Cheating on the Band

[Andromeda 0]

A friend of mine said that she is getting the bypass done instead of the band, because it is too easy to cheat on the band. Is this true?

[Rchavez101 0]

I think they are all what you make of it. If your friend was thinking it was easy to cheat on the lapband then she will probably cheat on the bypass. I think the bypass would be harder to succeed due to there is no adjustment unlike the lapband. Just my thought.

[elikis 0]

The point of the Band is that you don't feel hungry for a longer time after eating smaller portions. If she is one who will eat even when not feeling hungry, or "cheat" my guess is she will have problems no matter what she does. Its a personal choice, really, both have positives and negatives based on your needs.

[cheryl2586 3,053]

If you are going to cheat it doesnt matter what weight loss surgery you have. If she is refering to not eating sweets with the by pass she still can she might have a reaction but she still can. Weight loss surgery is not a cure for obesity. Our minds are a cure for obesity. You can eat food not matter what surgery you have. If you have the by pass you can eat anything you want in time, if you have the lap band you can eat mostly anything you want also. Its all in how you percieve your surgery. I am a sugar addict one piece of candy leads to a whole bag no matter how tight my band ever will be chocolate will always go down it. You have to diet no matter what and weight loss surgery is only a tool. It wont make you break your bad habits if you dont want to. All I can say is if she thinks that way she is risking a whole lot more complications just to think she wont cheat because yes she will.

[honk 780]

It depends on how you define cheating. Since you can drink water; anything that is liquid will slide right down what I call the funnel and into the large stomach. That shake from McDonalds won't stay up in the pouch area for 5 hours even though it has 600 calories.

[MaineJackie 3]

When I was researching which surgery was 'right' for me....one of the reasons I took the band was that I felt I would have better long term success. With the RNY, and the fact that you can't eat sweets (without risking dumping syndrome) I thought that would make me feel deprived.

I think the band has given me control. If I want to have something sweet, I can still have it....but the band has helped with my feeling satisfied with less food, so I am less likely to over eat.

Can you eat "around" the band? Absolutely. chips, ice cream, Cookies, chocolate....all go down wicked easy. But for some reason I no longer feel like I need to have these......and when I do, I can control my portion size.

[gatorgal 0]

Sure it's easy to cheat or to "eat your way around the band." I quickly lost 75 pounds with the band, but recently, because I thought it would be OK to indulge in things like I used to, I have regained 10 pounds. With what have I cheated? All those slider foods that my doctor warned me against, mainly ice cream. I have had to take a hard look (and get a swift kick in the pants from my doctor) at my food choices. I will ALWAYS struggle with weight, and no tool is going to be the magic bullet. Fluffy above was right--weight loss is really in the mind rather than in any WLS. And ice cream will never give me the satiety that is the trick to making the band successful. I have to eat dense, healthy foods that will make me feel fuller longer.

Someone else posted that one piece of chocolate leads to the urge for all kinds of sweets. Well, for me, that's true. My doctor and I have devised a plan so that I can "detox" myself from sweets much like I did for my pre-surgery diet and three-week post surgery diet when I ate no sugar. I am back to a no-sugar diet until I can get back on track. Is it easy? No, but it is what will work for me. We are all different, and your friend has to decide what will be the best thing for her.

[nina874 48]

Absolutly, but then you can with all kinds of weightloss surgery!

If you want to eat icecream, creamed potatoes and gravy and all of the slide down a treat foods then you can and you wont lose any weight, but if you stick to a few simple rules - like eat the bulky stuff first and then just have one cookie which is all you will want when your band is full, then you will do fine. Often it is the taste that you are after, but the full mechanism gets turned off if you dont have a band. In my experiance if you push your band like that it will give you big time payback in the form of a stuck episode or just an outright vomit. I call it my choke chain, it yanks me back when I need it!

As one of the previous posters said, it is a much a battle of the mind as a battle with the stomach. I railed against my band rules for the first year, I still lost weight I just bitched about it all the time, then once I realised that as long as I ate the bulky stuff first and didnt have things swimming in sauces the weight would come off and I could still get all the flavours I was craving I just chilled out.

The bypass was waaaaay to radical for me, and I am the kind of girl that if I can't have something it becomes my obsession to have it, there is no way that I could deal with dumping syndrome, or the nasty side effects of fats. Everything had to be available to me I needed to take back the control myself.

I could go into all the reasons health wise why I chose the band but ultimatly your friend will decide to do what she wants to do, just warn her that none of the paths are easy!

[djmixon 1]

You can cheat on any kind of weight loss regime. It is up to you to stick with it.

I ended up eating stuff I wasn't supposed to yet this last weekend. I am back to the liquids now. I am just glad I didn't get blocked.

A friend of mine said that she is getting the bypass done instead of the band, because it is too easy to cheat on the band. Is this true?

[IndioGirl55 32]

If you are going to cheat it doesnt matter what weight loss surgery you have. If she is refering to not eating sweets with the by pass she still can she might have a reaction but she still can. Weight loss surgery is not a cure for obesity. Our minds are a cure for obesity. You can eat food not matter what surgery you have. If you have the by pass you can eat anything you want in time, if you have the lap band you can eat mostly anything you want also. Its all in how you percieve your surgery. I am a sugar addict one piece of candy leads to a whole bag no matter how tight my band ever will be chocolate will always go down it. You have to diet no matter what and weight loss surgery is only a tool. It wont make you break your bad habits if you dont want to. All I can say is if she thinks that way she is risking a whole lot more complications just to think she wont cheat because yes she will.

Well said !!!

WLS isn't about cheating or not - it'a about getting healthy - a piece of cake - or a cocktail - or some fried food occassionally isn't cheating - it's normal - what's not normal is eating these things 24/7 365 and not moving, thats how we all got fat in the 1st place..

[Andromeda 0]

I'm planning on the band myself. My mother did the bypass and well, since she lost the weight, she starting eating like she used to and not exercise and is gaining it back. I know my weakness....food LoL. I crave sweets often, so that is one thing I have to be mindful of. Thanks everyone, for the quick words.

[mimi368 0]

I have seen so many people regain weight after having a gastric bypass that I think if you are going to cheat, you are going to cheat no matter what. Both procedures are to be used as tools and you can defeat the purpose with either one.

[Melissannde 41]

In the little bit of research I've done I read somewhere that while the bypass uses malabsorption, eventually the intestine which is not bypassed, learns to compensate for.. it starts absorbing like the bypassed intestine was designed to do. Therefore caloric restriction begins to fade. This happens sometime after the first year after surgery. So if the RNY patient doesn't learn to make better choices in that first year, they may be in for a rude awakening.

We had a person at one of the support groups lately who was a bypass that had regained and was going for a band now. Called Band Over Bypass or BOB.

[Losing_It150 6]

My mom had bypass done and has gained all of her weight back.......you can cheat on any of them. If you are in the right frame of mind and certain of your decision you will succeed. There will be struggles....but that's life.

[Losing_It150 6]

Well said !!!

WLS isn't about cheating or not - it'a about getting healthy - a piece of cake - or a cocktail - or some fried food occassionally isn't cheating - it's normal - what's not normal is eating these things 24/7 365 and not moving, thats how we all got fat in the 1st place..

Love both of those posts!