Little Green

So I've been making my way through the various plant-based docs on Netflix (favorite is Forks Over Knives, least favorite is What the Health although it wasn't terrible) and I came across one called Fat, Sick, & Nearly Dead. The filmmaker is Joe Cross, who I saw in another documentary as a plant-based person, so I looked him up and found the film. To give a short summary he decides to undertake a 60-day juice fast (with medical supervision) so basically eating exclusively fruits and vegetables in juice form - I can't recall if he said whether he added any of the pulp/fiber back in or if it was exclusively juice. Then after his fast he gives the impression that he went on a plant-based diet. He lost about 90 lbs in less than a year, doing a "reboot" juice fast every so often, and started traveling to promote this way of living. Now I'm personally not into juicing especially if the fiber is left out. So I didn't decide to do juicing or follow his journey or anything. However, I thought it was a decent documentary and promoted fruit & veggies so I was like, "Cool," and moved on with my life. Then Netflix recommended the sequel film, Fat, Sick, & Nearly Dead 2. So I started watching it. Well... he stated that at the end of his juice fast he had lost 90 pounds to be about 220. He's 6'2 so that's a BMI of 28. Not bad for coming from being 310 lbs. However then he said he has gone up to 240 and fluctuates between 240 and 250. That's a BMI of 30.8 to 32.1 so basically he is obese now. He said 40% of his calories come from fruit and vegetables which I thought was kinda low, but maybe he eats a lot of grains or whatever.... and then he hit me with the big one that he eats animal protein for dinner every night! To my mind this is kind of crazy to call yourself plant-based and then eat meat not just occasionally but every night for supper. I feel like he is kind of riding the trend of plant-based/veganism while sort of hiding the fact that he's still eating meat. I mean I definitely left the first documentary with the impression he was fully plant-based/vegan. And it really got me wondering if this is why his weight is still so high and he has to constantly be going on these "reboot" juice fasts to lose weight again. I wonder what would happen if he just cut out the meat and ate plant-based all the time, if his weight would go back down and he wouldn't have to reboot. I know he travels a lot which can do crazy things to your body, sleep, water retention, etc. But Dr. Greger also travels all over the place doing talks, etc. And Dr. Greger admits his diet when traveling isn't always ideal - he said sometimes when traveling he only hits 25% of the daily dozen recommendation - but he does eat only plant-based and stays healthy despite a crazy travel schedule. So what do you think? Have you seen this movie or the sequel? Do you think if you eat meat every night you are still plant-based? (This doesn't count vegetarianism because this forum is also for vegetarians, not just vegans, so I am referring only to meat here.) Would you rather eat meat and have to juice fast, or just cut the meat and eat mostly plant-based all the time for the same results?

Did you? Do you plan to? Do you wish you had, or hadn't? It was recommended to me and I'm currently watching it now. I don't want to link it in case it upsets some folks but it's called "Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass (RNY) procedure with Dr. Jon Bruce, FACS, FASMBS" on YouTube, and it's from the channel Bariatric Specialists of North Carolina. I think it's pretty interesting so far. I'm feeling a little emotional but not grossed out or anything. Just making it more real.

Actually, Little Green is a reference to a Joni Mitchell song, NOT a comment on my size - but I thought the title might be funny So I'm 2 weeks away from surgery and just started my liquid diet. I thought I'd officially start one of these "tell your story" posts so that I have a place to keep track of all my stats and thoughts. My highest weight is 381.25 and that was 6/14/14. After that I lost down to around 300-ish in about 18 months doing calorie-counting on MFP, but regained nearly all of it after my husband became disabled in a motorcycle accident. About a year after the accident - last March - I visited the bariatric surgeon for my first consult and I weighed 367 pounds. I've gone up and down since then but I started my liquid diet (today!) at 350.2. I am a classic story of overweight-since-childhood along with a rapid weight gain starting in my late 'teens after getting a job and my driver's license, giving me full access to fast food morning, noon, and night. I'm not sure of all my milestones throughout the years but I know I weighed 180 pounds in 7th grade at age 12, and more than 220 when I graduated high school. I'm 5'8 so BMI 25 is 164 pounds and my goal weight is 150. About six weeks ago I decided to go vegan and I've been transitioning into that diet ever since. I'm relying on plant-based protein supplements during the liquid phase but I hope to move to getting protein from whole food as soon as possible. My post-op diet will definitely be a lot higher in carbs than most people on this board are used to, but I'm confident in my choices and really excited about the health benefits in addition to weight loss. I am going to try my darnedest to weigh myself only once per month after surgery. I did the obsessive daily "don't drink anything, have a bowel movement, get naked, and weigh myself" routine during my MFP days and it was really harmful to me mentally. I'm also logging my food in a physical journal and I won't be weighing anything or measuring beyond the standard 1/4 cup, 1/2 cup, etc. meal sizes for post-op guidelines. Measuring food definitely works and I think many people can benefit from it. But again, it ended up being bad for my mental health. My ultimate life goal is to eat and enjoy an abundant amount of healthy plant-based whole foods without weighing or measuring portions. I know it will be awhile before I get there, but that's where I'm going and how I'm positioning myself for long-term success. So that's a little about me! I'm going to post random crap in this thread, like musings on diet stuff, numbers, feelings (I have a lot of them), my appointments, etc. Thanks for reading!

No weird body odor for me. That's interesting! I did have to do Lovenox injections for two weeks post-op. It was easy/fine for the first week or so but the last few days I was so mentally over it that I started having extreme anxiety every time I had to inject myself! I had really horrible belly pain for about 10 days post-op and my left side had (still has) some numbness and nerve pain on the surface of the skin, so I couldn't inject myself there without a lot of pain. Ugh, those last 3-4 days of injections were just awful. But I am deathly afraid of blood clots, and I couldn't walk very much then, so I soldiered through. I definitely looked bruised and beaten. I think a lot of things along this theme of "what they won't tell you" or "what I wish I knew" about surgery are just because each person's experience is so different. For example I had NO gas pain. That was one thing I was 1000% sure I would have and that I prepared extensively for. Nope, not even a minute of it. *shrugs* The best thing we can do is read and research widely to arm ourselves with information but accepting all the while that we will have an entirely unique experience of surgery.

I hit my plateau at 2 weeks post-op, too. I lost 19 pounds in the first two weeks post-op and then it was another 3 weeks before I lost anything and it was only 3 pounds. It was very infuriating. But I've been losing steadily and averaging 18-19 pounds a month since my pre-op diet. Try not to get on the scale everyday, it hurts your brain and spirit.

So you had lost no weight according to your doctor's scale as well??? What did they say to that?? I would give it another week or so and then demand an endoscopy to ensure that my pouch was correctly sized and all my plumbing is functioning correctly.

So sorry to hear the sausages made you feel that way Fatty foods like sausage, some cheeses, oil-based dressings, etc. do this to me as well. Definitely stick to easier foods until you're farther out!

I cheated on the pre-op diet once, with food from Panera Bread. It was worth it IMO and on surgery day my liver was perfectly pink and smooth--according to the surgeon's medical student they were astonished that it had no sign of fat whatsoever and said it was probably my genetics rather than the liquid diet. I basically skipped the pureed stage and went straight to soft foods because during week 3 I was having extreme food aversion where I struggled to get in anything that wasn't a Premier Protein shake. So as long as I mashed up the food really well in my mouth I counted that as puree and was just thankful to get the calories and protein in. I don't separate eating and drinking at all. And I use a straw in my water cup. Neither of these things bothers my pouch in the slightest and haven't caused any increase hunger or problems with my weight loss, so even though I know it's a big sin not to separate the eating and drinking, I just can't bring myself to do it. I eat lots of carbs including rice, potatoes, and whole grain bread. Also bananas. This isn't a cheat or confession for me personally because this type of eating is encouraged by my RD, but I know it's a big sin for most bariatric patients so I figured I'd mention it. Hmm. I think that's about it. I've had a few not-so-healthy food choices over the 14 weeks since surgery, including a spoonful of my grandmother's banana pudding and two tiny forkfuls of some friends' desserts at a fancy restaurant, but overall I've been very pleased with my food choices and ability to limit myself to tiny samples of less healthy foods.

Honestly at this point, would you think it's maybe your scale? Have you done any troubleshooting with it, new batteries or recalibrating or putting it in a different place? When is your post-op follow-up? You're about two weeks out so I would imagine the fluids and swelling from surgery would be gone by now resulting in you seeing at least 5 pounds of loss from surgery day over that amount of time. I'm so sorry you're going through this!

So I thought I'd ramble about hair loss in its own post. I started losing my hair around 11 weeks out, when I was on vacation in Florida. My mom was putting sunscreen on me and kept dragging pieces of hair all over my back and that's when I first noticed it. I am very fortunate that I have a large volume of hair and it's medium-bodied and curly, so the loss is not yet highly visible. However, to make the constant shedding easier to deal with I did cut my hair up to my chin. My hair is usually all the way down my back to the top of my butt. I cut it in December to my shoulders, that was when I thought I was having surgery in February. So it wasn't a huge drastic cut from its original length, but it is extremely difficult for me emotionally to have such short hair right now. I was fat from around age 7 and as anyone who was a fat child knows, the "compliments" adults give you are very different when you are overweight vs. not overweight. So growing up one of the only things I was ever complimented on was my hair. Over time this led to my pride and vanity in my hair especially when I became extremely obese as an adult. My hair is like my security blanket - the one thing I can always rely on to make me feel feminine and beautiful. Having it sheared off was almost physically painful and the sadness reverberated for days. The day I got it cut I had a therapy appointment afterward (coincidental but I'm glad it worked out that way haha) and I told my therapist I'd rather weigh 400 pounds than lose my hair. That's obviously not true but that's how sad it makes me. I'm finally starting to feel better, about 9 days later lol, but it's still hard. I feel very exposed and "naked" for lack of a better term. I will keep my hair short until the regrowth catches up - so maybe six months to a year? And then I'll start the ~3 year growing out process to have my long locks back. Just a part of the body image issues we all have to deal with as we go through drastic changes in our bodies, images, and self-confidence. I'm trying to get through it by reminding myself of the reasons I had this surgery - long life, mobility, and health.

14 weeks out from surgery and I'm 75 pounds down from the first day of the liquid diet, which I started about 4 months ago. I've gone from 358 to 283 and, if I include the pre-op diet, I'm losing about 18-19 pounds per month on average which I'm very happy with. July was sort of meh for weight loss, not exactly sure of the stats but I know I stalled for awhile in the low 300's. August has been better, I've lost the last 10-15 pounds pretty rapidly here in the last two to three weeks. I saw my surgeon last Friday for my three month follow-up and she was really happy with my weight loss. We discussed "goal weight" sort of, I said I'd like to be normal BMI but would settle for 29.9 BMI. She said it might be more realistic to be around 30-31 BMI. So that puts my "goal" range from 164 (24.9 BMI) to 210 (31.9 BMI). I think I will set my goal as 29.9 BMI which is 196 pounds... so basically anything under 200 will be good for me. Although I doubt I will keep losing 20 lbs a month, it's crazy to think that I could, hypothetically, be to that 196 pound goal in 4-5 months! I discussed my issues with getting sick with both the surgeon and the dietitian and they suggested avoiding any foods that I know for sure are irritating me - the dietitian assured me again that my tendency/desire to eat more carbs than most bariatric patients is totally fine and that she encourages the whole wheat toast, cereals, fruit, brown rice, etc. for health reasons (and especially if that's what I'm able to tolerate vs. beef and chicken). She also recommended that I refocus on chewing really well and honestly since trying to take that advice I think that was the problem all along - going too fast because I wasn't chewing enough. In the last week since seeing her I've only felt ill a couple times and they were mild, not as bad as the intense nausea and sometimes heaving/vomiting I had been getting. Yay for eating with proper bariatric etiquette!

12 week update! I've lost 52 pounds since surgery and 68 since the start of the liquid diet. Eating is better, but not by much. Still get sick-feeling fairly often. I went on vacation and it was absolute hell trying to eat AND having to pay for a full meal that I could only eat a fraction of and would never be able to finish all the leftovers while traveling. Still eating a lot more meat and cheese than I would like to be, I find myself having a bit of food aversion in the sense that I just want to eat whatever will meet my goals in as little quantity and fuss as possible. So the easy protein in animal products just works for me right now. However, it is still my goal to move toward a fully plant-based diet. I'm noticing a big difference in clothes. I was able to wear three dresses that I could not fit into when I bought them! NO MORE buying "hope" clothes in my future. My underwear is all too big and my above-the-knee dresses are getting quite long, lol. I've bought a few things but unless it's marked way down I am loathe to spend money on something that will only fit for a couple months. I need to hit up Goodwill soon! And best of all, I am under 300 pounds now! Goodbye, good riddance!

I missed my 8-week update, so here's a 9-week update. 63 days, wow! Where has the time gone? I've lost 41 pounds since surgery and 57 since the liquid diet. I'm hitting my goal of average loss of 20 lbs per month and I'm pretty happy with my progress. I'm 301 pounds today so hopefully in the next week I will bid goodbye to being 300+ forever! In the last couple of weeks eating has become much more difficult. As anyone reading this thread knows, for the first 6 weeks or so I had literally no issues with food from the first day post-op, no nausea or vomiting or pain at all. I was thrilled! Lol. Unfortunately that is no longer the case. I can't exactly pinpoint what is causing it - whether it's the food itself, or eating too fast, or eating too much... often I'm totally fine, so I don't think I have a stricture or any other medical issue. I'm sure that I will eventually be able to identify a pattern and adjust accordingly, but for now, I get pain and some sliming about 30-40% of the time I eat. I even threw up after eating a salad the other day Overall I'm happy, but sometimes I feel frustrated and wish I didn't have the RNY and I could just eat normally without worry of pain and cramping. My biggest issue is still hydration... some days I do great and some days I'm just behind. Trying to work on that as much as possible for health AND weight loss reasons.

I just realized I posted my issue with dehydration on my status, not this thread. So just as an FYI for anyone reading, I went to urgent care for a possible UTI and my urinalysis results showed signs of dehydration. Not severe enough to need to go to the ER for fluids or anything, just a clear indicator I wasn't hydrating like I should be (with, potentially, the intense heat as a confounding variable). I also had bilirubin in my urine which possibly indicated an issue with my gallbladder, but the follow-up only showed trace bilirubin so my doctor said it's more likely that was also a result of the dehydration.

Doing better. My follow-up urinalysis still showed dehydration, but much closer to being normal than before. Working on getting all the way there! Recently incorporated toast back into my life! Sooooo happy. I chew really carefully and take my time, the bread I eat is full of grains and seeds so I want to make sure they're all easily digestible. One slice of the bread (which is Dave's Killer Bread 21 grains & seeds variety) is five grams of fiber and five grams of protein. Add peanut butter or hummus for more fiber and more protein. Perfect and highly nutritious plant-based meal! I also want to try a recipe for copycat Zoës Kitchen braised white beans... I've been getting those a couple times a week and man they are SOOOOOO GOOD. They never get old! Since I've been able to start swimming I am also doing much, much better in the stamina department. I still feel weakness in my quads pretty early on but I no longer feel faint or like I'm going to pass out after 15-30 minutes of activity. I might start a bodyweight squatting routine since my knees are doing better with the weight loss. When I get under 300 I'm going to start skating again in the hopes of playing roller derby in the next year or two. Now THAT will get my quads in working order in no time

Aaaaaaand another not good experience tonight. Russell Stover SF candies... just one, JUST ONE! 10 minutes later and I was... well, let's say if I had been constipated I wouldn't be anymore. That thing was more effective than the damn bottle of magnesium citrate the day before surgery. I seem to be unwittingly testing the boundaries of my RNY and it is answering with a megaphone. Well, good to know, RNY. Good to know.

I ended up having my first experience with dumping last night, I believe. I was feeling very lonely, emotional, restless... a classic night where before surgery I would get in the car, drive around listening to music, and stop in at a fast food place for some fatty food, a soda, and a dessert. I tried hard to resist but ended up going out anyway. I was still full from eating supper (tuna with sesame crackers) and really did not need to eat, but I wanted to eat so badly and tried to justify it by telling myself it had been four hours since supper so I could have something if I wanted. I stopped at Wawa and picked up some food (some BBQ chicken with cheese). Within 2-3 minutes of eating the first few bites I was milliseconds from vomiting. I was doubled over in pain, nauseated beyond belief. I tried to wait it out but eventually had to drive home, slowly, sweating and an instant from puking the whole time. When I got out of the car I almost threw up on our carport but managed to hold it together. I never did throw up, I think I was just so determined that I wouldn't, didn't want to know what it felt like... after 20 minutes or so the threat of vomiting passed and I got the slimes for the first time. Slimes meaning my mouth filling up repeatedly with excess saliva... eventually it passed and I dissolved an anti-nausea tab on my tongue and started feeling better. What an awful, awful feeling. I will never, ever do that again. I could barely eat today at all, just half a protein shake this morning, until I finally had supper a couple hours ago. I need to figure out what to do in the event of that insatiable, irresistible pull toward late night restless, reckless eating... clearly my coping mechanisms are not fully in place yet. NOT a good experience, but I'm glad it happened.

Yesterday was six weeks post-op and I weighed in at 308 pounds! That's a full fifty pounds lost since the morning I started the liquid diet on April 27. Fifty pounds gone in two months! I know it won't keep going that fast, but if it did I'd be at goal of BMI 23 in only 6 more months hahaha. A girl can dream! NINE pounds to go until I'm under 300. Going to try and avoid the scale for another two weeks, see if I can keep my resolve against daily weighing up!

Going to try a protein bar today, these were allowed at 4 weeks but haven't experimented yet as I was sick of them from pre-op. We can only eat half at a time and are supposed to chew really well!

Read it! It’s amazing! Thanks! I actually don't think I ever did so I'll check it out now

40 days post-op. Well, I'm doing really well, weight-wise. I've lost 10 pounds in the last week! 32 total since surgery. Only 11 pounds to go until 299! However, I'm not sure I'm eating enough because I am still really weak. I really want to resist tracking because it's not good for me mentally but maybe I could just do a day or two to see where I am and where I need to make adjustments. Things that I've been eating since starting soft foods almost two weeks ago - bananas, meatloaf, cottage pie, meatballs over rice, pita with hummus, a Taco Bell bean burrito. The quantity of soft food I'm able to eat is very small compared to eating things like mashed potatoes and grits. 1/5 of a small pita with 1 tbsp of hummus, 1/4 of the burrito, 3/4 of one meatball with a spoonful or two of rice. I can only eat half a small banana in a sitting. (I am not finding that the carbs give me any trouble at all.) So maybe I am just not eating often enough to compensate for the small quantity. I still have almost no hunger signals so I can definitely forget to eat for long periods of time. I'm no longer having cravings for fried or fatty foods - maybe because I've incorporated meat into my diet at this point which is giving me a higher fat intake, or maybe things are in a better place mentally. I'm starting to notice a difference in my body, particularly my belly. I've always been pretty flexible and could touch my toes even 60, 70 pounds ago, but now I can hang down low and let my hands drag on the ground. I'm SUPER excited about that because I'm taking a yoga class at school this fall and I'm happy to know I'll be able to do more of the poses by then. I don't know whether the fat has really gone yet or if it's just transforming into squishier fat first instead of the more solid tissue and that's why I notice the increase in flexibility. Either way, cool stuff happening!!!!

Thank you so much for your encouraging comment!

Random updates 33 days post-op... I started a bonafide period yesterday. I had been spotting on and off since the 2nd week of the pre-op diet but this is my first real period in years! Seems like a weird thing to be happy about, and of course I enjoyed not having periods pretty much ever, but it's really nice to know that regardless of weight loss, a return to hormonal health is underway! My energy level is still total crap. I get so shaky so quickly it's almost infuriating at this point. I feel so lazy and useless. I tried to go to a festival on Saturday and I made it maybe 25-30 minutes in before I needed to find a seat in the shade immediately or else have my legs give out. This was despite having a 30-ounce yeti cup full of ice water. Mr. Green is going to test our pool water again when he gets home and hopefully I'll be able to get in. If the water isn't ready soon I'm going to have to join the expensive gym with a pool because not being able to exercise is driving me crazy. I only have to lose 21 pounds to be under 300 for the first time since 2009 so I want to give it all I've got! Hopefully will get there by 2 months post-op! I'm feeling a little frustrated with food. Most of what I'm eating right now is food that I personally consider unhealthy, with a lot of meats and cheeses. I really want to get refocused on plant foods and I have some recipes I want to try, but I have no energy for or interest in cooking at the moment. Hopefully once I get the exercise worked out........ We've gone out several times recently and the food has all been delicious but obviously I take home a ton of leftovers. Once I eat the leftovers once, I'm not interested in them anymore and can't make myself eat them again even though there's a guaranteed 2-4 meals left (stupid restaurant portions). Maybe another form of food aversion? Anyway, it's wasting a ton of food and it's really irritating. Not sure why all this random mental stuff is popping up - of course I assumed there would be emotions and adjustments but these things don't seem like any sort of logical response. I was at an all-time low with insomnia last week, and I've been focusing on that since this past weekend. I started taking a small dose of a sleep drug and so far it's helped. I've slept about 6 hours every night, which is basically double what I was sleeping last week. I'm still napping each day but thanks to getting more sleep at night, they're more of the rejuvenating kind instead of the basic survival kind, lol. Hoping to hit an average of 6.5 hours soon and be able to stop napping so much!

Thank you! I eventually just went to bed and it went away by the next morning, lol. Definitely just trial & error!