Biddy zz 🏳️🌈

Fluff, your commitment, your eating choices, your outlook, and your progress are inspirational. I sit in a stall (I know, I know, only for a week, it will pass but SHEESH) and I got huge joy from this post. Thank you so much - sharing your journey has been an unexpected joy on this journey.

Hey @frust8 There are still foods I love! I went to a restaurant and ordered tuna carpaccio - 6 thin slices of raw tuna seared a little around the edges (seared before slicing) with 6 slices cucumber, tiny dots of wasabi mayo, tiny dots of shaved red chilli, and drizzled with citrusy ponzu sauce. It was a pants-down-party in my mouth!! But - even though each slice was maybe 3 inches x1 inch and very thin, the first two were great, the next two nice, and the last two were “I need the protein”. I suspect even back as a champion eater, I only ever really loved the first few mouthfuls - but then in the BS (before surgery) days I didn’t realise I wasn’t loving the meal the same until I had eaten three cups full and felt pogged!

Great to hear your progress. Like the rest of the family here said - those cravings just fade away. I had ‘em bad during soft food stage. By 2 months, gone. I reckon maybe the craving for sweet goes faster of you dump or reduce sweetener intake, zero type soft drinks - train yourself not to want sweet stuff. Maybe this is why so many bypassers chose a low-carb lifestyle. Well, that and the dumping!!

My tastes have changed too - I love and crave salad (used to think it was a waste of a good chew!). On the other hand, directly opposite to you @Mattymatt, I now really dislike canned or pouch tuna - formerly a comfy staple - now I find it dry and nasty ew ew ew!! Happy with fresh tuna, thankfully - raw preferably - or any other fresh seafood - I would have tasted to lose that food love! Oyster season has just started here in NZ - I can only eat three raw oysters, but yum yum, and protein to boot!

Well, I am the odd one out! Clearly I need WAY more practice. See y’all in a few days ... 😁

Great post Patty, and great result. deciding to get the surgery before your weight creeps up again is very clever. And like you, I love having no “I have to regurgitate” feeling - the productive burps of band-land. fingers crossed for smooth reduction to your goal...

Yep, it really is! Your life is about to change - all for the better but there will be days that try you! Welcome to the community!!

One more thing. My surgeon has longitudinal study of 1700 RNY patients, going back over 15 years for longest. 1 year after surgery, average daily calorie intake was under 1000. I think he said 900. He has impressive no-regain figures in his patients, and gives you a rough weight-loss projection just pre surgery. Spot on for me so far.

I am 4 months post op. I had my malfunctioning band replaced with RNY, a ‘fobi pouch’ non-stretch variety with small built-in non adjustable band, when I was 230 lbs but still a way off my 260lbs or so heavy weight. I also pretty well don’t get hungry. When eating, I don’t think I have a good ‘feedback’ mechanism for full, but I just sorta run out of interest. Most meals 1/2-3/4 cup. I am on strictly 3 meals a day no snacks (although I do have the odd one - mostly sensible, eg fruit!) I like regular, predictable meals. Always have. So I now typically eat: Breakfast- 1 shot coffee, 1oz milk, 1oz protein powder, 6 ice cubes - in blender, coffee protein smoothie. Makes about 6oz, 2 mins to drink but I try and take 5. Lunch- 1 low-carb beer stick (salami type thing, 10g protein) and 1oz Edam cheese OR 2oz shredded chicken, 2 lettuce leaves, 5 halved cherry tomatoes, red bell pepper and 1tsp mayo. Which option depends on whether I have time to make the salad - chicken is frozen in 2oz packs from our last rotisserie chicken dinner. Dinner- I cook for us. We have a home delivery service - each fortnight we get 4 recipes and all ingredients. We eat one every 3-4 days, eat a portion between us and freeze 2 portions, or have for next 2 nights if it don’t freeze. I eat 3/4 cup, protein first. Great range of food, international food types. Tonight - thawed meal of lentil and baked cauliflower salad in yoghurt dressing with almond slivers. Try to get 15g protein plus good veggies Drink- 5 mugs decaf instant coffee a day with 1/2 sweetener. Fizzy water a lot. Occasionally 1/2 bottle cider. 50g protein, 600-700 calories, typically. This has been pretty much stable since 6 week mark, by the way @FluffyChix

Fantastic! You must be so stoked!!

Nope - if anything mine have sorta gone the opposite - mmm lovely lovely lovely lov... oh damn, that sorta fizzed out just at the end there. Your post gives me hope - try, try and try again!

Can I ask, are you eating slowly? My advisory was that burping is often an early symptom of 8ndigestion - eating a bit much or a bit fast. As for your comment that you are not losing weight just now - maybe just a stall? How many calories a day are you getting? And grams of protein? Oz or water??

I know you are asking sleeve, and I did bypass, but my overwhelming message - it has been GREAT to get the surgery. Effortless. I had put back on maybe 70% of band weight loss - gone in just 16 weeks, painlessly. i find gastric surgery to be much much easier to manage than the band (and I loved the band, back when it worked”. Hope that helps!

Hi team I am just home from a brief pacific island holiday (scuba pics coming later!) and the holiday showed me an interesting thing about my eating. I am 3.5 months post op, and I gotta tell ya, it has been a dream run. Surgery, recovery, weight loss - all smooth and damned near effortless. I don’t really get hungry (a few days of that early but not since). I can eat pretty much most stuff I want, but have had a couple of dumping episodes from sugar and luckily I really don’t want it! I am on strictly three meals a day - I start with protein and am loving finding delicious protein treats - like the 6 thin slices of tuna carpaccio in the islands! Yum! Then I finish with greens, veggies, salad. Very happy, no serious temptations. I sort of miss my nemesis - potato crisps - but have discovered baked veggie crisps, and two or three beetroot crisps makes me crunch-satisfied on the odd occasion when I want crisps. So - off on this holiday, imagine my surprise to suddenly get real cravings. First - the airline club lounge - really wanted my old staple, chocolate coated shortbread with my coffee. Just noticed it and resisted. Then, had a hotel overnight before international flight - minibar yelled at me all bloody evening. Chocolate, crisps, chocolate almonds, cider, coke! And then, onto the flight, and the seat screen just kept shouting “Snack bar! Ooh, pringles. M&Ms. Do it, do it”. 3 hours of resisting - had a beerstick lunch - low carb, good protein... Anyway, I was just surprised at the “location” triggers for those old eating habits. Resisting was ok, but I realised that I will need willpower on an ongoing basis - I had sorta assumed I was in a more secure place re food temptations. The only answer, obviously: very very regular pacific island scuba diving holidays...

Not me (thankfully - potato chips were my life downfall!!) Post gastric band, I could eat maybe 6 crisps and be ‘blocked’ for 2-3 hours. Same now with my RNY - but I prefer baked beetroot crisps now, anyway - but still only 1/2 doz or so. Popcorn - I can manage maybe 1/4 cup and ditto - full up. Takes maybe 1.5 hours (thankfully, the rest of the movie!!!) to clear. Haven’t tried cookies cos I got bad dumping early on, so am gonna try and live my life without ever testing whether I still have!

Today, so joyful. Tomorrow - on a flight to a small pacific island for 7 uninterrupted days of scuba diving - no mobiles, no internet. Scuba is MUCH harder when one is obese - you need so much more lead weights around your waist just to make that damned fat sink, plus I was less fit, fatty tissue uses that air faster, etc. This photo - me diving 5 years ago in NZ just as I started to regain weight following my lapband failure. I am smaller than this now, and in the warm pacific water this diving trip should be paradise - interspersed with fishing, and then eating fresh fish and crab meals when on land! THIS - the miserable idea of being too fat to ever do it again safely - was my main motivator to get things sorted, See y’all in a week! As we say in New Zealand Maori - Kia kaha, everyone. Stay strong.

Did I what!! The most toxic snake alive, but with a tiny mouth. So they are most likely to bite you on Small skin flaps, like the webbing between the thumb and forefinger. I did, though, think of my other patches of loose skin and try to keep them far from my turkey neck...

This is my personal record of my progress at twelve weeks. A bit dull so don’t read it! But I kinda need to get it down. And I have to admit, it has been a dream run. 14 December, Lap band removal and RNY in one. Fobi Pouch (‘no stretch’) type RNY, with intestine sewn over the incision line for my long thin pouch, making it very thick and non-stretchy, also with a small non-adjustable silastic ring sewn in to maintain the girth size/shape. Open surgery, but even that was pretty easy. I did take 4 weeks off, then built up my hours over the next 3. I have a stressful job with 1000 staff, so I wanted to come back carefully, knowing I would not collapse. And steady weight loss averaging 3.75lbs (1.7kg) a week ever since. The MyFitnessPal graph below- at the start the pre-op diet for 3 days, the flat drop in the post-surgery out-of-town-so-no-daily-weighing days, and daily weighings first thing in the morning since. I am so glad that I faced up to the non-working band and made the call for surgery before letting my weight get right back up to my pre-band weight. In only 3 months I am less than 5kg off my band-working weight, so my reward has been like instant gratification. Back into many of my old, carefully stored clothes. Walking, without feeling self conscious. Hips, knees much less sore. Proud of my eating. Back into my motorcycling gear - so bought a new bike in the weekend!! She’s a beauty. And going scuba diving in the pacific at Easter. Amazing the lifestyle difference 45lbs makes. Being ‘obese’ and not. I can eat more than I want - I think. Too much sweet gives me dumping - or did. I am too scared to try sweets again! I have a piece of liquorice each night, fine. I can eat bread easily but if I eat a bread roll that is my whole meal, so I don’t. I feel like I can eat a lot, but after a meal maybe 1/4-1/3 the size of my partner’s, I kinda stop eating - not feeling full exactly, but feeling ... finished. Disinterested in having more. No drive to eat til stuffed. 3 or 4 potato chips and I am done - these were my nemesis. Am never driven to buy them. I am pretty good about ‘protein first’ each meal. I get 45-60g a day. My calories are 750-900 a day and very slowly climbing - I am on strictly 3 meals a day but I think I may need to add one to get to 1200 calories/60g protein. I eat too quickly and I sometimes forget and drink with a meal, to no ill effect. I drink lightly carbonated water, my coffee is mostly decaf, and I start each day with a Nescafé pod/ice/trim milk//‘balance’ vanilla protein powder frappe on the NutriBullet. Lunch - sardine or chicken salad. And a good dinner, which I love to cook for us both. My normal-sized partner’s wee pot tummy is gone because I am not being a bad influence! And this forum has been a constant source of inspiration, chuckles, and fascination. Many thanks.

Almost 16 weeks today, and I am now at the weight I sat at when my band worked, of 80.5 kg - two or three lbs off my lowest weight with the band. Took me 15.5 weeks RNY to get here from 230lbs, where it took over two years - closer to three - with the band from start of 260lbs, due to having to travel for fills etc. So I am now wearing all my best beautiful band-weight CEO clothing. People are complimentary although one guy did ask me today if I have worms!! Except, the weight loss is a little different in pattern this time. Legs smaller, abdomen above navel a bit bigger, so some of my “slim” clothes catch on it. I guess fast vs slow weight loss gives a different effect. No worries though - last week on scuba holiday I lost nearly 2kg, so I know it isn’t over yet! In fact my current weight was initially my goal. Then I lowered it to 5kg less than now, when surgeon said I should be more ambitious. Not I have lowered it to the top of my bmi ‘not overweight’ range - I should at least have a GOAL of not being overweight, right? This surgery has been an utter joy ride...

The first lot were a little, but I put in whole-grain mustard in the second and they were totally un-eggy!

There is!! Look up either Revolutionary Rolls or their variant (my preferred choice) Oopsie Rolls on the Internet - I have made 1/2 doz whenever I crave a burger or sandwich - and it has perfectly hit the spot! With bacon and egg filling, or cheese and tomato, or BLT. Most of the recipes are really simple, 3-4 8ngredients. Our own fluffychix has a great but a bit more complex recipe here: http://fluffychixcook.com/basic-revolution-ary-rolls-low-carb-and-gluten-free/ Magic.

I made myself mini Easter eggs in advance - by wrapping individual grapes in coloured foil squares, and unwrapping them when with the family and eating them - no-one noticed! And I feel like I had a treat, as well....

I really noticed that! Apart from the protein powder soups here on bariatricpal Store, every other protein powder I find sickly sweet! I have so easily made a switch to a low carb diet - and to compensate, I am loving things like salad greens! Never been partial to that before!! I struggled to find a tolerable protein drink and settled on this as my everyday breakfast: 1 shot of coffee, cooled in fridge overnight 6 ice cubes 1 oz milk 20g protein worth Of least sweet possible vanilla protein powder Blitz in NutriBullet - yum! The coffee sort of mellows out the sweet in the protein powder - this is my everyday starter meal...

One thought - two general anaesthetics so close together has quite a likelihood of inducing fatigue for 8-12 weeks - it might be that... Take care - sounds like you are doing all the right things...