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Neater house, spend less money. We want a new house and we want to make a huge step up in terms of where we live and what we live in so we need to save save save. We're stuck on one income for the next four years while I finish my degree, sigh, I havent worked in 10 years as it is. The diet and exercise are going to take care of themselves, I truly feel I am not the same person any more.

No I dont. I dont believe in Protein as the be all and end all of everything, to me its just one of the macronutrients we need - of the same importance as carbs and fats, not more. I dont count protein grams, I dont eat a ton of protein (probably average out 40 to maybe 60 grams most days for my 5ft 10, 168lb frame) and I have not had hanging skin, nor did I lose my hair. I think a well balanced diet, with plenty of the good fats can help, and taking a Multivitamin supplement is good insurance for everyone. I guess the only thing I could say that has perhaps helped is that I'm an exercise fanatic. I run looooong distances and I lift very heavy weights. I work very hard, at least an hour of really hard stuff most days. No namby pamby walking for me, lol. But I really think its luck of the draw. I also had 3 huge 10 lb babies and never got a single stretchmark, and I did not carry weight on my stomach but more, all over, stretched over a tall body. I also was overweight/ish most of my life, but not severely obese for more than about 4 years. Simple as that.

I need 1300 to maintain, I do good to get that many in each day. Many days I am under by a couple of hundred. Seldom do I go over, and the times I have, it's 10 - 100 calories, never anything major. I FEEL like I eat constantly just to eat what I need to! I hope this never changes!!

Maintenance calories can be all over the map depending upon factors too numerous to count (but including such things as lean body mass, activity levels, and amount of metabolic damage.) When I dropped to within 10 lb of my goal weight/body composition, I was still losing at a fairly consistent rate of 10 lb per month (and had been for the previous three months) which implies a caloric deficit of about 1000 calories, so I had a ballpark number to work toward (which turned out pretty close, as I was losing at an average of 1100 calories and am maintaining in the 2000+ range.

Hi. I'm new here to the forum and wanted to jump in and introduce myself! Im a 52 year old fluffy gal from Just south of Pittsburgh. My surgery was Feb. 5, 2015--lap RNY. This past week has certainly been a learning curve for me. I'm not sure exactly what I expected ( which, incidentally, I think would be a great thing for those awaiting surgery--to actually WRITE what they expect week 1), but it wasn't this! The surgery itself wasn't awful. I think the worst pain is from a hernia my surgeon fixed while he was in there. The part that I wasn't anticipating was AFTER the surgery. See, my drs. office has been amazing. The girls in the office have cheered me through the six months (10 months in my case, but that's another story) prep period and been right behind me. In the hospital, however, when I woke I felt like I'd been thrown to the wolves. Suddenly, full trays of food appeared at my beside (am I supposed to EAT that or photograph it for future reference?); the compression apparatus on my legs was at once vaguely titillating and cutting off my circulation; my IV kept setting off an alarm that would just miraculously stop (am I dying? Have they just given up on me?); my foley was....well, doing what a foley does; I knew I needed to walk, but the call button for the nurse was about three inches from my stretched fingertips (while the Salisbury steak was inches from my nose). I was...alone. I guess at that point I wanted coddled a bit (not that I'm spoiled or anything), but a "poor dear, what can I do?" would have been more than enough. At any rate, that is just the start of my already too long introduction. This week has included numerous calls to the dr; a high-drama trip to the local ER; and more meds than Carter had liver pills (what? I'm old!). So...if I haven't lost you yet, I hope to become a part of this community--even if you only let me sit outside with my ear to the door. Although--it's like -10 here today!

Hey Karen, I finally got my laptop back just to have to send it back again! Otherwise I am a huge chatter box on here! What time are those meetings? I wish one meeting would be in the morning. How is everyone doing? Shauna, check in will ya? I missed you yesterday online. I am online in the morning usually between 9-10:30 and then after 10:30pm (when all good mommies are either cleaning or sleeping). LilMonkey: How are you and your hubby doing? Lara: Are you still around? Phoenixwife: Where are you? I hope all of you are doing well... I am in One-der-land finally! And I'm going swimming tomorrow.. I don't have to go far, my back yard! Check in everyone and give us an update!

I'm sorry it took me so long to get back to you, if you haven't found a way to finance please look up the care credit. I wouldn't say its the lowest finance you could get - i do have a great credit score but I wanted it fast and it was the fastest route- I knew i would be able to pay it off in a year. Don't let lack of credit detour you from trying though. If you call them they will answer your questions about how much your monthly payment will be and so forth. It took me matters of minutes to be approved. Airfare is not included. I live in Michigan about 4 hours away from detroit. Did I loose fast? ok I'm in constant loss of weight but in the beginning it was a struggle because I didn't have the restriction so its not like you wake up and pounds just drop off. When I finally got restriction.......wow they fell off. Now my body is totally different therefore my mind is different (I feel so much better about myself) and I do sooooo many different activities (exercise does not mean u have to b at a gym it can be riding bikes, play ball ect.) but I want to do those things. I started out at 264 and I am now 182 (and still losing its been a year 2mo.) I'm 5'5" tall and am not a skinny minnie but I feel great about the skin I'm in now. I can go into a store and try 10 outfits on and they all fit-now its trying to decide what one to buy instead of just hoping one will fit right! If there is one point of advice I can give you is please get your fill every 6weeks until you reach your sweet spot. I didn't and I could've been further along a lot quicker. We are what some may call lap band orphans I've learned throughout the journey and a lot of my info comes from this site. I've fought my whole life with my weight losing many times each time gaining more than when I'd started. I would keep it off for 2-3 years then balloon up. You are so young I believe you would be so happy! I wish I had done it sooner. I researched it for 2 years b4 I made the commitment. Same reasons as you the finance. My husband and I stayed at the " hospital motel" I want to say it costs something like $14 or $17 under 20 anyway. I wish you the very best in this journey!!!!

Congratulations on your 10 months progress. Fantastic, you look awesome!

I'm starting at 10 for the first day, so two sets of 5, and going up 5 per set each day. I don't think that there is any problem splitting them into 3 sets. Once I start hitting higher numbers i will probably start splitting them into more sets. Sent from my iPhone using VST

Hey girl, I think I would have to say that you probably shouldn't get an unfill but it really is a personal decision. As an example I'm going to use your stats/information and apply it as if I was putting myself in your shoes.. Hope you dont mind!! 45 lbs in 9 months is great, well done *pats on back all around* that is roughly 5 lbs per month (although we all know it usually doesn't work out so smoothly it can be 10 one month, nothing, 5 the following etc). So lets say you unfill and have a "food indulging vacation" and granted it is only for a weekend (I believe that is what you said) however, depending on how much you indulge you could easily gain back 5-10lbs in that weekend - I wouldnt want to undue 1-2 months of progress for 48hours of food inldulgance. Not to mention I believe you said you are at/near your sweet spot and if you unfill say "x" amount = 5cc's you may not be able to just get 5cc's put back in and be at the sweet spot again - it could take another couple of months worth of fills here and there to get where you need to be. And if you are anything like me going through the stages of getting restriction is frustrating as heck! And to risk being the pot that calls the kettle black it does sound like you are still associating "fun" with food. The reason I make the pot/kettle comment is I am still learning how to break that association myself (I'm just over 3 months post op) and the reason I want to break that association is as a part of my journey to the new me - the healthy me who has a healthy body and healthy relationship with food. Heaven forbid some day down the road something happen to my body or my band and I have to have it removed (the band, not the body - although a replacement body would be nice hehe :cool2:) I hope that if that time every does come (knock on wood that it doesnt) I will be equipped mentally and emotionally to deal with it so to not eat myself back to my old ways. Good luck on your journey, and I wish you the best :tongue:

Thank you for everything...now u said u did self pay and I'm just curious I'm 19 and my credits not too high. Did you have to have good credit for that carecrdit? I think that sounds like a great option for me I just need to know what hoops I have to jump through for each option. Are payments pretty high up there? Did that include airfare? Also about the procedure did you loose pretty fast ? Thank youcomfortable and full faster but able to swallow w/o vomiting- when u reach it that is when It all begins life changes as u know it! This has truly changed my life.... No more tv for me..... now I love to play basketball with the family, ride bikes, go to the beach , live life without being afraid b/c of my size. No more back pain either!!!!!! And also since I was self pay I didn't have to do any pre surgery visits I just called and 2 weeks later I was having the surgery.

Anyone else catch this show? My Tivo recorded it last week for the first time, so I don't know if it's new or what (on National Geographic Channel). First one I saw, they follow the story of how someone (tourists all I've seen so far), agree to do smuggling to make some extra $$ while on a vacation.. get caught, and go to jail. First one was a guy smuggling nearly $2m in gold to Napal, and got caught, and was sentenced to 8 years in Napal's jail. He had an uncle in the royal guard or something, and was able to get him pardoned on the king's birthday after 8 months of jail time. It's really surreal, so this is what I expected. I watched Mexico last night :wink_smile: So we follow the story, they are doing illegal stuff, so shame on them.. but it still makes me think of Broke Down Palace-- though these people brought it on themselves. So near the end, I expect to hear how they were released.. they've been interviewed the whole time, how they thought they were smuggling weed from Costa Rica to Amsterdam (weird concept imo), and the layover in Mexico they got caught.. and it was a crap load of Crack, not weed. So they got 10 years in prison. And they are currently serving it!! So near the end, they are showing us around their cells in prison in Mexico City. They won't be out until 2014. What a crazy thing to happen, it fascinates me. I couldn't imagine being on vacation somewhere, and getting dazzled by the idea of smuggling drugs or gold, etc. through foreign countries. Wow. Anyway, this is one of my new favorite shows, it's so scary!!

I dont even know if I am posting this in the right area. I need some serious advice. I recieved an explination of benefits from my Carefirst BlueChoice about a week ago stating that my cost of surgery was $6152.56. I was shocked today when I recieved another explination of benefits stating that I owe $1026.00 for anesthesia. Here is word for word of the explination of why it was not covered: Under this members coverage, benefits for any services or supplies related to weight control, weight reduction or overweight conditions are excluded. Sicne it appears that these services relate to one or more of these exclusions, we are unable to provide benefits for these charges. Please refer to your employee benefit booklet. WTH!! I called the insurance company to asked if they cover this procedure. I was told yes! In additon, I was given the guidlines ( 6mo supervised diet and documentation). I only had to do 3 months because I had documentation of 3 prior months of supervised diet. The lady that handles the insutrnace info also checked. I was approved 1 week after submitting my information. So I called carefirst and the lady said she would look at my $1026 claim. After being on hold for about 10 mins she told me an adjustment was made and it would take 20 days. What does that mean. Am I going to recieve a bill for the whole 1026 plus the $6152.56? What should I do? How can they switch crap up like that?:smile:

I'm interested to know if you found an answer to your question. I also take vyvanse 70 mg + 10 mg of methlyphenidate

You will do great. 10 months out today with my surgery from Dr Alvarez. I'm down 156 pounds and still losing. I can't thank him enough.

Since most of us are off restriction on what we can do... does anyone wanna do a November exercise challenge? Like I hope to do 3000 steps on the wii fit 5 days a week for November. Which would total 60,000 steps. Anyone wanna join me? BTW I can do that in 30 minutes max. So it's a total of 600 minutes for a month, 10 hours. teri

I was banded 10/28/09, and had my first fill in Feb.2010, I didn't really start losing till March after my second fill. Keep doing what you have been doing, once you get more restriction you will start losing more.

My 12 yr old stops eating when she's full, my 10 yr old eats till she's stuffed. I don't want to put pressure on her because what my psychologist who helped through my "eating disorder", or disordered eating as she called it said is that there is a lot of research that shows that when from a young age we are told when to stop eating those "cues" that normally tell us when we are full or when we are hungry are lost, or aren't given a chance to develop properly, which I believe is true, as I said earlier from the age of 9 I was put on a diet,I was told what to eat when to stop, how much I could eat, and I know that my fullness cue didn't exist , I would eat till I physically couldn't anymore, the sleeve helped me so much with that because now I pay attention to when I'm full, still amazed how I completed changed my relationship with food

Eureka & DJjackson... yep, my 10 year old is exactly the same... regardless of what he is eating, once he is done.. he is done|! He only eats when hungry and never, ever eats to feel 'stuffed'!! My daugher and husband on the other hand.... well they eat til they can't eat anymore! The annoying part.... they are all in the healthy weight range - sooooo... that leaves exercise... and yes, guess what... all three do a lot of exercise that they love! My daughter who is 12 now did go through a stage about 2 years ago where she was 'fat' and I am not sure why or where this came from.... it lasted approx 6 mths. She now understand that her body is changing and that she is turning into a woman,.. she hasn't mentioned it since... My son is probably more body aware because he does boxing training and has recenlty been asked by the coach if he wants to fight... he is aware of different muscle areas and has a 6 pack developing nicely, of which he likes to parade!!! All that said I am going to keep an eye on him... I don't want him to focus on how he looks !!

I lost 19 pounds my first week post op. But the scale hasn't moved for me either in almost a week. I know my body is holding on to everything cuz it feels like it's in starvation mode. Give it a little time and I bet you see a big drop soon! Don't give up, keep hanging in there.

Get your potassium checked. That happened to me and I was admitted to replenish fluids and get 10 bags of potassium.

That's so exciting! Congrats to you! My goal is 8-10. In a 14 now and starting to get a little baggy.

Hi Everyone , I had gastric bypass about 3 months ago as a revision to the gastric sleeve due to horrible GERD, and before that I had the lap band in and had to have it removed due to some of the same symptoms that I am having now and since I left the hospital I have had nothing be chronic nausea and some vomiting, I do get dry heeves almost very day and these " episodes" can last for about 10 minutes at a time, I also have left side abdominal pain that sometimes feels like gallbladder attacks, my surgeon has been trying every thing to figure out what this could be, my EGD came back normal, no structure or leak, currently taking zofran raglan acephex Zantac and care fate, I have tried to stop these and I end up feeling worse and sicker I also had an upper gi done that just showed reflux, he is sending me for a ct scan because of the pain, he does think that there may be a super small hernia, and he wants another pH study to see if the acids are really bad again. He said that he has a whole bunch of docs looking into this but I have stumped them all. He gave several options such has having a j tube or tpn so that I am getting some nutrition, he did ask if I feel better if I don't eat, and I said yes the nausea is not as bad as if I eat. He also said he is going to see if mayo clinic will look into my case due to the complex nature of it all. I just want to know has anyone else had anything like this, or any other suggestions. I a just at my wits end with all of this I am not even 25 and having all these problems, and I just feel that all of this was done in vein, and I don't know what to think or do please help Erica

Last Thursday I saw Dr. Srikanth for my pre-surgery consultation. I went ahead and started my liquid diet on that day which made it a 12 day pre-op diet instead of 10. I haven't cheated except for having some caffeine which I am not supposed to have and yesterday and the day before I had a piece of fish. I wasn't feeling good and really wanted something. Unless I am desperate I hope not to actually eat anything else. But the caffeine has been warding off my headaches. I have been having protein shakes and clear chicken or beef broth. I haven't been getting all the water in though because I am trying to not drink 30 minutes before anything and 30 minutes after and have been forgetting to drink it. I can also have sugar free Jello and sugar free juice popsicles. I am really amazed that my date is getting so close. It is now 9 days away. I just cannot believe it is going to happen. Everyone is asking if I am anxious or nervous. I don't know how to answer that. I am kind of worried about the pain because I have never had any surgeries before. I pretty confident that it will all be okay though.

It is hard to believe it is over. I am doing well but before I get into that I want to try to recap before I forget everything. The night before the surgery I decided to go to bed early since I had to be at the hospital so early the next morning. I was required to be there by 5:30 AM which was riddiculous. I arrived on time with both of my parents and checked in. We waited until they called my name and they took us to a waiting room. One by one people were called back. Hours went by and my name wasn't called. I of course couldn't eat anything, but I felt bad because my parents weren't eating because they didn't want to eat in front of me. I forced them to eat at lunchtime. Yeah... I said lunchtime. I wasn't called back until 11:00 AM. When I got called back they weighed me. I was excited to hear her say that I was 297!!! I had started my pre-op diet at 316 so that meant that I lost 19 pounds. She then took me to a small room with instead of a door there was a curtain. There was a whole line of them down the hall. I was to take everything off and put on the gown and robe. There was also a haircap and socks with skid resistant rubber on the bottom. A nurse came in to start my IV and I was happy that she decided not to do it in my wrist but higher up my forearm. She then asked me lots of questions that I had been asked a bunch of times already. Once she left they let my parents in. An hour had already passed. My poor parents were so tired. I stayed there another two hours and then they came to get me. I had say goodbye to my parents and I walked to another room where they made me lay in a bed. More people came and asked me questions then I got to close my eyes and wait some more. When they came to get me they pushed the entire bed down the hall to the operating room. Once I was there I had to slide over to another bed. They gave me the anesthesia and I was out quickly. I only remember them asking me to take deep breaths once in a while. When I was all done they pushed me to another room to recover. It was similar to the first one that I was in earlier. They put my bed in an almost verticle position and it made me slide down to the rail. I was so uncomfortable. Luckily a nurse later helped me fix it, I just couldn't change the angle at the top of the bed but I at least got to change the ange at the bottom so that I didn't slide out. I really didn't get any rest that night. They were doing my vitals every three hours and I had to walk at those times too. I didn't mind the walking, I just minded the getting up part. My port site hurt when I had to get up and sit back down again. The next morning they had me change clothes and hang out until they were ready to do my upper gi. I got discharged about 9:00 AM. I asked for more pain meds before I left since I was starting to hurt again and I had an hour ride home. Luckily I found a comfortable recliner at Goodwill last week and that is what I have been sitting in since I got home. I was even able to get a good night's sleep last night. I just have to force myself to get up and walk so that I don't get a blood clot. My cats have been great. My little girl kitty really wants to sit on my lap and I have place a pillow on my stomach so that she doesn't jump on me and hurt me. I have to guide her to my shoulder so that she doesn't hurt me. My incisions look pretty good. The port incision is really indented and hurts a lot. The nurse said it was normal. I do feel better than yesterday. I just have to keep drinking water and broth. I would write more but I am now feeling sick. My head is starting to hurt so more later...