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Hi all, my name is Kevin, and I'm new to this board. I just signed up because, for the first time, I think I have a story to share. I've been reading on this board for months as I've been weighing surgical possibilities, and now it's weird being on the other side. I did my gastric sleeve with Renew Bariatics in Tijuana about 4 months back, and I'm at -82 lbs to date. If you're undecided or on the fence—believe me, I'm there. I wasted YEARS jumping around, attempting every diet, every exercise craze, every miracle pill. Nothing held. I'd lose 20 lbs and gain 30. I was at my all-time high last year at 312 lbs, and it started affecting every area of my life—my knees hurt all the time, my energy level was zero, and quite frankly, I just didn't know who I was anymore. I eventually made the decision after my first doctor quite kindly suggested WLS. Insurance here in the US would take an eternity with all the pre-reqs, so I investigated Mexico (fairly skeptically at first). But Renew Bariatrics would keep coming up in every search, and I started watching videos, reading testimonials, even stalking threads here. I ended up deciding to go for it. The Tijuana experience was much better than I expected. The hospital was clean, the staff were nice and genuinely professional, and they were very organized. I went alone (which intimidated me), but I never at any point felt in danger. My coordinator was responsive and the time to prepare me ahead of time, like what to bring and how the day would go every time. Surgery day was actually a blur. I was terrified of heck, but the surgical team made me feel comfortable and at ease. I had no severe complications—only some expected gas pain for a couple of days. The hardest part? The adjustment in my mind afterward. Eating slowly, learning to stop when full, and knowing that food wasn't going to be my crutch anymore took work. Still does. But here's the thing—I got my life back. I can move again. I sleep better at night. I walk into rooms upright. I've still got a long way to go, but this has made such an amazing difference, and I'm glad that I pushed the limits and gave it a try. If you're considering Renew or just need to talk to someone who's gone through it, go ahead and comment or contact me. I recall how valuable it was reading actual people's posts when I was still on the fence. Happy to return the favor. Thanks for reading my long tale—I'm happy to be here!

So if I'm understanding your post correctly, you've been eating 1200-1400 kcal per day yet your weight has been stable at ~215 pounds. This either means: Your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE) is also around 1200-1400 calories per day, OR You're eating a lot more calories than you think. Let's explore each of these in more detail. Based on your height and weight, your TDEE should probably be 1800 to 2200 calories per day. Just your BMR or Basal Metabolic Rate (the number of calories your body burns per day just to keep you alive), should be ~1500-1800 calories per day. There are lots of reasons this could be lower, but for your TDEE to be 1300, you'd have to have a BMR in the neighborhood of ~900 calories per day or as much as HALF of what we'd expect. This would be exceptionally low considering your size. BMRs that low tend to only be seen in elderly frail women. To be clear, without having a metabolic test, we can't know for sure, but this does seem unlikely. A more logical reason for this discrepancy is that you're actually eating a lot more than you think. Calorie overestimation is extremely common (unlike extremely low BMRs), thus I lean toward this as an explanation. I have seen some suggestions stating that the magnitude of this may be as high as 40-50% underestimated. In other words, someone could think they're eating 1500 calories, but they are actually eating 2200+. So where do people go wrong? Misreading/misunderstanding nutrition labels. It's not uncommon for people to confuse a serving with a container of food. Sometimes, manufacturers will list a serving of something, but what you're actually eating may be 2 or more servings. Accepting as fact the calorie counts on nutrition labels. In the US, calorie counts on nutrition labels can be off by as much as 10% before manufacturers would be expected to adjust the calorie count. Keep in mind, though that manufacturers are self policing here and really don't have a lot on incentive to make sure these are correct. Many people simply guess at serving sizes, especially if it's a meal they made themselves. This can lead to wildly inaccurate calorie counts Also very common when they are making meals themselves is to just look up a calorie count for a similar food, but this also can be really inaccurate. Lots of people guess at amounts, thus you may think you're getting say 1 cup of a food, when it's actually 1.5 cups. Speaking of measuring by cups, this also is wildly inaccurate. To properly measure calories, you really need to weigh EVERYTHING you eat IN GRAMS. Any other method just isn't very accurate. I also wanted to touch briefly on your comment on exercise. While I think it's great that you're exercising, this really has nothing to do with weight loss. Lot;s of studies show that increasing energy expenditure through lower levels of exercise like you're getting typically leads to lowering your energy expenditure elsewhere throughout the day. This means you really have no increased calories burned and shouldn't think this means it's okay to eat more as a result.

That was well said, and I’m so glad to hear of your good results.

I was going to say the peri-menopausal syndrome has struck again. I had to switch to 50mg DHEA while the hormones were swinging around. I had my various doctor’s blessing. It is a hormone therapy treatment so please talk with your physician. Formal Hormone replacement therapy would have been better but alas, insurance. Now I’ve weaned off to 25mg at age 57. I live just fine on 900-1200 kcals at 5’4” and I’m not frail, I weight lift and have a super active job, and walk 20-30 minutes a day. Each of us is different. Soups make me very full, and salads when I can’t stand the hungries.

Do not let doomsdayers get you down! You are already well past your surgery. Your stomach tissues should be all healed and happy. You just have to follow your program, know it’s a journey not a race (don’t be bothered by plateaus). This kind of talk by your co-workers is common — ever notice how when someone in a group is pregnant or has a major illness people will start sharing stories about how they know someone who had something similar but there was a freak occurrence or bad outcome, etc.? “My sister was pregnant with twins and she was in labor for 36 hours!” “My Aunt Ada had kidney cancer and her left leg just popped right off one day! They never did find it.” They are just connecting to the experience with storytelling, which is pretty thoughtless (but a good reminder to be mindful ourselves that we probably do it to other people and should watch out for that). Next time you hear talk like that, smile to yourself and know you are completely in control of your journey, you are rocking it in every way and you are a success. If you feel the need to say something, maybe a breezy, “Oh, I think the docs I’ve had care with have everything under control just fine.”

yay! congrats! excited for u! recovery really varies from person to person. i do understand that if your procedure does not include muscle tightening it should be a little bit less painful (but again it depends on your individual pain tolerance!) things that i found useful for recovery (note: i had muscle tightening) 1) my husband. lol 2) a stool to sit on in the shower 3) big sturdy pillows to stay propped up in bed (helps when getting out of bed too) 4) my mother's cane to walk...mind u i probably walked too much, but it def helped my back cuz i was hunched over all the time. 5) a pillow to hug in the car when going over bumps, or when i coughed, and omg when i sneezed (sneezing was the worst!!) 6) my faja to keep me all tight and snuggled. i wore mine way beyond than what was prescribed because i just really liked the feeling of it, ha. good luck! ❤️