Confused

[PatientEleventyBillion 851]

34 minutes ago, Cape Crooner said:

I'm 19 months post and while I never had second thoughts going in, I now see things that add to my confidence in my decision.

1. I see friends who killed themselves to successfully lose weight "the old fashioned way" in the same time frame as me put it all back on and more.

2. I see other friends who are very diet and exercise conscious still gain a few pounds a year, eating salads and going to spinning classes. The fact is, as we age it's much harder to lose/keep off extra weight. Which means if you have a serious weight problem now, you'll have a worse one as you age.

3. After 19 months of logging calories and fitness tracking, I can tell you that MY body doesn't metabolize like they say in the diet books.

I have averaged 2,500-3,000 calories burned each day for 21 months. Pre op, I ate 1,000 calories a day, then post op 400 to start up to 1,000 a day until I reached my goal. Today, I still exercise 90 minutes a day (average 2,750 calories a day and eat 1,200-2,000. Based on the books, I should be skin and bones, but I'm simply maintaining my goal weight (26 bmi).

The one pound lost for every 3,500 burned is bunk. The truth is much harder and impossible for ME without my WLS.

Understand, without WLS, your weight loss efforts will ultimately fail and when they do, you're looking at a short life full of health problems!

Who wants that?

I liked all your post until this part. I think you're putting the surgery up on a pedestal. While we wouldn't be here without it's obvious benefits, the real changes are psychological. It's easy as hell to "beat" the surgery if one isn't committed psychologically to the lifestyle changes required -- then one is back where they started. Then what? Another surgery?

Edited March 7, 2017 by PatientEleventyBillion

[MBird 298]

I like your enthusiasm but even with WLS, people can and do gain. If someone possesses an eating disorder, they may gain. If someone is not mentally sound, they have a high risk of gaining and even worse, falling into depression. One example, I read the post of a woman who managed to eat four bananas in a sitting and "guzzle" Water after her surgery, then complained she worried she stretched out her pouch. Ridiculous, and the perfect example of a person who will most like fail, even with WLS.

It's a mindset with or without surgery.

But the sleeve literally cuts away 80% of the stomach AND that's including the hunger hormone, so we have an advantage provided our obesity isn't due to food addictions.

WLS is a tool. We still must make a lifestyle change for the rest of our life.

As for calories I find from all my experience that the calories they site people ought to eat are ridiculously high. My Dietician and Psychologist even said they couldn't eat 1,800 -2,000 calories and both are active, athletic women.

When I was a gym monkey and lost 119 pounds working out five days a week for 2 1/2 hours, I only took in maybe 800-1000 calories.

Everybody's body is different. If we are wise we learn to listen our body and understand what its trying to tell us.

[Berry78 4,261]

Wowzers! In general, I maintain on 3-4 thousand calories, and lose tons of weight on 1500cals. (With exercise).

[Cape Crooner 589]

6 hours ago, PatientEleventyBillion said:

I liked all your post until this part. I think you're putting the surgery up on a pedestal. While we wouldn't be here without it's obvious benefits, the real changes are psychological. It's easy as hell to "beat" the surgery if one isn't committed psychologically to the lifestyle changes required -- then one is back where they started. Then what? Another surgery?

I do have WLS on a pedestal, to me it is a miracle. That doesn't mean it "can't be beat" and/or all the other things I must do are easy - they aren't.

What im saying is that I'm convinced that this is the option that would have enabled me to succeed.

I'm 64 and i was 13 when I went on my first diet I lost 50+ pounds on my own multiple times and always put more back on. After 55, I found it impossible to lose more than 10 pounds I tried everything else including the latest prescription siaity drugs.

This was the only option left and it has succeeded thus far. If that means I have it on a pedestal, so be it. I know that it has saved my life and that's a pretty big deal