lizonaplane

I will be eating out a lot after surgery as I will be traveling for work every week (assuming COVID ever ends). I plan to just eat what I want and leave the rest, or take it back to my room if I have a fridge and microwave. I had a coworker who had had VSG and that's what she did. I didn't know till later that's why she did it and I never thought twice about it. I thought she just didn't eat much. I doubt the waiters even noticed. I am in agreement with not ordering from the kids' menu. I don't even like chicken fingers and mac and cheese, and it's horrific for your new stomach. Also, I can't think of the last time I went to a restaurant and they had a senior menu, and lunch menus are pretty rare too.

I told my line manager (who has never met me - I work from home when I'm not on the road which was every week pre-covid) and she said, oh, I'm thinking about doing that! I also told one of the project managers and she asked me how much I weighed LOL! I will have to take a month off from traveling so I felt like I had to tell people something, and I'm an open book. If you don't want to be so direct, try saying you have to have abdominal surgery and it will require you not to lift anything for one month?

I tried it. Was not impressed. It was dry and gritty. But that might have just been the location we were at, as I've heard that other people really liked it.

So, I use myfitnesspal.com and you can set that up pretty easily, but it does sometimes feel overwhelming because they have such a huge database so when you look up "boneless skinless chicken thigh" there might be 30 options. They're all about the same, just different brands, but if it's a single ingredient, the differences are so small it doesn't really matter. Just enter in the ingredient by weight in grams or ounces, or if it's like a banana or a cucumber, it might say "1 medium banana" or "1 8 inch cucumber". You can also enter that you eight 1/2 or .25 of the banana or cucumber. If you have a brand name ingredient, like you bought " Dannon light and fit greek yogurt" you can just type that in and up it comes! And it usually doesn't matter what flavor you chose, because almost always all the flavors have the same nutrition. However if you actually got Chobani greek yogurt, that might have twice as many calories/carbs because that's sweetened with sugar instead of artificial sugar. Hope that helps!

I am not surprised by the confusion, but it will come up for sure in the required psych evaluation. I had some issues with restrictive eating in my early teen years but they were of limited duration and were more about other things. However, the psychologist really went into the details and also about the few times I had used purging. I don't know whether you would be denied for surgery or whether you would simply be required to have more ongoing therapy; it wasn't an issue for me. I have bipolar disorder and they are requiring that my psychopharmacologist sign off on my having surgery. So, I would at least assume they would want any current therapist you are working with to be in agreement with you having surgery. I am also not surprised that recovering from anorexia nervosa has caused your weight to increase drastically. It's pretty common, although I don't know of anyone else who has had WLS after having any eating disorders other than binge eating. How many years have you been in recovery? It seems like for me personally even the prep work I've had to do to change my eating habits to prepare for surgery has brought up some of the issues I had with restrictive eating, like trying to be "perfect" in my diet, and feeling like no foods are truly healthy enough. It's a real struggle. Good luck!

There is a clothing site called gwinnie bee that does plus size clothing rental. You can have a few pieces out at one time depending on the cost of the plan. https://closet.gwynniebee.com/pages/join I joined years ago when I was losing weight the last time. They have sizes 12+ I think. You can order things to wear at one size, wear them once or a few times then return them for something new or in a smaller size. They are totally great for business casual as long as you're willing to wear dresses and/or fancy shirts. It's essentially clothing rental. I didn't think I'd like it but the quality is quite good. They wash the pieces when you send them back in pre-paid bags. I might have changed since I did it years ago.

Did you specifically ask your surgical team about caffeine pills? I mean, do they know you are taking them? I would make sure they understand you are not asking about coffee but specifically caffeine pills, because pills are different than liquids and they might have different rules. I say this because it seems like everyone here is responding with answers pertaining to how their doctors felt about coffee or caffeinated drinks, not caffeine pills. I would make sure your surgery team understands you are asking about pill-form caffeine. Good luck!

That sounds delicious!

Stevia is the only one that tastes funny to me.

As soon as I made the decision to go the surgery route and I researched the changes needed for WLS to succeed, I started incorporating the post-surgery eating habits into my life. The first major change I made was to stop drinking diet soda. Honestly, that one thing prevented me from going down the surgery path last time - I guess I wasn't ready before! And it was a lot easier than I expected. The other changes were in some ways easier than expected too, at least most of the time, but this week has been really rough since I've had to take more of a medication that increases hunger, and I'm also having difficulty sleeping, which also increases hunger. I just want to eat constantly and yesterday I started crying because I was just so damn hungry. Also, the fact that the surgery program can't even tell me what month I'm going to be able to get my surgery done due to COVID backlogs means I'm just tired of my life being on hold... I just feel drained this week.

That looks interesting! I used to have a problem with stevia, but it's not as bad for me anymore. Still leaves a funny aftertaste...

I agree with the full liquid. Also with the lightest possible clothes! Scrubs or shorts/tank top if you can, and no shoes. Also, get weighed in the morning, and don't drink/eat anything first if possible. Also, if you still are really close, and I can't believe our effed up insurance system has me saying this, you could "find some way to make sure you've evacuated your bowels". I know since I'm chronically constipated due to meds some days of the week I'm 2 or more pounds heavier depending on when I've last had a BM. Oh, and make sure you're limiting salt and drinking a lot of fluids for a number of days prior to weigh in (same function if not extent of diuretics).. Good Luck!

I will take my weight loss any way I can, water weight, poop weight, whatever!

I hope you can get things sorted soon! It's so hard.

I'll have to look for those. What brand is it?

See a headache specialist or at least your PCP. I have migraines and I have since I was in college (I'm 41 now). I was started on a preventative medication back then (topamax) which actually causes weight loss in some people and also sumatriptan (imitrex) for immediate relief when I get a migraine. It made a huge difference. Also, getting a bite guard from the dentist because I grind my teeth during the day (during the pandemic it got so much worse!) and that causes migraines too. Now when I find my migraines getting more frequent I wear my bite guard for a few days to retrain myself and also limit my TV (that makes me grind my teeth and the lights can give me migraines too!). The imitrex works 100% if I do get a migraine, which I got this morning from crying (I had a panic attack trying to deal with my health insurance company.). TL:DR - See a neurologist who specializes in migraines!!! You have to figure out what is causing your migraines and how to stop them

I usually am more hungry in the morning between breakfast and lunch, but this week I'm been hungry 24/7 so I've been eating cheese or nuts at night.

Also, you can't sustain 1500 calories long term unless you have the surgery. That's completely true. Once you have a smaller stomach and less hunger hormone, it will be easier. Also, once you lose weight, you will need fewer calories. And if you eat food that is higher in protein and lower in sugar, it is highly likely that you will feel more full on fewer calories. Take a breath. It's okay; take it one day at a time and celebrate small successes, don't beat yourself up for slip ups.

I like to mix 2 T mayo (or low fat), 1 tsp yellow mustard, 1/2 tsp curry powder, 2 T water for a curry mustard sauce. I'm pre-surgery, so I ate it on grilled chicken today, but I bet it would be delicious in pureed chicken or tuna salad. (You probably wouldn't need all of it, that's just the proportions I had premade - I used about half of that for 2 small thighs)

Don't worry about it too much. I was super hydrated at both doses and I still got a wicked headache both times. They also told me to move my arm which I did the second time but not the first and it hurt the same amount both times. The only thing would be that since it can give you a fever, if you start to have symptoms of a fever, DEFINITELY focus on getting fluids in, because you would feel worse if you were sweating and lost fluids and were already a bit dehydrated (then you would get a worse headache). But whether you get the baseline headache seems to be just how your body's immune system responds (younger people are MORE LIKELY to have a reaction, but that's just on average). If you have had reactions (not anaphylaxis, but things like flu-like symptoms) to previous vaccines, you are likely to have similar reactions to this vaccine, because all vaccines work by stimulating the immune response. Do the best you can, and either way you will likely get a mild headache, but you'll be okay. If you can take it, tylenol would be best thing to take for the headache. There is some possibility that NSAIDS could interfere with the immune response, but I don't know if there's much evidence for that.

I haven't had surgery yet, but I take meds that cause constipation and I also work in oncology where people have constipation from meds. Miralax is great, but it's not something that works instantly, more something to be taken long term. Drinking a lot of fluids, coffee (not sure if you can have coffee yet) and MOVING your body/walking. Also eating more fat. Often depending on the cause of the constipation (like especially from meds like pain meds) adding more fiber just makes the bloating worse and doesn't help the constipation. I hope you find relief soon!

You can do it; but you can't do all of it all the time every day 100% perfect and certainly not starting from day 1. This is the lesson I've been struggling to learn. Yes, you can give up soda. No you don't have to give up artificial sweeteners. There are still many WLS patients who use artificial sweeteners and maintain a healthy weight and didn't grow horns and didn't develop cancer, whatever. There is a TON of junk science around artificial sweeteners. Like, they say that they cause weight gain. That is not true. The few controlled scientific studies there have been show that when people eat the same number of calories, artificial sweeteners do not cause weight gain. Also, I found that changing my pre-surgery diet to increase protein and decrease sugar made me feel less hungry and crave sweets LESS. SHOCKING!!! I couldn't believe it. But I'm not perfect. I still eat a little ice cream sometimes and I still eat fruit every day. I'm still months away from surgery and I'm struggling this week. I had to increase my medication that causes hunger/weight gain because I'm having bipolar symptoms, so I'm eating more, but still trying to focus on protein first, and I can't believe that between that and traveling to Miami last week for work, I am still losing weight. (But yesterday afternoon I was so hungry I cried... so yeah, I'm not going to lie it's really hard.) Try not to expect perfection. It is SOOO much. You have to do the work, but you can take it at your own pace and on your own terms. And take everyone's advice/rules with a grain of salt - I know at least one successful maintainer on here who drinks diet coke regularly. Nothing is forever, failure is not final.

Hi all! I take a lot of pills that I won't be able to stop after surgery. I'm wondering how hard it is to take pills right after surgery and how to do this. My surgeon hasn't been very responsive to my questions, just saying we'll get to this later, but I'm anxious because I can't miss a single day. I have bipolar disorder and missing any medication, especially when I have a major stressor in my life, could be a huge issue. None of my pills are extended release so I could crush them, but I've heard this can be really painful or unpleasant tasting. I take about 20 pills a day mostly right before bed. Right now I can take the 14 I take at night in one gulp with water. I don't want to spend all evening taking pills! Also, the medications is why my surgeon recommended the sleeve; I had wanted the RNY since I have GERD.

A statistically significant sample size would include 10s of thousands of women, and not just women you know, who are not likely to be a representative sample of all women worldwide. Sorry. And when you make a scientific claim, that men's emotions are inherently different than women's emotions, you'd better believe I'm going to bring the fact that the "data" in this area is pure junk.

Science is NOT "the first thing that pops up on google". Plus there is always more variation across people in one gender than there is between males and females. I have studied statistics extensively and have worked in research methodology. I work in clinical trials now. Also, one woman that you live with is not a statistically relevant sample size.