What to expect with the band.

Kate's view!! And mine only! Doesn't have to be yours!

We all hear the words "the band is just a tool" but we make this major decision to have life changing surgery and we tend to hear what we hope to hear! This can lead to unrealistic expectations, both about the speed and rate of loss and about the way in which we personally have to work.

We've all tried dieting! And it hasn't worked - if it had we wouldn't be on this fourm!

Imagine yourself following a programme which did (for a time) work for you. It might be Weigh****chers, it might be Atkins, it might be your own version of healthy eating. So you might be counting WW points, or carbs, or calories, or you might just be trying to eat less and cut out fattening foods.

All the band will do for you is make it a bit easier to follow your chosen programme. It won't do it for you, it won't stop you eating the wrong foods, it won't make you malabsorb fats etc.. You can still eat fattening things, you can still eat too much if you graze, you can still drink alcohol, you can still put sugar in your coffee and, believe me, creamy desserts and candies will slide down all too easily.

So is this a lifelong diet? Did you get wls just to spend the rest of your life feeling miserable and deprived?

No!  That is what the band does, takes the misery out of it. It makes those small quantities satsifying. Once you "know" your band and as loss becomes less important, you can choose to eat the foods you want and which work for you as long as you in some way monitor overall intake. That's not dieting! It is living as most of my slim friends live. In your teens and twenties, many can eat what they want and stay slim. But as you get older, very few are that lucky. Slim people in general eat small quantities of what they choose and just keep an eye on what those things are. That is what bandsters can do - in whatever way they choose. 

My own chosen route was not to count things but to make healthy choices (most of the time, not all of it!) and eat small portions. In that I am indistinguishable from my slim friends! That's what they do "naturally"; I do it with my band.

Helping you to help yourself  is all the band does. If you rely on it to stop you eating by causing pain, you are misusing it and storing up later problems.

End of lecture!!

Kate
PS Please note, I am aware that a few people never get restriction and so the band does not offer them the help I describe. So don't bother with the "that's all right for you, Kate" replies! That's what I am saying - this is all right for me!!!

Well said as usual !!!! :)

 Thanks Kate - well said 
~ Barbara

Kate
You are an inspiration for me. I have been reading these boards for months and  always enjoy your posts. Although I do not have the lapband (I have the realize Band)  due to cir****tances that happened I still love reading these boards Between the information I have gotten here from you and others and the people on the Realize board I have truely learned alot. I am not one to judge anyone for their decisions and sometimes I wonder how some people can be so harsh when you write something. I want you to know that I have always thought that your posts were something that everyone should read and ponder. Thank you for taking the time to  write this
Anna

Anna, in terms of how we live our lives, there is no difference between the Lapband and the Realize band. In fact, there's very little meaningful difference in the actual bands! There is probably more difference between my old 4cc LB and the newer, larger LBs than there is between the new LBs and your Realize band!

Kate

Kate great post !!!

Another thing you told me just a few weeks ago a fill does not make you lose weight.  You dont know how hard that hit  home that week when you told me that .

I was stuck at a weight loss , I was not hungry , but I was thinking of getting a fill till you told me those words and I knew right then and there I was doing the wrong thing.

I see so many folks at my surgical place that goes and gets fills for that reason alone or they get a fill because their head hunger is getting the best of them and they think if they get a fill it will go away hate to disappoint anybody but that just isn't going to happen that is something YOU and you have alone have to work on !!!

I want to say something so bad but I dont its not my place that is between them and the doctor .

Just be careful when you go get fills a lady in my support group lesson is learning that lesson the hard way she just had a band slip from being to tight and going months without saying  a word to the doc because she was losing weight.  Now , she has to have surgery again.  She came right out in support group told us how it happened and why it happened so watch them fills peeps its nothing to mess around with either .

Simply and perfectly put, Kate.  This should be a sticky at the top of the board so that daily newbies can read it.

It is almost impossible for someone who is considering lapband surgery to comprehend what living with the band does and does not mean.  You have laid it out there in understandable terms.

If you want to change your life, the lapband will help you.  If you want the lapband to change your life, you may be in for disappointment.

Ditto

Kate - I completely agree with your comments.  The main point that I wish I would have understood clearer was the point of -
Helping you to help yourself  is all the band does. If you rely on it to stop you eating by causing pain, you are misusing it and storing up later problems.
That hits home in such a huge way.  A LOT of people, including myself live thinging this is exactly how the "band works".  Since I have been cutting my portions down and not grazing - not drinking and eating - I feel like I have my band back.  Ohhhh I learn, but I tend to learn slowly.  
I appreciate your feedback on your posts....and I agree with others, your feedback is typically something I can use or apply to my own situations.  Thanks again.