OutsideMatchInside

Pork rinds and stuff are good for coating real protein to fry/bkae/air fry but just as snacks? They are a waste. I don't think fried foods are forbidden foods at all. You just can't make them a part of your daily diet. Too hard to accurately track the calories.

What @Berry78 said. The last pounds are the hardest for everyone. I am at a point where my body is comfortable and it makes sense to me, this was my HS weight. I haven't really felt like putting in the effort to lose the rest, because I know it is going to be serious tracking, calorie cutting, and I'll have to work out a lot more. Are you tracking your food?

It is really a personal choice. You have to live with the surgery no one else not the Dr, not us.

@Maya321 Try broth with unflavored protein powder. Also did your Dr give you nausea medicine?

I'm 5'6, they recorded me as 5'5" at the Dr office for surgery but I am 5'6, but I use 5'5 here. Anyway.. Before I lost any weight, when I started I just wanted to be a 16/18. I thought that would be obtainable and easy to maintain. A 12 looks good on me, if I want to be really "curvy", but I actually like being smaller. A 12 doesn't feel as good as 8/10. I think 12 will be my top out size, I never want to be larger than that. Period. Still a 12 feels fat to me now, It is way too close to plus size, and I never ever want to be plus sized again. While I am still young, 8 seems like a great size. Most women are not an 8 or below so you have a lot options when shopping for clothes and hitting clearance. Size 10 is just an annoying in between size. It is so hard to find 10s anywhere, worse than 12s. 8 seems to be a golden size for finding stuff. Right now I wear 10 or 8 depending on the brand. I am hoping to be a 6 at some point after skin surgery. It might not ever happen because of my hips and my boobs, but a girl can dream. I am shooting to be a small 8 (as in an 8 everywhere) or a 6 by next summer before skin surgery. We'll see if I can pull it off. I am not that dedicated to be a 6 pre-plastics but it is nice to have a goal. I have already hit and surpassed most of my goals, so that is my stretch goal. Well now I know why everything at Land's End fits me terrible (except the Kayaks LOL). They hate hourglass figures. I never looked at the size chart, just tried clothes on and was disappointed. My waist is 29 or 30 inches most days.

I don't think the lack of air flow caused the UTI. If anything you would get a yeast infection. UTIs just happen,

When your weight stabilizes it tightens up. I had more loose skin at the 230-210 range than I do now.

@DaphneZ When I got around the 6 month mark, and was healed, I started working with a sports medicine program at a local University. This helped me set my marcos based on RMR testing and a DEXA scan. I set my calories based on my RMR and my protein goals based on my lean mass. The lean mass of a person that has been morbidly obese for a length of time is different from most people. Our bodies have to adapt to carry the weight so we have more lean mass, since we have more lean mass we also burn more calories. Keeping that lean mass is important because it allows you to burn more calories and keep your RMR higher, which makes maintenance easier, you have more calories to play with. My first visit to the clinic let me know that my RMR was above what most calculators would have it at, and that my lean mass was much higher. I used that information to set my protein goal, my goal is 120g a day, which is less than 1g per 1 pounds of lean mass, but 120 is about the max I can do most days, sometimes I exceed it and hit 130, I try to never be under 100. This has allowed me to keep almost all of my lean mass, without doing weights and keep my RMR higher and look leaner that most women my height/weight. I used the RMR information to set my calories. It is hard for me to hit my calorie goal, and I don't really pay a lot of attention to calories. It is hard to get that many calories in just because by having my protein goal so high, there is little room for other food/calories and that automatically keeps my calories low. I try to eat between 1400 and 1800 calories a day on an average day. I can't function on less than 1200, I get dizzy spells etc. I eat over 2000 maybe a couple days a week (really active days). I only pay attnetion to calories just so I don't go under, going over isn't really a concern. I don't have any hunger so if I get busy and occupied I will completely forget to eat, which is a problem. I can easily go 24 hours without eating.

I eat Salads alone for this reason, because even with protein, they are sliders, they will take a decent amount of protein that will provide some fullness and add so much moisture to it that it is barely filling, and I am hungry again in an hour. A whole bag of baby spinach is like 40 calories, so it being a slider isn't an issue, but I have to be really careful when eating out and having salad with other things. It would make it super easy to over eat.

Really? Salad is a slider for me. I can basically eat endless amounts. What is in your salads?

2 years out, I eat a pound of meat a day 4-5 ounces at a time, plus other stuff.

https://blossombariatrics.com/ Not cheaper than mexico, but honestly having 85% of a vital organ removed is not really the time to bargain shop. A lot can go wrong, and a sleeve done improperly is completely useless.

I replaced my love of food with dressing as proactively as possible without looking like an actual street walkers, lol. Which is fun and challenging and keeps me motivated to maintain my weight loss. On a serious note though, you have to figure out why food comforts you so much. You are probably numbing some feelings with food, once you figure that issue out and tackle it, the rest is really easy. I was stressed all the time, I removed the things from my life that caused excess stress. I made peace with my childhood. I basically decided life was worth living and living to the max. WLS will not stop you from binging AT ALL, you can easily binge eat with WLS. And it might even be more satisfying because you get full on small amount but your stomch empties fast so you can mini binge all day. Work through the emotion issues or you will even up back where you started.

My close friends know, and have mostly forgotten about it. My family including my college age child do not know. It was honestly shockingly easy to keep a secret. I would tell people but now, 2 years later there doesn't seem to be much point, my weight loss is just about like anyone else at this point, and I have to exercise self control and will power. I am glad I was able to navigate losing weight and surgery without other people projecting their feelings and expectations onto me. When I decided I did not want more than one child and had an IUD inserted I did not tell everyone, I just went and did it. I pretty much view WLS the same way.

Just find shakes you like. You might need to have a shake now and then for the first 6 months, it is easier to have some that you like than doctoring them.

Vitamin D deficiency will thin your hair out. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2835491/

You don't have to follow any particular plan post-op. You want to focus on dense protein that is baked, broiled, grilled etc. Followed by veggies, green veggies. That is about it, simple clean eating.

VS does not go up to a 44 band at all. Are you sure you are a 44 band? We are the same height, I am closer to 5'6 than 5'5 and at 207 I was a 36 or a 38 band.

Did he look at the coverage options for all of the plans? I know people that are not managers at ATT that have WLS covered but they are not in Florida.

Don't watch TV, it is full of food commercials. Go to bed early.

GoFundMe isn't going to pay attention to a campaign that has only raised $125. They only fact check when it is thousands. If she wrote here what she wrote on GoFundMe, maybe people would have been more sympathetic. She came here like a crazed treasure troll. It could still all be a scam and she came here hoping to garner sympathy and get donations, but when people were not receptive to her story she abandoned it and went full nuke. Even considering her story is true. Of course the people in the hospital being treated for complications, well have complications and are miserable. She isn't talking to healthy people. So that is like going to a homeless shelter to look for a hedge fund manager.

Best scale I have owned. Super accurate and mine came with a tape measure that you can use to measure yourself too. https://www.amazon.com/EatSmart-Precision-Digital-Bathroom-Lighted/dp/B001KXZ808/ref=sr_1_8_a_it?ie=UTF8&qid=1501775025&sr=8-8&keywords=body+scale

Try eating protein only ever 2 hours. 4 ounces of dense protein, something you have to cut with a knife. Steak, Chicken breast, pork chops, etc. Nothing ground, no deli meat. Something really dense that will sit in your sleeve. If you have a schedule and you know you are going to eat in 2 hours it is easier to resist temptation. Eating dense protein should sit in your stomach for a while so by the time you are feeling full, it is time to eat again. Liquids are just probably going to make you feel deprived and they don't trigger restriction. I mean if I drink a protein shake, I'm basically still hungry, it is no different than drinking water at this point. There is a regain forum also with other people having regain issues.

You feel soft because your fat is breaking up. I used to think I had these massive muscles, but nope it was just solid fat. When I lost enough fat I could feel my muscles I knew the difference. The first 6 weeks are for healing. Not exercising not losing weight. Your goal is to heal. Walking is great exercise and will get you prepped to do more once you are healed. The muscles in your abdomen have been cut. The last thing you want is a hernia.

This is going to be long so if you don’t care about the story part, skip to the bottom for the numbers. I never thought I would be here, post-op from WLS surgery, especially a surgery that removed most of my stomach but here I am, and I am thrilled to be here. I grew up in a healthy, athletic family, really athletic, at the Professional level. We had healthy food and some not so healthy comfort food, but always real food in the house. I was always athletic, but slightly overweight growing up. Then in college, I started to yo-yo. My weight would change between 20 and 40 pounds. Then I had a baby, BOOM. I gained 70 pounds with the pregnancy and never lost it. I started working with Tech Startups in the dot com era and we had all the perks. Free food, free alcohol, all day every day. I moved up the ladder and with all the five star hotels came high calorie free meals. Extensive business travel meant eating out 5-6 days a week 3 times a day. On the days at home the eating out continued because I was so exhausted from the work week. I was healthy with low to normal blood pressure and not diabetic most of this time. I was a healthy fat person for a long time until I wasn’t. I was active. I exercised, I could walk circles around even my thin friends in a mall. Then 10 years ago, diabetes. It was easily managed with pills and diet, so it didn’t create drastic changes. I never took it very seriously because I was never really extreme in my high sugars. Then about 4 years ago it seemed like things took a turn, I could never lose more than 20 or 30 pounds. My ability to exercise and be active seemed to diminish. Carrying all that weight was finally catching up to me and my body was breaking down and suffering. Then last year, high blood pressure came. After taking high blood pressure meds for 2 weeks that made me sleepy and made it almost impossible to run my business. I decided to have WLS. I had researched and looked at WLS for years. I read WLS forums and talked to people, but always talked myself out of it. I finally decided that even if I died on the table that was better than dying slowly. So I knew I was ready. I went through the process very quickly. Almost not trusting myself to drag it out and I felt a real necessity to get the weight off quickly. I went from my first visit with the surgeon to surgery in 8 weeks. BCBSIL was wonderful and the whole process was fast and easy for insurance approval. Another deciding factor that WLS would work for me, was because the post-op diet was something I was already familiar with. Low carbing? Sign me up. I had been an avid low carber off and on with varying levels of success for years. I realize now that the reason I was never successful was I gave up in stalls, but with the sleeve there is no giving up during a stall. I have always enjoyed low carbing because for me it makes my mind sharper, it is like doing coke or Adderall (no, I have never done either but I have been told the experience in great detail multiple times from multiple people). I have never viewed it as a punishment but a perk. My issue prior to surgery has always been portion control. I skipped meals, focused on work and then would be ravenously hungry, and consume a whole days plus worth of calories all at once, or maybe in 2 meals. Even low carbing and eating healthy I would eat huge amounts. A 12 to 16 ounce ribeye is 900-1300 calories. I was lucky to have an uneventful, rapid and easy recovery. I had very little pain, went back to work as soon as I came home (I work for myself), and stopped taking the pain meds within 36 hours of surgery. I met my Protein goals after the 2nd day. I eat all of the foods I enjoy, just in small quantities. I was lucky in the sense I never ate or liked a lot of the things that people have issues with giving up post-op. So I don’t have issues with avoiding them. I gave up sugar years ago to try and control my diabetes. I gave up alcohol for the same reason. I was already years out from either of these things when I had surgery so I didn’t have to give them up post-op. Okay that is by backstory and how I got to the point surgery and why I felt it would work for me. This is where I am now. Numbers The weight I have on here is the weight when I first went to the Dr. It is not my actual highest weight. HW 377 SW 358 CW 231 Total weight lost 146, 134 since first surgeon visit, and 127 since surgery. Inches lost Measurements in Inches Bust (fullest part of bust): 20 Pecs (just above the bust line): 15 Ribs (top of rib cage just below the bust) : 21 Waist: 25.5 Abdomen: 22 Hips: 17 Right Upper Thigh: 8.5 Right Lower Thigh: 9.5 Left Upper Thigh: 8 Left Lower Thigh: 10.5 Right Calf: 2 Left Calf: 2.25 Right Upper Arm: 6 Left Upper Arm: 5.5 Total 172.75 I wore a tight size US Womens size 28 plus and a comfortable size US Womens size 30 plus. Now I wear a Misses 14/16 I am almost to a 12. I have boundless energy to match my personality. I am so active in my everyday life in big and small ways. I don’t hurt all over anymore at the end of the day like I did before. I thought that was natural, because I had been so heavy for so long, I didn’t think there was a different way to feel, I thought that was norm. Now I know the difference. I feel like I have taken 20 years off my age. So that is my story, if you read it all, thanks. I hope it can help someone. Obviously I am still not done. I need to lose at least another 50 pounds and once I get there I am going to evaluate and see if I want to lose another 20 or 30. I never thought that would be an option, to get my weight that low, but I think now it is a possibility.