BMI right at 40, wondering what to expect regarding excess skin

[FishingNurse 1,210]

Hello all,

I am a 27 year old due to be sleeved in the first week of Aug. Any input on excess skin for those of you starting out with a BMI right at 40? Any thing you have done that helps? Has anybody not really had a problem at all? This is one of my biggest concerns (besides safety of course!) Thank you all :-)

[MegInNOLA 531]

Hi there:

My BMI was right at 40 (I actually had to gain a few pounds in order to get it there to help qualify for the surgery), and I'm 47 years old. I think skin looseness is dependent on a lot of factors--age, ethnicity, things determined by genetics. That being said, sometimes people who lose more slowly (and by slowly I mean "at a normal pace" for regular, non-sleeved folks) have fewer problems with loose skin. People who exercise seem to have fewer problems with it.

I have loose skin on my stomach and my underarms, but it's not dreadful and it's not anything I need to "cover up." I've only lost 52 pounds, though, although I've moved from a size 26 to a size 18. Some of the smaller girls on the forum who have lost a lot of weight do talk about having loose skin, and at a point, there's just going to be loose skin if you're 5'2", used to weigh 300 and now weigh 130.

Seems like you, with your young age and relatively low BMI, will probably have less problem with loose skin than some folks might. Good luck!!

[420gal 1]

I've read that another factor contributing to loose skin is the length of time a person has been obese. That is, if you've been big for years and years, the skin has been stretched out for a longer time versus someone who has been obese for a couple of years.

Don't know if this is accurate or not, but I wanted to share it nonetheless.

Best of luck!