Scary times.....

Thanks Maria (you know who you are), for convincing me that I should get back blogging. Over the coming days and weeks I can fill in some of the gaps since I last posted, but for now, I'm in a scary times sort of limbo - my band has been emptied this morning. 

 I've often wondered what it would feel like to have no restriction again, so I could compare it with how I have felt over the last four years since getting bended in the first place. But I never actually thought I would experience 'emptiness' so to speak. So why, I hear you ask? Acid. Or acid reflux to be more accurate. I've had it on and off for long periods over the last couple of years and I think I'm due some serious commission from Zantac, Rennie and Gaviscon. I've had two small de-fills already to try and solve the problem, but each time, I get a few weeks of improvement and then it comes back again. If you've never had acid reflux it's horrid. You get woken up many times in the middle of the night with this nasty acidic taste in your mouth and sometimes acid shooting up the back of your throat. You never get a decent nights sleep and it just wears you down. Things have got quite bad because I've even been getting it during the day over the last couple of weeks. Hence my visit to my friendly bariatric nurse, Clare. 

 I thought it might be a case of needing yet another small de-fill but Clare convinced me that it wouldn't solve the problem, and that I needed for my band to be completely emptied to let my stomach settle down. I've to see if things improve over the next week, and if not, book an x-ray appointment to see what's going on. If things do settle down, then I can skip the x-ray and start to get my band re-filled again in about three weeks time. 

 The band was emptied two hours ago and I don't feel any different yet. Maybe I'm expecting to be ravenously hungry, or maybe the presence of the band itself will provide enough restriction to keep the hunger pangs at bay. I don't know. I'm really not sure what to expect, but I'll keep you posted.