Clothing Tips For Women Losing Weight

One of the searches that I see repeatedly is women searching for advice on how to handle their wardrobe during weight loss. Lap Band patients lose, on average, about 8 to 10 pounds a month, which could mean a new wardrobe ever ten weeks or so. That would get pricey quickly.

One of my favorite plus-sized clothing sites is Janelle Lowe’s Love Your Peaches! Janelle is a plus size designer and I will let her intro page speak for her here:

Welcome to Love Your Peaches Clothing Co., where our motto is “no boundaries”. I started this company in 1996, because, frankly, I couldn’t find any clothes in the marketplace that spoke to me, the confident plus size woman. I hope you enjoy my fashions, all modeled by beautiful women of size. Some items are more daring, some are more conservative, but they’re ALL made with love. Seriously. I know it sounds corny, but Peaches is so much more than just a company to me. It’s my response to the world that told me that I was too fat, that I had to wear black, that I couldn’t go sleeveless, that I couldn’t wear a bikini, that I didn’t look good. Well, my friends, for me those barriers are coming down, and I hope they do for you, too, because it’s a wonderful thing to be free. I’m often asked what the name “Love Your Peaches” means. Those of you who are over 30 may remember this, it came from a line of an old Steve Miller song: “Really love your peaches, wanna shake your tree.” Great song. More than that, however, I chose the name because it speaks to self-esteem. As women, we really do need to “love our peaches”. We need to smile when we think of ourselves, to believe that we are as juicy and luscious and desirable as a perfectly ripe peach. We’ve wasted way too much time being unhappy with our bodies. Isn’t it about time we started living with joy? I hope you enjoy the site!

What I love about Love Your Peaches clothing is that the designs are simple and clean and made with high quality fabrics. What I love about the site is that Janelle shows her clothing modeled on genuinely plus sized models as opposed to lucious size twelves we normally see. And importantly, for plus sized women, she also includes line drawings so that you’re very clear as to what the shape of the garment is.

Since Janelle designs her clothing, I wrote and asked her advice for bandees on how to select clothing that will be wearable through several months of weight loss and easily alterable as well. Here’s what she had to say:

#1. Find yourself a good tailor/alterations person. The dry cleaners is
a good place to start. If they don’t have someone on staff, they usually
have someone they can refer you to. Keep trying different ones until you
find one that you’re happy with. No matter what size you are, you will
look and feel better if your clothes fit you well.

#2. Knits are your friend as they can accommodate a changing body better
than a stiff, woven fabric.

Here’s a link to her new Calista dress – which I love. It’s a Cotton Lycra Jersey and it’s $65. It’s pretty, it’s feminine and affordable.

#3. For tops, one of the best looks around is an adjustable wrap top (or a
dress). Also, tops that have belts or ties at the waist. These are
great as they can be adjusted for changing sizes, getting more mileage out
of your clothing dollar. Luckily they’re also very fashionable right now!

Here’s a Wrap Dress and Wrap Top that shouldl do you well for several months.

#4. Skirts are probably the easiest thing to alter, embrace them if you’re
on a budget.

Janelle’s Every Day Skirt, goes with all of their knit tops. And let her know if you need a different length – important for us shorties. The Simple Skirt is indeed simple and easily altered as well.

#5 Pay attention to necklines. If the neckline gaps, or slides and
slouches from the get go, it’s will only get worse as your size changes.
You can get more mileage out of a garment longer if the neckline lays
correctly. Ditto for armholes.

#6. Avoid garments that have a lot of topstitching on the seams (jeans,
or denim garments). This makes them more difficult and costly to alter.

Pull on pants are perfect. They can be easily altered by taking in the seam on the side. Janelle’s got them in stretch denim, Cotton Lycra Jersey (to match the other pieces above) and linen.

#7. The fewer seams your garments have, the easier and therefore cheaper
they are to alter.

Here, here and here!

#8. If you have elastic waistband pants or skirts, have your seamstress
tunnel the elastic insead the seam, and leave a 2″ gap open on the inside.
(Tunneling is when the fabric is folded over and stitched down without the
elastic. The elastic is then fed through the waistband, leaving it free
inside the fabric). Then as needed, you can simply pull the elastic
tighter and stitch it , or even use a large safety pin if your not
comfortable with sewing.

#9. If you love woven fabrics, look for bias cut garments. When a woven
fabric is cut on the bias (on the diagonal), it has more give to it, almost
like a stretch fabric. The garment will grow, or fall in, as needed.

Here’s Janelle’s very pretty, and very simple Bias Cut dress.

#10. When you’re shopping, take pictures of yourself in new styles!
It’s difficult to analyze how you really look in a mirror, especially as
your body changes. Photo’s make it easier for you to be objective, and
recognize what really works for you.

Now this is something I had never thought to do. I’m an apple and have a terrible time picking clothing out for myself. So many times, the clothing I thought I couldn’t dream of wearing is exactly what looks best on me. So, this is something I’m going to try. Plus, it’ll make me remember to put my make up on before I go shopping.

She has a lot of career ware as well for those of us who pack up and go to an office or to see clients everday. And she has really fun stuff like her Edie Sundress and her Juno dress. The embroidered chiffon Bette shirt speaks to my inner Stevie Nicks!

Anyway, as you contemplate how you’ll get through the coming months or years of weight loss, Janelle’s advice gives you a solid way to think about clothing that can be worn through different weights with just a touch of altering. I hope you enjoy her site. As always, if you have any comments or questions, leave them here or email me.

Weight Loss Surgery Radio Tonight at 8pm EST

And 5pm here on my beloved west coast. Alright, Life Coaches and bariatric surgery patients Cher Ewing and Jeff Cadwell are having surgery Dr. Trace Curry on this show tonight. Here’s what they have to say:

Trace W. Curry, M.D. is a board-certified general surgeon who specializes in minimally invasive weight loss surgery. He is a Cincinnati native and trained at Good Samaritan Hospital. He is the director of bariatric surgery at The Jewish Hospital of Cincinnati and has performed well over 1300 laparoscopic gastric bands, 700 laparoscopic bypasses, and 75 sleeve gastrectomies, making him one of the most experienced in the region at the laparoscopic technique.

You can call in and ask questions, if you’d like. I’m looking forward to it!

PBS Documentary On Obesity and Weight Loss Surgery

I just watched FAT: What No One Is Telling You – a PBS documentary about obesity and weight loss surgery. They interview Dr. Lee Kaplan extensively and it’s always good to hear what he has to say. He does discuss just how complex weight gain is and states, for the record, that only 5% of people who have gastric bypasses get all the way down to a normal weight. Very interesting. They also interview Dr. Michael Gershon who talks about the gut being a second brain for our body. He even composes poetry to the intestine.

From the Press Release:

As a young man, Michael Gershon, professor of medicine at Columbia University, went against the wishes of his father and the advice of his professors who urged him to study the brain. Instead, he set off on an exploration of the bowel. Intrigued by some long-forgotten 20th century scientific discoveries about an independent nervous system in the gut, Dr. Gershon’s research uncovered how this sophisticated physiological wiring functions essentially as a “second brain.” The gut, it turns out, has a mind of its own and plays a major role in deciding when and how much we eat. When the brain in the head says eat less and in moderation, the “second brain” in the gut can override the brain in the head and propel us to eat more and without restraint.

Obesity expert Dr. Lee Kaplan and his team at Massachusetts General Hospital compare the body’s hunger drive to the human body’s response to running up six flights of stairs. You can force yourself to breathe slowly for a few seconds, despite this exertion, but ultimately your body will demand more oxygen and you’ll breathe faster. When it comes to decisions about how much to eat, a similar battle occurs between your conscious will and your subconscious. And if your subconscious brain wants more food, it wins and you eat more.

A study of gastric bypass surgery has led Dr. Kaplan to a compelling discovery about how the body regulates food consumption, and the hope that someday surgery can be avoided altogether. Dr. Kaplan has found that weight loss in surgery patients is not just a result of making the stomach smaller. The surgery actually reduces the feeling of hunger by cutting some of the nerves in the bowel, which changes the signals that flow between the gut and the brain. It also alters the way the hormonal system gets its information from food and sends it to the brain. “By manipulating the gut, even in a small way, we end up changing the communication to the brain and the brain acts differently to manage our weight and metabolism,” says Dr. Kaplan. His goal now is to completely replace surgery by developing medication that alters these intricate circuits in the same way that an invasive operation currently does.

They follow a handful of people who are losing weight – one of whom has a gastric bypass and loses 150 pounds over the course of the shoot.

A familiar face on television, actress Mary Dimino’s battles with food and dieting are the hysterical heart of her stand-up comedy. As the documentary opens, we see Mary sweating through one of her daily three-hour gym sessions on the treadmill. Acknowledging that it’s a lot of exercise, she explains, “I have to work just as hard, even harder, just to maintain this level of chubbiness.” Like many people who struggle with weight control, Mary has persistent fat cells in her body that were added during years of overeating. Now the weight may come off, but the cells remain — always hungry — constantly crying out for more calories and defying Mary’s willpower.

“There was something haywire,” says Rosie Delhi, whose words confirm the suspicion every fat person has from trying and trying to lose weight. A retired school principal, her bariatric surgery was, until now, a secret from everyone but closest family members. “You can’t believe how awful it is,” says Rosie, who yearned to play on the floor with her grandchildren and be able to get up again. “If I didn’t make a change, I was headed for a death sentence.” The rewiring effect of the bariatric surgery, which Dr. Kaplan has identified, seems to be helping Rosie to sustain her weight loss by helping to suppress her hunger impulse. Now her disciplined effort to maintain a healthy weight has a shot at success.

As a senior in high school, Rocky Tayeh utilized his budding talent as a journalist by producing a radio documentary on his battle with obesity. Raised in Brooklyn, Rocky laments the everyday temptation of food available in his neighborhood. “If I’m hungry at 4:00 in the morning, I just have to walk a block down,” says Rocky. “There’s a Dunkin Donuts here, a McDonald’s here, a fast food restaurant here, a Chinese restaurant and they deliver.” Despite the disapproval of his family and his own doubts about “taking the easy way out,” Rocky makes a decision to have surgery, loses 150 pounds and faces the prospect of a new life in college without the embarrassment, shame and stigma.

Carla Hurd has gained about 120 pounds over the last twelve years in her job as a marketing executive at Microsoft. Carla and her overweight husband David signed up for a comprehensive weight management program funded by Microsoft. Even with the no-holds barred support of all the best personal trainers, doctors, dieticians and psychologists and a profound motivation to get pregnant, her success in the battle to lose weight is elusive. In videotaped diaries, Carla tracks her uncontrollable urges and her struggle to resist the comforting temptations of food that calms her stressful life.

Public health nurse Pat Lyons, who describes herself as a professional fat woman, knows there is very little justice or sympathy for fat people. Pat’s mission is to uncouple the idea that physical fitness and activity is only useful in regard to losing weight. She believes everyone should be active, regardless of size, aiming to be as healthy as possible whatever weight you are. “There are happy, healthy people of all shapes and sizes,” she points out.

It’s broken up into little clips. The longest is about 10 minutes and the shortest about 4 minutes long. It’s easy to get through.

What Can You Eat With A Lap Band II

I realized I’ve never done a post on what Lap Bandees are most comfortable eating. I have Lorraine Kay’s YouTube clip where she talks about what she can eat, but perhaps I should expand on this a bit more.

Let’s begin by addressing how one loses weight with a Lap Band. Lap Bands make your stomach much, much, much smaller. Typically, your stomach holds about one liter of food though it can be distended to hold up to four liters – close to a gallon! At the top of your stomach are stretch receptors and when they are stretched, they signal your brain that you’re full. With the Lap Band, you’ll be eating about six to eight ounces of food per meal. Because your stomach is so tiny now, those stretch receptors will be activated quickly, and you’ll feel satisfied with a far smaller amount of food than you would have before the Lap Band.

What makes Lap Bands so much more effective than diet and exercise is the capability to keep weight off once you lose it. Ninety eight percent of people who lose weight through diet and exercise put it right back on in under two years. That doesn’t usually happen with Lap Bands. Those stretch receptors being stretched after each meal tell your body that food is plentiful and because of that, your body doesn’t crank down your metabolism the way it does on a diet. And because your body doesn’t crank down your metabolism, you keep the weight off that you lose. Brilliant, eh? I should add that you’ll be consuming about 1100 to 1200 calories per day. Your body’s new set point will be established when the amount of energy you are burning at your new size equals the amount of calories you are consuming – same as for everyone else.

For the sake of a visual comparison, you’ll be eating the equivalent of McDonald’s Double Cheeseburger and a small order of French Fries per meal. Now, needless to say, your surgeon doesn’t want you eating those two things, but McDonalds’ food is internationally available and the same size everywhere.

Anyway, the first week, you just don’t feel any hunger by and large, and you only consume clear liquids. The point of this is to not stretch your stomach in anyway in the first days. Be of good cheer – I have yet to hear anyone complain about being hungry that week. After that, you begin a journey that will lead to your first fill and the adjustment process.

What so many Lap Bandees love about their Lap Band is that they can eat almost anything within reason – at holidays, you’ll eat what everyone else does, just less of it. Bread is the most consistently problematic because it mushes up into a gloopy little ball and doesn’t pass through the clip very well. Lots of bandees find that fish quickly becomes one of their favorite dishes – even the people who hated it before. Red meat needs to be cut into tiny pieces and chewed slowly. Crunchy stuff goes down well. As, Lorraine Kay says – tacos with crispy shells, good. Tacos with soft shells, not so good. Nachos, first rate. Some bandees do very well with rice and pasta, others less so. I think it may largely be a matter of being content with just a few bites and moving on. White meats tend to be easy though some people have to be very careful with chicken. You can have ice cream, of course, but it’s calorie dense and goes through the band quickly – thereby defeating the entire purpose.

That’s the short version of it all. I’ll be doing a couple more interviews this weekend, I think. I’ll be sure to talk to the bandees about it, and I’ll let you know what they have to say. In the meantime, if you haven’t watched Lorraine Kay’s interviews on this site, I’d encourage you to do so. She’s someone who thinks and speaks for succinctly. She covers a lot of territory in her interview and you’ll have a much better idea of the road ahead by listening to what she has to say.

I’ve covered caffeine a lot on this site. In fact, there is a whole category about it. The surgeons are split on the subject. Some don’t want you drinking any caffeine whatsoever, and some don’t mind. What I’ve noted in the past is that caffeine causes the blood sugar levels to spike in Type II Diabetics. Spiking blood sugar produces insulin and tells your body to store the energy you’re eating rather than to burn it. Atkins had long noted that people on his diet didn’t lose weight if they drank caffeine. Keep that in mind, and decide how much you value your morning Joe. Atkins now allows people to have one cup a day. If you’re a determined coffee or tea drinker, experiment to find out if there is a reasonable amount you can consume.

Some surgeons object to Lap Bandees having any alcohol at all – the feeling being that you are so restricted in the amount of calories than there are none available to waste on an alcoholic beverage. Dr. Paul O’Brien, of Monash University’s Centre for Obesity Research and Education, says that a glass of wine per day seems to do well by his patients. He’d encourage to check out Australia’s wines, as well. 🙂

As always, if there are any questions, pass them along. If you’re interested in reading more about why losing weight and keeping it off is so difficult, check these posts out.

Lap Band Surgery in Texas For $9500!

I can see from my searches that a lot of you are looking for Lap Band surgery in the US for under $10k. Finally, Lap Band For Life has stepped up to the plate! I don’t have a lot of details on the program, but I do know that they are using hospitals rather than surgery centers for the procedure.

If you’re interested, fill out the application and someone will get back to you. I’ll be eager to hear about your experience.

I’m Looking For People To Interview

about their experience with Lap Bands. The promise of this website is that our guests would get to see lots of interviews with people who have Lap Bands. I’m now gearing up to get to work on that full time, and I’d love to hear from some of you who have Lap Bands – particularly if you live in Southern California or thereabouts.

If you live elsewhere, and have a video camera, I’ll be happy to work with you on what I want on the video. You just need a comfy place to set and either a tripod or someone to hold the camera. It’s easier with a tripod. 🙂 You don’t have to do any editing – I’ll do all that.

If you’re willing to do an interview, you can be as anonymous as you like or fully identified as Lorraine Kay is. The point of the interviews is to create really solid, dense information so people contemplating Lap Bands will have a very full sense of what their life will be like on a day in/day out basis. So, if your profession would frown on this discussion, you can call yourself whatever you’d like.

You can leave a comment here and I’ll email you back or you can write me at love my lap band at live dot com.

I hope to hear from you. This is going to be a cool project. The feedback and email I’m getting is overwhelmingly positive.

Forum For Lap Bands and Teens

I was just looking around Lap Band Talk – an absolutely superb forum for people interested in Lap Bands – and discovered that thave a forum for teenagers who have questions about Lap Bands. The youngest bandee is fifteen though I know surgeons are doing Lap Band procedures on adolescents as young as twelve.

If you’re a parent of a teenager wrestling with obesity, some of the surgeons with New Hope Bariatrics work with teens as do several of the clinics in Mexico. Before you get the willies about going out of country for surgery on your child, just know that most of the surgeons who do Lap Band procedures in the US were actually trained by doctors from Mexico. Dr. Rumbaut, Dr. Ariel Ortiz, and Dr. Lopez Corvala all have a vast amount of experience working with Lap Bands.

Here’s a very brief assessment of a study on teens and Lap Bands, just in case you’re nervous that it’s completely inappropriate.

Dr. Paul O’Brien’s 8 Golden Rules Of Weight Loss With A Lap Band

Dr. Paul E. O’Brien’s name was one of the first I learned when I began investigating the Lap Band. He’s published innumerable medical studies on the Lap Band and is the author of THE LAP BAND SOLUTION: A PARTNERSHIP IN WEIGHT LOSS. I just received my copy today and will be reading it tonight.

Dr. O’Brien is a world-renowned authority on obesity, weight loss and Lap Bands and these are his very moderate rules for Lap Band weight loss success.

1. Eat three or fewer small meals per day.

The LAP-BAND works primarily by taking away your appetite. If it is adjusted correctly you should not feel hungry.You may eat up to three times a day. We don’t mind if you eat fewer than three times per day. Many people do not feel like breakfast and some will miss a midday meal. If you don’t feel inclined to eat, don’t eat. If you find you are getting hungry between meals, tell us. We will probably consider adjusting the band a little tighter.There is not much room for food, as there is a virtua lstomach rather than a real space above the band. As you eat, the food seeks a space and you need to keep that space quitesmall. Therefore each meal should be about the amount of food you can get into half a glass. If you eat more than that, you will not lose weight so easily and you will gradually stretch the stomach. This can lead to the need for a further surgery later on to reduce the enlarged stomach. The adjustability of the band is the key to allowing you to be happy with this small amount of food. If you find that
you are tending to eat more than that, tell us and we will consider adding more fluid to the band. Always use a small plate, put a small amount of food on the plateand always try to leave some. Remember the angels.They need their share.

2. Do not eat anything between meals.

No snacks, no biscuits with your coffee, no fruit, nothing. All food must be restricted to meal times.One of the most frequent causes for failure is the taking of snacks between meals. If you are getting hungry between meals and are tempted to have a snack, you must tell us. It is probably due to inadequate adjustment and you may need more fluid added to the band. Between meals you can only have zero-calorie liquids—water, mineral water, tea, coffee, low-calorie sodas.

3. Eat slowly and stop when no longer hungry.

When you have eaten enough, you will no longer be hungry, and signals from your stomach to your brain tell you that you do not need any more. These signals take time to be generated. Give them that time. Each meal should be stretched out over 15-20 minutes. If you eat rapidly, you will already have eaten too much before you realize that you have had enough. However, do not eat beyond 30 minutes. Throw away whatever you haven’t eaten at that time. That is the end of that meal and you must have nothing else until the next meal. Try to make each meal last for 15-20 minutes. Try to sense when you have had enough and stop before you feel at all uncomfortable. Use a small plate, put a small amount of food on the plate and develop the habit of always leaving some of it uneaten. Once the meal is finished, it is essential that you take no further food until the next meal time. This has to be avoided absolutely. The slow emptying of the stomach gives you a feeling of fullness, which should make it easy for you to achieve this. You must ensure that this indeed does happen.

4. Focus on nutritious foods.

Foods that are high in protein (meats, especially fish, eggs, dairy, lentils, beans and nuts) and foods that are high in complex carbohydrates (vegetables, some cereals) are best. Simple sugars are worst. Be careful with foods that are high in fats, as they are a dense form of calories. Be careful with fruits, as they contain quite a lot of sugar. The good foods can come from all the main food groups and include vegetables, meats, eggs, cereals and dairy. There is no need to focus unduly on the particular foods in fine detail. It is not rocket science. It is simply selecting foods that are good (protein and complex carbohydrates), being careful with those that are not so good (fats, alcohol) and avoiding those that are bad (simple sugars). And take a well balanced vitamin and mineral replacement each day.

5. Avoid calorie-containing liquids.

Any calorie-containing liquids will tend to flow past the restriction of the band and not give you any feeling of satiety. You are then more likely to take too much. You are only allowed to drink:
1. water.
2. mineral water.
3. tea or coffee (with low-fat milk if you wish but no sugar).
4.low-calorie soft drinks (but be careful with the gas).

An exception to the “no liquid calorie” rule is a glass of wine with meals, which we have shown is good for your health and good for your weight loss when taken in a modest amount.

6. Exercise for at least 30 minutes each day.

This is at least as important as all of the other rules. Not only must you take in fewer calories, but you must use up more calories. Exercise will improve your general health as well. Initially, while you are severely obese, this can be difficult, but as your weight decreases, it becomes easier. As you become fitter and healthier, you get greater enjoyment from exercise. We understand that not everybody is sports-minded and exercise may be something quite new
for you. Start slowly and seek to build up activity progressively. Aim to put together 30 minutes or more of moderate-intensity physical activity on most and preferably all days. Walking is ideal to start off with. As your fitness improves, progress to more vigorous walking and even jogging, cycling, aerobics, swimming and light resistance training. As your weight comes down, your exercise capacity will increase and your general activities during the day
will increase. This is to be encouraged, and the more active you are, the better the result will be. Your exercise program should be aerobic. You should be puffing and, if you check your pulse, generally it should be up around 120-140 beats per minute. There are a wide range of activities that will allow you to achieve this. If you can manage it, a personal trainer or fitness consultant can be an excellent assistant. They can provide an individual program according to your specific preferences and lifestyle that is realistic and achievable. Regular exercise requires commitment. The more effort you put in, the greater benefits you will see and feel.

7. Be active throughout each day.

Think of movement and activity as opportunities and not as inconvenience. Try to be active every day in as many ways as you can. Make it a habit to walkor cycle instead of using the car. Become active in the garden and do things yourself instead of usingmachines. Avoid sitting down at all cost. You should see sitting down as an opportunity for activity lost. Try to spend as much time outdoors as possible. We tend to be more active when outdoors. Use a pedometer as a stimulus to you to show how your activity level is increasing. If you are using a pedometer, aim to get beyond 10,000 steps per day—this represents a very good level of routine daily activity.

8. Always keep in contact with us.

We want to follow you permanently. There will never be a time when we say that the job of
controlling your obesity is done and we do not need to see you anymore. There will always be a need to check your progress, monitor your health, check for nutritional deficiencies, make sure that you understand the rules, bring you up to date with new developments and adjust the volume of fluid in the band. There is always going to be a very small loss of fluid from the band over time. For example, if you had 3 ml of fluid present and we checked the volume after
a six-month gap, there would probably be about 2.7 ml present. This occurs because the balloon of the band is not totally impermeable. If 3 ml was the correct volume, you would be starting to get hungry and eat more with a volume of 2.7 ml. It is importantyou understand that this can happen and come back to see us for replacement of that small loss. This is the main reason that we want a maximum of six months between appointments.

Weight Loss Surgery Radio!

Wow – this is so cool. Life coaches Cher Ewing and Jeff Cadwell have both had weight loss surgery. Cher has had a Lap Band and Jeff has a gastric bypass. Together, they have an internet radio show that provides advice and counseling for people who are thinking about or have had weight loss surgery.

Their next show is Wednesday, April 23rd and they’ll be talking to Nurse Connie Cox, a registered dietician, who works with bariatric surgery patients and has had a gastric bypass herself.

Date: 04/23/08
Time: 8:00 pm ET, 7:00 pm CT, 6:00 MT and 5:00pm PT
Where: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/thewlscoaches
Call-In Line: 646-716-9413

The have a fantastic podcast available with Dr. Terry Simpson of the Arizona Bariatric Center. Dr. Simpson is late calling in so the meat of all doesn’t happen until 40 minutes in – I’d encourage you to skip the first forty minutes and just cut right to Dr. Simpson. The interview with him is about 42 minutes long and is well worth the time to listen. He’s an incredibly charming, well-spoken, funny guy who knows his subject inside and out. I learned several things from the show that I’ll be writing about later today.

Caffeine, Insulin, Fat and Weight Loss

As I mentioned earlier today, Gwen of Gwen’s WLS Journey was stuck on a weight loss plateau for several days. She’s lost eighty pounds with her Lap Band and is now down to losing her final fifteen. She finally laid off coffee over the weekend and voila! she dropped a pound and a quarter.

Duke University did a study on caffeine and Type II diabetics and discovered that it caused blood sugar levels to spike through out the day after meals. We don’t know whether it does the same for non-diabetics or not, but we do know that Dr. Atkins found his patients didn’t lose weight as well when they were drinking coffee. In my case, I could barely register as being ketosis if I drink any caffeine whatsoever regardless of how meticulous I am about keeping my carbs below induction level.

Here’s a quick little video from the Mayo Clinic for diabetics about how blood glucose and insulin are created and function in your body.

Calories Per Hour puts what happens next very simply:

Our pancreas creates a hormone called insulin that transports blood sugar into our body’s cells where it is used for energy. When we eat refined grains that have had most of their fiber stripped away, sugar, or other carbohydrate-rich foods that are quickly processed into blood sugar, the pancreas goes into overtime to produce the insulin necessary for all this blood sugar to be used for energy. This insulin surge tells our body that plenty of energy is readily available and that it should stop burning fat and start storing it.

From the Duke study:

Participants took capsules containing caffeine equal to about four cups of coffee on one day and then identical capsules that contained a placebo on another day. Everyone had the same nutrition drink for breakfast, but were free to eat whatever they liked for lunch and dinner.

The researchers found that when the participants consumed caffeine, their average daily sugar levels went up 8 per cent. Caffeine also exaggerated the rise in glucose after meals: increasing by 9 percent after breakfast, 15 percent after lunch and 26 per cent after dinner.

“We’re not sure what it is about caffeine that drives glucose levels up, but we have a couple of theories,” says Lane, who is the lead author of the study. “It could be that caffeine interferes with the process that moves glucose from the blood and into muscle and other cells in the body where it is used for fuel. It may also be that caffeine triggers the release of adrenaline – the ‘fight or flight” hormone that we know can also boost sugar levels.”

For those of you who aren’t losing weight, try laying off the caffeine and see if it makes a difference. We all love our coffee and tea, but most of us would rather be skinny. 🙂

Got Any Questions About Lap Bands Or Weight Loss?

I haven’t been blogging as much lately because I haven’t been sure of what to write about. I am new at this, y’know. Anyway, I thought I’d put it out to you – is there anything you’re specifically wondering about with Lap Bands, or even weight loss or weight loss maintenence, that you haven’t seen addressed anywhere? If so, leave the question here in comments or send it to me at love my lap band at live dot com.

I’m working on finding out about weight loss plateaus for Gwen of Gwen’s WLS Journey. She got stuck for eleven days without any weight loss but has finally dropped another pound and a quarter this morning. Congrats to her on that. BTW, she had to give up coffee to do so. As soon as I get some answers on plateaus, I’ll be posting those.

I’m also going to be doing a post on how to deal with the clothing crisis that develops when you’re burning through a new wardrobe every two to the three months, and discussing some sane ways to get through that without going broke. If you have any tips, thoughts or questions on that problem, be sure to drop them along as well.

Finally, if you’re someone who already has a Lap Band or is having a procedure in the not too distant future and you live in Southern California, I’d love to interview you for this website. We’ll have a couple phone conversations. I’ll come out with a camera. We’ll set it up and talk for an hour or so. I know some people have professional concerns so to be sure, you can identify yourself however you’d like.

So, ask away! I love researching this stuff, and I’m happy to dig in to whatever it is you want to know.

Successful Long Term Weight Loss With The Lap Band

Diets and exercise just don’t work – let’s face it. Fewer than 5% of people who lose weight through diet and exercise manage to keep it off. There are reasons for this, as I have written about before, that have nothing to do with self-discipline. You can’t lose weight and keep it off for some very sturdy evolutionary reasons – your body likes having all that handy-dandy energy just packed away for a rainy day. Or more precisely, a non-rainy season. So when you lose weight, after a certain amount, your body starts cranking down your metabolism. Youve been losing weight on 1200 calories a day? No more. That fifteen pounds you’ve lost that has you feeling svelte is gonna come right back, if your body has any say over the situation. And your body does have say over the situation. So, your metabolism goes down and your hunger level goes up. Your body floods you with chemicals that make you feel hungrier than you’ve ever felt. Oh, you think you’re just being undisciplined and you feel guilty for eating. But that’s not what’s happening. Your body is pushing you to eat, eat, eat, and it’s slowing your metabolism down so that you can pack the weight right back on. Good bye, little red dress. Hello, big black dress. Have you ever stood in the kitchen eating something, hating yourself for eating it because you’re actually losing weight, but you can’t stop because you’re so darn hungry? That’s normal. That’s your body functioning as it should. The curious thing is that obese people’s bodies functions normally when they’re heavy and their bodies cease to function normally when they lose weight. Factor in that we now know that around 75% of weight gain is genetic, and we’re all in a dire situation.

Look, there are lots of reasons to lose weight besides vanity – you’ll live longer. And if you’re like most people, you have family who love you and want you to live as long as possible. That right there is good reason to do it. You’ll be happier. And more physically comfortable. And you’ll probably earn more money. And have more sex. So with all those motivations, if losing weight was really possible, you would do it. Some of us master the literally Sisyphean task of weight loss and peel off 120 pounds or maybe more. But then, because of biological imperatives, we gain it back again. Over and over.

That’s where Lap Bands come in. Dr. Favretti, one of the first surgeons to work with Lap Bands, completed a 12 year study on the effectiveness of Lap Bands and the news is good – people don’t gain the weight back. The study covered over 1700 patients over twelve years both morbidly obese and super obese. The average weight of the patients started out around 260 pounds plus or minus 37 pounds with an average BMI of 42.6 – that’s our 5’3″ woman at 236 pounds or our 5’10” guy at 292 pounds. At the end, they weighed on average 185 pounds plus or minus 60 pounds with an average BMI of 31.6 – putting our woman at 175 pounds and our man at 216.

If you want to check your BMI, you can do so here at the Centennial Treatment Center For Obesity in Nashville, Tennessee.

I know all of you reading this think, “Oh no, I want to lose a lot more weight than that!” Well, of course you do, and as far as I can tell, you can. You do have to exercise though and to make that point, I’m going to quote Dr. William Lee of Blue Earth, Minnesota in the Mankato Free Press:

Lee said his patients can be divided into two groups, those who shed 6 to 8 pounds a month and patients who lose 10 to 15 pounds a month. “The difference between these two groups,” he said, “is exercise.”

So, just keep that in mind – you’re gonna have to buy a trampoline, a pair of Nordic Walking Poles or get yourself a backyard treadmill. And if you do, and if you follow the doctor’s directions, and get yourself into a support group, you’re going to have a really good shot at getting down to the tiny little person you’d really rather be. 🙂

Meet Becca – Indiana Lap Band Video Blogger Extraordinaire!

Cruising around YouTube today, I found Becca’s video blog. She’s only got two videos up, but she’s very well spoken. She’s lost, I think, 50 pounds in the past few months and has gone from three chins to one. 🙂

And here is her second video where she talks a lot about the process of having a Lap Band. She only needed Tylenol to deal with the pain – nothing stronger. She had her surgery on Thursday and was back at work on Monday. At the very end, she shows you her scars and I know there are a lot of questions about that out there.

Her surgery was performed by Keith McEwan at the Indiana Obesity Center.e.com/watch?v=V1VG824lr6M&hl=en]
Anyway, enjoy.

Lap Band in Mexico For Under $10,000. Way Under.

I know that there are a lot of people who are looking for less expensive ways to have a Lap Band procedure. I haven’t found anyone in the US who is doing the procedure for under $13.5k. But in Mexico, it’s considerably less expensive and the physicians there also have considerably MORE experience doing the procedure than American physicians do. Indeed, when the FDA finally approved the Lap Band here in the US, Inamed brought in teams of experienced surgeons from Mexico to train the doctors here in the US.

A lot of you who are self-paying have families who love you very much and who are very skeptical of the idea of you having surgery in Mexico. But there are numerous medical facilities in Mexico which are built to encourage Americans to spend their health care dollars south of the border. The facilities are brand new, brilliantly clean and incredibly well run. The doctors usually speak impeccable English as well.

Now, to facilitate the trip south, particularly for those of us who don’t live in Southern California, we have World Med Assist – a company that assists Americans seeking to go abroad for medical care they cannot afford here at home.

WMA has ties to just five hospitals around the world. Before they include a hospital in their company, they do extensive research as to their reputation in the medical community, who their physicians are and the level of esteem with which they are regarded. After they are satisfied that the hospital and the physicians comfortably meet American standards for medical care, they fly to inspect the hospital first hand and meet the principals. That way they can be confident that when you arrive at the hospital for medical treatment, you’ll be treated with the same exemplary care you would expect to receive here. In fact, if you have your Lap Band procedure in Mexico through WMA, you’ll actually spend three nights in the hospital rather than the out patient experience we have here in the US. For those of you who feel that you are extremely high risk, this is something to keep in mind.

Part of what WMA does is handle all the logistics. They’ll make sure that you have all the paperwork needed from your physician here in the US and that it’s in the hands of the surgeon in Mexico. WMA will arrange your flight to San Diego where you will be met by a driver who will drive you to the Hospital Angeles in Tijuana. You’ll have a mobile phone with you that will provide you with local numbers should you need to contact someone. At the hospital, you’ll meet Dr. Lopez Corvala who speaks perfect English and has performed over 3000 Lap Band surgeries – something that not many physicians in the US can say. If there are any problems or questions, WMA is there to act as a patient advocate. They have several physicians on their staff who can quickly cut through anything you would have concerns about. After you’ve returned home, WMA will help you arrange for fills locally and if there are any questions on your bill, they’ll help resolve those as well.

World Med Assist client Angela Jones had a Lap Band procedure in Mexico:

WorldMed Assist proposed Dr. Lopez Corvala at Hospital Angeles. “I had friends who’d gone to Mexico for Lap Band surgery – two who each lost 150 pounds – so I was very comfortable with what WorldMed Assist proposed,” said Jones. “I checked Dr. Lopez Corvala’s background and was very impressed with his volume of lap band surgeries—over 3,000—and his track record. Then I checked out the hospital, and saw that it was very new, very modern. I was completely confident in my decision to go there.”

Located just a hop across the U.S. border, Hospital Angeles draws 95% of its patients from the U.S. and Canada. Among all hospitals in Mexico, it performs the highest number of lap band surgeries.

The 95% number is important. When I talk about Mexican medical facilities gearing themselves up for American health care dollars, this is what I’m talking about. I know people think it sounds scary to have health care procedures done in Mexico, but this is why you can feel confident – the business itself demands that the facility rise to the standards that Americans expect for their healthcare dollar. These people want you to refer your friends to them for their care as well – that’s why you can be confident they’re going to take very good care of you.

Back to Angela:

Jones was away from her home in Dalton, Georgia for just two days. “I’m so glad I found WorldMed Assist. They made everything so easy, and stayed closely involved from my very first contact. Not only did they make all the arrangements for me in Mexico, they also helped me find a center to have my lap band filled that’s only an hour away from my home.”

Would she recommend a trip to Hospital Angeles for others seeking a permanent weight loss solution? “Definitely. Everyone at the hospital was super nice and my doctor was terrific. The hospital was even more impressive in person than on the internet. Even if I could have afforded the $20,000 for Lap Band surgery at home, doctors here wouldn’t do it because my Body Mass Index was just below the minimum requirement. My surgery in Mexico cost me less than $8000, everything included.”

Jones plans to shed 80 pounds by fall. “The hospital urged me not to take it too fast, and recommended I plan on 10 months so I can maintain good nutrition,” she said.

World Med Assist has a page that explains what the process is for determining if they can help you with your Lap Band procedure, what you need to provide them with and how you make your decisions. I want to highlight a couple excerpts from this page.

Step three: Initial Information. Next, we need to get to know one another better so we can tailor a medical solution to your unique situation. We’ll contact you to:

Find out more about your medical history and current medical needs
Determine whether you’re a good candidate for medical travel
Explain in more detail exactly what to expect and when
Answer all your questions
Describe how we evaluate medical providers to ensure the highest quality care for our patients
Discuss destination options for your medical condition and learn your travel preferences. Describe the “behind-the-scenes” services we provide to ensure a smooth, simple and seamless trip abroad for your treatment

These people are very good at providing succinct information over the phone – certainly their website suggests that they understand very well what people want to know. Your conversation with them will provide you with a lot of information that’s going to make you feel much more comfortable about proceding abroad.

The next part comes under the KISS paradigm. Stop fretting and let them handle logistics:

Step seven: We Arrange Logistics. Once you’ve made your decision, we take it from there, and even help you get your travel documents, such as passports and visas, in order and arrange for payment, including financing if needed. Once we’ve tied down the date for your procedure, WorldMed Assist then makes all arrangements with the doctor and hospital, and coordinates your travel itinerary. All you have to do is pack a suitcase and board the airplane.

And this is the process once you arrive:

Step eight: You Arrive. Once you arrive at your destination, you’ll be greeted at the airport and driven to the hospital. You’ll be introduced to your liaison, who on our behalf, will coordinate your admission and all details during your stay. During admission, you’ll make payment to the hospital, usually by credit card, and then you’re ready to meet your medical team. Your lead doctor will explain every aspect of your procedure in detail and the in depth pre-op tests. The tests ensure there are no changes in your medical condition since the transfer of records. Most patients are impressed with the thoroughness of these tests, and unlike in the U.S., are all at no additional charge. No matter which of the WorldMed Assist hospitals you’ve chosen, you’ll be able to communicate clearly in English, the facilities are pristine and technologically advanced, and the staff is dedicated to your medical care and your personal comfort.

If you or someone you love can’t afford to have weight loss surgery here in the US, this is an excellent way to go about saving money and receiving excellent care all at the same time. Eight thousand dollars is something that most families can come up with if necessary and extending the life and physical comfort of someone you love seems like an excellent thing to do. Maybe this surgery could be a Mother’s Day gift, or a Father’s Day gift or even a birthday gift. What do you think – would others in your family pitch in? I bet they would.

Anyway, check out World Med Assist’s website and then call them and ask your questions. 1-866-999-3848

Study Looking For Obese Teens For Lap Band

I know I have a lot of people checking to find out whether Lap Bands are appropriate for adolescents. I’ve featured several stories about kids who have lost a tremendous amount of weight with Lap Bands and are much happier for it. The key is that you must be serious about losing weight and be capable of eating reasonably.

If you’re a teenager in Southern California, and you’re interesting in having a Lap Band procedure, UCSD may be looking for you.

Millions of adults have turned to surgery when diet and exercise don’t work. Now, with childhood obesity sharply on the rise, researchers are exploring whether surgery may be a viable option for teens. As part of a multi-center clinical trial, UCSD Medical Center will evaluate whether or not a minimally invasive procedure called gastric banding is a safe and effective weight loss treatment in obese adolescents ages 14-17.
“Gastric banding is known to be highly successful in adults. The question to answer is whether or not the procedure can help morbidly obese teens, who on average are overweight by more than 100 pounds,” said Santiago Horgan, M.D., director of the UCSD Center for the Treatment of Obesity. “Over a period of five years, we will closely monitor the patient’s weight, in addition to their overall health and well being.”

Here is the short version of what they are looking for:

The nationwide study population will consist of 150 adolescents recruited from seven weight management centers. Twenty two participants will be recruited at UCSD Medical Center. Potential participants must demonstrate a history of obesity for at least two years and have failed more conservative non-surgical weight-reduction alternatives such as a supervised diet, exercise, and behavior modification programs.

And here is their contact info along with a statement of purpose by the researching physician:

“By addressing obesity at an early age, we may be able to avoid life-threatening conditions such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and depression,” said Horgan who has performed more than 1,000 gastric banding procedures. “In the long run this could potentially save billions of dollars now spent on obesity related healthcare.”

UCSD Medical Center has a comprehensive program dedicated to the holistic treatment of obesity. Through a compassionate team approach, patients and their families are offered leading-edge medical care combined with nutritional training, fitness counseling, and psychological support.

To learn more about the gastric banding clinical trial for adolescents, including potential risks and side effects, call UCSD Medical Center at 619-471-0447 or email misresearch@ucsd.edu.

This press release is from last summer, so the program may be full already, but it seems to me that if you’re a teenager who needs to lose over 100 pounds, it would be more than worth it to contact them and see what the story is.