James Marusek

I had RNY surgery and at 1 month the meal volume was limited to 2 ounces. So you are exceeding your meal size. Also you have one month to go before you should be eating solid foods. You should be entering the pureed food stage at this point. [i am assuming you had RNY gastric bypass. It might be that you had some other type of surgery and the requirements are different. But if you had RNY, it is important to follow the directions given by your surgeon, if you want to lose the weight and be successful.] In the early stages after surgery, the most important requirements are meeting your Protein, Fluid and Vitamin requirements. Food is secondary because your body will convert the store fat into the energy that drives your body. Thus you lose weight. If you limit your meals to 2 ounces, you will not starve. I don't think you have stretched your pouch, but if you eat solid foods too soon you may damage the surgical seams in you pouch and that can cause complications.

Good luck on your surgery. Keep us informed when you return home and let us know if there are any problems you need some help with.

I will pray that your surgery is successful. Good luck.

1. Many people have doubts or questions about going ahead with the operation. They still wonder if they can achieve weight loss without surgery. For many that undergo the operation, we have come to realize that we can't, and this represents the only viable real option available. 2. I told everyone that I had the surgery. But many people limit who they tell. In part I think this is due to the diet mentality. Many people go on diets, lose weight, tell their friends, gain weight, feel like failures. Since I didn't do too much yo-yo dieting prior to surgery, I didn't feel stigmatized like those associated with diet routines. Whenever someone approached me and asked me "How I lost the weight", I told them "I had an operation". After a pause, I could see the wheels moving in their brain. They thought what kind of surgery? Cancer? So I said "It was Weight Loss Surgery and it seems to be successful". I am now 29 months post op, and the main comments that I receive is "You sure look good!"

Congratulations on your weight loss and all the hard work you put into this weight loss journey. The key to the "Maintenance" phase is to be happy. Try to figure out fixes for all the many little problems you encounter. "I can't eat more than 1/2 cup or so at a sitting." That doesn't sound normal. Could you have an obstruction? When you lose weight, you lose the padding on your rear end. It can make sitting for a long time painful. I use gel cushions and that helps. Also when you lose weight the fat that normally insulates your core is gone, thus you are more sensitive to the cold. When I work outside in the cold shoveling snow in the winter, I began using hand warmers, otherwise my fingers froze.

Try hot Soups. It might be a stomach flu.

No pass on stomach flu. If you are beyond the "Weight Loss" phase and into maintenance, there might be a single bright spot. You may lose 5 to 10 additional pounds at the end and if you try hard, you might add this to your total weight loss.

A few months after surgery, my skin began to shrivel up on my face. I literally looked like I was a hundred years old. My skin was paper thin with the finest wrinkles. I began to wonder if it was all worth it. It was one of those moments. Sort of similar to yours. My wife suggested I use a produce called Bio-Oil on my face. I did and my wrinkles dissolved away. Sometimes there is a solution right around the corner that can help. Sometimes you just need to give it a little time. For me it took six months before I reached my happy state when all the problems went away.

In RNY surgery they cut away the part of your stomach that process fats and sugars. Eating these will cause dumping syndrome. After about a year, your intestines will adapt and begin to perform the function that your stomach once did. Your intestines will then be able to convert fats and sugars and you will not longer experience dumping syndrome. Although if you want to maintain your weight loss, you may want to avoid the sugars.

I think your goal weight (135 pounds) looks fine. That would give you a BMI of 24.7 which is on the high end of the normal weight - right where it should be. Studies show that individuals that are underweight or overweight have higher mortality rates than those that fall into the normal weight category. It is important to have a little extra fat on the body. Fat provides an energy buffer. When you encounter a serious injury or sickness, this fat provides the energy to sustain your body until you recover.

I had RNY gastric bypass surgery 29 months ago. For the first 4 weeks I was on Full liquids. The next 4 weeks was pureed Foods. After that it was Solid Foods. Pureed food has the consistency of mashed potatoes. It generally means that you need to prepare the food first in a blender or food processor. My guidelines included fish in the pureed stage. Avocado's were not listed but I would suspect that because it is a very soft food that it would be fine, provided it was mashed or blended.

One of the reasons why I had RNY gastric bypass surgery was because I had Type II Diabetes. I am 28 months post-op. My diabetes went into remission the day I left the hospital 2 days after surgery and has remained in remission ever since. A recent study implies that controlling blood-sugar levels may help prevent dementia offering hope to patients with diabetes that keeping glucose levels in check might reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease and other types of cognitive impairments. http://www.foxnews.com/health/2015/09/16/controlling-blood-sugar-may-help-prevent-dementia-study-finds/ So there may be another side benefit that I never thought of.

I will pray that your revision surgery goes well and that it meets your expectations.

I will pray that your sinus infection/severe allergy dissolves away and does not affect your upcoming surgery and that all goes well.

Congratulations.

After surgery, the taste of Water became intolerable. Strange that the taste of water should change so dramatically after surgery but it tastes excessively chlorinated. So I found other fluids that worked. These included adding a little taste by using Crystal Light, decaf teas and coffees, milk and hot cocoa (no sugar added variety). The liquid component of the Protein shakes also counts towards your daily Fluid requirement. Also the water that you add to your Soup also counts.

After gastric bypass surgery, a cup of hot cocoa will help fulfill two requirements (fluids and protein). The hot cocoa used must be "no sugar added" variety. The milk used should be low fat or no fat. I use Nesquick "No Sugar Added" chocolate. There is 7 grams of carbs and 1 gram of fat per serving size.

Congratulations and good luck on you new journey. I hope it solves your previous issues.

Let's see, if we are addicted to food, what happens if we just stop eating? In humans, prolonged starvation can cause permanent organ damage and eventually, death. In adults complete starvation leads to death within 8 to 12 weeks. What happens to a heroin addict, if they stop taking heroin? They go into withdrawal, then their body recovers. [Heroin craving can continue years after drug cessation. Detoxification alone is not treatment—it is merely the first step towards full recovery.] So from my perspective eating is a natural process and not an addiction. That probably leads to the next question - Is overeating an addiction? Using the logic above, it seems like it might be. If we stop overeating, then our body returns to normal weight. The problem, just like an addiction, is that it is darn difficult or next to impossible to stop overeating. It is even programmed in our genes. Throughout human history, man has faced times of famine. Millions have died of starvation over the ages. The extra fat on the body provides a buffer to provide energy to our bodies during times of major sickness, injury or starvation.

After bariatric surgery, exercise is recommended for most patients. Generally 30 minutes per day is the recommended amount. But several patients exceed these goals. How might this additional exercise affect their health? A recent study by the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center et. al. analyzed responses from 12 large studies involving 370,460 men and women about their exercise habits. They found that those that followed their 30 minutes per day regimen specified by the American Heart Association (AHA), showed a slight decrease in heart failure (compared to those who did not exercise at all) but those who doubled and quadruple the amount of exercises had lowered their risk by 20 to 30 percent. http://acsh.org/2015/10/heart-failure-and-exercise/

Here are some of the ways people deal with constipation from past posts: Apples with the skin Smooth Move Herbal Tea Prune juice (warmed) Prunes (4 in the morning and 4 at night) Magnesium citrate Insoluble fibers (Garden of Life Raw Fiber or Renew Life Triple Fiber). Haribo sugar free Gummy Bears Aerobic Magnesium 07 Low Fat Bran Muffin (recipe). 80 calories each 1 cup flour 2 teaspoons baking powder ½ teaspoon baking soda ½ teaspoon cinnamon 2 cups bran Cereal 1 ¼ cups milk 1 egg ½ tablespoon applesauce optional: banana, berries, mini chocolate chips Bake 400° F for 22 minutes

Welcome and I wish you well on your journey. I wrote down my experiences with gastric bypass surgery. The article is available through this link. http://www.breadandbutterscience.com/Surgery.pdf I also wrote an article that covers the period after the "Weight Loss Phase" after I transitioned into the "Maintenance Phase", which you can find here. http://www.breadandbutterscience.com/Surgery2.pdf

Generally when I travel I use Protein bars for protein. Perhaps fruit such as apples, bananas or oranges might work.

I have included a few recipes for homemade high Protein Soups at the end of the following article. http://www.breadandbutterscience.com/Surgery.pdf

I am bringing this Grand Experiment using essential oils to control hunger to an end. I developed a blend of essential oils that I named “Anti-Hunger”. I consider the experiment successful because it controls hunger and hopefully it will add another tool to the toolbox for weight loss and maintenance. I dropped 7.4 pounds in 11 days. I am 29 months post-op RNY surgery and very near my bottom weight when I began this experiment. Before I began the experiment, hunger was slowly creeping back into my life, I found myself grazing and gaining a little weight. Not much, but a little. At the end of the experiment I was still not hungry and I was able to resist the temptation of snacking. I also fell below my lowest-ever weight since surgery. The “loss of hunger” using this essential oil blend was similar to being in the Honeymoon stage after RNY surgery. I have posted this formula on my updated webpage at http://www.breadandbutterscience.com/Surgery2.pdf One of the final observations was that the effects of using this formula apparently tappers off as one drops weight and doesn’t allow one to become anorexic (provided one eats 3 well balanced meals per day).