Any binge eaters who had sleeve?

[jillw8 22]

I am getting my surgery on Tuesday and am so excited. The only thing I am nervous about is I have a binge eating problem. I have tried to overcome it for years. I am nervous I will still have those cravings and will be an emotional wreck. Anyone out there deal with binge eatin after the surgery? I am hopin it will just go away but I think I will see a counselor afterwards. I'm worried I will be a mess!

[Billy363627 15]

Well first of all you have to remember this is a tool. I will tell you it will be hard to binge eat after surgery you will feel like your going to die..I have been a really big sweet eater all my life and after my sugery I was too scared. I have learned to eat the right things as well as occasionally eat something sweet in very very small quanity. It is a learning process and sometimes your upset you cant have that big ol burger and fries and milkshake, but you learn by follwing what the doctor says as well as making mistakes. It is a true learning process. You will do fine and you will realize what you can and cant do really fast. I know for me a lot of my sugar cravings went away and I really try to focus on what My body needs and not my mind. If I listened to my mind I would eat fast food every night and eat cakes and Cookies. I will tell you one thing and everyone will tell you the same thing. It is a new way of life and you have to embrace it and It will be rewarding to the utmost.

[jillw8 22]

Thanks! I am glad you are calling it a tool. So many people look at me like I am cheating to lose weight with surgery. However, when I explain it i use the word tool and make sure people realize the surgery is what I put into it. You can still fail with WLS. I have been preparing myself mentally for a while. I am ready to use this TOOL to meet my goals.

[HDubSleevery 25]

I was a binge eater. I couldn't even control it to stay on my pre-op diet. I was too ashamed to admit it to many people before. I binged in secret once I got home. I would eat until I was overfull and too miserable to move for the rest of the night. I have seen counselors and even tried OA (along with all the counseling in all the different diets). I had gotten to the root of my issues, but it still didn't stop the behavior.

For me, food in mass quantities was just too accessible to me. I could always find an excuse why I was binging. It's been 11 days now and other than the occasional "mental food pity party" it really hasn't been bad at all. I haven't had any real cravings for anything other than different flavors of Water or Protein shake. I got some sugar free pudding and thought I would go to town on it, but after 2 bites I was full and satisfied - not even overfull.

For me, this surgery was the best thing I could have done for my binges. It is a tool that helps to keep me from hurting myself. Some people take drugs to help them live a better life, and I had surgery. I don't view myself as any different from someone with a disorder. We as a society don't look down on people who use Botox for Migraines so my sleeve is my Botox.

[Tammieruth 0]

I Love that! "my sleeve is my botox"

[jillw8 22]

I love the the Botox reference! My friend (who had a boob job) was being very negative. I asked her how it was any different from her breast augmentation--she did it for appearance and self-confidence, only differnece is- my surgery does not require a revision every 10-15 years (which they do!!!) It just makes me so frustrated to think of all that our society accepts but when it comes to obesity, we are shunned and laughed at. Yet ,when we do something about it we are looked at and judged for it. Makes no sense!!! Thanks for the Botox reference!!!!

[Escape_Pod 358]

I think it's great that you recognize that you binge eat, and that you may need to seek counseling post-op. I've struggled with binge eating myself, and I'm continuing to see a therapist and to work on emotional eating issues. The surgery will completely change your focus, and you simply won't be able to eat huge quantities without hurting yourself. The high Protein focus also helps with sugar cravings and appetite supression. But you've become accustoming to stuffing down your feelings and comforting yourself with food. What will happen when you can't do that? It can be an uncomfortable process, and if you can get support going through it, you'll be much better off. Some people unfortunately transfer to a new addiction - alcohol, gambling, shopping... other ways of distracting themselves from their feelings.

I don't think you'll be a wreck, but it's something you'll still have to work on - just one more thing your new tool will help you with!

Good luck - you'll do great!

[grannyk 58]

I am not necessarily a binge eater, I am a stress eater. And since life is basically one big stress ball for me, hence I suffered from morbid obesity.

On the other hand, the sleeve has given me a tool to control my eating. Trust me, further out you just will not be able to binge eat without causing your self major discomfort. Not fun!!! Not even tolerable.

Last Monday at work we started switching to a new electronic medical record integrating into a huge system. This week has been disastrous. The system is difficult to learn (I am not computer stupid) and the clinic is very busy, meaning everyone is behind and we were all at work late last night (I was the first one to leave at 6:45). Well, on the way out the door, I ate about 6 tortilla chips completely because I was stressed to the max. Five months ago, that would have been one bite. Yesterday, on the way home my tummy was very uncomfortable. Fortunately the chips went on down because they are a slider, but my frustration was relieved and this morning I had lost another 1.5 lbs this week.

Don't beat yourself up if you slip (allow yourself that only rarely). It will NOT defeat you in your journey to your goal.

Good luck and wishes for a happy and healthy journey...Kathe

[grannyk 58]

And one more thing...

Thanks to those of you who compare the sleeve to botox and boob jobs done in the name of vanity. Certainly we have had surgery to make ourselves look better, but when did anyone ever have botox or a boob job for their health????

YEAH US!!!!!

[HDubSleevery 25]

And one more thing...

Thanks to those of you who compare the sleeve to botox and boob jobs done in the name of vanity. Certainly we have had surgery to make ourselves look better, but when did anyone ever have botox or a boob job for their health????

YEAH US!!!!!

Exactly my point! Yes, there is a factor in the surgery that is cosmetic. We will look better (in clothes). However, we are taking something most of the country still deems as cosmetic or unnecessary and using it as a tool to live a better life.

If we had stomach cancer and the only way to live was to remove 85% of our stomachs, they would do a 60 minutes special on us and we would all be revered for our "bravery". Because we are using it as a tool for obesity (which WILL kill us just a little bit slower), we are pariahs.

It's a double standard like nothing else and sometimes infuriating!

[kellyw74 258]

You WILL NOT be able to eat large quanties of food! That is what will make it better for you. I can not eat more than 2 oz of anything at a time!

I was like that too, not so much with food food, but candy and Cookies. I would eat 10-12 oreos, 1/2 gallon of ice cream and 1/2 large bag of M&M's at one time. Just one of those items at once, not all of them!! But, now that I have my new tool, I am afraid to try anything sweet and at 4 months out have not ate anything sweet at all. I don't even miss it.

I did not have this surgery to look better, I did it to improve my health as I was SICK!!!!!!!!!!!. I was SERIOUSLY killing myself slowly and had diabetes and high blood pressure. Looking better is just a bonus!

Kelly

[jillw8 22]

Very true! I am not doing it for appearance....that is just a perk. My real reasons:improve my health (at 27 already have joint problems....and I want to be a mother some day), have more self-confidence and self-worth ( which should get me off of depression meds). Lots of reasons to do it.....smaller clothes is just the visible reward.

[Last Chance Lil 1]

I am a binge eater, comfort eater, stress eater, emotional eater, you name it. For a while after surgery I was fine but gradually I started to eat more and more, and eat the wrong foods (junk, too many carbs) and since surgery 4 years ago I have regained 50lbs of the 100lbs I lost. I stretched my sleeve and became addicted to carbs and soda again and now I am having to restart my journey with a stretched sleeve. I will probably have to have a bypass revision next year.

I don't tell you this to scare you, but I think it's a really really good idea to have counselling and try to fix your binge eating asap. The sleeve won't necessarily "cure" it. If you try, you can cheat and work around the sleeve. My advice is, stay right away from junk food, don't eat simple carbohydrates, don't drink soda even diet, esp when eating. And get professional help (which I am now doing).

Good luck!! I am a RARE case of failure, so don't panic, just be sensible and follow your food plan ALWAYS.

[reallyrosy 161]

That scares the hell outta me. I'm going thru this procedure to remove 2/3 of my stomach and don't know if it will contain my out of contrl eating or just be a very expensive temporary loss. Damn. I don't want to spend all the money to find out I need therapy. I've been in therapy since I'm 17 and that didn't cure my eating habits. The only thing that did work for me was phentermine and exercise workouts. I don't know if I'm doing the right thing by persu8ing this. I don't think that the online 'support' is enough.

[swizzly 901]

I preface this by saying I'm not a binge eater and never have been, nor am I an emotional eater. So take my input for whatever it's worth, given that.

I gained weight for several reasons, but primarily due to anorexia and bulimia (purging only, no bingeing) in my younger years, followed by health problems and some awful medications, compounded by large meal portions/bad food choices and lack of exercise. However, I got myself under control by learning maintenance as a way of life. GRANTED, I was maintaining at 100 lbs too heavy, but I stayed at that same weight for over a decade. I had the help of a therapist throughout -- but not my ED therapist, just a normal good one (several actually, as I get a new one wherever I live LOL). I so often wanted to go on another diet or start something new to lose the weight, but I had failed in the past and I was terrified of getting into the cycle of up and down and hating on myself. I thought about WLS for YEARS, but wouldn't go ahead with it because I wasn't ready.

I have no crystal ball, I don't know how this will work out. All I know is, I spent a long time learning how to not gain weight (now I'm learning how to lose it in a healthy way as well -- thanks, sleeve!) and be in some kind of balanced mode where I only wavered +/- 10 lb. The fact that I could do that, and maintain a weight for so long, is what gives me hope that I can maintain at a lower weight when I'm done losing the excess.

So yeah, my point is -- I invested 10 years in learning how to find a healthy balance and body acceptance, and how to eat less the next week if I'd overdone it the previous week (or day or whatever, though I didn't obsess by the day generally -- that's how EDs work in my world ) and that sort of thing. I wish I could've done the sleeve sooner, but I wasn't ready. I think being ready (or as ready as you can be -- mentally speaking) is important, because this surgery WILL mess with your head no matter how sane and grounded you are.

Yes, the tool will help you control your eating at first -- but if you go into it white-knuckling it, you might not be ready to use the tool over the longer term, in the way YOU deserve to use it. You want success and you deserve to find it -- so look for ways to find balance prior to surgery and then the tool can be a more natural part of that journey. The risk for transfer addictions is no joke.

Best of luck to you!! I wish everyone a great experience.

PS: When people give you the "easy way out" crap, ask them when was the last time they typed out a letter on a typewriter and put it in the post instead of using email? "Easy ways out" are actually advances in medicine and technology, so we don't have to do the weight-loss equivalent of sending smoke signals (from a high mountain, on a windy day, from a fire we built without axe or matches...only to fall down the mountain [and even into a hole] and have to start all over again...) anymore.