thanks sweet, it wasnt that easy at first, but now its a breeze. I try to exercise regular, and i like to take our dogs for a walk every evening. ive even recently startin joggin in the early mornin. as far as eatin goes, ive decided i wont eat it unless it flies or swims, or grows in the ground. i eat tons of salads (no ranch, i like Kraft's caeser vinaigrette with parmesan). replace ground beef with ground turkey, things like that. i found all kinds of healthy recipes online too that the whole fam could eat. hope i could help. ull do great, and thanks again for the comments.

hey thanks for stopping by! I changed my mind i wasnt going to get it well for the past 2 months almost I was working out so hard and eatting decently enough. But I lost 8 pounds and then 2 weeks on special duty for work i gained it all back pluse some!!!! Tomarrow Im scheduling the surgery, my girlfriend whome had it done wow she got do dress like sexy rine stone cow girl forhollowheen me ummmm need i say any thing about that... Im actually doing it Im ready for this crap to be done, I have the love of my life back and i want to be sexy and slim and not uncomfy for our one day wedding he is from the virgin islands so i know we are going to wed and honey moon some where i need a bikini lol please keep up on me

Hi Sweetmama...Thanks for the compliments. For the past two months I have pretty much been maintaining. At my one year mark I was down about 107 pounds. I'm currently wearing a size 10 and/or mediums. I started out in a very, very tight 22/24 and/or 2X. I never thought that I would be where I am today but I decided that if I was going this route and having surgery, I was going to make it work for me. I began exercising and eating right and the weight started falling off. I just recently completed the Breast Cancer 3-Day, walking a total of 60 miles over 3 days. I never thought that I would be able to do that but I did it and felt wonderful about it.

Good luck to you. You can do it. Think of how wonderful you will feel and how much energy you will have. I love going out to play with my kids now and before I just wanted to sit on the sofa. My life has definately made a dramatic change, a change for the better. Take care of yourself and keep in touch.

Hi SWEETMAMA_OF4 ~
Congrats on your recent banding! How are you doing so far??
To get the weight off, I was very strict with myself in those first few months after banding ... I had a routine and I stuck to it. I ate 3 small meals, 2 small snacks inbetween and most importantly, I made sure to get in all my water everyday. Before banding, my drink of choice was soda ... I absolutely despised water but knew going into this I had to train myself to like it and like ALOT of it! So to make sure I got in all my "required" fluids I drank a 16oz. bottle of water between each meal/snack so by the end of the day I had at least 4 bottles down. Of course, to make it taste better I added the little packets of Crystal Light and such but definitely getting in all of your fluids is most important.
As you may know, it takes 3-5 small fills to get to your "sweet spot" and start losing ... well, I'm a bit impatient (and somewhat stubborn according to my husband ... but what does he know!) so anyway I started following a low carb diet after banding to help speed up the process. Some people don't "agree" with that and it may not work for everyone, but it works for me. I have never in my life liked vegetables (the ones that are actually good for you) so my typical meal doesn't consist of a protein followed by a vegetable then a "good" carb as most doctors would suggest. My diet consists of mainly protein and just a few carbs. I occasionally have a salad but like I said, occasionally. When the weight slows down and I start to plateau, I switch my routine a bit to kickstart the loss again and I do that by either increasing/decreasing my calorie intake or just increasing my carbs. We're all different, what works for me may not work for you and vice versa and of course you should follow the post-op plan that your doctor has suggested, I'm just telling you what has worked for me. In addition to my "strict" routine, I was also walking 1 mile each evening. I bought an elliptical machine too but I've since decided it's evil and so now it collects dust in my garage, LOL ...
Best of luck to you on this wonderful Lap Band journey ... it has definitely changed my life for the better and I hope the same for you. Keep in touch!

Thanks for comments, As for the weight loss my DR told me that I had a natural restriction with just the band. I have had 2 fills since the surgery. The key to what I have done is that I got a trainor and started a work out routine (something I never had done before) and I read nutrition labels all of the time looking for foods low in fat and calories,Low in carbs and high in protien. Please remember that it took your whole life to put weight on so it will take time for it to come off. I think of it as a marathon not a sprint. Good Luck and God Bless.
ED

Hi , Thanks for the request. Good luck and God Bless

Hang in there you can do this x

Hi SWEETMAMA_OF4,
My name is Jennifer and I'm new to this but I wanted to send a hello. I live in Traverse City, MI. I haven't been able to talk to many people around here (esp those my age) who have been banded. Hope your progress is going well. I was banded on Sept 25 2008.

hi there! thanks for the friend request! happy to have ya! if you have any questions i'd be happy to help you, just let me know.

jenn

Thanks SweetMama!