTIONAL CARE of you." I felt no burning or pain, just went to sleep within about 1 minute. The next thing I knew, they woke me up and said that I had the GPS surgery and it went great! He also fixed my hiatal hernia. Dr. Watkins came back in to check on me. I had no nausea, just was really tired and my abdomen was sore like I had done 500 sit-ups. My shoulder and back were sore too. It was hard to move around but it was a lot better than I thought it would be and the nurses helped me. Although they had a lot of patients during the week, it was only me over the weekend and the nursing staff were always just a call away and they would be there in seconds. They checked on me every few hours, and I was given an IV so I wouldn't get dehydrated. I had ice chips, Water and apple juice that I could take very very tiny sips from. The leg massagers where great and very soothing. I had plenty of pillows & blankets. They also brought in a regular hospital bed for my husband to sleep in too. The rooms and hospital look SO NEW and CLEAN, like they have never been used. Elizabeth & Ineed, Theresa, (and everyone else!) were terrific nurses and very caring. I can't say enough about this Dr. & Hospital Staff and follow up care/office staff. The day after surgery, Dr. Watkins personally came in to check on me. I felt good enough to leave the hospital the day after surgery and went back to the hotel. I slept a lot and encourage anyone who has this surgery to sleep as much as they can. Also my husband was smart enough to bring a microwaveable heating pad, and this greatly helped my shoulder and upper back pain. We flew out on Sunday and were in and out of airports the whole day. I was miserable because I didn’t have all my pain medicine with me, I was afraid TSA would take it if we tried to take it as carry-on. So I only took a dose in the morning. That was a bad idea; all I could do was sit in pain for hours. I did do some walking and sometimes I rode in the wheelchair. If I had to do it again, I would have made sure to take the pain meds (and gasx strips – that got to be painful too) throughout the day as needed. It was very painful to walk, and I had to walk very slowly. Also due to sitting my muscles were tight in my stomach and I have make sure I straightened up and sleep straight so that they don’t get used to being tight. However, every day gets better. Dr. Watkins and his wonderful staff both called me to see how I was doing today. Now, I can roll out of bed with hardly any pain at all. My tiny stomach can take in about the size of a normal sip of liquid. I have had no vomiting so far, and usually if I drink too much too quick I have slight pain but it passes through very quickly. My asthma has kicked in, but lessens when I take the pain med. I think it's my body’s way of dealing with the surgery. Later on today both the hospital & Dr. Watkins called to check on me. They are all so nice. All in all, I feel great. I walked a few blocks today outside, this evening. I am still sore, but it isn't as bad as I thought it would be. I am SO excited to have finally had this surgery! I truly feel so normal that I am really afraid I’ll forget that I’ve had it and drink too much at once. Dr.Wakins and his staff are amazing. Even though I had to come a long way, it was totally worth it to have the surgery with this staff. If anyone has any questions, you can Private Message me and I’d be happy to answer them.

Great post!

Great post, Karen! Thanks for the informative info.. I LOVE this forum!

Hi Melanieleigh, congratulations search, you've come to the right place. This is a long, overdue story and I will also post it in “My Positive Experience w/Dr. Watkins Thread." This forum is awesome and I've been researching WLS HEAVILY since about June. I've read a lot on WLS. I struggled with the idea of partial stomach removal w/VSG, but knew that having a foreign object in my body would make me worried: slipping, rubbing, etc. - so I wasn't excited about lap band, but some have had great success with it. When I read about GPS on this forum, I KNEW it felt right. WHAT MAKES THE RIGHT DOCTOR? Initially, in my mind, I was all set to go to someone locally, so that if I needed support or had issues they would be there for me. I have never had surgery of any kind so this was all new to me. I also thought that I would ONLY choose a doctor who has had some sort of WLS and would be understanding in the weight loss/surgery/food struggle. I attended a seminar from a Dr. who I think had done only 3 VSGs (yes, I know, they have to start somewhere and make a living, but in this case, I didn’t want it to be me) and I found out later that certain things he talked about were incorrect, (like shoulder pain cause being unknown and that could be permanent) is actually referred pain from the diaphragm -per Dr. Watkins. RESEARCHING… THANK GOODNESS I RESEARCHED MORE! According to one of the WLS books I read, complications go WAY DOWN (like 80%) when you use an EXPERIENCED surgeon. Of course, this GPS surgery is NEW, but it would stand to reason that it is still better to choose a doctor who had done a lot of surgeries, especially weight loss surgeries. Naturally, I researched Dr. Corvala in Mexico because I think has had done over 100 GPSs by now plus thousands of other weight loss surgeries. However, the book I read also cautioned that while some hospitals/Dr. were terrific in Mexico (just like US-there are good and bad hospitals/Drs.) it may be more challenging to find aftercare in the US. However, there are many people happy with their choice to leave the country and I probably would have been very happy with that route, but I am a worrier. As I constantly read the forum and asked MANY, MANY questions of the patients and to a few doctors. Dr. Watkins was the most responsive doctor. I would ask him about the surgery details, what other patients experienced, emotional eating, what hunger felt like, hormones, genetic makeup, etc. my symptoms, how big the size of the sleeve, aftercare, etc. For awhile I thought I would try dieting and exercise one more time, and he directed me to the free YOU TUBE about weigh loss which again, shows that although he does run a business, he is really trying to help people. I came obvious conclusion that Dr. Watkins is EXTREMELY KNOWLEGABLE, DEDICATED and in always in COMMUNICATION when you need him, is ALWAYS helping on the forum (even if someone is not his patient) and isn’t pushy. I had a friend that wasn't sure about her GPS surgery, and he left it up to her - didn't pressure her. She had it and is doing fine. I researched him EVERYWHERE and found happy patients and a great track record. Like others have said, it is important that you have the hiatal hernia fixed when they are doing WLS surgery, and that was important to me that Dr. Watkins did that. Yes, I love Cincy Weight Loss-NO I don't get any financial gain or have anything to gain, no discount for my writing all of this. I do not work in any way with Cincy/Dr. Watkins; I am just a happy patient. WHEN ONLY THE BEST WILL DO..TOP NOTCH CARE- DR.WATKINS/CINCY WEIGHT LOSS & HOSPTIAL This Dr. does the right thing.. he even denied me surgery because it was the right thing to do.. Here is my story: After asking A TON of questions and doing lots of research, I was scheduled for Plication surgery in the fall w/Dr. Watkins a couple months ago. Everything went great up to surgery, did well on the pre-op. Visited Cincy Weight Loss, it was a VERY NICE, NEW upscale area, the OFFICE was GREAT. EVERYONE there IS REALLY & TRULY INTERESTED their patients! They had a great book with lots of before & after pictures of real people and it was so exciting to see the success. My husband and I chatted with Diane for almost 3 hours about the great things and weight loss challenges. We met the nurses and his lovely wife Pamela and they were ALL great! We made new friends and had a GREAT TIME. We met Dr. Watkins in person, and sat in his office. He truly is a NICE, SINCERE, DEDICATED & KNOWLEDGABLE PERSON. He is very humble, but it still made me feel good to see all of his certificates/accolades on the wall to know that I was getting a quality and knowledgeable doctor. Since they rarely talk about it, I’ve taken pictures so everyone can see HOW NICE & NEW, MODERN the hospital and his office are. Never once did we feel “rushed” or pressured, or cut off in conversation, they listened answered our questions thoroughly-my husband and I were REALLY impressed. I was VERY scared, because I hadn’t ever had surgery or been put under other than my wisdom teeth. However, being put under and waking up was a breeze. HOSPTIAL was MODERN, NEW and I felt VERY confident with my surroundings. They even offered me a hospital gown with state of the art technology where warm air was blown in. I walked with the Dr. and staff into the OR, and laid down on the table. Everything was state of the art, clean new and I was out like light, felt NO pain (except for the initial IV). It felt odd when I woke up, like it had only been a couple of minutes. Unfortunately for me, the surgery didn’t happen because I had surprise stomach polyps for no good reason. I was VERY disappointed and asked Dr. Watkins about 5 times if we could do surgery later on that week, but it was important to have some other tests & due diligence done. Even though he faced disappointing me, he did the right thing. Some surgeons don’t even do an endoscope, which can reveal polyps, ulcers, hiatal hernias, etc. My family was also grateful for the level of care and professionalism from this Dr. Later on that day and few times over the weekend, he called us to see how I was doing with anesthesia recovery, and I didn’t even have the surgery! But he is that caring. After many tests, (gallbladder, H Pylori, blood test, gastric level tests, gastric emptying test and colonoscopy) it looks like I am fine. I have one more I am going to have done on Friday but I am SO happy that I SHOULD be having GPS surgery with Dr. Watkins in about a week! I am praying that there will be nothing from stopping the surgery and the new life.. Here are a final few words on what I’ve learned..1) It is NOT normal to have stomach pain/throat burning. I lived with this probably my whole adult life. The pain/burning I experienced feels the same as STARVING HUNGER-GOT-TO EAT-NOW was actually acid and was GREATLY reduced on the pre-op diet with the PPI/Prevacaid. Dr. Watkins and his staff have kindly and patiently helped me through this lengthily process of research and tests. Hopefully, no one will have any surprises like I did, but it only made me feel better about my decision. 2) Keep researching until feel comfortable w/your doctor. If you research their website you’ll see they SUPPORTIVE & HAVE GREAT FOLLOWUP: http://www.cincyweightloss.com/ Here are my pictures.. Info from Cincy Weight Loss Site Cincinnati Weight Loss Center is owned by Dr. Watkins, not a large corporation. This allows us to provide you with the kind of customer experience that family owned businesses like ours can provide. Most of our competitors focus on surgery. We focus on weight loss. There is a huge difference between the two philosophies. Other practices try to compete with us by lowering their price. We focus on maximizing your weight loss success. We don't strive to be the "cheapest in town". That is not a good weight loss model. We strive to provide the best weight loss success in every patient. We offer value - the lowest cost per pound lost. We get a lot of transfer patients who had gastric band surgery elsewhere and are disappointed with their post-op program so they transfer to our practice where we help them achieve their weight loss goals. Many practices don't monitor their weight loss success. We do, and have published five scientific articles on gastric band weight loss. We started doing band surgery shortly after it was FDA approved in the United States (June 2001). Since then we've completed nearly 5,000 gastric band procedures and have experience with band adjustments that number in the tens of thousands. That extensive experience has taught us many import things on how to perform gastric band surgery and how to take care of patients afterward to minimize their frustration and maximize their weight loss success. We repair/revise a lot of band operations done improperly by other practices. Patients who choose our practice want it done right the first time and want to maximize their weight loss success. People who only care about getting the cheapest surgery and don't care if they lose weight afterward go to our competitors. Dr. Brad Watkins Dr. Brad Watkins is one of the few surgeons in the United States who: · Has completed well over 1,000 gastric band procedures · Has experience with nearly 5,000 procedures in his gastric band clinics · FDA proctoring surgeon for both band companies (Allergan, Ethicon) · Published five academic papers on gastric banding in the surgical literature · Performs band-over-bypass procedure · Performs the new incisionless ROSE procedure · Teaches other surgeons on primary gastric banding · Teaches other surgeons on band-over-bypass · Teaches gastric band courses · Teaches ROSE courses · Consultant for Allergan Company, LAP-BAND® · Consultant for Ethicon Company, REALIZE ™ · Consultant for USGI Company, ROSE procedure · Completed many advanced bariatric courses and bariatric CME programs · Involved in multiple clinical trials for adult and adolescent obesity · Nationally recognized on the "Today Show" · Member American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery · Member Council for Advances in Bariatrics

This is a long, overdue story and I will also post it in “My Positive Experience w/Dr. Watkins Thread." This forum is awesome and I've been researching WLS HEAVILY since about June. I've read a lot on WLS. I struggled with the idea of partial stomach removal w/VSG, but knew that having a foreign object in my body would make me worried: slipping, rubbing, etc. - so I wasn't excited about lap band, but some have had great success with it. When I read about GPS on this forum, I KNEW it felt right. WHAT MAKES THE RIGHT DR? Initially, in my mind, I was all set to go to someone locally, so that if I needed support or had issues they would be there for me. I have never had surgery of any kind so this was all new to me. I also thought that I would ONLY choose a doctor who has had some sort of WLS and would be understanding in the weight loss/surgery/food struggle. I attended a seminar from a Dr. who I think had done only 3 VSGs (yes, I know, they have to start somewhere and make a living, but in this case, I didn’t want it to be me) and I found out later that certain things he talked about were incorrect, (like shoulder pain cause being unknown and that could be permanent) is actually referred pain from the diaphragm -per Dr. Watkins. RESEARCHING… THANK GOODNESS I RESEARCHED MORE! According to one of the WLS books I read, complications go WAY DOWN (like 80%) when you use an EXPERIENCED surgeon. Of course, this GPS surgery is NEW, but it would stand to reason that it is still better to choose a doctor who had done a lot of surgeries, especially weight loss surgeries. Naturally, I researched Dr. Corvala in Mexico because I think has had done over 100 GPSs by now plus thousands of other weight loss surgeries. However, the book I read also cautioned that while some hospitals/Dr. were terrific in Mexico (just like US-there are good and bad hospitals/Drs.) it may be more challenging to find aftercare in the US. However, there are many people happy with their choice to leave the country and I probably would have been very happy with that route, but I am a worrier. As I constantly read the forum and asked MANY, MANY questions of the patients and to a few doctors. Dr. Watkins was the most responsive doctor. I would ask him about the surgery details, what other patients experienced, emotional eating, what hunger felt like, hormones, genetic makeup, etc. my symptoms, how big the size of the sleeve, aftercare, etc. For awhile I thought I would try dieting and exercise one more time, and he directed me to the free YOU TUBE about weigh loss which again, shows that although he does run a business, he is really trying to help people. I came obvious conclusion that Dr. Watkins is EXTREMELY KNOWLEGABLE, DEDICATED and in always in COMMUNICATION when you need him, is ALWAYS helping on the forum (even if someone is not his patient) and isn’t pushy. I had a friend that wasn't sure about her GPS surgery, and he left it up to her - didn't pressure her. She had it and is doing fine. I researched him EVERYWHERE and found happy patients and a great track record. Like others have said, it is important that you have the hiatal hernia fixed when they are doing WLS surgery, and that was important to me that Dr. Watkins did that. Yes, I love Cincy Weight Loss-NO I don't get any financial gain or have anything to gain, no discount for my writing all of this. I do not work in any way with Cincy/Dr. Watkins; I am just a happy patient. WHEN ONLY THE BEST WILL DO..TOP NOTCH CARE- DR.WATKINS/CINCY WEIGHT LOSS & HOSPTIAL This Dr. does the right thing.. he even denied me surgery because it was the right thing to do.. Here is my story: After asking A TON of questions and doing lots of research, I was scheduled for Plication surgery in the fall w/Dr. Watkins a couple months ago. Everything went great up to surgery, did well on the pre-op. Visited Cincy Weight Loss, it was a VERY NICE, NEW upscale area, the OFFICE was GREAT. EVERYONE there IS REALLY & TRULY INTERESTED their patients! My husband and I chatted with Diane for almost 3 hours about the great things and weight loss challenges. We met the nurses and his lovely wife Pamela and they were ALL great! We made new friends and had a GREAT TIME. We met Dr. Watkins in person, and sat in his office. He truly is a NICE, SINCERE, DEDICATED & KNOWLEDGABLE PERSON. He is very humble, but it still made me feel good to see all of his certificates/accolades on the wall to know that I was getting a quality and knowledgeable doctor. Since they rarely talk about it, I’ve taken pictures (but the pictures don't do this justice..) but it will give everyone an idea on HOW NICE & NEW, MODERN the hospital and his office are. Never once did we feel “rushed” or pressured, or cut off in conversation, they listened answered our questions thoroughly-my husband and I were REALLY impressed. I was VERY scared, because I hadn’t ever had surgery or been put under other than my wisdom teeth. However, being put under and waking up was a breeze. HOSPTIAL was MODERN, NEW and I felt VERY confident with my surroundings. They even offered me a hospital gown with state of the art technology where warm air was blown in. I walked with the Dr. and staff into the OR, and laid down on the table. Everything was state of the art, clean new and I was out like light, felt NO pain (except for the initial IV). It felt odd when I woke up, like it had only been a couple of minutes. Unfortunately for me, the surgery didn’t happen because I had surprise stomach polyps for no good reason. I was VERY disappointed and asked Dr. Watkins about 5 times if we could do surgery later on that week, but it was important to have some other tests & due diligence done. Even though he faced disappointing me, he did the right thing. Some surgeons don’t even do an endoscope, which can reveal polyps, ulcers, hiatal hernias, etc. My family was also grateful for the level of care and professionalism from this Dr. Later on that day and few times over the weekend, he called us to see how I was doing with anithisa recovery, and I didn’t even have the surgery! But he is that caring. After many tests, (gallbladder, H Pylori, blood test, gastric level tests, gastric emptying test and colonoscopy) it looks like I am fine. I have one more I am going to have done on Friday but I am SO happy that I SHOULD be having GPS surgery with Dr. Watkins in about a week! I am praying that there will be nothing from stopping the surgery and the new life.. Here are a final few words on what I’ve learned..1) It is NOT normal to have stomach pain/throat burning. I lived with this probably my whole adult life. The pain/burning I experienced feels the same as STARVING HUNGER-GOT-TO EAT-NOW was actually acid and was GREATLY reduced on the pre-op diet with the PPI/Prevacaid. Dr. Watkins and his staff have kindly and patiently helped me through this lengthily process of research and tests. Hopefully, no one will have any surprises like I did, but it only made me feel better about my decision. 2) Keep researching until feel comfortable w/your doctor. If you research their website you’ll see they SUPPORTIVE & HAVE GREAT FOLLOWUP: http://www.cincyweightloss.com/ Cincinnati Weight Loss Center is owned by Dr. Watkins, not a large corporation. This allows us to provide you with the kind of customer experience that family owned businesses like ours can provide. Most of our competitors focus on surgery. We focus on weight loss. There is a huge difference between the two philosophies. Other practices try to compete with us by lowering their price. We focus on maximizing your weight loss success. We don't strive to be the "cheapest in town". That is not a good weight loss model. We strive to provide the best weight loss success in every patient. We offer value - the lowest cost per pound lost. We get a lot of transfer patients who had gastric band surgery elsewhere and are disappointed with their post-op program so they transfer to our practice where we help them achieve their weight loss goals. Many practices don't monitor their weight loss success. We do, and have published five scientific articles on gastric band weight loss. We started doing band surgery shortly after it was FDA approved in the United States (June 2001). Since then we've completed nearly 5,000 gastric band procedures and have experience with band adjustments that number in the tens of thousands. That extensive experience has taught us many import things on how to perform gastric band surgery and how to take care of patients afterward to minimize their frustration and maximize their weight loss success. We repair/revise a lot of band operations done improperly by other practices. Patients who choose our practice want it done right the first time and want to maximize their weight loss success. People who only care about getting the cheapest surgery and don't care if they lose weight afterward go to our competitors. Dr. Brad Watkins Dr. Brad Watkins is one of the few surgeons in the United States who: · Has completed well over 1,000 gastric band procedures · Has experience with nearly 5,000 procedures in his gastric band clinics · FDA proctoring surgeon for both band companies (Allergan, Ethicon) · Published five academic papers on gastric banding in the surgical literature · Performs band-over-bypass procedure · Performs the new incisionless ROSE procedure · Teaches other surgeons on primary gastric banding · Teaches other surgeons on band-over-bypass · Teaches gastric band courses · Teaches ROSE courses · Consultant for Allergan Company, LAP-BAND® · Consultant for Ethicon Company, REALIZE ™ · Consultant for USGI Company, ROSE procedure · Completed many advanced bariatric courses and bariatric CME programs · Involved in multiple clinical trials for adult and adolescent obesity · Nationally recognized on the "Today Show" · Member American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery · Member Council for Advances in Bariatrics

Yes! Only the BEST care with Dr.Watkins! I am glad you all are doing well. I am scheduled to have mine next week! SO excited!

Thank you EVERYONE! What a great post! Thanks too, Dr.Watkins for all of your help and kindess.

Sorry typing from a phone..I was starving and had to wait until 3 pm to eat or drink. I was amazed that I could comfortably consume 2 large crepes and half of a loaded veggie omelet with cheese. It is amazing how much the stomach can fit! I would be very disappointed too if I was you. From what other people talk about-you should have some stretching but pain or vomiting if you over eat. I wonder if it can be redone? I guess the option is to maybe ask about getting a barium test if you haven't had one to really see your stomach capacity. I am sorry about your situation.

Hi Sarah I love pizza but the most I have remember eating is about 5 pieces or about half of a medium pizza. I wonder if your pizzas are small er there? Still if you look all thru out the forum it seems like most patients can eat about 1 cup or less. I have not had surgery but soon hope to have it. The other day I disnt

I have searched in the Total Gastric Vertical Plication Sleeve Surgery thread and have not found whether or not anyone experiences hair loss with Plication ?(GPS, Total Gastric Vertical Plication Sleeve Surgery or Super Sleeve) surgery. I have found discussion threads in the VSG section, but would love to hear from Plication patients to find out if they are experiencing hair loss. One might hope that if you get your Protein in and don't have to have to have a large portion of the stomach cut out you'd be able to keep more hair. From the VSG patients it sounds like it happens mostly between 3 months to a year and then new hair growth starts.

Thanks so much

Thanks! I love your blog!

Thank you so much for replying..and I love your blog?