LaLaDee

For the liquid stage, I stuck to Optifast (or slimfast or whatever you can get your hands on) and protein shakes. For the puree stage, you will want really high protein soups (like meaty soups and lentils and stuff like that). I made a soup out of chicken breast, potato and leek and blended it till it was very liquidy and froze a million tiny portions. Never ever have like a plain vegetable soup (like pumpkin or tomato soup). It's a waste of the limited space you have in your pouch. You have to stick meat and beans or something in there. I also basically took one of those hand held blenders and would puree a tiny portion of casseroles, beef chilli, bolognese (without the pasta) and whatever my family was having as long as it had protein. There's also runny scrambled eggs and fat free puddings, cottage cheese/ricotta cheese things (google VSG recipes for the pureed stage). You can also have milk, yoghurt and smoothies. Plus, if you can still stomach them, carry on with optifast shakes (at least once a day). Otherwise, use the opportunity to start making your own protein shakes which taste much better (throw a frozen banana, some chocolate protein powder and honey with skim/almond milk in a blender and see if you like it). Some people will eat mash potato and things like that, but remember they will do nothing for you nutritionally. I found the puree stage the most unpleasant. Puree most foods and they look pretty disgusting. However, the puree food stage goes by pretty quickly. You will survive it. The truth is that I wasn't that interested in food anyway, so it was just a matter of trying to get some protein before I felt totally full. Other than protein, protein, PROTEIN (you get the idea), make sure you are drinking water constantly. Best of luck JuniperBug. If you want more information than your team gives you, then you should order a book (written by doctors and nutritionists). I had weight loss surgery for dummies and that was pretty helpful. There is a lot advice on the internet, on forums and youtube etc but remember that people can tolerate different things and different doctors have different plans, so generally you should stick with your doctors advice.

I drink a lot of peppermint tea to settle my stomach. The bonus is it helps with water intake.

I initially wanted the band because it's reversible and seems less scary than having part of my stomach removed. However, my surgeon talked me out of it. He said he barely does a handful a year and that he spends lots of time doing band revisions and removals. Apparently, a lot of people have had to change from the band to the sleeve. There are a lot of complications like band slippage. With the sleeve, you also don't have to get adjustments or worry about as many follow up appointments. Also, it can restrict your ability to eat healthy foods like raw vegetables and chicken, but then things like ice cream slide very easily down. For me, the main thing that freaked me out was having this foreign object in my body. I read on the internet about people who can see or feel their port through their skin and I didn't like the idea. I think you should talk to your surgeon and do as much research as possible. My surgeon did say that for someone with a lot of weight to lose, the sleeve is better. However, if you don't have much weight to lose then maybe the band could be for you (or you might consider the laparoscopic balloon or another alternative).

That sounds lovely sassy683. Even better than the food, I think it's great that your friends and sister are being so supportive. That's going to help you do so well!

I lost about 16 kg or 35 pounds in the first month. I did kind of stall around the third week but the overall weightloss was pretty awesome as far as I'm concerned!

I definitely had a final last meal before I started my pre-surgery diet. I hit up a restaurant and had everything, wine, desserts etc. I just ate everything I wanted. It was delicious and I don't regret it.

Everyone's experience is different. The anesthesia put me in a lot of pain and nausea. I also ended up spending hours in recovery because my blood pressure went crazy high. My family was told I would be in my hospital room after about 2 hours and they ended up waiting about 10 hours so they were freaking out. The first 4 or 5 days my body was in shock and I was alternating between feverish sweating and violently shivering. My oxygen was low so I had to wear a mask and my mouth was so so dry. That was worse than anything. And then two weeks after surgery, my body had this weird autoimmune sarcoidosis thing so I had to go and spend another week in a hospital. I've been on prednisone for two weeks which is not something you want to try and lose weight on! But then I jump on these forums and see other people sail through the surgery with no complications. So, it's hard to prepare! But I would just go in with a good attitude.