Don't be hard on yourself and don't give up!! You shouldn't have to "white knuckle" it but you do have to watch what you eat and exercise. Don't get me wrong - if I could eat veggies instead of chocolate I won't be here either! I'm still a newbie but it definitely sounds like you need more fills before you can decide if this worked or not. Good Luck! Kim

I can certainly understand your feelings. I waited too long to get my first fill (6 weeks) and I regained a bit when I got on solids. I can see where it would have been easy to backslide right then, but by some miracle I didn't. My first fill was 2.6 cc! My surgeon and I believe in a big first fill, then lots of small tweaks. Maybe that's something to discuss with your doctor .. once you know the reason for his fill protocol, you can work with him to your advantage. You don't have anything to be embarrassed about, and in fact you can use it to your advantage, hopefully, to get your surgeon's attention. I didn't get a sweet-spot fill for over a year and a half .. it's a process that requires much attention, patience and tweaking. You are a relatively new Bandster. This surgery takes more patience and work on the part of the patient than the others, but the result is so worth it. I wish the best for you. Email me if you want. jeanie jeanie

Brandy, I am sure I would feel the same way if I only had 1cc in my band... that is less than my first fill was!! My first fill was 1.5ccs and I still didn't have restriction! You have to USE your band before you can declare it a failure, and I am afraid your surgeon hasn't filled you enough to let you know what the band is capable of. I questioned whether I even had a band until I had some restriction, so i can certainly understand where you're coming from. The band does work in most cases, you just need the support of a surgeon and a drive on your part to get those fills so YOU can stop working so hard!! That's not why we got these bands... it wasn't so we work our butts off for the rest of our lives, it's so we could get some help. With that said, yes, we do need to follow some basic rules and exercise, etc... but it's SO much easier once you have restriction. Restriction makes this whole process make sense. I hope you'll go back to that surgeon and get another fill. Fills are just as important as getting the band put it. It makes ALL the difference. Good luck to you in this journey, Melissa

I have read previous posts where people have been FLAMED. I know I am opening up myself to that but I don't care.There are so many wonderful weight loss stories on the lap band board, and they are very inspiring, however i think that people who are not as successful are reluctant to write heir stories. Well here we go.... I was banded on Sept.29,2005 and to date I had lost about 12 or 13 pounds on the liquid diets but gained them all back plus 4 0r 5 more once I started to eat mushies and regular food again. I was the "model" patient at first, following all the rules of postop life. But then the hunger came and I was not prepared for it.Also at the same time, I started to gain weight just from transitioning back to regular food. This weight gain sent me right back into the patterns that made me fail as a dieter before surgery.I would diet for a week or two or three, but as soon as there was no weight loss or a slight gain, I would give up and my mental "issues" with food would take over.I have had 2 fills so far, each .5cc. To my body that is like water. i feel like i have NEVER HAD SURGERY!!! My doc is pretty dissappointed in me but no one understands that this is the problem that led me to have surgery in the first place. I can not "white knuckle" it. I fail at that miseribly and it sends me into the yo- yo pattern that got me here in the first place. Also, i have a very unique metabolism. I know most people's metabolism is screwed up from yo- yo dieting, but mine is non-existent. I went through 4 pregnancies in which I lost an average of 30 lbs. with each from excessive vomiting and nausea. After the pregnancies, i would look GREAT but from the first crumb I put in my mouth, my body would hold onto it for dear life and now it has become sooooo adept a doing this. With any decrease in calloric intake it holds onto everything and resists weight loss, so the postop diet started that cycle over for me. Well this is my story.... I have not given up totally yet, I have still been trying to eat like a bandster by chewing completely and I have even gotten good at not drinking with my meals.I am trying to diet also. I tried medifast, but the hunger was unbearable so now i'm trying Dr. Phil's diet since I lost 20 lbs. on it before and it is very close to bandster style meals. Iwill also try to restart exercising at least 30 min. a day in the next couple of weeks. I have basically tried to institute one healthy behavior per week. Last week I drank at least 5 glasses of h20 a day, this week i will try to increase that and get control of the eating by trying to stay on the diet.My next fill is for march 2.,but i'm trying to lose something, anything so I won't be soooo embarassed. Do you know how humiliating it is to go to your surgeon after he operated on you and you have GAINED weight. I know I am messing up his success rates but right now I am doing the best I can. The tears are coming right now as I write this because it just hurts so much. i am glad that I didn't tell anyone except my husband or it would be even more embarrassing.One last thing.. Last summer me and the family were at Busch Gardens, my 13 year old and I were trying to get on the roller coaster and I had to get off . That had never happened to me in my life before so I was caught off guard. It was so humiliating but it showed me how much bigger i have gotten over the past year. Also this year I opted out of my 20 year reunion because I just couldn't face all those staring eyes. Life is passing me by. This June the family is going on an airplane to disney( the kids first airplane ride). Please pray for me that I can at least lose enough to fit in the airplane seat and the rides. I know i don't have much time... So there you have it. I do regret getting the surgery because nothing has changed in my life and one more failure has really messed up my already fragile psyche....

I was told by my surgeon in the initial consult that DS was what he would recommend for me IF I weren't yet so young (going to be 30 and still haven't had children yet) - that I'd have a greater chance of losing the majority of the weight with it vs. rny. But he says RNY will work for me and that, like anything else, it's just a tool. I don't want to continue to eat like a linebacker, even if I knew I was losing weight in the process. The problem for me has always been food being a daily focus - socializing, thinking about it, feeling a need to eat away stress. It's great that DS works for you guys, but I don't see having to go for Bms 4-6 times per day as a positive...that's just me. It's misleading to say that lap band is the "safest," folks - it's not done on the same scale as the other procedures - most people can't get it approved or can't afford to pay for it themselves. It's still considered experimental by most insurers, and it's not an option for people who have more than 150-200 pounds to lose (i.e. people who have many co-morbids or who would have to lose more than 100 pounds before they'd see an improvement in mobility, etc.) RNY is what was recommended to me, and it's what I'm in the process of getting work-ups done for. There are risks and benefits with every procedure - there is no "magic" procedure that will get results in a short amount of time without some kind of negative (small or grave).