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Is it just me, or is it really odd they'd tell you what not to use, but didn't tell you what you should be using? Surely they must have some suggestions that fit what they want here? As far as I know, all meal replacement shakes contain added vitamins as that's sort of the point. They also contain added carbs and fats that most protein shakes don't have. I'd say the vast majority of people here were told to just use protein shakes. That's typically for a few reasons: First, especially if you also take a vitamin supplement, you're not going to suffer any long term harm using protein shakes instead of meal replacement shakes for a few weeks. Second, most meal replacement shakes are lower in protein than a typical protein shake. We want as much protein as possible to help prevent the breakdown of muscle tissue when dieting. Third, most bariatric doctors don't actually want you consuming very many carbs, since one of the main goals of the pre-surgical diet is to shrink your liver to make the surgery safer. The best way to do that is a very low carb diet. (The liver is one of the main ways your body stores glycogen, so by depleting it of glycogen (carbs), it will get smaller, even if no other changes take place.) TL;DR: Ask your team what they want you to use.

I'll do my best to help, but I'm going to have to start by asking some questions: When you say the weight is "barely coming off", can you be more specific? How much in the last week, two weeks, last month? Can you clarify what your goal weight really is? In your profile, you're showing that you're currently at 78kg and your goal is 75kg. That's only about 6-7 pounds, not the 33-44 you listed. I'm thinking you probably have a new goal and have not updated your profile, but it's important to understand what you really are trying to do. When you say you are "eating pretty well", can you give some examples of what a typical day looks like? What is your daily caloric goal? What about protein, fat and carbs? How are you determining your what you caloric and macronutrient intake should be? How are you tracking your intake? Do you weigh everything in grams before it goes into your mouth? Let me explain why I'm asking these questions. Typically when people are struggling with weight loss, we see a few common issues: Unrealistic expectations. Especially if weight loss early on after surgery was easy, people tend to think it will continue that way until they reach goal weight. Unfortunately, that's not how this works. The heavier we are, the more we'll lose at first. The closer we get to goal, the harder it becomes. It can take months just to lose a few pounds if you are already pretty lean. You also have to really have your nutrition dialed in at that point.. I won't get too deep into the physiology here, but there are multiple reasons for this and it's 100% normal for this to happen. My point is that you may be right where you need to be. It's hard to know just that just based on what you posted above. Eating more than you think. Study after study shows that almost everyone thinks they eat less than they really do, even those that log their food using calorie tracking apps. It's sometimes simple things like those little tastes while preparing a meal, or that handful of nuts they forgot to log. Others, they just guess at calories because accurate tracking is really hard. Burning less than you think. Most people have absolutely no idea how many calories they actually burn in a day. We often use estimates based on height and weight, but these can be off by may hundreds of calories depending on age, lifestyle, percent body fat, etc. Further, your calorie burn isn't the same all the time. It can vary by hundreds of calories per day even before you consider exercise. Speaking of exercise, we drastically overestimate the impact of exercise calories. For the vast majority of people, the calories they burn in a day don't actually change all that much due to exercise. Blaming things outside your control. It's natural for people look for causes for problems. If we take ownership of the problem, we can then take steps to correct it. It's when we place the blame on something we perceive to be outside our control that we can run into serious problems. Let me give you an example here. We can't escape simple physics. If you burn more calories in a day than you consume, you'll lose weight. Eat more than you burn and you gain weight. If I take responsibility for this, then it means I need to eat less or burn more to lose weight. I realize that's easier said than done, but without first taking responsibility for the problem, I'd have no hope of fixing the issue. If on the other hand, I were to say "I have a slow metabolism", I'd essentially be saying this issue is outside my control, even though the solution is the same as before: eat less than you burn. Thinking a particular diet/macronutrient is more important than calories. I noticed you hinted at that in your post. Calories are king here. Specific diets that emphasize one or more macronutrients can help, but they never trump calories. I can go into more detail later, but this post is already getting overly long so I think I'll stop here. Please provide some additional detail and I may be able to provide better guidance.

6 week update: Down to 252. So officially 10 pounds down. I feel good. Clothing is fitting better. Snacking habit broken. More energy from eating better foods.

I have a tentative surgery date of June 17th so I'll be starting my 2 week liver shrink / pre-op diet the first week of June. My nutritionist said I will have to drink meal replacement shakes for breakfast, lunch, & supper. I have Premier Protein powder at home, but he said that is not a meal REPLACEMENT, it's just a high protein shake. What meal replacement shakes do you recommend? Which ones tastes the best? I don't think I can drink the ones that have a heavy vitamin taste.

I use Quest brand Milk Shake Protein replacements with 45 grams of protein. I also get 30 grams of protein from various flavors of Premier Protein, these are both meal replacements. Be careful with anything bought in a store, make sure it has 3g or less of fat and 3 g or less of sugar, and make sure that they have NO added sugars. Gotta read the labels. I agree with SpartanMaker, you need to be very careful when looking for what you need in the guidelines you shared. That's page 19, I wonder if there are other dietary guidelines within your packet. Wishing you the best.

Just be careful with selecting meal replacements since a lot of them won't meet the guidelines as outlined by your team. As an example, the Bariatric Pal creamy chicken soup meal replacement mentioned above is too low in protein. While there are a few products out there that will meet those guidelines, most won't. They'll either be too low in protein, or too high in carbs. This includes the vast majority of products you'll find at grocery & drug stores.

Congratulations. Look forward to hearing your updates.

You got this. I was also active on here in the years following my sleeve. Had a life event occur that knocked me down. Stayed in a hole for the past few years....but started resuming normal life recently. Addressing the regain. That part is going well. Staying in my lane, been alcohol free the past 6+ years, working long hours and taking care of yard work & house chores on my days off.

@MrBeeswax I feel that no matter which surgery you receive when we suffer from the disease of obesity and we detour from eating properly then we're gonna experience weight gain. Obesity bodies are different than regular bodies who metabolize food normally. We who suffer from obesity have a metabolic disease, so when we get surgery and start back creeping in those "comfort and emotional eating foods" that we KNOW our body loves to store FAT with such as chips, cakes, cookies, unhealthy CARBS, refined sugars, just SUGARs period in access then we're gonna regain unfortunately we have a horrible disease that requires very proper planning for success. I lost a lot of weight really fast with VSG and I credit my success to 1.Meal prepping for success 2. Being organized 3. Movement. i honestly don't think the type of surgery matters. its that HAND TO MOUTH MOVEMENT what are we putting in our mouths 😂

Hi everyone! I'm scheduled for August 13, RNY. I started at 361 lbs. and joined a weight-loss clinic 18 months ago, where they put me on something similar to the LSD. I lost about 80 lbs. and then my body decided my set point was around 270, so surgery is next. I've been trolling this site for quite a while, even when I was wondering if I should get the surgery in the first place. To prepare, I've been experimenting with the recipes that people post, and trying various products/shakes/vitamins that have been recommended by this group and my local support group, to see what options I like. I've also been collecting items for post-surgery, like a magic bullet and small silverware, things from the list my surgical team gave me. I tend to over-prepare to cope with stress, and this is a biggie. I'm also trying to figure out what hobbies I can distract myself with post-op - any suggestions?