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Kristen, throw that Halloween candy in the garbage! That's what you would tell me so do it for yourself. We're supposed to get Papaya Enzyme. I got mine at Walmart and the brand name is Spring Valley and they are chewables. It's not very expensive for 180 tablets and the holistic Dr I spoke to yesterday said we can take 6 if needed. Caryn, I know that protein drinks do that to me too. Now I need to cut out the black beans in my hubby's wonderful turkey chili and no more sweet potato fries for me. I just started the probiotic and maybe between that, watching what I am eating more carefully and the Papaya Enzymes i can reduce the gas. Sorry about TMI. Last night we ordered Outback takeout with friends. I was amazed that I actually stopped and felt full after les than half of my petie filet and less 1/4 of a baked potato. I ate all my salad with their Tangy Tomato dressing and felt full so I stopped without eating even half of my dinner. A real NSV for me. I thought their dressing was low fat so I used it. NOT! That house salad was 216 calories. I should have checked it before I ate it. If I know I am going somewhere out to eat I always check to see if their menu is online. If I had, I would have taken off the croutons and used my own dressing. I really did enjoy it but looking back I should have been more careful. Since I had not eaten much yeserday I was 156 calories over my 1100 so it will probably be OK. Overeating on salad, dumb mistake. :mad3: We can do this! Blessings, GG

Hello August bander!! How is everyone? Its 6 months today I got my band. I have been doing well and loving the band (sometimes) It is kinda tight and I like it like that, it helps me make the right decision to eat. Old habits or you can say bad habits are hard to break. I log my food everyday on my fitness pal, I look for help and advice from friends or family when I struggle. I was never a breakfast person and now with the band I find I dont like to eat breakfast so I have a protein shake every morning. I try any and all shakes and usually stick with the isopure, 2 splenda in a blender. Lunch is usually Chobani with some protein granola in it, by lunch I have usually had my protein for the day. Dinner is always different. Meals I enjoy CHILI always is good, chicken depending on how its cooked,turkey sausage keilbasa with kraut, I love the crockpot and try to mix up meals in there. Crock cooking helps because my daughter is 3.5 and son is 17 months doesnt leave me much time to do much when I am home with them and my husbands days off rotate so im alone and not always easy and by the time I get them in bed it is almost 8:30/9pm and I'm done by then!!!! I started couch to 5k, I was religious with it but its been cold and I have weened off a lil in the following weeks. Since my husband leaves for work by 6am I have to be up and dressed to run by 5/5:15AM if I wanna get it in. I have been doing it usually 3 days per week and go to the gym once a week to get in a Zumba class. I love it and lots of fun! The weight was slowly coming off and I am happy with that. i am still not done and still a work in progress LOL I have lost 49 pounds and I started at 236, was 231 the day of surgery and now I am at 187..ugh 1 lb away from 50...SOON!!!! Once I started running the weight flies off, so anyone thinking they cannot do it, you can and its a basic simple training program that works on interval run for a minute or two then walk then run...interval training has worked wonders for me. I am so proud of all of us and we are keeping our heads high and doing it! Somedays are better than others, some things are tolerated one day and not the next. I still hate eating with people, I go out to lunch with coworkers but usually play it safe and get a chili. I skip most carbs- bread, pasta, pizza, bagels,cereal (all was a staple everyday or once a week) I have changed everything I used to eat and feel terrific. I on occasion will eat slider food and regret it but for the most part I follow the "rules" I stay focused on my goal, i am liking my willpower, determination, and my 50lb weight loss verses the guilt I would feel for going to mcdonalds and pigging out, or the clothes not fitting and me getting angry or upset with myself and saying "thats it Im going on a diet" and failing the next day. Its not always easy but the NSV's I have had these 6 months will carry me another 6. I like walking into a regular store and buying clothes at Macys, not sweating from a flight of stairs, and most of all even if the scale doesnt move I know I am not on a diet but I have changed my lifestyle for the better. Wishing eveyone the same success!!! I have an incredible support system from online bander support groups, friends, neighbors, family, books, LBT, and my husband. I am here if anyone nees any support, advice, or a kick in the arse LOL best of luck A11's keep on with your journey and dont ever quit! keep your eye on the prize!

I only weighed myself a couple times/month in the beginning. I can actually remember each one.... day 1 of preop diet, day 11 of preop (to make sure I was losing what my surgeon required) surgery day postop day 5 (when I returned from Mexico) postop Day 11 (New Years Day) 6 weeks, 7 weeks, 10 weeks, and 3 months. Don't even know if I had the infamous 3 week stall! But I do know I gained 3 pounds between weeks 6 and 7 and still weighed the same at 10 weeks. Then randomly lost 13 pounds by the 3 month mark. Not weighing myself drove one of my friends crazy. She had bypass 8 years ago and she weighs daily. She couldn't believe I never knew my weight when she'd ask. It was fun torturing her ???? Ever since then I've weighed once/week so I have something to post on the challenges on here. I don't own a scale, so I weigh at work on the dog scale (after Breakfast and coffee), fully clothed with shoes or boots. No clue what my actual naked weight is. For me, NSV's mean so much more than numbers

another NSV: I have a large hill on the vacant lot next to mine that I mow every week (because the owner doesn't take care of it and I don't want his weeds spreading to my yard). Last summer, I had difficulty getting up the hill on my riding mower and couldn't even attempt to go horizontally because of the risk of rollover. Now that I'm almost 100 lbs lighter, I can go horizontally with ease and my mower has no trouble getting up the hill.

I was thinking to myself: why don't I know where to shop men's clothes in this city? Then I remembered it was because I used to wear a 6XL and could only shop online. For more than a decade. Today, a few shops will see me bring items in size L and M - and 32" pants, if you can believe it (I still can't) into the dressing rooms. I'm not sure I'm even needing anything, I've changed my wardrobe already. I just want to go out to shop and not feel out of place. Simply planning to do that feels like such a NSV. Wish me luck! Reference expectation, except I'm not really a hooker. Or a woman. Or in LA.

My newest NSV. Life is so tough now. I have just caught myself complaining that there is too much choice in the clothing sites online. I used to rage when I could not find clothes in my pre op size.

I bought a couple of sweaters from Ann Taylor Loft on sale because I have nothing for the colder weather. The size small was not the NSV - but the freedom to not feel like I “shouldn’t” wear a sweater with horizontal stripes was a big one! I didn’t realize how much my mom had instilled that in my head until I was looking at the website and purposefully skipping the ones with horizontal stripes because it would make me look bigger. Well, I got it in the mail yesterday and I think I can now say wearing horizontal stripes will be part of my life! PS - I think anyone at any size should wear what they want and what they feel good in - but my mom hammered into me all of these things about being heavy from like middle school on (suck in your stomach, be in the back behind people so your full body isn’t on display, no horizontal stripes, etc.) so this is just 30 years of baggage I’m trying to unload. Wearing horizontal stripes is major for me.

My new NSV: I was able to finish an entire spinning class without panting for breath or quitting early! It’s amazing how much losing weight can make working out easier! Now I’m training for a triathlon coming up in a few months!!

i'm can (and want!) to do this: P.S. no, not a "weird" NSV, just kinda cool...cant seem to find the old, just vanilla-NSV thread and got lazy to keep looking! so here we are 😂

This isn’t a NSV, but everyone reading this thread HOPEFULLY can give me some insight. I am 18 months PO. I have lost 156 lbs. (total) BUT, WHY do I bite the inside of my mouth when I chew sometimes! Is it the weight lost in the face, sagging to allow me to ‘bite it easier’ now?

Weirdest NSV: Taking my son to baseball training practice and having the teenage boys spend more time staring at me then their trainers!

So it turns out that 7kg or about 15.5 pounds is what I need now. Took some trial and error but my buoyancy seemed pretty good with that weight. Another weird NSV - I play the violin and I am going to need a new shoulder rest. There is a lot more room between my chin and shoulder now. I hadn't even thought about that until I wondered why I was cramping up during rehearsal the other night.

New nsv for me is feeling lighter on my feet. Just being able to stand in my heels for a longer period of time and noticing that my feet are not hurting.

OK, here's a funny one. I need to start off by saying that my husband is supportive, thinks I'm beautiful at 240 pounds when we first met 18 years ago, all the way up to when I weighed almost 400. I've lost 165 so far and naturally have a ton of loose skin. You can also feel a lot of my bones now underneath it all. Anyway, my husband and I were lying in bed and talking about my progress and I was talking about the loose skin, and he said yeah, I have a sack-o-Tricia now! Now I know this may sound like an insult, but he was just saying it was crazy how much I've lost, and I died laughing at "Sack-o-Tricia". And what I love about it is that he knows that Tricia is the person I am, not the shell I am inside. And I love him for that. He's always loved me for me. So it's sort of a NSV, but also I'm super lucky to have such a supportive husband. I'm pretty darned proud to be a Sack-o-Tricia now! [emoji1787] Sent from my Nokia 7.2 using BariatricPal mobile app

I somehow missed this thread when it was first started. I just found it and enjoyed reading everyone's NSVs! I have a lot of similar ones, but here are a few of mine: I used to have to keep the steering wheel in my car raised to make room for my belly, and it blocked my view of the clock and temperature. Now I can put it low enough to see the whole dashboard. The other day, I climbed 12 flights of stairs like it was nothing. Didn't even have to stop for a break. Amazing how easy it is without carrying a whole extra person! I used to leave a lot of extra time when going to work, meetings, etc. because walking to another building or up stairs would leave me sweaty. I used to carry around a fan and small towel so I could cool off/dry off after getting sweaty. I also liked to be super early to meetings to make sure I wouldn't have to squeeze behind someone to get to a chair. Now I can just get there on time like a normal person and not worry about any of that. I was taking a walk recently (which is crazy in itself -- I never used to just go outside and take a walk!) and I had to move off the road while a car passed, and I tripped and fell in the grass. When I was 300+ pounds, a fall like that would have hurt and it would have been hard to get up. This time, I just jumped right back up like it was nothing. I no longer dread meeting people in person for the first time as I used to when I knew they would think less of me once they found out how fat I was.

Have a mixed NSV from today! I'm 5 weeks out, and flew Southwest today to visit my parents for the holiday. I paid in advance for the COS extra seat policy, and when I got there I was stopped by a supervisor and told I wasn't big enough to qualify. I'm down 30lbs since surgery and about 45 since I last flew. The downside is that I'm still big enough that people don't exactly look thrilled to have me as a seatmate!

My surgery was in July, but My favorite NSV so far is: Went to universal and fit on every ride easily. Last time I went I couldn’t do two of the rides!

You guys! I just realized a NSV that I have to share!!! This is something that I've been wanting to achieve - forever (not forever, but for a little over 7 years)... The keyboard tray on my desk is at the same height as the arms of my chair. For as long as I've had this chair/desk combo (a little over 7 years), my tummy has stuck out farther than the arms of my chair. I could squish my keyboard tray in and touch the arms of my chair, but my tummy would be touching the tray. Today - I noticed that my tummy isn't touching the keyboard tray, but the tray is up against the arms of my chair!!!! There's only about 1/4-inch of space, but it's there!

Eating a cookie may not sound like a NSV, but two days I ate one Girl Scout thin mint cookie. Not one box. Not one row. Just one cookie! It was my first one post surgery 1.5 years ago. Trying to make sure it’s not a slippery slope, but leaving the rest in the fridge for my family. I savored every bite of the ONE I had.

What a fantastic NSV! Truly life-changing. Congratulations and I hope you enjoy learning to drive your new car.

These "small" victories are such big deals. Congrats on this NSV - it's a good one!

A few NSV, I can finally close the towel around me, my hubby folded my tank top and put in his drawer thinking it was his, and my digital scale kept giving me a warning to have the app open when weighing in because people were within same range, I thought it was me because I was trying to see how much my weight fluctuated and how that affected my body fat % but turns out I'm 8 lbs lighter than my husband.

I can relate somehow. My negative NSV is that I've lost the "padding" I used to have and now sitting for a long period of time hurts haha.

i'm 4.5 yrs post op now, so NSV's come few and far between, but every now and then a new one will pop up: yesterday i was sitting on a chair scrolling through my phone when i dropped it in my lap. i shut my thighs to catch it, it landed on one if my thighs, then it slipped right through between them and fell to the floor. my knees felt a little knocked, and i was thinking damn, i hope my apple-care warranty is still valid, then i realized whoa, my thighs are smaller than i think. p.s. my phone is ok! 😂

I second this. I have been on this site for almost 15 months now and I have NEVER heard anything but encouraging and very helpful advise from Arabesque. Congratulations on your NSV.