I've Been a Bad Girl!

Julie, Hey girl I think I had surgery the same day as you, all the doctors have different diet protocal. I was on clear liquids up until the 27th then on soft protien for the next month. Your probably fine, I went to lunch with my family and had ckn torilla soup at Chevy's minus the tortias and peppers and it was great!!! See my surgeon tommorrow! Talk to you soon....and don't be guilty Erin

I tried mashed potatoes first and they didn't bother me at all. That was about 10 days post op. I was dyin' for some real food!! Then I got brave and tried one tiny bite of fish. BAD IDEA!!! It got "stuck". (The same thing happened with a tiny bite of well chewed meatball - ugh) However, after that I went back to my liquids and was okay until the appt the following week. Now I am on Pureed, only I don't puree anything....I just chew and chew until it's a fine mush. So far, it's been okay. On the egg thing...I made a scrambled egg the other day and was able to eat about half of it. It sat okay in my pouch. However, today I made another scrambled egg, but I did it a bit differently. After 2 small bites, I couldn't handle anymore because it felt lodged in my chest. The first time, I took one egg and a dab of milk and scrambled it in a bowl with a whisk, then I cooked it lightly (I made sure NOT to overcook it...eggs cook a bit even after you get them out of the pan). That egg did great!! Today, I said "I don't need to whisk it" and just threw it in the pan and scrambled it with a spatula, then got it out and sprinkled some cheddar cheese on it and nuked it in the microwave for about 10-15 seconds to melt the cheese. I even put some sour cream and salsa on it today to make it "wet". I think the time in the microwave made it too rubbery or something because I couldn't tolerate the egg today. It could just be that some times what works on one day doesn't work on another...but the consistency was slightly different and I attribute that to part of it as well. Hope this helps. PS - I will probably try a scrambled egg again in a few days, only I will cook it the way I did the first time.

With my nut.'s approval, I've sort of advanced on my diet too but in a modified way. I became lactose intolerant after surgery so couldn't get my protien from whey powders. So I've been living off canned soups and sf jello. In order to get more protien variety I took some of the foods from the puree list and liquified them. Canned vegetarian chili blenderized with a can of beef broth is good and has real flavor, a couple of hard boiled eggs blenderized with fat free cottage cheese, some low fat mayo, skim milk and seasonings mushed to the consistency of runny pudding. (tastes like a devilled egg!) And those eggs go down whereas I have not been able to eat scrambled eggs by themselves since I had my VBG in '99. Can't even look at them now without something to hide them like salsa or a white sauce. I did try my homemade ground turkey and even added more liquid but it wouldn't go down...but that was when my stricture was forming. After getting scoped they put me back on straight liquids. A few days on puree was lovely and I'll be getting back to it one of these days.

You are not alone! I did it on Christmas Day myself. It was only a few bites but I felt really guilty too. My food was supposed to be mushy at that point but I was just not strong enough to resist some of the traditional items. I talked to the nutritionist my doctor gave me and she said that I was probably ok and that the biggest worry would be making my stomach or pouch work too hard before everything was healed. The risk would be slippage and erosion of the band. That scared me enough to stick to it! I have only one more wee****il my first fill. My surgery cunsultant said that for some people, the time between surgery and the first fill is called "banster-hell." I totally understand why! I'm still hungry all of the time or else it is that I am craving the naughty things that will sabatogue (sp?) me!