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I had my surgery 12/10/2018 and I am at goal weight. Before surgery weight somewhere north of 320, (I would t weigh myself but the one time I did I saw the scale hovering at 32—- and I quickly stepped off) day of surgery 294 and today 164. I have went from a size 24 to size 8. I feel amazing. Pictures of me April 2018, September 2018 and September 2019. I have quite a bit of loose skin on my abdomen and inner thighs but I can live with it for now. I met with a plastic surgeon back in May and asked her what I could do to improve my overall body appearance and prepare for a tummy tuck and breast lift and she recommended pilates. I got a prescription from my primary care and my insurance covers most of the cost of pilates. I am addicted to pilates. I am slightly concerned I won’t be able to stop losing weight now that I met my goal. Does anyone else ever worry about losing too much weight?

I would send you private message but I can't figure out how. So I apologize discussing this openly. I'm not trying to be bossy but I was mis managed with this for a year. Once I went to a 2nd opinion with a gastrointestinal cancer specialist he told me the only one to manage IPMN is a Liver/Pancreatic specialist. So I found one of the top specialist for Liver transplants and have been with him last 12 years. With IPMN he laid out his treatment plan; they need to do biopsy on the fluid to make sure it's not pre cancerous, they also have a blood test CEA-19 which is specifically for pancreatic cancer. Then a MRI to monitor changes in shape and size yearly. You have worked so hard to get healthily, Just asked your GI about these testS the CEA 19 is just a blood test, you many have already had it. Good Luck

Gorgeous pics, thanks for sharing!! 5'4" Starting weight 297 VSG on 7/31/19 Surgery wt: 266 CW 228 GW 135 Sent from my [samsung Galaxy] using BariatricPal mobile app

Thank you!! I was able to lose the 3lbs I gained last week [emoji16] 5'4" Starting weight 297 VSG on 7/31/19 Surgery wt: 266 CW 228 GW 135 Sent from my [samsung Galaxy] using BariatricPal mobile app

Hi Mikey! My surgery was 8/12, so I'm 10 weeks post-op now. Can you run down exactly what you went through whilst in hospital? I checked in around 6AM, and had to wait 2-3 hours to be brought into the surgery prep. I changed into the gown and spoke with the nurse and anesthesiologist. They put in the IVs, and I was wheeled to the surgery room, where I fell asleep within seconds. I woke up feeling very woozy and in pain. Post-surgery, I spent about 36 hours in the hospital. I was in a lot of pain for the first 12 hours or so, but they give you medication for it. Getting up and walking really helps with the pain, as much as it hurts to get out of bed those first few times. I was discharged in the early afternoon of my second day. How did you feel in the first few days to weeks.. Where you able to drink much Water? I felt very groggy from the pain, pain meds, and dehydration. In the first week, I was getting around 36-48oz of fluids per day, and by week two, I could get int 48oz+. Did you feel hungry much? I felt a little bit hungry for the first week, but not starving (even though you are technically starving). Was the pain bearable? The pain got noticeably better each day, and around 2 weeks, it was almost gone. It's not constant, nagging pain. It's sharp pain at the incision sites when you sit up or twist a certain way. I couldn't sleep on my side for about 10 days, which was very annoying. However, as bad as the pain was at times, at 10-weeks post-op now, I barely remember it, and it was definitely worth it. And in the first weeks or months are you still feeling restrictions on how much you can eat or drink in one go? Definitely, but it depends on the food. It's a lot easier to eat 4-8oz of yogurt or cottage cheese in 30 minutes than it is to eat 2-3oz of meat in 10 minutes. As for drinking, I can take bigger sips now and finish a small iced coffee (12oz/350ml -- not sure if Australia uses metric or imperial) in about 45 minutes. I'm just curious how we're meant to get enough Protein if unable to drink much liquids? The surgeon and dietician understand that in the first 2-4 weeks, you'll struggle to get enough of both. That's why you prioritize liquids over protein at first.

So I’ve been thinking about all of this and I’m wondering where my body will choose to settle in. When I set my GW at 155, it was primarily bc for my height that put me just at the upper edge of normal BMI. I also thought that there was no way in hell I would actually get to this weight bc I knew it would mean losing >80-90% of my excess fat and since I was choosing sleeve, I knew that was going to be extremely difficult. Well here I am at this weight and I have no plans to get on the scale this week bc I’m trying not to focus on the number as much as my body. Besides, if I have any kind of gain I don’t want to freak out over it. My plan now is to focus on increasing carbs and calories and if I see a gain it will be counterproductive. If I’m very honest with myself (and I MUST be for this to work long-term) I’m hoping for and expecting another 5-10 pound weight loss over the next 2-3 months bc if I actually gain or don’t continue to lose weight at

My surgery was in August, and I'm 10 weeks post-op. My surgeon and nutritionist refused to give me a calorie goal, which is annoying. Considering that you're only 4+ weeks post-op, 1000 calories sounds high. At 4 weeks, I was getting between 400 and 600. If I were you, I would try adding another 100-200 calories of protein to get into the 600 calories/day range and see if you can tolerate it.

Yesterday, Thu, Oct. 18 Maintenance : 5'2" / F / 1yr PO / 115.0 lbs ...'twas a junky, carb-y day 10:00am - chicken broth 1:10pm - salad greens + carrots + pumpkin seeds + can of smoked oysters + seafood sauce + 1 french macaron 2:30pm - cashews + chili peanuts + half a brownie + bite of deep fried banana + handful of popcorn 7:00pm - salad greens + cashews + chili peanuts + 2 oz grilled chicken + wasabi peas + 5 chocolate covered blueberries Totals: 2084 cals - 74g Protein - 170g NET carbs - 112g fat

I'm 10 weeks post-op and my weight has stalled around 45lbs of weight loss and it's pretty upsetting. I'm also easily able to eat 800+ calories per day and my appetite is coming back, which is also upsetting. I feel panicked because I know the majority of weight comes off in the first 6 months and the clock is ticking.

I have increased my calories and slowed my weight loss. I am now at 127 fairly consistently at 5 ft 2.5 in. I know I could still lose more and be in the normal BMI range however I have muscular legs and have saggy skin with wrinkle above my knees and baggy arms etc. so I don't want to lose anymore. I would be happy where I am at but ideally would like to be 5-10 pounds heavier to fill in a bit. I am thinking I should try to maintain this 127 for now assuming I will regain the bounce weight at some point and still be in a good range. However, over the last few weeks I lost 1-2 pounds and I guess my fat has shifted or maybe I gained a little muscle and lost more pounds of fat. My butt is saggy like an old lady and flat so I don't have much padding. Now my bum gets sore sitting too long even on the couch. I also have to wear shoes or slippers on my wood floors since my heels feel sore. I have had to sleep with a pillow between my knees for a few months now since my knees are bony. Maybe I am just overly sensitive? So my question to those that are at normal BMI did you go through this? Did you just get used to it or did your weight or body fat redistribute? I am already forcing myself to get in 1400 calories to maintain but still lost a few pounds over the past month.

Lifes good today!! Weighed in this morning at 258. down 82 from surgery 7/10. Im doing crossfit (happy open) and i love it. its changed my life. Im still at about 800 cals a day. shake for breakfast and lunch. meat and veggie for dinner, quest protein chips in between. im loving it. food is fuel now, and nothing else.

Good luck, best wishes, safe surgery! Congratulations on your new journey. See you on the losers bench in 10 days (I'm so nervous too)!

I’m unsure if I will have neck surgery or not. On July 13, 2018 I hurt my neck catching a falling patient. (Not supposed to catch them, but it’s reflex....) from that time I couldn’t move my neck in any direction and it was stuck in a permanent looking down position. It improved, but still can’t turn my head to the right and my head is “crooked” while my neck was at it’s worse, the swelling caused the base of my skull, c1, and c2 to fuse together on the right side. According to the last doctor I saw with my local hospital through workers Comp, there’s nothing they can do. They can’t “unfuse “ it. Too risky. I asked for a referral to Barnes which is a research/teaching hospital. From what I understand they only take cases they think they can help, and they have scheduled me to see them on January 10. Will I gave neck surgery? I don’t know. I hope so because I want my neck fixed. But who knows? If they do surgery before I have the sleeve, I will need a letter of clearance from them. Neck surgery takes usually 3 months to fully recover. I don’t know if I would have to wait until I’ve fully recovered or what. A friend had his neck fused and his recovery time was 1 month to drive 3 to go back to work. But I think I would chose to have my neck fixed prior to anything else. It’s been a long time!

I am a lap band to sleeve gastrectomy. My surgery is scheduled for 11/22/19. I have a nasty slip with my babe which I'm convinced happened after my gallbladder removal sx. I gained haha of what I lost after the gallbladder sx. Fortunately I have Tricare and all will be covered. I know a young lady who when to Mexico to Pompeii Bariatric. They seem to be reasonable and may work with you. Check them out. Can't hurt. You need to get that thing out if nothing more. Sent from my SM-N960U using BariatricPal mobile app

Hi. I got my VSG on 10/15, also. Yesterday it took me a full 24 hour but I got around 48 ounces in. That includes the terribly sweet clear protein drink diluted with water. I’m not really hungry tbh. And with every sip of water my stomach growls LOUDLY. Odd I’m looking forward to day 6 when I will be able to sip a protein shake because until then, protein is going to be a big challenge for me. Best wishes...

Hey guys hope all is well. I'm just getting nervous and anxious about my surgery coming in 10 days time. I would love to hear from people who had surgery in the last month or so. Can you run down exactly what you went through whilst in hospital? How did you feel in the first few days to weeks.. Where you able to drink much water? Did you feel hungry much? Was the pain bearable? And in the first weeks or months are you still feeling restrictions on how much you can eat or drink in one go? I'm just curious how we're meant to get enough protein if unable to drink much liquids? My surgeon says his directions are 2+2+2 for each phase but if you like you can stay on liquids for 3-4weeks shakes etc Sorry if I'm posting a lot 😬 Mikey

i had the sleeve 4 months ago and had terrible gerd for 10 years before the surgery.. i take daily nexium keeps my gerd in check

I'd follow her plan. She wants to know if your body can "naturally" slow down at the 1200cals per day. At 5'5" you are only at the very beginning end of normal. You're still losing at that rate cuz you have extra fat to lose. Your body should theoretically start slowing down when it's nearing a set point. For a lot of us that appears to be somewhere between 19-21% fat. The loss should crawl to a stall. Add too many cals back, then you are artificially maintaining at a weight your body doesn't really want to support. If you are in the normal BMI category (not an athlete, not power lifting, not endurance training, not overly muscular, aren't "big boned", etc...you know, just average, then this chart can apply to you.) Don't fear too much weight loss. Believe me. Most of us are CHAMPIONSHIP level weight gainers. If you lose more than 10lbs, then that's your cue to call her and ask for her orders at that point. But she knows you have a ton of wiggle room. If it were me, I'd want to be closer to 130lbs and that's likely where your body is gonna stop losing. Just my 2 cents.

Great Job Zahara and congrats. I know its hard because we see others who have the surgery doing the exact same eating as us and yet they lost 4-6lbs every single week, week after week and it gets discouraging. But its true without surgery none of us would lose 70 lbs in 10 months... so it is working but its a daily struggle - for me anyway- not to see others who lose what i should be losing and i am not. On average according to my watch i burn 3500ish calories in a day (including my RMR) and i eat around 600. so i am at a 2900 cal deficit a day! which means i should be losing 6 lbs a week. I am lucky if i lose 2. talk about a mindBLEEP. but this thread is so helpful a reminder that 2 lbs is still 2 pounds and in a year thats over 100lbs.. keep up the great work.

Hi friends! I am about to start maintaining. I got some advice that I felt was a bit conflicting from the PA (she is new to the practice) at my appointment today. Here's the scenario: They don't want me to lose anymore, but would be accepting of up to another 10 pound loss, preferably only 5 pounds. (At this point, I suspect most of my concern areas will need to be address by PS anyway, and not by weight loss. Starting a conversation with a plastic surgeon is on my to-do list yet this year, although I won't pursue a surgery date until I have stabilized, of course.) I agreed to this minimized loss at the appointment (I wanted to lose 15 more), but here's my question- I was told to stick with the calorie intake I'm currently at, even though I made it clear that I'm still actively losing at this intake level (~1200 calories). I upped it about 2 weeks ago and the loss hasn't slowed at all. She doesn't want to see me again for 6 months unless I lose more than 10 pounds before that. Ya'll... unless I very rapidly stabilize at this caloric intake, I'm probably going to lose these 10 pounds before Christmas, based on my current loss rate. In 6 months, I could very well lose 20 or more if I don't find a new caloric intake. I felt a refusal to work with me on transitioning to maintenance calories before 18 months is up, but at the same time, I was pretty explicitly told that I really should stay where I am weight-wise. I specifically asked if I should incrementally increase calories or anything like that if the loss doesn't slow down, and was told no... just stay where I am until we meet again in 6 months, but also, don't lose any more weight unless you really feel you must, then absolutely no more than 10 pounds. This just feels odd to me, knowing that transitioning to maintenance can take some time, and I'm actively losing where I am now. Am I missing something? I realize it's totally possible for me to very suddenly stabilize, but that doesn't appear to be the case for me at the moment. What were your conversations like with your team when you began transitioning to maintenance? I really feel that if I don't start experimenting with slowing the loss now, that I run the risk of losing too much and being unhappy with how I look.

My journey starts all the way back to my pre-teen years. I was a chubby little girl. At about 8-9, my Mom put me on my first diet. At 15, I took weight loss shots every week for two years. During High School I stopped eating and dropped weight and grew so that helped. By 17 and graduation, I was at a comfortable 125-130. I maintained it for the next 10 years by smoking and not eating. I didn't eat healthfully, but darn if I didn't eat slowly and chew my food to death. Fast forward those ten years and I was 27, in one abusive relationship after the other, and became an exercise addict. I still didn't eat healthfully. but I ate so little that it didn't really matter what I ate. Forward another two years and I was 29 and getting married to my true love. I still had very bad eating habits, and now I was faced with having to eat regular meals at regular times. ACK! I gained weight almost instantly, and it's been compounding for the last 26 years. I tried SlimFast, Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Adkins, Mediterranean, and pretty much everything else. If I did lose some weight on them, I gained it all right back once I went off of them, plus more. I became a yo-yo dieter. The only thing that worked for me again was to stop eating. I could do a fast for about a day but by the second day my husband was on me to eat. Not that he didn't want a healthy wife, but I think he was afraid that I might turn out to have an eating disorder that was dangerous. At 36 I moved to where we live now, kind of out in the country, with cities not too far away. Once I worked for the university I started to look into finishing my bachelor's degree. Which I did. In 2008, when I was 44. At that point I was so heavy that I couldn't stand myself and started looking into weight loss surgery. Husband and I both went in, listened to the seminar, got our first appointment out of the way, talked with the surgeon, talked with the insurance guy ... and never went back. Insurance was nigh unto impossible to get cleared back then. The hoops you had to jump through were prohibitive, so I dropped it. For then. I scheduled to do the seminar again in 2015 or so, and again the insurance hoops discouraged me. Plus other people discouraged me. So I stopped. Now, I'm at my highest weight ever. I have GERD, sleep apnea, kidney problems, HBP, low thyroid, and joint pains. All from the excess weight. So I went back (3rd time's the charm, right?) and started the process over again. I've had my initial visit and labs done, I have scheduled the next 4 NUT appointments (thru Jan) and then the post-NUT assessment with the surgeon in January. Between this time and that, I need to get my psych clearance and have an ultrasound of my stomach done. Both are now scheduled. Now, I wait. It seems like it is taking forEVER, yet I only had my first appointment on the 8th. Not even 10 days yet and it feels like MONTHS have passed. I've started cutting things from my diet -- all my bad habits. The first to go in October are candies, cookies, fast food, and chips. i'm already down 7 pounds. Next month, I limit soda intake, and cut portions down to 2 cups per meal. November, I cut soda intake in half, cut my portions down to 1.5 cups per meal. December I go off the soda, drop my intake to 1 cup per meal and increase number of meals per day to 5. January, I'm hoping to be drinking my water, and be at the point where I'm at 1/2 cup of food per meal and 5 meals per day. Hopefully I'll be able to have surgery in February depending on my surgeon's schedule, and my insurance to clear. They have lightened up on their requirements so I'm more hopeful that I'll be approved. As far as who knows, my husband knows I went to my first appointment and that it is my goal to have bypass surgery. He's not super excited about it. In fact, I haven't been able to share any of my excitement or goal setting or anything with him. He is disabled and his health is frail, so he's been having his own issues. So, I bring my enthusiasm and my questions and my hyperactivity here to BariatricPal. You all have taught me so much already. Thank you. I'd love to make some great friends here, and I think I will. If you'd like to make friends, send me a message or reply, or just feel free to add me. I'd love to start a conversation with other like minded folks, who are excited, learning a lot, questioning a lot, and are just generally addicted to this site. LOL. Seriously, though. I'd love to hear your story too. Cheers, Mac

I should start on a positive that I’ve lost 20 pounds since my pre op appointment last Friday. Silver lining and all that. With that though.....I’m so exhausted/weak/irritable. Just being awake takes all my energy, let alone working. I’m allowed 5 shakes a day, one cup broth and plain water. This morning I had raging diarrhea (sorry). I honestly thought people that took the pre op phase off work we’re crazy but I totally get it now. My boss lets me sneak into treatment rooms to take 10 minute naps here and there to get through the day. I can’t wait till next Tuesday and i can rest. I mean, I’ll probably be in pain but at least I can rest. 😂😂😂 That’s all! Just needed to vent.

Hello to anyone out there who is reading this. it has been 11 years since my gastric bypass and wow! I was reading my past entries things have certainly changed for me. I had the weight problem, lost about 90lbs, became an alcoholic, got divorced, remarried, moved to Houston, then back to Atlanta, became born again, through the peace and grace of Jesus Christ!, traveled monthly to RI to check on my parents, lost my brother and father in 2019, relapsed with alcohol several times, as of today I have been sober for 2 years!~~~~WHEW! So now I am married to Michael White, someone I have loved for over 30 years, I am living sober, grieving the loss of my brother, Chip 01/09/2019 and my Dad, Ray 09/06/2019. As for the weight, I am now 208lbs and not really happy at this weight, but Thank God it's not 275! The most important part of my journey is that I became a Christian, I would have been dead by now if I had not done that. I feel okay today, some days are difficult because I do not drink alcohol anymore, so I have to depend on God through everything...opps gotta run....

I'm taking a couple weeks off of IF. Just taking a break from it. I'm still doing "lean days" at the beginning of the week. And more lenient eating at the end of the week. Kinda going back to basic clean eating. Having morning lattes and eat my first meal around 10-11am. So very loose TRE. I weigh 131.6 today.