Life after Surgery with your Gastric Band

Mobilise yourself as early as possible and avoid long periods of immobility. Keep up your daily walking of 2 - 4 miles as soon as you can. Continue to wear your surgical stockings until you are fully mobile to help prevent deep vein thrombosis.
Stay focused on keeping sugary snacks and fizzy drinks out of your diet.
Stay on your low calorie liquid diet for two weeks before gradually returning to a more solid but small portion diet.
Do not try to test out how much you can eat! Do not be surprised if you find you can eat without too much difficulty. The band does not provide significant restriction until after it has been filled at your clinic visit 4 - 6 weeks after surgery.
You will have dressings over the wounds and clips in the skin. Use the dressings to keep the wounds clean and dry and to stop your clothes catching or sticking to the wounds. Your skin clips can be removed 1 week after surgery.

After each band fill you will need, for about 2 weeks, to revert to the liquid diet that you have now become very familiar with. After this period your band will have loosened off a little and you can move to reintroduce softer foods and then solid foods. Do not get stuck on an overly mushy food diet just because it is easier to get through your meal this way. You must choose healthy foods eaten in small pieces and chewed really well. Plan that your meals will take longer and that you will stay in control of your portion size, especially if your band is not quite tight enough yet.
You need to be constantly aware not to let sugary snacks back into your diet
If you swallow a lump of food too quickly it might stick on your band and cause discomfort or pain behind your breastbone or in your back. Try to sip a little water slowly. Stop eating as soon as you experience this sensation. The food may pass into your stomach or you might have to regurgitate it.
You will usually require more than one band adjustment before the exact level of restriction is found to suit you best. During this time it is important to stay focused on not letting sugary snacks back into your diet.
In addition to your walking each day, begin to add more vigorous exercise to your weekly routine. Choose exercise that you enjoy and try to vary it rather than just sticking to one type of exercise.

It is common to find that weight loss slows down only to begin again later.
When beginning to exercise more vigorously you may build muscle which slows your weight loss. Do not stop exercising, you are converting fat into muscle and you will notice your body shape improving and clothes size decreasing.
Always start by examining the choices you are making with your food intake. Common problems are allowing chocolate, ice cream and alcohol back into your diet. Another issue can be getting stuck on very soft foods. In this case you need to work hard to stop taking this easy option and take your time to move to solids eaten in small mouthfuls and chewed really well before swallowing. Take your time over meals!
Have I let my daily walking slip? Could I be doing more to increase my activity levels and exercise programme?
Do I need a band fill? If you think this is likely and your appointment at the clinic is too far away please ring the clinic to see if an earlier appointment can be made. Try to address the points above before just looking for the band to be tightened. Stay in control yourself whilst awaiting the band adjustment.
Do not lose faith or trust in the system! A solution can nearly always be found. Sometimes time and patience are required.

Every individual is different
The pre-operative programme should result in about a 1 stone weight loss
The initial post-operative programme should result in about 0.5 - 1 stone weight loss
By about 3 months after surgery you are likely to have lost about 25% of your initial excess weight. For example, if your starting BMI was 45 and your ideal BMI is 25 you will now be about a BMI of 40.
By 6 months after surgery you should have lost about 50% of your initial excess weight. For example, if your starting BMI was 45 and your ideal BMI is 25 you will now be about a BMI of 35.
By 1 year after surgery, and with a lot of hard work and self control, you should have lost about 75% of your initial excess weight. For example, if your starting BMI was 45 and your ideal BMI is 25 you will now be about a BMI of 30.
Not everybody achieves these goals so do not set yourself unrealistic goals. It is more important to continue to lose weight than how fast you lost the weight.