Littel_Urchin

Fair warning, this post is part rant about period but also, I'm genuinely looking for advice / suggestions. First of all, can I just say I hate it that as a woman who's trying to lose weight (in my case, at least), I only get 2 good weeks out of every month where my body and my weight loss can be quite predictable and reliable. I hate it that even if I can find the motivation to get my weight loss momentum going psychologically, physically my body can only sustain that momentum for 2 weeks before PMS hits and everything goes haywire that makes it very hard to stay on top of things. I am currently in the middle of one of my worst PMS weeks ever especially when it comes to weight loss. It's the kind that induces fatigue, bloating, constipation, and cravings, so it's a quadruple whammy. A week ago when the PMS set in, I was knocked out for 2 days due to the fatigue, which was unusually extreme. And I have been very constipated and bloated ever since, the kind that even laxatives don't help as much (I've been taking the maximum allowable daily dose of senna every day since the constipation set in and I only have one bowel movement every other day). On top of that, my appetite has increased and I just want to cry every night because of how much I want to eat even though I've already met my daily caloric goals. It has been very discouraging because it throws my exercise and diet for a loop, not to mention all the bloating and constipation make you feel fat as hell. And the most frustrating part is, it seems like there is nothing you can do to ensure that your next cycle will be a good one. You just have to roll with the punches and ride it. I'm sure many women can attest to this but you'll never know what kind of PMS you'll get each month. PMS and period can be very arbitrary. I've had months where my PMS was literally non-existent and the period was a breeze, and there were months where the PMS set in a full week and a half before the period with a vengeance, and for the life of me, I can't seem to see any correlation between my PMS and my eating habits / lifestyle choices. I've been doing a lot of research and I know all this is due to hormonal changes but none of the articles says anything about how to prevent / at least keep the hormonal changes in check so your PMS won't cause much disturbance. Anybody has any advice? Please help, this is horrible.

@MargoCL, listen hun, I'm not saying my plan or your plan is better, just that there are many plans and approaches out there. I'm not trying to mislead anyone, I'm just sharing my experience. I believe anyone here knows this is just a forum and not a doctor's office and to take it up with their nut / surgeon if they're not sure. I am happy with my team's care and plan, I am happy losing weight slow and steady, I'm happy with my 80-20 approach of clean vs junk food, and I am also happy for you for finding plans that suit you, even though they are different than mine.

My nut's approach is a little different. I was cleared for soft foods right after the 2-weeks liquid phase post-op (where most people usually graduate to puree). Her reasoning was that we still have teeth. She just told me to chew really well and choose softer foods in the beginning, so it's basically like a puree stage without actually pureeing. My nut is not so strict once I'm out of the 2 weeks liquid post op. She gave me a rough guide on the average progression (2 weeks 'puree' stage then 2 weeks soft solids, then solids, etc) but said I could start earlier / later on those stages, depending on my new stomach's tolerance. As for carbs, my plan doesn't specify a certain period of time to avoid it, it just says to give priority to protein, and more nutrient dense but low calorie foods such as fruits and veg, and carbs should be the last one you eat. The explanation for this is that they want you to meet your protein and other macros goals, and if you load up on carbs first, you won't be able to get them in because you'll be full. I think with plans such as yours (carbs to be avoided for quite long period of time), the nut wants to maximize the honeymoon period and ensure you're used to the new eating habit before re-introducing carbs into your diet. It's weird but that especially one rough day during PMS (where I was able to stomach quite a lot of carbs) was an anomaly because I haven't been able to repeat that ever since. As I mentioned, I suspect I was low on serotonin, which apparently can only be made after starchy, non-fruit carbs are eaten (you can google it).

Got sleeved on Aug 15, 1 day shy of 5 weeks post-op now. Just want to update everyone on the highlights of my progress and experiences post-op. 1. I've been able to tolerate carbs surprisingly well. --> Once during pms (about 3 weeks post-op), I ate about 1/3 bowl of rice with broth and had no adverse reaction. My body was craving carbs so bad, I read it's something to do with serotonin drop during pms. 2. I don't experience that aversion to sweet stuff that so many people have spoken of. --> I still crave them, I still eat them, I still enjoy them. 3. Eggs feel uncomfortable, which is a bummer. 4. Salmon and sauteed onions cause that stuck feeling so now I avoid them like the plague. 5. I didn't lose a drastic amount of weight in the early weeks post-op. -> I lost the bulk of my weight during the pre-op liquid diet. 6. I haven't been losing as much as some people post-op but I'm definitely losing weight albeit slower than my pre-op phase. 7. I still have big appetite which often causes me to ponder whether the surgery has failed, but then I order something and the appetite goes away quickly after a few bites. The surgery works! 8. You literally can still eat anything but you learn how to be smart about them. --> I had Mexican and Greek food last week. I had fajitas meat and allowed myself a small amount of the guilty stuff (chips and tortilla). For Greek food, they actually have lots of healthy stuff (bean and eggplant dips, grilled skewered meats, etc). I steamed some cauliflower to eat with the dips and allowed myself a small amount of pita bread. 9. Sometimes there's no rhyme or reason to how much weight I lose daily. --> I was losing around 300-500g daily during my pre-op liquid stage. It was quite steady and reliable. Then with reintroduction of new foods, PMS, or exercise, I either stalled, went back up a little bit, or the wackiest of all, I was losing 2 pounds, 100g, and 2 pounds, 3 days in a row. 10. Once, I was craving this particularly unhealthy food. I gave in and had the entire thing but I only chewed and didn't swallow. It was a low point but you do what you gotta do.

Thanks, Letsgetgoing2018 and Frustr8! They're really peaks and valleys, I post on here about my dark days, thought I should also post about sunny days Day 2 of back to work now, my colleagues still can't shut up about how much smaller I've become.

So this is kind of a non-scale victory for me. Nobody knows about my surgery except my SO. I've also been on self-imposed lock-down ever since I started my pre-op liquid diet and the only person who knows me who'd seen me after surgery before today was my landlady, who sweetly but carefully asked if I'd lost some weight because according to her, my clothes had been getting looser and that she could 'see' my face now. Today I went back to work after being gone for 1.5 months. I've lost approx. 22 pounds since my colleagues last saw me. I know I've definitely lost weight but I did not anticipate how my colleagues just FREAKED when they saw me. They echoed my landlady's sentiment, they said my face has slimmed down a lot and that my dress looked much looser now. They all came by my cubicle one by one to see me and compliment me on how 'skinny' I've become, joked that I was my own younger sister or an intern, all in all being very encouraging. I hit some kind of stall a week ago so this definitely boosts my motivation. So happy.

This weight loss journey has taught me a lot about myself. One of them being that my vice is savory, carb-y, oily snacks. We've got a pretty good Little India neighborhood over here and authentic Indian street snacks are aplenty. Top three things on my list I want to eat as soon as I could: onion pakora, potato & peas samosa, and bhelpuri. I've been dying for these even if just a small amount. My question is, based on your experience, when were you able to stomach foods with texture similar to things I mentioned above i.e. fried, carb-y, not to mention spicy? Also, how uncomfortable is it to eat something dry? I read in another thread that eating cereal could be uncomfortable. Bhelpuri is practically dry cereal topped with spicy sauce.

You have a point. Thanks for sharing, it’s a good reminder!

I'm aware of this. I certainly am not looking forward to gobbling down a bucketload of onion fritters, I just miss the taste and it's hard right now because you can't even have just one bite. I also miss pastries, both the flaky and the doughy types. I went by a bakery selling Cornish pasty today and they look so good!

Yeah, bringing a pillow is a good idea although (in my case) it was only one night out of your life. My first night I stayed at the high dependency ward and the pillows were good. Then they transferred me to the general ward and they were the most pathetic, flat, foam pillows that offer no support at all.

Hello! My experience may not be applicable as I am not in the US but here's what happened to me: I packed a hospital bag (change of clothes, toiletries, body wipes, phone + charger, breath spray, my journal + pen) but when I was admitted, I was not allowed to bring the bag with me so my friend had to bring that back with her. When she brought it back to my ward that afternoon, I realized I didn't need most of the stuff I'd packed so I only took a few things and my friend ended up having to take the bag back with her again (God bless her!). Here's what I ended up using during my hospital stay: - Hair brush / comb (very important to make yourself feel good again) - Small perfume oil roller (same as above - to make yourself feel good again, and in a safer format than a spray, what with oxygen tanks and everything) - Lip balm - my lips were dry during my stay. - Flushable feminine wipes (I like to feel clean down there, and can be used as body wipes in a crunch. It turned out my hospital also provides personal cleansing wipes, so I didn't need to bring one). - Breath spray (I didn't feel the need to brush my teeth because I was only allowed plain water during my stay. Also, my hospital offers mouthwash in the morning). - Phone + charger (very important for staying entertained) - 1 set of clothing to change into on the day you're being discharged. - Eye mask + ear plugs (the eye mask especially was very helpful as I am a light sleeper and very sensitive to light) Hope this helps ETA: I was given slippers by the hospital so I didn't bring any with me. I asked my friend to bring me shoes when she picked me up.

This may not be your cup of tea, and I'm not sure of its availability where you live, but I love silken tofu, perhaps you can consider it? When I was on my 2 weeks pre-op diet, I got so sick of all the sweet protein shakes and was craving something salty that I racked my brain for alternative. I came up with this very simple dish, which is basically 1 serving of plain silken tofu topped with 3/4 tbsp miso paste diluted a little bit with water or broth to the consistency of a sauce. You can either eat it cold (like the Japanese do in the summer) or pop it in the microwave for a few seconds. You would not believe how good silken tofu tastes after almost 2 weeks being deprived of flavors (but don't forget the miso sauce, otherwise it would be very bland. Or you can experiment and use any available sauces but miso is made from soybeans, so it will help with the protein as well). I am only 5 days post op and my dietitian gave me a no-go on silken tofu until after the pureed food stage. I personally think I could already handle silken tofu now as it is very soft but I'm not taking any chances.

it'll be over before you even know it!

Was on a self-imposed lockdown until after my surgery, now I'm back Ooh, on the flip side, I've always wanted to try American Chinese food, especially moo shu pork eaten straight out of the oyster pail.

I'm pretty early so not expecting to eat any of those anytime soon. Just want to know other sleevers' experiences with similar food. For example, onion pakora are practically onion rings. Is it true that oily foods are hard to stomach now that we're sleeved?

What did I tell ya, jultrim18! Happy to hear that.

I love protein water for this purpose. I take something called Prowater, it has 25g of protein and 480ml of liquid in one bottle and it doesn't give me nausea. I develop gas if I take dairy (which feels like nausea), especially if I sip too fast. Not so with protein water.

I had to wait quite some time to get my surgery date (close to 1 year from the initial appointment) and was able to do what I call my "Food Farewell Tour". I managed to eat a lot of things but they were all nicely spaced out so I didn't put on weight. I live in a city with access to many ethnic foods. I'm 5 days post-op now and waiting for the day I could eat Indian street snacks again. And there's this Chinese breakfast item comprising sticky rice, boiled peanuts, and fried shallot that's high on my list, too. Probably not so soon, though.

Hi, kristennicole19! I think we both were sleeved on the same day. I am also 5 days post op. So sorry to hear about your experience. Did your med team tell you what caused all those things you were (are?) experiencing? My suspicion is it could be dehydration. Would protein water help? it contains good amount of protein and also liquid, both are said to be crucial in healing. If this helps, I remember when I first woke up from anesthesia, someone told me that the pain I was experiencing at that moment would be the worst and that it'd only get better. I've found this to be true.

Nice to talk to you, too! How's the pain 9 days out? Do you still take pain meds? I'm considering stopping it because the pain meds make me drowsy and lethargic, I was sleeping alot day 2-3 post op and I hate it. Yeah, if you can get your hands on them, try protein water. Mine called Prowater, it has 25g of protein per bottle and 480ml of liquid that can be counted as water intake. I like the pineapple coconut flavor, tastes like virgin pina colada. I can't stand clear broth so I add a little bit of miso paste to it, my dietitian is ok with this. Are you still on full liquid diet? Can't wait till I can eat more stuff like silken tofu, pumpkin soup, or scrambled eggs. My dietitian says no to these for the first 2 weeks post op.

I’m one day out. So far so very, very, very good! It all went so fast. I arrived at the hospital at 6.30am, by 11am I was recovering. Being put under is realy a wonder, I remember they put the oxygen mask on, the anesthesiologist said she was putting the drug in, and then it all went dark, like somebody flipped a switch. Next thing I knew I was waking up in the recovery. I was fully awake by 1pm. Between 11am - 1pm it was hazy. I was bracing myself for the gas pain BUT to my delight, it was very manageable. None in my shoulder or chest, only upper stomach, and it wasn’t even that bad. I get painful bloating during period and I thought the gas pain would be something like that only more intense- NOPE. It was very manageable for me. I dealt with it by sitting up on the bed, leaning forward while hugging a pillow and simply tap my back and neck gently to make myself burp a lot. The gas discomfort subsided quickly after burping and half an hour later I was able to lie on my back and get some rest. It’s kind of weird that my doc didn’t get me on my feet right away as so many of you have said. I only started walking a full day after surgery but I was moving around in my bed alot without any issue. I could get up and down on my own and the soreness of the incision sites is akin to sore muscle after exercise. I had to take a peek at my tummy to confirm that they really did do the surgery because I really wasn’t in that much pain. Overall I’m very happy with my experience. Currently there’s still residual gas discomfort and soreness on the incision sites but very manageable. If the gas moves I feel nauseated but it only lasts about 2 seconds every now and then. I’m just taking it easy. Starting optifast soon. P.S. Everyone on my team is very pleased. They keep saying the surgery went very successfully. They also seem happy that I was able to stick to the 2 weeks pre-op liquid diet which has seen me drop from 104.5kg to 97.9kg on the day of surgery, which might have contributed to the success of the surgery. Looking back to those 2 weeks of hell, I’m glad I stuck it out, now I am filled with a sense of accomplishment so lesson here: stick it out, folks! You won’t regret it

Have you tried leaning forward and gently tap your back? It works wonder for me. I’m 4 days out now, doc gave me meds for nausea and acid reflux but so far i don’t feel the need to take them. I find dairy products to cause the most nausea but it only lasted 2 secs with each sip. I am also eating tomato soup made with low fat milk (allowed by my dietitian to boost protein intake and for variety) and it, too, causes nausea. Optifast is a torture because there’s just too much in one serving and it thickens the longer it sits. I’d rather 3 scoops of Ensure + 2 scoops myotein. Today I got myself protein water and my body agrees with it! Mild to no nausea, and you can boost your water + protein intake in one go. Have you tried them?

What time do you need to be at the hospital? I know it’s hard what with all the nerves and excitement, I myself only got about 4 hrs of sleep before my surgery. Just breathe

It’ll be over before you even know it Wish you a successful surgery!

Hi, I’m 31 y o female, been fat as long as I can remember, finally got so fed up and decided to take the plunge last year. I will not spend another decade as a fat person. Saw the surgeon in Nov 2017. I know I’m a good candidate (241.5 lbs and 5’4”, BMI was 40+). As per the usual practice, he referred me to several specialists (dietitian, psychiatrist, physiotherapist, and endocrinologist) and will see me again in March 2018. FYI, he recommended the sleeve. First was the dietitian. I’ve been put on a simple diet by her. She prescribed the standard -500 cal daily thing and did not put me on any food restrictions. I think she wants to go gentle and just take baby steps. I’ve lost 10 lbs so far. Sometimes I feel good about this as I’d never lost any weight at all, much less keeping them off but sometimes I’d read about someone losing 40 lbs on their initial pre-surgery diet within the same time frame and I’d feel like such a failure again. Second was the endocrinologist. Blood works confirmed I have Type 2 diabetes (have suspected so, was afraid to get it checked). Blood pressure is also through the roof. Am now taking Forxiga and Metformin XR combined with Lisinopril for the blood pressure and vit D pills for some reason. I feel like a total failure sometimes. I’ve seen the physiotherapist twice. Both times she was too afraid to prescribe any exercise because my blood pressure is very high and ended up prescribing me some very mild form of exercise (like standing-up-sitting-down rep, lifting 9 oz bottles rep, that kind of thing). I admit I seldom do these. I walk everywhere and I feel I burn more calories doing that. I haven’t seen the psychiatrist yet, I’m meeting him this week. There are also other non-health issues intersecting with this surgery that make this journey especially hard. I have parents with Narcissistic personality Disorder (NPD) and am Low Contact (LC) with them. There is no way am I involving them in this journey. I am also an expat and don’t really have friends. Colleagues I can talk to, perhaps, but not confide in. My support system is literally only my girlfriend of 11 years. Oh yeah, that’s right, I’m in a same sex relationship, too. LGBTQ is officially condemned here but most people generally mind their own business. We do have gay pride here. Still, I can’t risk upsetting my healthcare providers (I know they’re supposed to be professionals blah blah but you can’t control personal bias and I feel more comfortable with them not knowing). I really need a support system. There are support groups here of course, but for the reasons stated above, I can’t be completely honest about my situation and feel what’s the point of even going. I have anxiety and am easily stressed out in social situations which will make me feel restless, leading to sleeping troubles which will drive my blood pressure up again. I feel more comfortable with online forums hence here I am. ETA - I'm also concerned about juggling work with the surgery and all its pre- and post- that entail.