EmmyJ

I'll start with the good news! I went into Dress Barn the other day and the store is basically separated by "regular sizes" on the left and "plus sizes" on the right. For the first time in years, I didn't have to stay on the right side! I'm pretty sure I still could have fit into the smaller stuff in the plus sized section, but being able to fit into the "regular sizes" was too darn crazy for me to walk away from! Bad news is I haven't lost an ounce in the last couple of weeks. I consistently wonder if my calorie intake is too low (between 700-800, I'm 3.5 months post-op) but every time I try to see if I can increase it, I find I simply can't ingest any more food. The only thing I can think of to have more calories in the same volume of intake would be to up the fat content, but my NUT has me scared away from eating over 30 g of that a day. I'm frightened of carbs all on my own, so that never goes over 50 g (some will still say that's too high, I know.) I really should up the exercise a bit, but I doubt that's the main contributing factor--it's not like I've been sitting around doing nothing! Sigh, I wish I had more guidance, since they only seemed to give me any in the liquid and smushie stages. I just hope this snaps soon. Oh well, at least I have 3 cute new dresses, a cute new shirt, and cute new black skinny jeans!

Glad it worked out with no issues!

I don't think it's crazy, I think there are a lot of PCPs who don't understand obesity or bariatric surgery as well as they should. But you can only stand your ground and explain why you believe this decision is best for your health! If your doctor can't get behind you doing something to improve your health, then I would think it's time to get a new doctor

If you followed the preop instructions, I doubt there'll be an issue! You can usually talk to your surgeon for a few minutes just preop though, if you need extra encouragement

Getting protein in has been a bit of a challenge for me too. Especially since at this stage I'm trying to hit my goals with real food only (no shakes) as often as I can, and I can still only manage to eat so much in the day. I try to make 90% of what I eat very protein dense meat and dairy and the remaining 10% is basically vegetables. Back before solids, I could almost never reach the goal. At least now I'm getting close on the regular!

I am 23 and had a bmi of 47 at surgery date, and I had a sleeve. I've been doing very well on it (bmi is 38 now!) and it was only a little over 3 months ago. I didn't think DS was appropriate due to the malabsorption part either! But it's up to you

I love beans and I especially loved them on soft foods. Fat free refried beans were a happy meal for me. The only one to avoid is the baked beans that are loaded with sugar. I say, eat up, and let any unpleasant side effects be someone else's problem

Sometimes high cholesterol is just genetic and no matter how skinny you are, you're going to have it. There's no harm in being on a cholesterol medication, and if it lowers on its own, that's great, but there's really no guarantee of that happening. High cholesterol is a very painless treatment, so you can wait on it, but that's up to you

I was on lithium but for whatever reason, after surgery, I couldn't tolerate the pills and the liquid was so nasty. So I was switched to lamictal and I have no problems with my mood or losing weight thus far.

I feel like I'm losing three quarters of my weight from my butt! My boobs aren't shrinking a bit, but the behind seems to be getting flatter and flatter. Ugh.

I made a similar mistake ordering french onion soup a couple months out. Cheese that's too melty can cause major problems. However, I still like eating out. At three months post-op I can eat most things, and I like to look for restaurants that have a "light" section of their menu. I go for chicken or ground meat and fresh vegetables and tell them to leave off any rice or potatoes that might come with the entree. I usually portion off about a third of the entree to eat and take the leftovers home. I can also order a salad that has smart add-ins, but some people don't tolerate lettuce well. Earlier post-op, I tended to order cups of soup. Most importantly, I chew very thoroughly as I normally would. That way, I don't overeat or get anything stuck. I only go out once in awhile, but it is possible to make healthy choices and enjoy them!

Exactly. Cream soups tend to be considerably higher in calories than broth soups. Pay attention and whatever your serving size, make it fit into your plan. And add protein powder if you can.

Hey! I have some PCOS myself. My BMI at surgery was about 47, but I am around your age (I'm 23). Although some insulin resistance has been suspected in me, I never had fasting blood sugars above 100. The fact that you do should help chalk up a prediabetes comorbidity. You also have the hypercholesterolemia comorbidity. I highly recommend the surgery if you can find a good surgeon to perform it. I am coming up on three months out, and for once in my life, I had three periods in three months! I also attribute that to the low-carb, high protein diet I'm following post-op. I have yet to see any difference in hirsutism, but if I have to live with that then whatever. I didn't have bad lipids, but I sometimes have prehypertension. That hasn't gone down much quite yet, but I have hope. Bottom line: I think having these risk factors is a good reason to try and attack this problem at a young age!

During the full liquids, I had lots of "cream of x" soups with chunks strained out. And I was able to mix some unflavored protein powder in if I tempered it outside the soup first so that it didn't clump up in the hot soup.

My carbs hover around 50 a day and I haven't had any stalls longer than one week thus far. Nearing three months out. Some people have no issue keeping their carbs at 20 or below, but I'm not one of them either

I hope I lose some in mine...but despite over 60 pounds and three pants sizes down from my highest, I haven't dropped in bra size a bit I don't want these boobs!

I almost bought G2, because I swore it didn't have any sugar in it--it was a good thing I checked!

Sometimes it feels like I don't eat anything but protein LOL...maybe I need to eat more often

About ten days after my sleeve I sat with the family drinking a protein shake while they ate pizza. I feel your pain

I want to try low carb high fat, as I did get a PCOS diagnosis, but my NUT keeps encouraging me to incorporate whole grains into the diet and keep the fat intake low. Sigh.

Women's sizing is a nightmare! It's totally arbitrary. Men's sizing can vary from brand to brand too, but at least sizes are based on actual body measurements. We just have random numbers that mean nothing!

Oh wow, I'm at 10 weeks and freaking out every time I get close to 800 calories. Am i eating too little?

I've never really liked a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Fruits are a little better, but when it comes to veggies, I'm basically at potatoes, corn and peas (all of which basically count as starches, not veggies), broccoli, green Beans, carrots, and onions sometimes. There's a whole lot out there that tastes terrible to me. But I know to keep this all going I'm going to have to eat a variety of veggies! I'm sort of scared to even post this because I'm afraid the answer is "just suck it up and eat them", but does anyone have any tips for a veggie snob to learn to love them?

Thank you all for your suggestions! I'm gonna have to give everything another try with these techniques. If I still don't like them, well, I'll have to start finding ways to hide them in

I'm not too far postop, but I've noticed that the two periods I've had since surgery were miraculously on time. I have another one due in 8 days so I'm eager to see if it arrives on time.