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Wow!!!! That's an awesome weight loss. I have been told the same as the other commenters. 1-2 lbs per week. Hope you feel better soon!

I was banded almost three years ago in March 2008. I initially lost about 80 lbs but have plateaued in the last year. My doctor was very impressed with my weight loss at first as I was a college student. I've recently graduated and I'm having issues with inactivity and poor diet. I really appreciate knowing I'm not alone in this! -Liz

I am 15 days post-op and I want lie this has been so hard I was so moody during the 2 weeks pre-op and now trying to get used to drinking and eating again it been very hard for me I am always full and it's way harder than I thought it would be but I am taking it one day at a time and praying on the long run it will all be worth it. Best of luck to you Sent from my iPhone

I peeled mine off about 2 - 3 weeks in and I did get some scab with it, it didn't hurt though. I put normal bandages on and they were fine. My pants took 3 weeks I think. They are shipped from Britain so that is why they take so long. I read somewhere it is actually boat shipping.

Brian , My surgery was 11/5/08 and it was a breeze, i'll tell you why. My doctor and staff are second to none but since you aren't in New Orleans to see them ,i'll let you in on the secret's they gave me As soon as you get home start your pain med's and your gas-x strips . Continue taking them every 6 or 8 hours, whatever your bottle says, even if you don't feel any gas or pain. The objective is to have the med's in your system so that you don't have to feel the pain or the gas . You are beating it to the punch. If you wait for the symptom it is then to late and it will take forever for the med's to kick in. Also, walk as much as you can around the house, this will move the gas and also help in healing. Drink your liquids at least 2 ounces every 15 -30 min. I had no surgery pain or even gas pain but I did have slight soreness around the port sight. I used a heating pad on this area and it worked wonders. Also you may need to sleep on a few extra pillows at first. It was much more comfortable than lying down for me. Watching TV will become hard because every other commercial is about food. Get your spouse to go down to the local library. They loan out usually up to 6 DVD's at a time for free. You can keep them up to 2 weeks . Just relax and heal . Stay out of the kitchen because by next week if you see food you will want to devour it. Out of sight , out of mine. If you want to shove something in your mouth keep those Blue Bell sugar free pop-sickles in the freezer and just suck on that . Oh and I read about alot of people hating protein powder and I hate it mixed with water but I buy the EAS at Sam's and mix it with milk and it is great. I could't drink it if I had to do it just with water. I hope I was of some help. :biggrin:

totally my case a swell except the pain was so bad when I took a small sip of water that it felt like I was being stabbed. I was re admitted after only one day of being home because they were very concerned for me. they thought I had a leak. But after lots of tests they found nothing wrong, so they decided it must have been severe sensitivity to anything in my stomach. I was very swollen for a week but after that things got way better. I was able to drink 1/2 a ensure drink over the period of an hour lol but it was something! I still have very small intake but I feel good. Im 2 months out now. I can eat allot more variety now which is nice. dont worry it gets better as time goes on

@@JamieLogical I appreciate the information. I sent my coordinator a message and he said that it will be sent in a couple of weeks. I'll let the others in my surgical group know.

I just looked back through my email and see that I received mine on 9/13/14. My surgery was 9/1/14. So it was just under two weeks. They do all of their note-taking in Spanish, so it makes sense that it would take them a little time to have it translated to English. The surgical report itself is two pages and goes into a lot of detail about materials used and whatnot. Then there is one page that is a scan of my EKG graph. And one page that is a scan of my lab results.

Hi! I am brand new! I've had my first initial consultation and won't get to have surgery until December. I have to have 4 monthly visits for insurance. One down, three to go! I'm so excited, nervous, ready all at once! I am do thankful to have found this site and have already learned so much!! Thanks!

Hoping for a better Thursday…Here’s the plan! Breakfast: Peanut butter and banana on toast. Lunch: Going to brown bag it. Hard-boiled eggs, string cheese, an apple, and a protein bar. Dinner: Probably pick up something quick on the way home, maybe steamed chicken and veggies with the sauce on the side plus brown rice from a Chinese place. How is your Thursday shaping up? What did it look like? Share your Thursday menu and remember – if you post your menu each day this week (Monday through Sunday), you will be entered into a drawing to win a $50 gift card to The BariatricPal Store! Don’t worry, you can still be entered into the drawing if you go back and post your earlier menus on the appropriate threads if you missed them already!

Had my surgery on 10/17/12.... up until now was really wondering what the hell I was thinking. Well, really, I'm still thinking that. I'm just out of sorts. My Dr wants me to stay on Protein shakes, Water and yogurt for the first 21 days. That was making me feel so lethargic and yucky. Yesterday I ate three or four bites of egg and instantly felt better. Is it the different type of protein or is it just in my head? I'm still getting weak quicker than I expect. Still trying to find comfort zone. I started this process to be healthier for my granddaughter. To be able to be active and live longer with her. That is my prize, so each pound lost is more time with her, thus worth every minute of any discomfort I may have.

I'm 15 days out today and just started three week soft foods. I've been having problems getting in all of my Protein since I had surgery. Yesterday, I thought I was doing awesome but today I'm having acid reflux so much more. I'm on Previcid 30 mg which the Dr. prescribed but before the surgery I was on Prilosec 20 mg a day. I don't think the Previcid is working! Also, the last two days my left side has been hurting a lot. I thought maybe I pulled the muscle or something. It hurts really bad when I lay down. Kinda goes around from the back to the front right under the ribs on the left side. Any ideas anyone of why this is happening? I called the nurse and she is yet to call me back. I'm so surprised!! NOT! Thanks guys!

Thanks! I saw other posts in which you mentioned eating cream cheese but didn't know when you started. It is so soft and mushy don't know why it's not on the approved list. I could have one tsp of pureed salsa week two. (Well this is San Antonio).

Today i had my second filling. I am currently at 4cc. This time the needle poke hurt a little. Next filling in 3 weeks. I can't wait. Lost another 2 lbs. I was worying that I was doing something wrong and not loosing any weight, but the doctor told me that was normal and i should start loosing a lot more once they get me fully filled - or whatever amount they deem sutable for me.

Give it a full week to see if it kicks in, then if you have a gut feeling your just not as restricted as you should be, make an apt to have your fluid level checked to make sure the last fill actually made it into your band.

I had port revision one week ago and they put 4.5 in my 10 and (1st fill ever) and by monday, I had to have 2.5 removed b/c I was throwing up all weekend. Then today, I had a complete unfill cause I cannot keep soup down. Please help. Are you supposed to throw up afer fills? Is my band failing me?

I wouldnt see why not, but definitely check with your surgeon first and I would be interested in knowing whats he says. I have my surgery next week but am also looking forward to starting to tan in a month or so too

Although my surgery is 3 weeks away, I love reading the questions and answers posted here. Thank you and glad you are feeling better. Thank you so much for the recipe, I've saved it for down the road.

I was able to eat chicken breast at 4 weeks. I was told by my bariatrician to make sure to cook it to just done so it doesn't dry out. Then use sauces or gravies to help make sure it slides down easier. My favorite recipe is Greek chicken breasts. The marinade actually changes the texture of the chicken in a great way. It is low fat and delicious! marinade: 1/2 cup olive oil juice of 1 1/2 to 2 lemons 2 cloves of garlic pressed or minced 1 to 2 tablespoons of fresh oregano chopped Salt Pepper Mix it well, put it in a ziplock bag with the chicken breasts for minimum of one hour. The longer you let it marinade the better. You can even do it the night before. Then grill the breasts using either your outdoor, indoor grill or grill pan. Cook them to done, don't dry them out. They are awesome and the rest of my family loves them. I serve them with grilled zucchini or tiny Greek salad.

@@LapbandKAB I had my band done Nov 2009 and the last few week i have been having the same thing... but it got much worse so today.... i went see dr... (who is also a close friend thank God) He took out 8cc.... Of course he fussed the hell out of me for waiting.... but i don't have insurance (he didn't charge me a dime) and hated to ask him to do that..... but he took it out and said when i feel better to go back and he would put some in for me.... i lost another 15lbs in the past few months and thought if anything the band would get loser.... but nope. he said this happens a lot. So my advice.... take care of it now... don't wait like i did and make your self miserable

Hi all, I was sleeved 3/4 and am down 35 pounds as of today! I was cleared to start back at the gym this week. I started working with a trainer and it has been pretty intense. I am getting about 100 grams of Protein a day. And totaling about 800 calories. I am trying to get in with my nut for recommendations but she is scheduled way out. Any advice or experience with this? Sent from my iPhone using the BariatricPal App

I was given clearance to begin tanning immediately after my one week post-op appointment.

Right before I made my final decision to go through with the RNY, I had a fear that I might lose too much weight. I thought, what if I lose the 110 lbs I need to lose but I can't stop after that? What if I keep losing and i look like a walking skeleton? No no no this is too risky. It's not for me! It's really silly now that I think about it. I'm only 7 weeks post-op, but I'm confident of how much I will lose and where I WILL stop. ????

GPS is a very hot topic in the bariatric surgery community and growing every day. I am now starting to train other surgeons on the procedure and the demand for this is increasing as patients request GPS and surgeons want to learn how to do it. I have visited several U.S. surgeons that also do GPS for the benefit of sharing information and maximizing our collective knowledge about a new procedure. We share information on a regular basis for the benefit of our patients. Last week I visited a prestigious academic center that has started offering plication as well. When we first started, our patients were having a hard time pronouncing and remembering terms like imbrication and plication so I asked my wife what we should call it and she suggested GPS for Gastric Plication Surgery because it was easy to remember. This term seems to have caught on and now I see even international surgeons use the term. There does not seem to be agreement about the bougie size (bougie being a soft rubber tube used to size the new stomach sleeve). I have a strong opinion that the sutures (stitches) should be interrupted (individual stitches with a knot tied at each location) as opposed to a running stitch (knot tied at each end of a long stitch taking many "bites" along the way much like sewing. With interrupted stitches, the tension is controlled at each knot. With a running stitch, the tension is not controlled and can get too tight and lead to stomach tissue necrosis and/or perforation which we have all read about on this board. Another part of this is not to place the suture too deeply. In surgeonspeak, the suture should be seromuscular, not full-thickness. I also have a strong opinion that the ideal stitch is 2-O Ethibond. This is a third generation silk that actually causes a bit of scar tissue (favorable) which makes the bond stronger than just the stitch itself. Ethibond has been around for many years plicating the stomach for other reasons and it holds really well. I have seen Prolene used which is a monofilament suture and causes no reaction and actually doesn't hold its knots as well (poor suture memory as we call it) which means the knots can come undone. I think Prolene is at too high of a risk for prolapse where the whole thing resorts back to the normal stomach size or even worse where only one section is herniated out and could cause problems. I also feel strongly that the sutures should be no more than 2-3 centimeters apart from one another. I've seen surgeons place their stitches much further apart and I think this again increases the risk for prolapse or the stomach herniated back out between the stitches. We've learned from doing thousands of band surgeries for the last 9 years the importance of a two week liquid Protein diet prior to surgery to reduce the size of the liver and improve the ease of the operation. The first weight you lose comes out of the liver. I also think it is important to eradicate the known stomach bacteria, Helicobacter pylori because it is ubiquitous, most of us have it in our stomach lining and it can cause ulceration, inflammation or swelling when surgery is done on the stomach. This is easily eradicated with a two week antibiotic regimen pre-op. I think it's important to stay on a liquid diet (pureed Soups, applesauce, Jello, pudding, yogurt) for the first week and soft mushy foods for weeks two and three. Carbonation is a bad idea in any stomach surgery for weight loss because it dilates our work. (Have you ever opened a dropped can of Coke?) The best weight loss is acheived when you avoid drinking liquids for an hour after a meal. This allows you to be fuller sooner and longer and really makes the tool of GPS more effective. We have found that Levsin (hycosamine) 0.125mg SL (sublingual - under the tongue) given pre-op and continued three times daily post-op dramatically reduces the crampy abdominal pain after GPS. This has really improved the patient experience with this surgery. I also use lots of numbing medicine (local anesthetic) during the surgery which dramatically decreases pain after surgery. I always scope the stomach during the operation to make sure we're not missing an ulcer or polyp or any other important pathology. I do this in the operating room because it saves doing it as a separate procedure and also the scope is the ideal bougie size so I leave it in for the sizing catheter and this allows me to look at the perfect sleeve I just created when we're done with the procedure. Many surgeons don't do a stomach scope and I worry about doing this with no knowledge of the stomach lining. There is a lot of debate about stapled sleeve gastrectomy vs GPS. One item of consideration I think is important is that stapled sleeve patients have a 9% incidence of Vitamin B12 deficiency. The stomach makes something called intrinsic factor that aids in the absorption of Vitamin B12. A distinct advantage to GPS is that no stomach is removed and the intrinsic factor levels are not disturbed so you would expect that GPS patients would not have such a high incidence of vitamin deficiency. Stapled sleeve patients are also deficient in several other Vitamins such as Iron, folate and Vitamin D. (Ref: Obesity Surgery 2011, Feb 21(2):207-11.) I think there are many advantages to leaving the stomach in the body - just making it smaller as a powerful weight loss tool. Ghrelin gets a lot of press but it is important to realize that you reduce ghrelin with pressure (food in a smaller stomach). Ghrelin is a feedback hormone so physically removing stomach doesn't eliminate ghrelin. You guys have seen me rant about hiatal hernias on this board and I continue to feel strongly about repairing this during the surgery. What I've learned is that if you are overweight, there is nearly a 100% chance that you have a hiatal hernia and even if this is small it should be repaired at the time of surgery. Otherwise, you will have terrible heartburn when your stomach is made smaller. I get calls from patients that had GPS elsewhere and they have terrible heartburn and their hiatal hernia was not addressed at the time of surgery and they are pretty miserable. This is avoidable. Hiatal hernias are really easy to fix at the time of surgery so my opinion is that there is little excuse for ignoring this principle. The latter part of this month, I have a major annual surgical conference and plication is now on the agenda of this meeting. All this to say, I think that GPS is here to stay and gaining in popularity. One of my GPS patients came in the office last week having lost over 70 pounds in less than six months and he is quite thrilled as am I. That is all the good stuff. To me, the main downside is that the procedure is still new and we don't have long-term data. Two year data out of Europe looks good but we don't have two year U.S. data yet. There is some interesting data from Germany showing dilations ten years after stapled sleeve gastrectomy and I think the GPS can do this as well. We know from other operations that the key to preventing dilation is to avoid carbonation and avoid eating to the point of regurgitation after the stomach is smaller. Whenever something new comes up with GPS I will post it on this board. I also thank you for teaching me. Your experiences that you post here educate all of us. Keep up the great work. I wish you all the very best of success in your weight loss journey. Don't forget to buy yourself a substantial present when you reach your goal. Brad Watkins MD

I was banded on Friday (May 28) in Mexico. I had the option to stay until Sunday but chose to come home yesterday because I felt it would be more comfortable at home. Right after the surgery I had pain in my shoulder and more gas pains than anything else. Today there is very little pain - just a little discomfort. I do have to say that on the drive home, I drooled over every restaurant that I passed by and the food ads on television are driving me crazy. This eating clear liquids for a week is not going to be fun but I am definitely not going to do anything but follow the rules. What did surprise me is what small drinks of liquids you have to take. If I take too large of a sip, it feels like it gets caught - I guess like it's going down a funnel. Weird.