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Reflux of stomach acid into the esophagus can cause scarring and narrowing of the opening as well as ulceration. The test of restriction is with real solid food. If you're too tight, you will start to move away from solid foods to softer foods so you avoid the golfball feeling of pain in your chest and heartburn. This can actually cause weight gain as you drink your calories down or let them melt down as in the case with ice-cream.

Sorry to hear this Wouldnt this be normal to gain weight with no fill for 1.5 yrs? Was she going in for a fill to prevent more weight gain and this iswhen they detected it? Lisa , remember I got a phone call from a bandster friend who was banded by Ortiz at your house in Vegas, she went to Tj and had an endo to find out she had an absess under her port, no erosion however, not yet anyways, but had to have her port removed and the absessed drained for 5 days..but back in November she had to have her flipped port surgically fixed, wonder if there is any connection? Hmmm.. The sucky part is erosion is a possibility, I wonder if it has anythingto do with the Dr.s who preform it or if some people are more prone to it then others, it is obvious from those I know who have had erosion being a perfect bandster not does not stop it from happening. Erosion is something I worry about everyday of my banded life!

hmm that is very interesting TBM, we might have to pay the outrageous small group plans premiums that we are just to have coverage. Is there any way to find that link? a certain search word or thread name? For a group of 2 healthy people no pre-existing conditions (except weight gain and loss) we pay $700 per month. Through Humana one (individual policy) my husband was paying $98 a month with our daughter on his plan! I won't even go into what I think of the insurance industry lol they certainly aren't out for our benefit. BCBSFL had us go through tons of testing for our son, get different opinions by "the best medical teams in FL" then diagnosed him with Autism at age 2. They sent us a "dear john" letter cancelling his coverage because of the long term care and benefits. We Appealed, talked to Ins Commissioner, appealed again - bottom line: get on the state's care for him. So I can believe they would find a way to deny coverage if you have the band

I'm struggling with how much I should be eating at a normal meal. Sometimes I think that I have no idea of what I should be eathing. If I eat 1/2 cup to a cup of food, I feel like I'm not getting enough nutrients. I can eat much more than a cup of food (depending on the food, even if it's healthy food), and since the holidays, I have done just that. Getting back to small portions of dense foods has been a challenge, and the 10 pound weight gain since October is making me feel horrible. So, for a healthy meal, how much are you eating?

It's a bang on article for me, my depression and weight gain came hand in hand.

I have been on paxil during menopause. I gained alot of weight, know it is not all the paxil but think it contributed to the very quick weight gain. I am concerned that my weight loss is slower being on it. Any suggestions or has anyone changed SSRI's since surgery? Carol

No only am I BP (medicted) but my birth daughter, husband, and adopted daughter are also. It can be a struggle but so much more so when we aren't on meds. thsnks God doctors now see it and can help us find the right ones but sometimes the side effects is weight gain (as if we need another struggle) On here we support each other no matter the struggle so feel free to share yours some of us are going throught the same thing and we can learn from you.Thanks so much for sharing you have already helped us.....................line dancer

@@Hiraeth That's amazing! I am so happy for you. I have PCOS and the fatigue and weight gain (plus sleep apnea!) were miserable. It feels so wonderful to get your life back. Keep up the great work. Can't wait to hear more on your progress.

Hi all! I am currently deciding to moving forward with gastric revision option. I had the sleeve originally. I was 287 lbs the day of my surgery My lowest weight was 130 and im back up to 185. I had a lifestyle, I chose exercise over food to cope. I was strong and I was so happy. Then it all changed!!!! I was diagnosed as bipolar and throughout the ‘learning’ curves of depression & the medication (which is known for weight gain) i lost my way health and nutrition wise. My depression consumed me and my I was taking meds notorious for weight loss. This along with my first detrimental ‘episode’ led to old bad habit. I see a psychiatrist monthly & psychologist weekly. Ive tried everything to loose weight but nothing worked. So now I want to know about some of your experiences! I am only 28 years old I want to run up the stairs without exhaustion, I’m getting married in the near future, I want kids. I want my lifestyle back I want to be a role model. I want to take my life back , a second chance, and live a happy life. I’ve searched everywhere but I haven’t found any information regarding treatment Resistant Depression & the ECT therapy. •Is it possible to do electroconvulsive therapy & surgery??? Has you done ECT AFTER surgery? / BEFORE surgery? •Has anyone had experience or success as a bipolar candidate? /// What did your surgeon think or say in the matter? •Has anyone had electroconvulsive therapy ( ECT) and Bariatric surgery??

back to topic guys "what was your final straw" i had so many trips/falls due to my heavy weight - knee replacements femur broke twice, etc i slowly realized that all my excess weight caused these problems falling since i had problems because of my "excess" weight i was always so sad about my weight weight gain, weight loss, weight gain etc, etc realized i had so many health problems i needed help, immediately hello sleeve good by diabetes meds/high blood pressure meds, no more CPAP my big NSV one was having my epilepsy meds dosage cut in half i was taking dosage for someone that weighed 235 lbs now that my weight was going down, down etc - i was taking too taking to many meds/pills so meds were less for a smaller person life is great now that's my story and i'm sticking to it kathy

Welcome. You will find support, love and laughter here. A quote that helped me pre-op. I posted this everywhere i mean everywhere in the house so i would see it. Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels. I was pretry much bed bound for 2 years. Yes i could walk but it would exhaust me. Sister i can go to miles. Lol could probably do more but my walking buddy has little legs and he gets tired. You are fighting head hunger. The root of all weight gaining. Occupy yourself with walking or doing something without food. Drink drink drink and eat Protein it will help. Good luck. HW 255# surgerversary 04/29/13 cw 202#

That's very important. Realizing that you're having a weight gain problem and working on it as soon as you can. You seem to have it under control. Keep us posted. Good Luck.

Three Years Later - What I've Learned Here's my experiences from the sleeve process years ago. I wish I had this information before getting the sleeve, so I wanted to share it with all of you: GAINING WEIGHT Gaining weight is easy: you simply eat when you're emotional, lonely, or not hungry. Even though my stomach would barely fit a slice of pizza, I could still suck down an entire large meat Lover's Supreme by eating a single slice, waiting until my stomach could fit some more and then eating another. Until the pizza was all gone. You can also do this with ice cream, burgers, fries, and all the other miscellaneous crap food widely available via drive thrus. This is why you're required to see a counselor and nutritionist - to handle your eating issues. If these aren't handled, then DON'T BOTHER WITH THE SURGERY. You will simply get fat again by eating smaller portions more frequently. If however you only eat when you're hungry - and stick to good foods then you're golden. Now OBVIOUSLY if you did that in the first place you wouldn't be fat. So surgery is a booster shot to your weight loss, and new way of life. Think of it as waging a war, and surgery is a tank. Now a tank is a formidable weapon. Can run over enemies, shoot some big artillery but eventually if all you have is that one tank, you'll probably lose a prolonged battle. So you gather some strategy and military air support (diet changes), some recruits and soldiers (lifestyle changes) and NOW you have a master battle plan for your war. And ultimately a better thought out path to success. You invested a lot of money and pain into this - don't screw it up. FIRST FEW MONTHS The first six months your weight will drop amazingly fast, because you're out of surgery and can only eat Soup broth for a week. And then slowly mushy foods come in, followed by a few solids. You don't really need a blender, there are ample canned goods you can eat. Baby food, blending a steak and other shocking posts you read about aren't required: just shop for other things that qualify. Going out with friends during this period is depressing, since your diet is so restrictive, you're staring blankly at the menu for a long time and finally decide on Water. Get everything you need together before coming home. You'll be on some pretty loopy meds when arriving home, and won't be in any shape to hit the local WalMart. Nor will your family want to bother with it - so plan ahead. FOOD AND STRETCHING You can only eat maybe a half cup of food during the first couple months. Then a cup after about five months, then two cups after longer. You can hurry this process along by stuffing your face until your stomach hurts so bad you need to go lay down, or vomit. But if your eating problem is that severe then see my multi-faceted approach to surgery from above. Each person is obviously different, but stretching your stomach (to me at least) seems difficult and a venture of pain and suffering. I can feel my stomach naturally taking in more food over time, however I've cycled that back down by going a few days drinking only delicious fruit smoothies. This makes my tummy literally shrink back to where it was after surgery, or pretty close, dependent upon how many days I go. You can also accomplish this via more extreme methods like water or veggie juice fasting, however banana/stawberry/pineapple with some coconut water and ice in the blender tastes much better in my humble opinion. If you do continue to gorge like a tick on bad foods, then yes your stomach will stretch. I've met a few people who's stomach has returned to normal size. Again - everybody is different, I'm just telling you MY story. How much food you can eat varies by food type: RICE - I can eat maybe five spoonfuls of this before I feel sick. Stuffing in another three before my body registers that I'm full and it's a vomit party. You need to eat slowly - there's a point in which eating more means bending over the toilet. And once you've experienced that joy, you quickly learn where the limit resides. Rice expands so you gotta be careful. An average meal of fried rice and an egg roll is a full day's worth of food, that requires splitting up. SODAS - Equivalent to drinking battery acid. I've met some people who've acclimated back to it, but why bother? MEAT - Steak is bad, try like five or six bites before calling it quits. chicken is similar. Fish goes down a little easier, and you can eat more, maybe because it's flaky. SALADS and FRUIT - I can eat one banana. Two is painful. Ditto with grapes, strawberries, etc. These foods process through your stomach quicker, so you can eat a little more often compared to stuffing down a sirlion. PIZZA - Takes me about 12 hours to suck down a large thin crust. Regular or deep crust, I end up tossing half of it into the trash. Desserts - They hurt. Bad. And then make me sleepy, ticked off and depressed. I mostly stick with natural sugars now like fruits and veggies. RESTAURANT EATING Eating out with friends has a lot of rules tagging along. You must wait 30 minutes after drinking water before eating (which works out great, since that's how long food takes to arrive). I order an appetizer or split a full meal with a friend, so this is not a big deal. I see and hear lots of drama about this mingling around, but it's not THAT bad, and you can easily make it look perfectly normal without telling people you had surgery. You don't need a little happy note from your doctor saying you had surgery, just get a doggie bag or go halfsies with a buddy. CONCLUSION These are just my two cents, and I hope they help someone. I lost about 100lbs, then gained back 50. I'm in the process of losing again thanks to a diet change (I went 100% raw food) and exercise.

I have been on Seroquel for many years for my Bipolar disorder and it has worked amazingly well. Last month my Dr. increased my dosage due to some problems I was having. I gained 8 lbs. Now he says he will take me off Seroquel and put me on Geodone if I can't lose the weight. I SOOOO DON't want that and am working hard to lose the excess weight so I can stay on Seroquel. Has this happened to anyone else? Has a medicine made you gain weight? I thought it was up to me to control the weight, but Dr. says "NO" some medicines make you gain weight. Do you agree or disagree with my Doctor? Did any medicine make you gain weight? Thanks, Terry

I also had to change some of my prescribed meds. With no change in diet but new meds, my weight went up. After consulting my Dr, he changed 2 meds that clearly had weight gain as a side effect. It worked to substitute other meds... It is worth looking up as itwas frustrating til we figured it out. Good luck

I think a little weight gain is normal but be very wary. For me, when I see my weight gain more than a couple of pounds I try to diet. If that doesnt work I go atkins untill my appetite and habits are under control. I also increase excercise it helps to control appetite. be very careful of carbs they can give you the urge to eat. I think that urge- appetite- is more of an enemy than real hunger. I think it will always be a battle for us but keep up the fight and dont feel discouraged. You got this far already !

I have been in prednisone for 6 years now. It is doubtful that a med pack will cause that much weight gain. You are only taking it a few days. Whatever you gain you will lose again. It would be like Water weight. If your doc thinks you need it then take it. Don't suffer with back pain. It will only be temporary if you gain weight. You might notice that you feel hungrier, but your stomach will not hold what it used to. Relax and take care of yourself!

Haven't binged, not a binger - but a single binge is not going to do much to you . Any weight gain is likely from the break in ketosis, and should come off as soon as your ketosis is - reinstated. Tomorrow is always another opportunity. So is right now. (Meaning - the "tomorrow" syndrome kills plans, the "right now" doesn't).

The more reliable research findings I've seen in this area support the consistent conclusion that individuals' differing genetic "instructions" convert calories to more or fewer pounds, depending on a wide-ranging calories = pounds equation. For example, these summarized findings at http://spectrum.diabetesjournals.org/content/20/3/166.full ... One study examined the effects of overfeeding on weight gain in pairs of monozygotic twins.24 Although all of the individuals in the study consumed the same amount of calories for the same amount of time (approximately 3 months), there was a large variation in the degree of weight gain, from 8.8 to 29.3 lb, among different individuals. However, the amount of weight gain was very similar within each twin pair. The reverse also holds true. When moderately obese monozygotic twins were kept on a low-calorie diet, the amount of weight loss varied greatly among different pairs of twins.25 However, within each pair of twins, the amount of weight loss was quite similar. These results indicate that the body's response to changes in caloric intake is dictated at least in part by genetics. Another line of evidence supporting the role of genetics in body weight regulation came from comparison of metabolic differences in individuals belonging to different ethnicities. In one study, a group of overweight women (average BMI ∼ 29 kg/m2) were kept on a low-calorie diet for a period of time until their BMI decreased to < 25 kg/m2, the defined upper range of what is considered normal weight.26 When these age-, weight-, and BMI-matched women were separated based on ethnicity (in this case African-American or white), differences in resting energy expenditure were apparent before and after weight loss. Although this study involved only a limited number of subjects, the results nevertheless suggest that individuals belonging to different ethnic groups differ in metabolic efficiency; those with lower energy expenditure while maintaining the same body weight are more efficient and therefore more prone to weight gain. Interestingly, African-American women had larger decreases in resting energy expenditure after weight loss, suggesting that they may be at higher risk to regain the lost weight. In addition, children belonging to different ethnicities also have different resting energy expenditures.27

Oh my just weighed myself today. I have gained 4 pounds can’t seem to get them off I do not know what to do. I am exercising and eating right. My surgery is February 7th. I am so worried that if I don’t lose the weight they will cancel my surgery. Any one ever had surgery cancelled? I am to start my period (sorry TMI) soon and I think that is why I am bloated, but will they understand that? Any advice?

I follow the basic band rules, because aside from losing weight, I do not want to cause any damage to the surgery. It was a big and expensive step to take, and I want to protect it. When I say the "basic" rules, I mean small bites chewed well, sticking to small portions, listening closely for the signal to stop, not drinking 1/2 hour before or after a meal, no carbonation, NSAIDs (for the most part). I was told no straws or gum, but I have zero issues with either one. As for the portions, my band dictates that....which pretty much stays in the 1/2-1cup measurement. I don't actually measure, but I can eyeball it when I put whatever in the bowl or on the plate. No matter what is on the plate, I stop when signaled. The other rules....well, I guess they're more behavioral changes they try to instill. Things like keeping a food journal and tracking calories. In the beginning, I tracked calories daily. Once I got to the green zone, I stopped. The band tells me all I need to know, and as long as I'm still losing, it's working. I feel completely FREE since I stopped tracking, and no longer worry about eating to the point of weight gain.

Hi there everyone. I was just wondering if anyone has ever experienced a 5 lb. weight gain suddenly?? I have lost steadily since I had my surgery (almost 2 yrs. ago), but I have never gained weight. I'm was actually down 134 lbs. before this sudden gain. I did goto a holiday party this past Saturday and I did eat a few bites of a number of different foods, but nothing that made me PB or anything. I do follow a low carb diet and don't drink any carbonated beverages so I'm stumped. I can't imagine that one night would cause me to gain 5 lbs. in 2 days. I also ate 2 chocolate chip Cookies on Sunday, but I've always allowed myself to have a cookie or two every so often. Does it sound like this could be Water weight??? I'm thinking that maybe I should do all Protein and veggies for the next couple of days. I just can't imagine that I would gain 5 lbs. in 2 days from 2 cookies and tasting a few different foods over a period of 4 or 5 hrs!!! Any suggestions or ideas are welcome. Thanks, Liz

I would avoid Pasta and bread. All empty calories. If you can't eat 3 oz of solid Protein you are too tight. My doctor doesn't want me drinking my calories ie Protein shakes. Some people are really tight in the morning and do a shake for Breakfast, I get that. I am at restriction and eat chicken twice a day and don't have any trouble. If you can't eat 3 oz solid protein by lunch you are too tight. People who keep the band really tight because they are loosing weight, usually eventually fall back on protein shakes. This usually leads to other liquid calories and thus weight gain.

I am so sorry you are feeling discouraged. Are you eating processed foods? The reason I ask is because processed foods will always slide right down because it already has gone through a phase of digestion it will not stay in your pouch. Take a look at your diet are you really not satisfied after eating some skinless chicken breast, vegetables and sweet potatoes for example? For the first year I battled with head hunger I kept telling myself I was really hungry but I wasn't I just wanted to eat. But please keep on going in the right direction no matter what your scale says doing the opposite will only cause weight gain and you already know that.

I had a similar conversation with a friend recently, (my BMI is supposed to be 100 lbs. I would be happy at 135-145! But my nutritionist suggested if I strive toward closer to my BMI, when the natural weight gain happens, I will be around 125.... ) she completely didn't see the point of getting so tiny and it really confused me. . I am so glad to share this with someone.