Is / was your nutritionist all that helpful?

[CowgirlJane 14,259]

So, one reason my NUT was so good was because she did more than spew facts. She intuitively guided and pointed out times when I repeated old patterns. She answered questions honestly but also gave me much hope and encouragement.

Now let's contrast that to the psych clearance requirement. Completely useless for me. Best I could tell they were screening for mental illness that could interfere with ability to understand and comply with program. Ok, check, addressed the small portion of truely mentally ill, what about the most of us that could have used more"advice" on living post surgery, the ups and downs of body image, maintenance struggles. Oh wait, I got that from the NUT since the psych person was pretty clueless and was actually against WLS

[drmeow 323]

Mine is just OK. She has given me some good ideas for how to adjust to eating smaller meals, chewing longer, etc (buy bright red plates to use, the color reminds me I need to pay attention to what i'm eating) and at each pre-op visit she recommended focusing on just one or two bad habits, not trying to fix them all at once.

i still have the last pre-op food class (3 hours) to go, so I'll reserve judgment until then, but so far she hasn't really talked much about particular foods to have or avoid.

The diet handout they give at the beginning, when you have to do the supervised weight loss for insurance, is a complete joke, full of carbs, typical govt pyramid stuff. I could never have lost any weight on that, and did my usual low carb which has worked for me in the past. She did agree that was a better plan for me.

[Jim in Utah 25]

Not incredibly helpful in that I think nutritionists and dieticians take a one size fits all approach to advice. For example, she told me I could never have carbonated beverages again after my sleeve. But I have seen from others who have the surgery that they do (at least occasionally) drink them.

Mostly I felt like it was something I just had to do for the insurance.

You can find plenty of good reliable (free) info on the internet. Just have to consult different sources and consider where the info is coming from.

[Jim in Utah 25]

I agree with STEVEHUD regarding artificial sweeteners. There is no convincing research that aspartame, saccharin etc are bad for you or cause disease in any way. There was a NY Times article just the other day outlining this whole issue. Google it.

[Bufflehead 6,358]

@@Stevehud I agree that there isn't a lot of evidence showing that artificial sweeteners cause diseases (such as cancer). I do think there is some evidence correlating artificial sweeteners and obesity and metabolic syndrome, etc.: http://livebetterlife.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/688.full_.pdf

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2951976/

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/09/17/artificial-sweeteners-may-disrupt-bodys-blood-sugar-controls/?_r=0

http://www.medicaldaily.com/diet-soda-may-put-older-adults-risk-metabolic-syndrome-how-artificial-sweeteners-325938

That said, I absolutely believe that the medical evidence stacked up against sugar is far higher than that against artificial sweeteners. I use artificial sweeteners relatively regularly but try to avoid added sugar as much as I can.

[jmw1982 59]

As of yet, I have only met with the NUT once. Knowing that she had the power to cause insurance to deny me, I smiled and shook my head in agreement as though what she was saying was brand new information. I agree with some of the other posters above, the NUTs think fat=stupid. Newsflash-I've been counting calories/carbs/fat grams/points for 20 years.

[peaceout 273]

My NUT gets mixed reviews. After my first appointment with her, I really disliked her. She explained to me in detail how to set up a MyFitnessPal account (I tried showing her several times that I had the app on my phone and had been logging for 2+ years), then we played with the plastic food, then her advice was to just eat Lean Cuisines as much as possible to learn what proper portions are.

My pre-op class with her went much better, and the one appointment I've had with her post-op was ok too. Still very cookie-cutter advice, but she did answer my questions. And when I email her, I always get a prompt response. I see her again on Wednesday, so we'll see how it goes.

Very interesting thread and responses!

[anaxila 501]

Mine was great, and I chose to do all of my pre-op appointments with her rather than others on the team because we had a great rapport and she was super-practical. I didn't follow any of her advice during the "supervised weight loss" phase leading up to surgery, but I was apparently listening and processing and remembering it all more than I thought, as it's been super helpful since surgery. I hear her voice in my head in the grocery store when I recognize the things she suggested, and gravitate towards them more often than not. I think she was absolutely critical to my success in the 7 months since surgery.

[jess9395 5,449]

Mine (two of them) were pretty useless. So much so I looked into going back to school to get my dietician license to become a nutritionist for bariatric patients! I would have loved a "been there done that" nutritionist.

Sadly because my masters is in the wrong subject it would take nearly three years (two of full time schooling and one of fieldwork). I'm too old for that, LOl!

[NORCALRN 60]

Mine was no help but I ended up with a J tube so for the most part, i did not need her.

[Stevehud 1,790]

I brought this subject up with m nutritionist, and he explained that many nutritionists do treat fat as stupid, due to the facts they see so many patients who literally have ZERO food knowledge, and its easier to take things at a very basic level if they cannot gauge the knowledge level of the person. For example, since in our opening interview they knew i knew a lot about measurements and being a paramedic, i knew a bit about the anatomy involved etc so we skipped the whole plastic foods bit.

I think that is the hardest part, being able to gauge the level of knowledge that someone has or doesn't have, and acting appropriately to get the factual bits across to them. I think many nutritionists, just take the easy and safe way out and just go with the treat everyone as the lowest possible denominator type lessons. Thankfully in my case this didnt happen.

I have had my previous nutritionist tell me stories before about people, like one woman, ( no she never gave names or anything, not that id have known anyone) but this woman just wasn,t losing any weight in her pre-surgery weight loss plan, when she inquired the person assured her she was on a liquid diet, finally she managed to get out of her, that she was drinking 3 to 5 Dunkin DOnuts mocha coolata's between Breakfast and lunch alone. , or the great story of the lady who stopped on the way home from her surgery t mcdonalds and wound up in the ER after tearing her sleeve eating mcnuggets, who stated she didnt know why she couldn't eat them, because its chicken. So it is sometimes true that people need to be shown everything, but certainly not everyone.

[Stevehud 1,790]

also as far as the study about metabolic syndrome and diet soda, it has been seriously questioned because they did not differentiate between the weights of patients. The premise is that people who drank a certain amount of diet soda daily had a much greater risk of metabolic syndrome. But they did not mention and one of the negatives of the stidy, was the weight of people drinking this soda. SO many of the research detractors have stated that more obese people drink diet soda because they are led to believe it will help with obesity. I wholeheartedly agree with this, the first thing most of us gave up is full sugar soda. SO the question then becomes is it that obese people have a higher risk of metabolic syndrome? or is it caused only by the sweetener in the diet soda. That was never narrowed down. This has been called a huge flaw in their questionnaire they used for their research.

[rosepose 105]

Just for the record - the link between glucose resistance and artificial sweeteners I referred to was in no way correlative. It was an experimental study done in mice. Cause and effect.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v514/n7521/abs/nature13793.html

However as I said before sugar and natural sweeteners such as agave (which can be 90% fructose) are very directly tied to metabolic disorder in a large way and not just glucose resistance but fatty liver and every other symptom of it so I'm not feeling much like artificial sweeteners are evil in comparison (though I don't love the flavor for the most part)

[ssflbelle 829]

I am new and have to be on a 6 month supervised diet. During the initial visit the surgeon gave me a book all about the sleeve and the after surgery diets plans I was to follow. He also said I would see the NUT when she got back from the wedding she was attending out of the state. So when I got the phone call I was anxious to get started with her on June 30th and see the 6 month diet I was to follow. I drove about 45 minutes North of where I live to meet with her. When I met with the NUT she told me what I had to do after the surgery not before. She didn't tell me anything that was not in that book I had to read. When I asked what diet I was to follow for the next 6 months she said "What did the DR tell you to do? I told her I had been following Nutrisystem for the past year but had only lost about 35 pounds and the DR told me to keep doing NS. She asked me if I wanted the surgery and I told her yes so she said well keep doing NS. But I only lost 35 pounds in a year and I told her that is hardly nothing to lose when your close to 390 pounds. I told her I felt that NS gave me too much carbs. As in addition to their food I was suppose to eat 5 more carbs. She said well then cut back to 1 carb. That was the only advise she gave me and I left in less than an hour. I came to find out the insurance has denied paying her and she cost me $250.00 for nothing.

When I went back to the surgeon whom I am to see each month for the next 6 months I told him what the NUT said and that she didn't give me a diet. I asked him will I be seeing the NUT again and he said no. I told him I thought it odd that I had to meet with her this first month before we even know if I am going to be approved for the surgery. I gave him my food diary for the past month on NS and he looked at it and told me to stop following NS. He said to eat only 3 meals and no Snacks, eat my Protein first and then vegetables and to stay away from carbs. That was his diet plan in the book as to what I am too eat after surgery after the first month. It seems odd to me that neither one really gave me a 6 month supervised diet. I want to lose as much as I can before the surgery and left very confused and disappointed.

[lauraellen80 855]

The dietician in my surgeon's office was nice enough... I dunno about how helpful she was, beyond giving me accountability in the a couple months pre-op by checking my MFP logs. She was young--still in her twenties, I'd guess--but the meal plans and advice she gave seemed straight out of the 90s. Low-fat or fat-free everything, with a lot more carbs than most people on here seem to eat. I just plugged in one of the sample "one year out" menus that she gave me, and it's 41% carbs (80g), 21% fat (18g), and only 38% Protein (74g).

She quit right around the time I had surgery (she was very pregnant, I'm guessing she decided to stay home after the baby came), and the new dietician hadn't started yet when I went back for my first follow-up. I'm really hoping they have someone on staff when I go in for an appointment tomorrow, because I have a lot of questions about what and how much I'm supposed to be eating at this point (7 weeks out) and the rest of my weight loss phase, and I'm still super-confused about carbs.