ms.sss

During the early months it did take some effort to eat for ME. Food aversion and limited stomach capacity were often at odd with nutritional quotas. I needed to set a timer to remind myself to eat. As time went by, as well as the increased ability to just eat more and more often, it started to become less of a chore. I’m 3.5 years out now and i basically just eat when im hungry or when i feel like it. No set times nor amounts or “rules” to adhere to other than to aim to stay below 2000 cals a day more or less (yep, i’m one of those trackers) , and not make myself sick. I have long ago learned what my limits are, eating-wise, and am pretty good at staying within these limits without thinking too much. P.S. I too am a 50-yr old Canadian with (three) kids. Im also 5’2” so it can be argued that I’m a little old lady already! Lol. …and i’m doing just fine.

Happy Birthday BF!! 🎉🎂🥳 Re: mini cupcakes (and donuts too for that matter): AGREED on the standardization of the miniture-ality for multi-flavoured desserts. (YUM to ur pic btw) whenever i buy cupcakes or donuts, i end up cutting out a mini pie-like slice out or ALL of them so i can taste it. I mean, i can’t realistically commit to just one…they are way too big, and there are so many flavours! (Plus..dumping) …then they become “leftovers” and become triggers for all the people who im setting up that support group for you 😇 lololzzz ❤️❤️❤️

So i had issues with my horse pill sized Calcium pill (that i had to take 3 times a day!) I would make me nauseous and/or barf. Cutting it up smaller or crushing it somehow made the ickiness worse. Then i stared burying that effing pill in a tablespoon of greek yogurt and swallowing the spoonful and that did trick. Took me almost 2 months to figure this out though. But then I discovered those chocolate calcium soft chews and Calcium Vitamin Time became a good time of day lol

Yep. Too much sugar will get me every time (esp if its on an empty stomach). My first dump was about 2-2.5 months post op with like a couple sips of a sugary soju/sake drink. It might have been like 1/8 cup in total. Kicked in about 20 mins later and it felt like death (heart palpitations, nausea, extreme lethargy, over-heating and eventually barfing). Oh it was not pleasant. …..but my WORST dumping episode ever was about a month later when i had maybe 1/8 - 1/4 cup of a dairy-based fruit salad my mom made. That time i think i may have actually died. I had the same symptoms as the drink from earlier, but much more intense and long lasting. And i was spewing “stuff” from BOTH ends. Yikes. Mr. had to pick me up off the bathroom floor and carry me upstairs to bed, where I promptly fell asleep (passed out?) for a couple hours. Ugh. Not Pretty. P.S. The bright side of the story here is that this was the first time in forever that Mr. was able to pick me up without struggling nor breaking his back! 😂

Me too. (your boobs, i mean 🥹)

Um….No. Not. At. All. (unbiased third party opinion)

Yayay! You’re baaaaaaaack Looking super cool as always. I cant see much of the shirt under the fab jacket, but i like the frill (im into frills/ruffles myself lately!) But um, are your shoes big on you? Or is it the angle? Or are u blessed with bigger feet?

“A majority” only??? What about the rest?? 😂😂😂😂😂😂

Not really for me as well. By 1 wk post op I was back to doing the majority of cooking. Honestly, while i enjoyed the smells and looking at the food (and taking pictures of it!), I wasn’t too interested in actually eating it. Watching THEM eat it gave me a weird sort of pleasure. Weird to explain 🤷🏻‍♀️ All during weight loss phase (and a several months into maintenance) i just ate something different (or not at all) at sit-down meal times. But i did sit there with them cuz I wasn’t about to miss out on all the conversation lol Im 3.5 years out and now I probably eat at least part of what they are eating maybe 50-60% of the time. The other times im eating my own leftovers from lunch.

Pro tip: just tell the truth, what you are honestly feeling, etc. Do this and you will get the right help YOU need.

I was never able to drink the pre-made shakes. Just the taste (too sweet) and consistency (too think) made me want to barf. i did use protein powders (was ok’d to start immediately) though and added twice the amount of water as instructed cuz I preferred them that way. I had to do a lot of taste testing with various brands until i found one that was the least sweet as i could find (Isopure Dutch Chocolate was the winner - added a tsp of decaf instant coffee and it was almost delicious). but if you are committed to the pre-made stuff, just add water to thin it out and go from there. as others said above, its not the end of the world if you don’t reach protein goals in the beginning (in my case i never reached them until about 3-4 months out, and probably only 75% of the time)

Oven roasted pork with baby spinach, with as espresso martini beforehand: 383 calories. #stuffed 🤢

We’ve finally got a few vacay trips on the books after a 2+ year hiatus, so thats normal-ish. Hopefully i’ve got some new OOTD’s coming as im currently on a shopping spree for some vacay clothes. Yay! But in the meantime: more clothes pics, people! (Pretty please 😘)

Yep, still woking on that salad i made 3 days ago (and yep, i eat 3-day old leftovers) i ate 1/2 yesterday and just now ate the other half with another scoop of ground beef and some fried garlic: 178 calories for the bowl (I didn’t actually weigh the leftovers, just estimated, based on the data i logged on Wed.) As you can see, i ate it all…3-day old leftovers, yuuuum lol

Sexy mamma 😉

@SleeveDiva2022, From my perception of the tone of your post, you sound like you are taking it in stride (however miserable you are/were) and are more or leas easy going about this all. So im gonna go out on a limb here and assume you wont get offended…but when i scrolled through your before and after pics I totally laughed out loud, omg (im still smiling now as i type this): You basically captured in 2 pics exactly how i felt on surgery day! You will be glad you took you took these pics later when you lose a bunch of weight. Can you like re-create these pics (with the same facial expressions and positioning) as you lose weight??? You could make a photobook. I LOVE it. Good luck! ❤️ P.S. hope you feel even better soon, and if that painful incision starts to feel hot or has starts to weep, pls get it looked at. ❤️

RE: intermittent fasting some people swear by it, some experience little to no effect. I sort of did 18/6 intermittent fasting without knowing it. Even before surgery I never/rarely had breakfast…my first meal/food intake was always after noon. Dunno why, was just always this way since around my university days (like 30 years ago!) . Eating in the morning tended to make me slow and sluggish in the first part of the day. Anyway, after surgery, i still didn’t eat in the morning, but then i also stopped any food intake after 6-7 pm…this because i had one horrible experience of regurgitating my stomach contents in my sleep, and it was horrible enough for me to make sure i went to bed on a completely EMPTY stomach. It is worth noting (maybe?) that my weight loss finally stopped (around 3-4 months into maintenance) when i started eating again past 7pm. BUT…im not sure this was solely or directly because of eating in a time-restricted window. My thinking is indirectly, because since I allowed myself more hours in the day to eat, i was able to get in more calories overall. There is only so much i can eat in 6 hours, due to stomach size restrictions. Extend this window by more, and i can inevitably eat more. Soooooo, this was my long-winded way of saying achieving calorie deficit is the tried and true way to lose weight. Period. Intermittent fasting, (at least for me, and some others i know) is a way to structure your day that helps to make it a little easier you to achieve that. Of course if one is going to eat very high calorie foods in their windows, then that would defeat the purpose. Good Luck! ❤️ P.S. sorry this was so long.

YUM 🤤

3.5 years out for me; and my stomach, like @Arabesque’s is still talking its head off all the time. Yesterday i went for a massage and it was going on and on for 90 mins. At first the masseuse was quiet about it, but then I could hear her giggling about 30 mins into it. People don’t normally hear it/react to it, but it was quiet in the room…it was hard to ignore. 🤷🏻‍♀️ She asked me if i wanted some fruit. 😂

So that’s where the term came from! Learn something new every day

I made this salad earlier this afternoon, (311 calories), but then decided i didn’t feel like eating it so put it back in the fridge. Then Mr. grilled up some steaks a couple hours later, so of course preferred to eat that instead, so the salad is gonna stay in the fridge for tomorrow! Rib-eye, roasted potatoes and sautéed portobello mushrooms: 402 calories for the plate/saucer. OmG the steak was so good, i gave it the all-Canadian try, but this is as far as I could get. I already know someone is going to eat it, so im gonna adjust the MFP entry for the steak later. THE (uneaten) SALAD: THE (partially eaten) STEAK:

Not quite 2 weeks PO, but I went to an event at 3 weeks post op. It was about 5 hours long and i was just fine. Didn’t eat anything at the party, but that was expected (i brought protein powder with me to mix into my water). One week earlier (at 2 weeks), i was still taking naps though…but that may have been related to my complete lack of energy cuz I wasn’t really eating those first two weeks.

I measured every Wednesday and it was one of my favourite pastimes back then, lol. And yeah, nobody noticed (or at least didn’t say so out loud) until I lost about 50-60 lbs. Which was fine because soon after that everyone and their mother would say something or other Every. Single. Time. for the next few months. Which got pretty annoying. Im 3.5 years out now, and me and my weight loss are now old news, thank goodness.

Yep, i agree (for me). I didn’t get to 1200 calories per day until about 3-4 months into maintenance (which translates to about 10-11 months post op) P.S. to keep things in perspective, I’m barely 5’2”

I was told to try to get 1200/day in, but I was more like 400/day at 2 months