I'm a RNY, but curious about Lap Banders

 Are they supposed to be following basically the same diet restrictions that I need to follow for the first couple of months (i.e. liquids, then puree's, then soft, then on to "normal"? Yes! The exact timings do vary according to the doc but most of us are back on to normal foods by about 4 weeks. Your friend should not be feeling any weaker than you after a similar time span. We all recover differently though and it may be her health and general well-being are not as good as yours. The anaesthetic stays in your system for a while and many people find they need a full week off especially if they have a strenuous job.  If she is feeling weak, she needs to up her protein. It must be in the correct liquid form (see her doc's instructions) but at this stage, she does not need to count calories - this is the healing phase. Unlike most other WLS, banded people may well not lose weight at first as they have nothing to help them eat less until they get their fills.  She should not be tempted to eat fish or any other solids unless they are blended/ liquidised. The band is sutured into position and eating solids causes movement in the stomach as we digest solids. This puts strain on the band positioning and may lead to long term complications. This is a difficult time for bandsters but please tell her she really should follow her doc's advice. Suggest that she comes on to this board to see the experiences of others. Kate

As others have said, all Dr's are different, but my Dr/Nutritionist uses the exact same eating plan for Lapband and RNY.  I had to follow a 2 week liquid diet post-op, and had foods introduced in stages after that.

I took 2 weeks off and am glad I did.  One thing different is that with the band, the port is stitched into the abdominal muscle and that makes it feel like you did 1 million crunches for days and days.  That was probably the most painful part.  My best advice...keep sip sip sipping water. Try a heating pad to the sore areas and use that pain medicine, don't be afraid of it.  Or alternate it with tylenol.

I had surgery Thursday and was back to work Monday. I am an attorney that was mainly at my desk...no court at that time so not much moving around. I had little pain, really. I was on clear liquids 2 days and then 3 weeks of thick liquids, then regular food in around one cup portions, three times per day. I had to get my liquids in also so that I would not dehydrate...that was important. I was not too worried about nutrition during the healing phase, more worried about simply healing. Had a lot of SF popcicles and jello during that time. Soup too. I hope that your friend calls her surgeon if she is not feeling better. If she has pain in her incisions have her look for hot red area or weeping and be sure to go in immediatley....fever too is a bad sign. Hope this helps.