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However many you need to eat, can actually eat and can still lose on! Around this point I was getting somewhere around 500 calories per day. Some people lose great on super low calories and some don't. I did my very best on around 900 calories per day and 70-80 grams of carbs. ~Cheri

I'm 5'1" and some change and at goal. I might have something to add here if anyone has questions. I had surgery at 242 pounds and a very snug 18/20 and am now maintaining between 133-137 pretty easily. Most of my clothes are size 6 or small. I had hoped for a smaller goal weight, actually, but it's just not going to happen. I'll need plastics eventually and that will easily take that last ten pounds off for me. It's not that I really feel I need to lose more weight, either, it's just that the BMI chart really sucks and my doctor still kinda nags about me being so close to the overweight line. Anyway, hello to everyone! It seems like the majority of the folks here were just recently sleeved or are awaiting surgery. ~Cheri Edited to add pictures. Everyone loves pictures, right?

Well, I got a bunch of tests done. I had to pay out of pocket to ship them to Almaty but it was laughably inexpensive (less than $30 for eight tests!) so no big deal. Everything came back perfectly normal and I'm not pregnant. The next step is ultrasound to see if there's another issue. The weight seems to be coming back off but I have weird jumps up and down on the scale now that I can't tie to my diet. And my cycle this month was a perfect 28 days again, so I'm not exactly sure what the heck is up. If we can't find anything via ultrasound there isn't much else to test or check so we'll chalk it up to a temporary thing unless the odd cycles come back again. Thanks for all the feedback and I hope you get some help, Sandy. I think close to ten different people advised me that Black Cohosh helped them through the night sweats and other joys of menopause so I'd try it if you're willing to work with an herbal remedy. ~Cheri

Yep, sounds like you worked on a little of the body issues but none of the head issues that led to your weight in the first place. You're not alone! Thank you for being brave enough to post about where you're really at, because it's a sign that you do want to change things. Your first stop is a counselor. Honestly. Do it. You need to and I think you realize that. It's okay to need help at different points in our lives, so take advantage of the fact that it's available and get help. Secondly, you're in luck. Because guess what? You STILL have a sleeve and it still works! Whatever your capacity is around one year is about where you're going to stay. You haven't stretched that sleeve out, you've just chosen to eat around it. There is no reason why you can't work on your head while also reworking your eating to get your body where you want it to be. Starving yourself to lose weight doesn't work. If it did none of us would have surgery, we'd just buckle down and stop eating! You know how this works - you know the drill! I don't have to tell you how to eat or what to avoid because you knew all of this before or you wouldn't have lost anything with your sleeve. So, call and make an appointment with a counselor. Then, look up the pouch test and get to it. Prove to yourself that your sleeve still works. Once you're done with the 5 day pouch test, get back to logging your food and putting the right things in your body. Start with that Protein and get back on shakes, too. It will help. You were clearly using food to cope - SO many of us do this without even realizing it! Now that you can't overeat you're transferring that to something else. Get some help. Only you can change yourself, nobody here can do it for you. Get up and reclaim your life so that you can feel proud of yourself again. ~Cheri

I did my surgery with Dr. Aceves and flew from Germany to do it. I paid by bank check more than two months before my surgery. There was no problem and my surgeon was just as awesome as I thought he'd be. You could go either way on this. I'm sure there won't be an issue with them allowing the charge, provided you called and told them you're going to be in Mexico (so they don't deny the charge thinking it's fraudulent). You could also call your surgeon and pay now just to have the peace of mind. ~Cheri

Yes, part of it was health - probably a good 40% because I had type 2 diabetes and wasn't able to keep up with my kids. But the rest was mostly vanity, with some for emotional/mental health in there. Maybe 40% vanity and 20% emotional/mental. I hated leaving the house and meeting new people prior to surgery because I hated the way I looked and assumed everyone around me did, too. I was so SICK of hearing "You have such a pretty face..." because that's probably one of the nastiest "compliments" I received on a regular basis. Surprisingly, now that I'm at goal I'm embarrassed by the attention and the way other people treat me. Pre-op I was sure my vain little self would preen at all the compliments but they make me incredibly uncomfortable. A lot of it is how I treat myself and how I act now, sure, but sometimes I feel like people treat me like I'm a totally different person. Anyway, kudos to those of you that are doing it purely for health. I can't lie - I wanted to shop in regular stores and be treated like a normal person more than I wanted to avoid heart disease. Call it a personal failing or a shallow personality or whatever. Regardless, I got my wish on all counts so I can't be unhappy about choosing the sleeve! ~Cheri

I used the thin breads to make sandwiches sometime around six months out - one whole round was still too much for me but about half of one sat pretty well. They had to be really soft, though. I am 21 months out from surgery and I am STILL careful with bread, rice, tortillas and Pasta because none of them sit very well. It's just too unreliable for me to enjoy eating these foods. I can go from happy to feeling pain and discomfort in just one bite. Everyone's body is different but yes, the idea to just sample small tastes here and there is probably best. I honestly didn't eat a single bite of anything that solid until close to two months out from surgery, though, so I'd take it really small, really slow and really pay attention to your body because you might not have a good experience! ~Cheri

My surgeon didn't really give me much of a guideline on them (that I recall) but I was totally unable to eat any type of lettuce or greens until somewhere around five or six months out, I think. It was a long time. Fibrous veggies also gave me grief (i.e., PAIN) and it took me a long time before I could eat them raw. If you try it earlier, do small and slow bites. Honestly, I ate some lettuce on a few bites of hard shell taco at three or four months out and felt horrible afterward. Lettuce is really, really hard for some reason. I tried all sorts of greens and nothing sat well for a while so it's completely up to your body's ability to handle it. ~Cheri

My advice is to stop worrying so much about Protein. Honestly, it took many of us MONTHS to consistently get both our liquids and our protein in. Right now you're on the fast track to burning yourself out completely. Cut yourself some slack and eat things that actually sound good to you that are reasonably healthy choices. Sometime around 8-9 months I realized that I needed more carbs but with only so much room in my sleeve I was forced to make up my protein intake elsewhere. You can add unflavored Protein powder to soups (it never really worked great for me but some people swear by it) and I always did two scoops of protein in my morning shake. This way I hit my totals for the day but had room for other foods that I needed. You can also try sludge - a bodybuilder friend of mine taught me this one. Mix one scoop of protein powder (I preferred chocolate) with 1 Tbs. Peanut Butter and just enough Water to make a sludge out of it. I chilled it really cold in the freezer and ate it up like ice cream. It's kinda weird but packs a protein/calorie punch and is easy to get down. Oh, and I second the vote on cottage cheese. If you like it, it's a great food. I was SO sad when my lactose intolerance made me cross it off my list. It's a soft food and is packed with protein. So, eat something you want to eat. Honestly, you're killing yourself here and it's not even necessary! It's very important to stick to your surgeon's guidelines so you heal properly but you're forcing yourself into a corner with your diet. Mental health is important for our overall well-being, too, you know! You need to be happy about what you're eating or you'll start to regret your decision. Good luck. I admire your determination but you don't need to be so fixated on reaching those goals so early out! ~Cheri

You're doing great, quit comparing! A lot of us lost much more slowly than that - I think I was down 50-60 pounds by four months out. Friendly advice, even though it's hard for all of us: don't expect your loss to be fast, or consistent, or easy all the time. You'll save yourself headaches and stress. Just keep doing the right things and it will eventually all fall off. As you get closer to your ideal weight your body loses much more slowly, so be prepared. You can combat disappointment with a positive attitude and the knowledge that you will lose weight even if it doesn't happen at the pace you might want. Keep it up, you're doing great! ~Cheri

I think a big fear a lot of people experience but won't admit outright is that fear of being forced to discover ourselves. We love blaming our fat on our childhoods, on genetics, on old injuries, on pregnancy, on whatever convenient excuse we have. Oh sure, all of those things can be somewhat to blame or in very few cases, completely to blame. But honestly, so much of being a fat person is hiding behind that weight, even when we desperately want out from behind it. Being faced with the inability to hide behind food - the inability to overeat ourselves out of sadness or depression or anger and the inability to snack mindlessly when we're bored - well, that can be scary if you're the type of person that's spent your life in denial about yourself and your habits. It's scary. Food is a coping mechanism for a lot of people. Giving up what is essentially a security blanket is frightening for a lot of people. Denial is a huge part of the problems we have with food. With the exception of unforeseeable complications there is nothing more difficult about life after surgery than life as a person who is so overweight that it impacts your overall health and quality of life. I am sorry, but the need to take a PPI or limit my portions or to need to get off my rear and actually move around a bit more - these things PALE in comparison to life prior to surgery. My life is far easier now than it was when I was embarrassed to be out in public or when I had to take medications for diabetes before I was even thirty! What is ten thousand dollars to me when it's bought me back my life? I'd pay it twice over to be where I am now because it would still be worth every penny. Anyone that could talk themselves out of this surgery simply isn't ready for the changes they know they'll have to make. And I feel sorry for that person, honestly, because once they do make the choice the only regret they'll have is that they didn't do it sooner. Thanks for your post and for your blog - your insight and information will surely help other people make this journey for themselves a successful one. ~Cheri

If you must have warm Water a trick we used with our twins (when they were babies) was to heat water and pour very warm (not boiling hot) water into water bottles or a thermos and pack it into a small cooler bag. The insulation works to keep heat in as well as cold but in the case of my thermos it would keep water hot all day long even without additional help. If you take a large thermos with you (I have one that holds a whole pot of coffee!) and fill it with hot water each morning before you leave the hotel and carry bouillon cubes or unjury Soup powder you should have nice hot broths to sip in the car along the way. Gas stations will often let you use the hot water button on the coffee makers to fill your thermos, too, and any restaurant you stop at will fill your thermos with hot water if you ask. Invest in a Protein shaker cup with the wire whisk ball if you haven't already. It will help a lot if you're going to mix powders on the go. The idea to bring ready to drink (RTD) shakes/drinks with you is a good one, too. I'd also bring drink packets or drops, too, to flavor your water. Plain water nauseated me after surgery for some reason. And yes, you MUST stop frequently to get up and walk around. Do not cross your legs in the car as this increases the risk of clots. Even when the car is moving fidget, move your legs around and shift position frequently. ~Cheri

All of us do. I even had them as I was losing, because I felt like I might never reach goal or that I'd be the first absolute failure at this surgery. It's normal. You will lose weight. Put aside any expectations on being a certain size or losing a certain number of pounds by a certain date and you'll find that it's easy. You're going to struggle for a short while on the post op diet because it's challenging but what you're doing now by following your surgeon's plan is going to set you up for success later. Once you're sleeved it really takes a lot of weight loss to see the difference. Our heads and eyes still see us as big people. Heck, even now I sometimes don't realize what I actually look like until I see a photo. Honestly, it would be nearly impossible for you not to lose weight. Take heart that it's a rough journey for most of us and involves a lot of learning about what made us this way, how to eat properly, how to be nice to ourselves and forgive ourselves for being human...it's worth it, though. Congrats on making this choice for yourself. I know you'll succeed with this surgery if you do the right things and stick with it even when you have those bad days. ~Cheri

It's not so hard to avoid them, even in Protein shakes. There are a lot of products out there sweetened with stevia or other natural sweeteners so you shouldn't have any more trouble than usual finding food. I'm far more sensitive to them post op, too. I do the real deal for all things (full fat, full sugar, full flavor) - and as long as we keep it in moderation we're okay. ~Cheri

Give it a try. It's a safer alternative than coming off of other drugs that you need, right? I was on metformin for diabetes and it's an easy medication to take with minimal side effects. Watch your sugar intake on the drug, though, because for me, anything with too much sugar caused digestive problems. ~Cheri

And how much did you really eat? My oft stated opinion on these boards is that the sleeve is not a diet. Yes, learn to eat healthier and to choose better options. Track your caloric intake and stay within the limits you set for yourself. But your day wasn't really that bad. And having the mentality that you're "cheating" by eating normal foods is going to lead to days where you throw it all in the crapper and eat like crazy because you'll feel like you've already blown the day by eating one thing off plan. The most important part of the sleeve journey is learning to eat like a normal person. What I mean is that people with no food issues and who haven't battled their weight do not freak out over eating spaghetti or a small piece of cake. They eat what they want, in moderation. They don't feel guilty about it and they don't hide it. They eat right 90% of the time and allow themselves 10% flex to eat what sounds good at the time. We can't live on poached chicken and carrot sticks forever! The sleeve IS forever, it is NOT a diet. So start by forgiving yourself for your diet the other day. Pick up the pieces, fix your guidelines and work within them. And don't shave your carbs down to nil, either! It's far easier to fall off the wagon when we feel deprived. You're doing fine! You'll be a success with this. It's a learning process for every one of us. ~Cheri

No joke. More like three nibbles! There's a nutritional guideline for a reason. It's hard to get through this phase but it will pass and you'll be on here griping about how you can't get enough calories in each day because you can only fit a bite or two. Check out the complications threads. What people suffer through when there is a leak is NO JOKE. Causing that intentionally by eating around your diet plan is foolish. People can die from undiagnosed leaks. Hang in there and find something else to focus on besides food. ~Cheri

Yum! I've used a recipe for years that uses vodka and club soda (the club soda makes them SO light and fluffy) but I like how simple this recipe is for in a pinch. And yes, matzoh goes down much more easily than a floury or sticky dumpling. Great idea - wish I'd thought of this while I was healing and had a limited diet! ~Cheri

Salads were HARD for me. I had a ton of trouble with fibrous veggies and lettuce was impossible until something closer to five or six months out. Everyone is different, though! I say start very small with veggies and also with Pasta, rice and tortillas...those are still my trouble foods, even at 21 months out. As for the post op diet, I had Dr. Aceves and spent weeks on liquids after surgery. I wasn't hungry at all but boy, I was MEAN and grouchy and tired all the time. At the end I just wanted to chew something despite having no appetite. It stinks but it's just a tiny bit of time before you'll be here complaining that you can't get enough calories because you can only fit in two or three bites of food at a time! Hang in there. Post op diets do vary but you trusted your doc to slice you open, so you should trust his judgement on what you should be eating afterward. ~Cheri

Carbs vary by person, though! It's very personal and your best bet is to find a guideline and as you continue to progress add more in until you hit that point where you realize it causes a slowdown or a stall. Surprisingly, contrary to what I believed prior to surgery, the more carbs I added into my diet the better I felt and it had ZERO effect on my loss. I lost at the same slow rate the entire time. I suggest NOT shaving carbs down to the bare minimum unless you find it's necessary for your body. I say this because in maintenance, you NEED carbs again. Slowly introducing them throughout the losing phase is easier than learning it all on the fly while also trying to maintain! I started out with low, low carbs but by the end could comfortably eat about 60-70 grams per day and still see the same losses on the scale. In maintenance I'm eating 120+ grams a day and easily maintaining. Low carbing makes many of us irritable and tired. I think it also adds to that feeling of deprivation that causes two issues: one, sneak snacking and two, the expectation that since we're denying ourselves, we'll see results on the scale every single day. Just my two cents, but I recommend starting in the 40-50 range and upping it slowly until you find what works best for YOU. ~Cheri

I've seen many posts on this and I think the general consensus is that the difference in bougie size is so small that it doesn't really add up to a noticeable difference to the patient. ~Cheri

Syntrax nectar Naturals are pretty good if you like fruity. Natural 100% Gold Standard and Natural Isopure are pretty popular, too. There are very limited flavor options out of the can and most of them are unflavored but you can do a lot to jazz up a shake with real fruit, cocoa powder, or Peanut Butter so that shouldn't be an issue. My favorite powder is unflavored and I choose it over other options all the time. There is a growing group of bodybuilders that are all natural and refuse to use artificial colors, flavors or sweeteners so you will have options, just not as many as you might like. ~Cheri

It's food and hormones and the stress of the surgery. You'll be more yourself soon. Hang in there. I had some hormone issues after surgery and was kind of a crazy person off and on as I adjusted. It's not unusual, so be prepared. Warn your husband and thank him for putting up with your crazy. ~Cheri

I'm sorry that it's your father being unsupportive. It's hard when our families aren't behind us. But the reality is that you aren't doing this for anyone but yourself so you don't need anyone's approval, even though it feels nice to have it. Do what you need to do and be thankful for the people that are on your side right now. Your dad might come around later as he sees you succeed, and maybe not. I'm proud of you for finding a way to fund this yourself and do it yourself. You're doing the greatest thing you can to change your life and if people that you love don't see it that way you have to just let it go and keep on trying to better yourself. Though I would say that you might consider venting about post surgery difficulties to someone that won't relay them to your dad - just because I'm the type that would hate to hear a single "I told you so." Good luck! ~Cheri

What you're talking about isn't physical hunger, so the surgery isn't going to fix this for you. Now, actual physical hunger almost always decreases after surgery. For me it went away almost entirely and didn't start to come back at all until after a year out. And it's not even remotely like it used to be. Before surgery I could eat a giant plate of Pasta and breadsticks and be so full I'd feel sick. Yet an hour later I'd have my head in the fridge looking for more food with my stomach growling. It not only took a lot of food for me to feel full, the hunger came back quickly. This is totally gone now that I've been sleeved. The sleeve will help you finally overcome the mindless eating or the eating until bursting IF you do the headwork after surgery. Immediately post op you shouldn't feel very hungry at all and food is often totally unappetizing. As you heal and can't eat more than a few bites that ability to just eat until you can't move will go away. You can use this opportunity to work on figuring out why you eat and when you eat, so that you're aware and can prevent yourself from indulging. Head hunger was easy for me to ignore in the beginning (with the exception of PMS) but as you move out from surgery and incorporate more "normal" foods and eat more calories you really need to be in a good place mentally to succeed. It would be EASY for me to graze on junk all day long and my sleeve would not stop me from that. It will stop me from eating half a pizza in a sitting but not from nibbling chips, Cookies or candies all day long. I was in denial about my food issues until after surgery. I still battle head hunger and you probably will, too. We have built a habit of indulging when we feel stressed or bored and it's hard to break that. However, with work you can overcome this and yes, I would say the sleeve can make it easier, especially in the beginning. Sometimes just taking a second to think before you eat every bite can help. If I walk to the fridge and open the door, I always take a second to ask myself why I'm there and what I plan on eating. It helps a lot. As does tracking your calories BEFORE you eat your food instead of after. Having a meal plan for the day can help keep you from straying into the foods you want to avoid or at least eat only occasionally. Well, now that I've rambled on I hope you're not sleeping! I just think that if you look at this as a head issue and not a stomach one you'll have a better chance of overcoming it after your surgery. And I think that it's something every single one of us has to deal with in order to be healthy, not just physically but mentally, too. ~Cheri