slvarltx

In my experience: 1. True. I can not tolerate cottage cheese nor coconut Water now. Not so much my taste buds, but they both give me a sense of nausea. 2. My appetite has not gone awayl. I still get hungry, but 3+ months out now, my sense of what a serving is has changed. I only have a little on my plate and eat slower to a sense of being full. This was the hardest thing for me so far as I at first just loaded up my plate when I was back on solid food. There was an ongoing battle between being physically hungry and just being hungry in my mind. 3. The thought of greasy food now grosses me out. I was a junk food junkie and now even the thought of it makes me a bit queasy.

From the American Society of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery: "Short term studies show that the sleeve is as effective as the roux-en-Y gastric bypass in terms of weight loss and improvement or remission of diabetes. There is also evidence that suggest the sleeve, similar to the gastric bypass, is effective in improving type 2 diabetes independent of the weight loss. The complication rates of the sleeve fall between those of the adjustable gastric band and the roux-en-y gastric bypass." Gastric sleeve surgery has skyrocketed in popularity. In the United States, it now makes up over 60% of all weight loss surgery procedures performed, up from 24% in late 2011. During the same time frame, gastric bypass dropped from 62% to 37% of all procedures performed while gastric banding (e.g. Lap-Band) fell from 7.5% to 0.8% of all procedures performed - See more at: http://www.bariatric-surgery-source.com/gastric-sleeve-surgery.html#sthash.PdjJlFPe.dpuf The sleeve is by far the most popular and still gaining ground of all WLS. Notice the band is almost non existent.

Congrats on your success! Good luck moving forward.

Mine was not a drug screen, so I would not be worried. Additionally, hydrocodone has a very short 1/2 life and metabolizes very quickly out of the body, so even if they were screening for it, it wouldn't show up 6 days later in the blood.

I am at the point that I only look at the scale once per week. I am really pretty uninterested in what it says as the "clothes" test tell me that I am releasing fat. I have to go clothes shopping today as my even my skinny clothes, the 40" waist ones, are now falling off. All of my belts are now useless as they look ridiculous from extra notching back. My energy is not only back, but is so much higher it is almost unbelievable. I exercise everyday now and look forward to doing so. My day to day life is so much more enjoyable. I look forward to releasing even more fat so my body can be even healthier!

I think there is a lot of misunderstanding about bariatric surgery in general. I found the idea of the sleeve to be very barbaric when I had my first consult. The permanence of it made it very scary for me as well. Maybe take your mom along for your next appointment? Best of luck to you.

Your dietician is going to be in an extreme minority when it comes to carbonated drinks, especially soda, both naturally and artificially sweetened. Most NUTs say "NO" in capital letters.

@Rdepps Based on your posting, I would DEFINITELY get a second opinion. There is a lot of variability among surgeons and NUTs on pre-op and post-op care as well as which surgery is most appropriate. Bottom line is that it is your body and you must live with the results. Best of luck to you!

@jamielogical Understand your point, but realize your experience does not make an experienced, trained professional a "big fat liar".

@jamielogical I will let my surgeon know you think he is a big fat liar. You can let him know which medical school you went to and the thousands of surgeries and patients you have dealt with.

I weigh myself only once a week. Most weeks the scale does not move. I think I was at 274 for 3 weeks. Then it moves rapidly down. I was at 254 for 2 weeks and then my weigh in last Friday I was down to 249. During this whole process I continued to lose inches off my waist (48" to 40") which is a far more important indicator to me personally. Additionally I can actually bench press more now than I could pre-op. My blood pressure, WITHOUT medication (after 10 years of taking pills), is now 110/70 with a resting heart rate of 57. I no longer snore and sleep a full 8 hours everynight. My advice to you is to stay of the scale. It is in some ways meaningless. To me, the qualityof life issues are MUCH more important than mass x gravity measured on a bathroom device.

@kahled I had the same strange thing happen. It lasted until week 3. I was a bit upset as my doctor specifically told me I would not be hungry after surgery for probably at least 12 months. It went away after 3 weeks and now I just have to remind myself to eat. I believe it was some sort of feedback loop between my brain and my enteric nervous system that just kept going on for awhile and then stopped when there were no more inputs to the enteric system.

My experience is that my weight drops in large amounts and then nothing for weeks. I was at 254 for 3 weeks and then weighed myself Friday (my weekly weigh in) and I had dropped to 249. In the interim, I notice my clothes continue to get looser. I am working out regularly and have gained back my pre-op strength.

Post-op is worse in the variations that different doctors and NUTs have: 1. coffee 2. NSAIDs 3. Alcohol 4. Water before/during meals 5. Ability to stretch sleeve 6. Carbonation These are just a few of the various items that vary depending on who your medical team is. There are many more if you keep reading here.

What a bummer for me! The 8 inches I have lost off my waist so far were all muscle! I really wanted a temporary fix because I want to be fat as hell again in 2 years. LOL

So I just thought I would share a post on being 3 months Post Op. Started my liquid diet at 305 and weighed in today at 253 for a nice 52 pound loss. Just thought I would share some of my observations from the last 6 months. 1. Pre Op I was absolutely obsessed with the operation and how it would effect my life 2. The operation itself was anti climatic..very smooth and easy. 3. The first week of post op is pretty miserable: I had pain, drinking water on my own was tough for a couple of days, walking was tough 4. Things get MUCH better after day 5 or 6...pain starts to fade, drinking water was no big deal, walking got easy Things I learned or have embraced: 1. Eating relieved a lot of stress...I must exercise to take over that stress release function 2. Stay off the scale. Just live your life by the program and don't worry about the numbers in the short term. I have lost 8 inches of my waist. 3. People are going to be shocked about how much weight you lost. I thank them and tell them high protein and regular exercise are miracle workers 4. I really like weighing less...standing for hours now is no big deal. 5. I don't get really hot like I used to...summer time is a lot more fun as I don't over heat 6. My electric bill is lower as I keep the thermostat higher. 7. This is truly a process that I know will probably take another 3-6 months to get to what I consider a goal weight 8. Even if I don't lose another pound, I am happy with the decision to have the procedure. 9. Eating a lot to me now is getting to 1500 calories, which I have done twice. 10. I feel guilty when I get 1500 calories in....I used to be able to 5000 in...(some pizza, and 2 pints of Hagen Daaz plus the rest of the day eating) 11. I never feel like I limiting myself...I can eat anything I want, just not that much. I wish everyone who is considering or scheduled to have this procedure the best of luck. My experience has been that the advertised results are dead on.

You don't have in your profile what your weight/BMI etc... If you started out at 5'9" and weighed 200 and now weigh 163, that is outstanding! If you are 5'2" and weighed 600 and now weigh 563, I would be a little concerned. On face value, your loss looks very good. Are you exercising daily? What foods have you introduced? Remember the goal in the early days is to set yourself up with lifelong habits.

Truth be told, I went through the same sort of experience. The closer I got to my surgery date, the worse I was eating. I had lost 30 lbs from December 2014 to March 2015, and then added 10 back before surgery. I honestly wouldn't worry about the food portion too much. My experience has been so far, that I couldn't imagine eating fast food ever again. The thought of eating McDonalds, Taco Bell, KFC, makes me feel queasy just thinking about it. Just make sure you do the Pre-op diet....very important. The exercise portion is where I would be concerned. You must be committed to exercise. Try your best at this point to get a 30 minute walk at any pace at least every other day. I have always worked out, but post op especially since the weight is falling off, exercise has become even more important since I don't have my good old food to alleviate stress.

Frozen yogurt bars. The mint chocolate chip ones are only 100 calories....the problem is I want to eat 4 at a time!

I can tell you that at week 11 post-op I barely remember the pre-op diet. Difficult as heck, but try not to dwell in the moment. Eye on the prize!

1 month here. No issues except for 1 day I had heartburn...took an OTC PPI for one day and was fine again.

You don't mention what your starting weight is nor your goal weight. 3 lbs per week is actually very good! In a year you would lose 156 lbs! Keep up the good work! Try not to compare to others...some folks here in here were on the high side of over weight and need to lose 200-300 lbs so their weight loss is much more dramatic.

after day 3, fluids were never an issue....If I have haven't eaten I can drink as much Water as I want. Consider yourself one of the lucky ones...my surgeon on the first 2 post op visits was only concerned about liquids. He told me about 20% of his patients are like me, basically no restriction on fluids, good restriction on solid foods.

I am 10 weeks post-op now and remember those fears quite well. While you are in the hospital you will have access to some very good medications that will control the pain and nausea. I think the worst thing of the whole process was the leak test as the X-ray room was very cold and the marker to check for leaks tastes horrible. There was some pain at the large incision site, but by day 6 I was walking 2 miles a day (I walked before surgery as well) and the pain had mostly resolved itself. Breathing was not an issue at all. I could not tell they had intubated me...no sore throat or anything. The waiting for the surgery was probably more miserable that the surgery/recovery itself! In 10 short weeks I have gotten off my blood pressure medication, dropped 6 inches off my waist and lost 50 lbs. The sleeve is retraining my mind on what a portion of food is supposed to be.

I drove on day 4...not the most pleasant experience as the car is low to the ground, mildly unpleasant getting in and out.