on the right side of the page, is filling up nicely. If you haven’t had a chance to do so, I’d encourage you to spend a few minutes today looking through. There is a tremendous amount of wisdom packed into the various blogs as to what the process of losing weight with a Lap Band is like.
For those of us here in the US, today is Memorial Day when we remember those whom we lost in war. To all of you who have lost someone in war, my kind thoughts go out to you today.
Nice blog update. Jaime, of Jaime’s Journey, went to the doctor the other day and has officially lost 50 pounds! She started off at 350 and her doctor is now teasing her that she’s just melting away. She has before and after pictures up as well - pre-surgery, 1 month post and 2 months post.
Lise the Loser came back from her weekend at Langley, Washington to discover that she has officially lost 30 pounds and now weighs - dun da da da! - 199. She is in Onederland to stay!
Achieving Me has bought herself a fabulous black ruffled dress (it is dreamy) for the Winter Ball she will be attending this July! She got it in a size 8 (12 for our Aussie friends) so that it fits in a few months.
Lastly, I think Gwen has some new photos up of herself in her photo carousel.
Happy Mother’s Day to all. A documentary I co-produced a couple years ago on the training of opera singers is being screened for the board of the organization we worked for tomorrow night. I’m excited about that. My darling 29 year old son may, or may not, be aware of Mother’s Day but you know, a mother’s hope springs eternal.
I’ve had Ashley’s Lap Band blog, The Band In Me, linked on my blogroll for several weeks now. She’s a twenty-something Lap Bandee in Seattle, Washington who has amassed a pretty amazing series of videos on YouTube. She starts 1.5 weeks before surgery. She weighs 235 and has just lost five pounds.
Cut to a year later. Here she is two weeks ago, talking about her progress.
The amazing thing is that she has a total of 51 videos online in addition to her blog. Here’s the link to her channel at YouTube where you can see all of her videos. Ashley certainly doesn’t pull her punches on the complications of a Lap Band but talks about how worthwhile she has found it to be.
FYI, she had her surgery done at Northwest Weight Loss Surgery in Everett, Washington. These people have a great site with a lot of information available to prospective patients although a lot of it is applicable to everyone regardless of where you’re having surgery. Here’s their page on how to approach your insurance company for coverage. They have an active study going on about adolescents and Lap Bands and accept teenagers for surgery starting at age fourteen. They have offices in Yakima, Bellingham and Spokane as well.
There’s a lot of information here. I think you’ll enjoy it.
I just checked in with Dr. Chris Oliver, my favorite Lap Band blogger. He’s 16 months post-banding and has lost 55% of his excess weight. He’s riding in bicycle tournaments, competing in triathalons and he looks great. If you haven’t read his Lap Band blog, by all means, check in. Being a physician, he writes with a level of detail and precision we don’t get with most Lap Band bloggers.
Anyway, he’s blogging about a Lap Band study out of Lebanon that followed 591 patients with an average BMI of 41.95 (that’s our 5′4″ woman at 235 and our 5′11″ man at 290) that had a Lap Band procedure. Fifty-one of the patients wound up having their Lap Bands removed. The researchers followed their weight loss for up to ten years. After the first year, the patients had lost, on average, 66% of their excess weight. At the end of the second year, they had lost, on average, 72% of their excess weight. At the end of four years, 75.9%. And, most delightfully, at the end of six years they had lost, on average, 82.8% of their excess weight! How exciting to learn that people continue to lose as time goes on.
If you want to check your BMI, you may do so here. For the newbies, most insurance standards require that you have a BMI of 35 with at least two co-morbidities - meaning high blood pressure, diabetes, sleep apnea or high cholesterol before they will cover it. If you have a BMI over 40, usually you don’t need the co-morbidities. I have a link to a list of the standards for several dozen insurance companies here.
I’ve had Lise The Loser linked in my blogroll for a couple weeks now. She did a good post the other day though, that I wanted to link quickly because I really approve of first person information. You gotta talk to your doctor, but I think that hearing from the people who have been through the process already makes a huge difference in your decision making.
I was writing to my friend Christina complaining (go figure…me…complain…unheard of!) I was afraid that I’m becoming a boring bandster now that I’m in this post-surgery/pre-fill/no restriction phase. So, the brilliant recently banded Christina wrote:
“First of all, you are not a boring bandster, you can always give updates on your pain. I know that is always a popular topic, people always to know what to expect. You can give an update so the people behind you can get an idea of how you are doing these days… are you totally pain free? do you not feel like your innards are coming out anymore? Are you pooping normally, eating normally, getting all the protein, do you have hiccups (I do) yadda yadda yadda. How it felt the first time you sneezed. (hurts!) that’s all stuff that at least I would want to know. we all know you hate exercise so i wont look for that :-)”
Isn’t she a smart cookie? I think so! So here are the answers (I feel like I’m being interviewed…how fun!):
Then she goes on to answer the questions. The first question is about pain, so I know that a lot of people are interested in that:
Are you totally pain free? Yes! I’m totally 100% pain free. I would say I became pain free at the 2.5 week mark. I can now sleep on any side I like, twist, turn, bend, and all of the other wonderfullness that comes with being pain free. I remember feeling like I would always have some pain during the 2nd week…when it hurt to even sit for long periods of time - but this is over. I forget I even have the band in me. Port pain is a thing of the past.
Good news there. I thought the questions on food were interesting, and Lise’s answers certainly echo what Lorraine Kay had to say in her videotaped interviews.
Eating normally? Totally normal. Everything except for bread, pasta, rice, crackers, etc. Basically nothing with wheat or too many carbs. But I eat steak, carrots, all fish, chicken, mushrooms, tuna fish, squash, etc. Have not had a problem yet…no vomiting…sometimes I wonder if the band is really in me or if it’s all a mental test and I’m “rat number 2128″.
Getting all the protein? Most definitely. I eat tuna everyday for lunch and have either steak, chicken or salmon for dinner each night. I am Mrs. Protein. I also drink a SlimFast-a-ccino shake every night before bed because it makes me feel like I’m having ice-cream. Yummm. It’s packed with protein, as well.
Lise is a prolific blogger and I’m sure you’ll see a lot of the questions you have answered in the course of her journal.
I just stumbled on Gwen’s WLS Journey blog this morning. She’s an RN who is studying nurse anesthesiology. She’s been banded for a year and she’s very thoughtful about the process and her relationship with food. Her entries aren’t short so if you’re looking for pithy little blurbs, she’s not your writer. Her slide show with different images of herself at different stages of weight loss is really nice.
She has a new physician who is advising her to increase her protein intake. I haven’t read anything quite like this before:
So anyway, I see Dr Pennings, at last. He didn’t seem super impressed with my weight loss at 1 year, but he saw I was within 20 lbs of goal. He liked how much I am exercising. They did a Tanita body composition thingie and determined that I had 120 lbs of lean mass, and he used that number with his personal number of 1.5 gm protein per kg lean body mass to determine that I need 90 gm of protein per day now. Um, what? How am I going to do that, without protein shakes? I think 75 gm might be more doable. My “people” at the Portland office told me 45-52gm, which I have been going by for the past year. Pennings believes that my weight loss will pick up again if I get 90 gm protein in per day. I believe he might be full of crap. But anyway, I’m trying to increase it some.
One useful tidbit he did give me was the calories-per-protein-gram rule. He told me to check labels on foods, and “gravitate” towards foods that have a ratio of 15 calories or less per 1 gm of protein. This seems reasonable and simple to do
Anyway, check it out, if you’re interested. I’ve added her to the Lap Bandee blogroll so you can always find her.
I’m always looking around for new and interesting blogs to add to the blogroll - the idea of this whole site being to provide as much info as possible for people thinking about gastric banding as possible. MJ, from A NEW START, talks about the changes in her life. Small post. Thoughtful post.
I can’t do this by myself. Putting weight on by myself is easy. I can just eat and eat and eat - I don’t need any help with that. Without all of the supportive comments that I get here, and on my piczo page, and on the yahoo message boards I don’t think I could do this. Thank you all. The support I’m getting in real life is priceless too - my boyfriend, most of my family, my friends and my colleagues make it so much easier.
Every study done finds that people who attend support groups do better than people who don’t. You can’t just get this surgery done, and then get it right without help. I know from people I’ve spoken with that having a good support system in place, even if you’re doctor doesn’t provide a group for you, will make a big, big difference in your level of success.
There’s a whole new world of flavours, textures and tastes out there. I think I’m eating better than I ever have in my adult life. I’m enjoying eating and loving all the different things going on.
It’s true - wolfing food down really isn’t the best way to sample it. Even skinny people have to learn this lesson.
I think my life is richer now. I’m more confident and happier, so I’m doing more. I’m trying different things and I’m less scared of what people think. Oddly enough, I’m not the centre of everyone’s world. Who knew?
Who knew, indeed? Funny how we all think we’re the reason for all the whispering and todo-ing in the world. And it turns out that everyone has got their own drama and they are, largely, ignoring ours.
It’s a good blog. She’s an accountant and I’m always interested in how they think.
BiBi is a YouTube blogger who had a Lap Band procedure a number of weeks ago. She’s got five videos up on YouTube documenting her progress. She went in for her first fill this week and talks about that process. She says she’s going well, but we haven’t seen photos yet. Anyway, here’s BiBi!
That Fat Chick, a Lap Band blogger, I’ve included on my blogroll, just got the good word from Blue Cross that her weight loss surgery will be covered.
I wanted to cry in relief when I read that letter. It does echo most of what the woman I spoke to on the phone with last fall said to me. It’s good to see it reaffirmed in writing!
And I definitely meet the “medically necessary” criteria, particularly in regards to having a BMI of over 40 (48-49) AND being 100 lbs. or more overweight (my ideal weight is 121 lbs. - 155 lbs. and I’m currently 309 lbs. You do the math!).
This is interesting. This is a woman in the UK (I think) who is doing a video blog on YouTube of her Lap Band experience. Her first video post was a look at her body as it is now - she’s probably 150 pounds overweight. The video I’ve linked here shows her at the hospital, a few shots of the procedure and what her incisions look like on the day of her surgery and then over the course of the next few days. Some of you may find it interesting. The incisions aren’t so bad as I thought. And that, for the ladies, is very good news.
Wow - so bandees who participate in support groups after surgery lose more weight than those who don’t. Drats! Foiled in my curmudgeonly ways once again.
I haven’t bought the full article, but the abstract says this:
Abstract
Background Support group meetings (SGM) are assumed to be an integral part of success after bariatric surgery. This investigation studies the effect of SGM on weight loss as well as factors associated with attendance of SGM. It is our hypothesis that patients who attend SGM (ASGM) lose more weight than those patients who do not attend SGM (NASGM).
Methods Postoperative bariatric patients completed a questionnaire regarding their opinions of SGM. Change in body mass index (BMI) was computed for each patient. The patients were then divided into two groups: ASGM and NASGM for data comparison.
Results There were 46 patients in the investigation. Patients in the NASGM group tended to feel that SGM are not needed after bariatric surgery compared to the ASGM group (5.29 vs. 7.06; p = 0.07). Patients in the NASGM group tended to feel that they would lose the same amount of weight with or without attending SGM compared to the ASGM group (5.67 vs. 7.38; p = 0.07). There were no differences in distance to clinic nor in time to clinic between both groups. Gastric bypass patients in the ASGM group had a statistically significantly higher percent decrease in BMI than the patients in the NASGM group (42% vs. 32%; p < 0.03).
Conclusion Patients in the ASGM group lose more weight than patients in the NASGM group. The importance of attending SGM should be incorporated in preoperative patient counseling and encouraged during postoperative follow-up visits.
Ten percent difference is a big chunk of weight. Good to know.
This link comes from Dr. Chris Oliver’s blog - one of the many healthcare professionals who have had a lap band procedure. If you haven’t looked through his blog, I’d encourage you to do so. He writes quite succinctly and has lots of pictures of himself along the way. And boy, oh boy, has his life changed!
I was out cruising around the internet the other night, looking for new and interesting things to bring home, when I found this very elegantly written blog post by Dr. Sid Schwab. Read the whole post. It’s a beautifully written piece about lap bands. The Simpson’s story below is fun as well.
The parents of Matt Groening, creator of the Simpsons, were friends of my parents. It might interest his fans to know, if they don’t already, that his parents’ names are Homer and Marge. Several years ago, my mom got Marge Groening to finagle a favor from Matt: he sent our son, on his birthday, several items of wittily signed simpsonalia, along with a couple of original drawings of Bart offering greetings, relating, as I recall, to a cow. This does not keep me from criticizing Mr. Groening on surgical matters.
On the most recent Simpsons episode, which I watched with my usual devotion, Homer underwent weight-loss surgery. During the pre-operative meeting with the surgeon he was told about “gastric bypass surgery,” but the explanation, complete with diagram, was of placing a band around the stomach. There’s a lot of misunderstanding out there.
And in the comments, I found a link to the blog of Dr. Chris Oliver, an orthopedic surgeon in Scotland who is blogging his weightloss with a lap band. I particularly like this post with the before and after pictures. Read the comments as well. Like Sid Schwab’s post above, Oliver references the fact that he doesn’t really feel hungry anymore. How liberating must that be?
