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Well done OP for nipping this in the bud. I regained 7kg last year (3rd year after my surgery) and I had to diet for months to lose that again. I am now back to tracking everything. I too got complacent. Alcohol crept in. I wasn't exercising NEARLY as much as I had. No more. It took too much effort to lose, I do not want to have to do that (all) ever again. Far too comfortable at my new weight. So far this year I have maintained by sticking to the surgery rules - protein first, veg second, carbs third by a long way. Everything crossed I can stick to this!

I strongly believe there is no perfect goal weight. I think the goal should rather be how you feel and how you feel you look. If you feel good and are happy with how you look, then you're at your goal. If you think you'd like to shed a few more pounds, then do so. If you feel like you look underweight, then it might be time to gain a bit. I would never recommend BMI as a guideline. A much better guideline would be % body fat, but accurate testing is expensive and not readily available. Keep in mind if you were obese for any length of time, your organs are likely bigger and your bones denser. This means you might look identical at 170 to someone that was never obese that weighs 150. Also, as most folks know, since muscle is denser than fat, the scale just does not tell the full story. There are people with a "normal" BMI that are carrying too much fat because they have so little muscle mass. I get it, especially for very goal-oriented people, they want something exact to shoot for, but when you think about all the above factors, picking a goal weight is just so random and almost certainly to be wrong for you.

We all deserve a little love 💗

I first came to this board in March of 2022. I had my 1st surgery (sleeve) in May 2022. I had my revision to bypass (due to A LOT of complications with the sleeve) in June of 2023. Since then I have been complication free. But I was struggling to maintain my weight. I was put on a diet and exercise regimen to gain and then maintain my weight. Well, my metabolism finally sorted itself out, but I wasn't paying attention. I was supposed to weigh myself once a week to see how things are going. I went 4 weeks without weighing myself. And I was just eating whatever I wanted in hopes I would gain. And boy oh boy, I did gain. I went from 176 to 190 in 5 weeks. That shocked me, because I wanted to get to 180 - 183. Now I have to stop eating willy nilly, get my diet back on track, and focus more on my workouts. I became lax with what I needed to do and I found myself going back to old eating habits. Examples include eating whatever I wanted, even when it went against my diet. Not working out as much as I was supposed to because I was tired or didn't feel like it. Eating when I was bored. Eating something because it's there, not because I was hungry. Grazing all day and night, which was ALWAYS my issue. I'm telling you all this because I've seen so many posts where some of you guys really beat yourself up for messing up. You're afraid you'll undo all your progress. I admit, that has creeped into my mind a bit, but I remind myself that I know what to do and what not to do. I know how to get back on track. And I know how to give myself grace while still holding myself accountable. It's just a matter of doing it. So I'm going to course correct, get back to the proper diet and exercise routine, and really work on my eating habits. Just know that EVERYONE can slip up. It's not the end of the world....even if it feels like it is. Just own up to your mistakes, correct your actions, eat and exercise properly, and it'll all be ok. And with that, I need to go work out. Have a good one, and wish me luck that I get this sorted.

How are you recovering @AmberFL ? Hope all is well and you're in a gym somewhere pumping some serious iron LOL

I so feel this! the wonderful thing about this surgery is that its a great tool! I am up about 5lbs from my "comfy" weight and I am a grazer. I could graze all day and be happy but that is what got me obese so I cannot do that. you have been inspiring and continue to do so, thank you for sharing and being vulnerable. Its good for us to hear that everyone can slip up but we need to hear that

I set my goal at "healthy" BMI. (60kg or 132lbs) I realise BMI isn't really the best indicator of overall health or even healthy weight, but it's a good starting point. But to be honest, I never even really believed that I would lose any weight at all, it was just a Hail Mary pass that I thought I would talk to my GP about and to my amazement, it's working! I was a size 24UK (US 20) 7 months ago and just thought I was going to keep getting bigger. 7 months later, I'm a size 16UK (US 12) and went from 122 kg (270lbs) to 87kg (193 lbs) I never though this would be possible. I've hit so many goals I never even set! I still have that arbitrary number goal because my GP seems to have BMI tattooed on his brain and the number matters to him, but I'm just going to go along for the ride and see where I end up and where my body is comfortable maintaining!

I discourage people from getting hung up on the number on the scale, because the non-scale victories are so much more important. The number on the scale is meaningless compared to things like your health metrics (blood pressure, glucose, lipids, etc.), fitness, and mobility. I am also curious how you can say you are 0.2 pounds from your goal weight because my weight can fluctuate by 5 pounds in a single day, so 0.2 pounds is far more precise than you can realistically measure your weight. Drink half a cup of water and your weight goes up by more than that. Somebody posted a video on this site a while back (maybe someone can repost it if you remember) with a doctor explaining why your "best weight" is not necessarily going to be in the "ideal weight" range based on BMI, especially for bariatric surgery patients -- and in fact, for many bariatric surgery patients, a "normal" BMI may be too low. BMI has limited use in determining a healthy weight for any specific individual. It is kind of a primitive measure of body composition; a much better measure of that would be getting a Dexa scan, which can determine your actual body fat percentage and visceral fat (which is what has the highest impact on health). I never really had a goal weight. I was required to state a goal weight for my psych evaluation, and I think I put 180 pounds based on the average weight loss from my starting weight. I never thought I would get to a "normal" BMI, but I am actually hovering right around a BMI of 25 (I'm maintaining between 135 and 140) with a body fat percentage of 21%. My goal now is to stay within that range because I think that's about the lowest I can realistically go without plastic surgery (nothing against that if it's what you want, but I have no plans to do so) or extreme measures.

My initial goal was to be 199lbs, that would've gotten me to 30bmi, then once I got there and I kept loosing I figured okay....I want to get new boobs and a tummy tuck what BMI would be the best and weight would allow me to get the best and safest results. So I dropped my goal to 180 then 170 and I kept it there. I now teeter between 163-170 and have been for a few months. Now that I got boobs I'm looking more at 168-172 but I super happy with how I look and feel, although I cannot wait to get back into the gym and loose just a couple more pounds to give me that wiggle room. Scale is just one factor that shows success but its not THE factor. (I have to tell myself that all the time lol)

I think the first thing that comes to mind is just how varied dumping syndrome can be. When the bariatric teams talk about it, they tend to tell you all the symptoms and that it tends to happen pretty quickly after eating. Unfortunately, it's not that simple or straightforward. Some people may only have one or two symptoms. Others multiple symptoms. For some people it happens really quickly, and for others it can take hours before it begins. Time to recover is also really varied. For some it's over with in 30 minutes or less. Others can be in agony for many, many hours. As an example, I'm over 2 years out and for the longest time I just assumed I was one of the lucky (or cursed depending of your perspective), people that didn't really have to worry about dumping. I can eat almost anything and not have "typical" dumping syndrome. What I do have is what I was calling reactive hypoglycemia, meaning I was having low blood glucose issues ~3 hours of so after eating. After talking to my bariatric surgeon in my last checkup, she pointed out that what I was calling reactive hypoglycemia, is likely just a different form of dumping. Once I started being more careful about not eating a bunch of added sugar without sufficient protein as a buffer, the symptoms mostly went away.