BeBe

I lost a $1,000 ring in Vegas... just slipped off my finger as I was walking. I asked the hotel about a lost and found, and they took me to a room and pulled out a box FULL of women's rings! Unfortunately, mine was not among them - but it just goes to show how often our rings slip off un-noticed.

Keep in mind that it's not all about the numbers on the scale. I was upset that I wasn't losing at all... but then my clothes seemed loose, so I went shopping for a new pair of jeans and discovered I was a size FOUR! I had been losing inches, but not pounds. It will happen at the rate your body wants to let go of it. Remember, your butt and your cellulite have been friends for years - it may be hard for them to part company. ;-)

Thanks everyone. I'm shocked, to say the least. It was totally unexpected - I already have 5 kids with only one left in the house (12 years old). I thought I was DONE!!! I'm too old to go through this at 39, right?!?! LOL! I'm taking it in stride - but it does seem to be my luck. LOL! I definitely need to get loosened up now, because I can hardly keep anything down.

Found out I'm pregnant. OY!!!

In the year and a half since being banded, I haven't had a single carbonated beverage... it's just not something I'm willing to risk. I used to be addicted to Diet Coke, but I honestly don't miss it.

I ate very little before being banded - or so I thought. All of my exes could never understand why I had weight issues and would often tell me "You eat like a bird! How can you be overweight?!?" I must have been getting a lot of calories from a bite of food here and there - all the grazing that goes on during the day... because since I've been banded, I've lost almost 70 lb. (I'm 1 lb. away from my goal weight). Yes, you will lose weight. It might be slower than other people (it's taken me almost 18 months to get here!), but it will happen.

I will be living back in San Diego in Sept. and would love to meet other bandsters...

Who do you see in Boise now?

My cycle shortened from 28 days to 24 days about 2 months after the surgery. It really sucks...

Some people look at this as "taking the easy way out" and can't support what they see as failure. They don't necessarily know how to react to admitting that your weight was something that you couldn't control on your own and you needed a "medical intervention". While she wasn't as supportive as you may have liked, at least be glad that she wasn't mean about it either.... because as others have said, there are those who have no problems insulting someone who had WLS.

How do you find places that do this? I googled it, and came up empty - but I may be looking for the wrong thing.

I did that with my first fill! I ate a chicken wing and it got stuck and I couldn't even SWALLOW! I was miserable until it came unstuck about 24 hours later. I would wait it out a little bit and see if it comes up or passes through. You can take some papaya enzymes to help. When my chicken wing went through, I was sipping on gatorade - I just kept taking the tiniest drinks and waiting a minute and taking another one. I know of someone else who ate after a fill and got something stuck so she went in for an unfill and then regretted it since the swelling went down and then she had NO restriction but was out the $$. Once it passes through (or comes up), make sure you stay on liquids until your swelling goes down.

To the person who thinks it's the low calorie diet alone (Lindsay?) - I'd just like to ask why then have I been at the same weight for almost 3 months when I'm eating less than 1,000 calories (more like 500-600) per day?!? If I'm already restricting my calories - obviously there has to be more to it. If I knew of someone in my area who did this, I would certainly give it a try. Just because you are not finding a lot of positive articles on hcg doesn't make it snake oil. I only just heard about it from reading this thread... it's still very new apparently, and the more people use it, the more data there will be on its effectiveness (if it is). It certainly couldn't hurt - so why be so negative about something that could possibly help others? Why discourage someone from doing something that might help them? How many of us were discouraged from getting the lap band? How many of us were told we should just get more exercise and eat less?!? Our bodies work in mysterious ways that doctors don't always understand (if they did, they would be able to tell me what's wrong with me! LOL!)... and just because there hasn't been enough positive results collected to satisfy you, there are plenty of intelligent women here who can do the research themselves and form their own conclusions without you trying to stuff your negative opinions down their throats. We are here to encourage and support each other - sheesh!!!!

I wonder if there was a lack of "positive statistics" to be found online when the lap band was new? Just thinking aloud here... ;-)

Ok, I just got back from my appointment, and he took .3 cc out, so right now I guess I'm at 2.7 cc. I'm trying to eat some chicken right now - we'll see how it goes. I just want to be able to start eating healthier foods. I haven't been able to eat vegetables in MONTHS... and very little meat (mainly just the fish from Jack in the Box would go down). Cross your fingers for me. Thanks!!!