A fill is a fill is NOT a fill

May 21, 2010

Just got home from my fill appointment with my surgeon. He said everything looked great (always good to hear). Then he said that he thought I looked terrific, "Michael, you look like you are at a great weight for your height. You looked like you were too thin before." Oy veh! I hate that. He knew about my motorcycle accident. I told him about gaining 40 lbs since the accident and losing that. Told him I am pretty close to the same weight I was at my last fill. Again, he said he thinks I'm doing great.

Then the fill process began. He numbed up the area above the port and inserted the larger needle into the port. Then the x-ray table went vertical. He handed me a cup of barium and had me take a swallow. Voila! There was my band, in action, restricting the flow of liquid through my stomach. I could see the pouch above my band, the band itself and the stomach below the band. He added more liquid to the band and let go of the plunger on the syringe and the liquid pushed back into the syringe. He said that indicated that the band had pressure against it from my stomach. We could see that on the fluoro screen. He pushed in about .5 or 1 cc and had me swallow. The liquid dramatically slowed down thru the band. You could see the liquid ball up above the band and even back up toward the esophogus. He said he felt it was too tight but it was up to me. It's very hard to figure out what will work with liquid when the band is restricting solid food. We ended up settling on .35 cc's. Now, I am on liquids for 2 days.

It's always very cathartic to SEE my band in action. To see it in there doing its job. I know it's there but seeing it is different than feeling it. Maybe after this last fill, it will kick in and help me feel satiated after meals. Next month is 3 years post op. That's pretty unbelievable!

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