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I was sitting in my office with a client the other day who’d had bariatric surgery several years ago. “It just didn’t work for me. I’ve tried everything. I don’t know what else to do.” She was looking down in shame, and I could tell she was feeling totally defeated. “This is a really common struggle,” I said, “And I want you to know it’s not your fault.” She looked at me in disbelief. The same advice over and over again You see, most people are accustomed to seeing a dietitian and being silently scolded and told to “eat this, not that...blah, blah, blah.” It’s the reason that a lot of people avoid seeing a dietitian - because it feels like you’re in the principal’s office. Truth be told, most people already know what they “should” be eating after surgery. Heck, they even knew before having surgery, but that knowledge wasn’t enough. And it still isn’t. If information were enough to solve a person’s weight problems, bariatric surgery wouldn’t exist. Thus, here you are in a frustrating dilemma: Knowing what you should be doing, but not being able to do it consistently. So now what? It’s time to start thinking about things differently. If what you’ve been doing isn’t working then STOP DOING IT. That same old dieting advice that didn’t work for you before surgery isn’t going to work after either. Don’t worry, I can help. I have worked with hundreds of people who have had weight loss surgery. From that work I have honed in on some key factors that will actually make a difference for you. 3 Secrets to Success Do the things that matter. It’s easy to get bombarded with information and overthink it. You can spin your wheels doing things that don’t matter. I had a client who kept trying all these special protein-fortified foods and finally I told him, “You’re spending a lot of energy on these special foods, and you’re still gaining weight. Let’s look at some other factors that might be impacting you.” He wasn’t seeing that his lack of sleep and snacking were working against him. Once we targeted those issues he started losing weight again. Implement a system. Don’t rely on willpower. Willpower doesn’t work because it’s finite, and it gets depleted by everyday stressors. You’ll inevitably find yourself lacking willpower with food when you most need it if you don’t have a system. Ever been through a drive thru on the way home from work after a stressful day? That’s because your willpower was depleted earlier at work. If you have a system for dealing with stressors at work such as automation of tasks, delegation, stress management techniques, and perhaps a wind-down ritual at the end of the day, you’re much less likely to hit the drive thru on the way home. And your dinners could be automated by a rotating monthly calendar or a delivery system such as Blue Apron. Make yourself a route to drive home that doesn’t go by any fast food restaurants, and BAM! we’ve created a system. Develop habits. People who are successful at something have boring habits. It’s never quick and easy like we’re led to believe. You don’t accidentally win an Olympic gold medal. And you don’t win it with magical solutions either, like taking supplements. Nope, it takes years of intentional and intense training. Same thing with your eating. You don’t accidentally or magically lose a ton of weight just by having surgery and taking vitamins. And you certainly don’t accidentally keep it off for the long run. You need habits that you stick to every single day. Things such as planning your meals ahead of time, grocery shopping on a specific day of the week, exercising at the same time each day. These are the habits that will pay off over time. Systems and habits reduce the cognitive load of having to make lots of tiny decisions all day long. Just like willpower, our decision-making ability gets fatigued and we start to take the easy way out. If something is a habit you’re much more likely to do it - rather than sitting there trying to decide whether or not you feel like doing something. Chances are there are plenty of times you’re not going to feel like going to the grocery store, or cooking dinner, or exercising. If you only do it when you feel like it you’re probably not going to lose weight. What to do today Today, sit down and take a look at what you’re really eating. Don’t lie to yourself, it won’t help. Be brutally honest. Write it all down. Then identify ONE thing that you want to change. Something that if you did it, would actually make a significant difference. Find a way to implement a system around this change, and do it until it becomes a habit. The result: You’ve now shown yourself that you can make sustainable behavior change. You can repeat this process over and over again to create new systems and habits. Keep doing it, and I promise you’ll start losing weight and feeling better, having more energy, feeling more confident. You’ll feel like you’re in control of your life. And that’s pretty awesome. If not, you can always check out this site for more in-depth help getting back on track. Have you made any changes that made a big impact on your weight loss? What did you do to stick with it? Let me know in the comments. Katy is giving away a free gift to help Bariatric Pal readers get moving, have more energy, and feel great.

Let me speak to the shock part first. Yes, I drank - a lot – in college. So did everyone else I knew. So did everyone in my family. In fact, most of the people in my family drank a whole lot more than I ever did! After I got married, I quit drinking on a regular basis. When I did drink after that, I usually drank to get drunk – true. It’s also true that I drank less after I got married because I started taking codeine – very rarely, at first – for bad migraine headaches. Over time, however, I took it daily because codeine helped me to not feel. Anything. At most, I took maybe three in a day. I thought addicts took lots and lots of pills! So when I was given the alcohol and drug addiction screening, I was certain I wouldn’t meet any criteria for alcoholic, and most definitely not for drug addict. Well, I got one heck of a case of the “Yeah buts…” in a hurry when the therapist said, after scoring my test, “Connie – you’re an alcoholic and a drug addict.” As she talked to me about the items that indicated addiction on the test, every one of my responses to her started with, “Yeah, but…” For example, “Yeah, but I could have answered that question either way.” “Yeah, but I don’t drink nearly as much as most of the people I know, especially the people in my family.” “Yeah, but, drug addicts take a lot of pills throughout the day.” “Yeah, but I was able to take care of my kids and work and go to school.” “Yeah, but I’ve never been in trouble with the law.” When I had exhausted all the “Yeah, buts” I could think of, imagine or create, I got quiet and let it sink in. I am an addict. And then I felt it. Relief. It made sense. What made sense to me about my being an addict is understanding, for the first time, the reasons I continued to do things that went against my own values. I started to understand the reasons I did things I said I would never do. It began to make sense that things I promised I would stop doing seemed impossible to stop doing. I am an addict. I have a disease that “hijacks” the brain. When I am in active addiction of any kind: the disease of addiction that affects my brain doesn’t allow me to listen to reason but stays locked in denial mode the disease of addiction that affects my emotions keeps me in a protective mode so I defend myself by blaming other people and things for my behavior the disease of addiction that affects my spiritual self says, “do what feels good in the moment” and hides the part of me that says, “what I value is good and decent” the disease of addiction that affects my social self, brings out the loud, obnoxious, hurtful voice I am capable of using the disease of obesity that affects my physical being takes dangerous risks, eats poorly, doesn’t exercise and doesn’t care Accepting the truth that I am an addict was a relief. NOT AN EXCUSE. I understood my poor choices better. It made sense that it was so difficult for me to follow through with the convictions I made to myself and the promises I made to others. I began to understand why my behaviors went against the person I wanted to be. Addiction is a brain sickness and a soul sickness. And a protector. All at the same time. Food, alcohol, shopping, pain medication, and other things I engaged in addictively protected me from my feelings. That is what I wanted most of all. To not feel. I didn’t want to feel the reality of my sadness, my anger, my pain and my shame. The trade-off for not feeling was to use addictive substances/behaviors and betray myself by doing things I was embarrassed about, ashamed of, and seemingly unable to control. Being an addict was in no way an excuse for the behaviors I engaged in. It’s very uncool to use being an addict as a way to avoid taking responsibility. “I danced with the boss’s husband at the holiday party. What can say – I was drunk.” NOT COOL. “I told her off but she had it coming and besides – I was drunk and couldn’t keep my mouth shut.” NOT COOL. For food addicts, it is similarly bogus to make excuses for overeating because the kids were acting up, you were late for work and got yelled at, your mother was sick, or your spouse ticked you off. Each one of us is 100% responsible for our behavior – even if we have addictions. If we have an addiction, once we realize that truth, we are responsible for getting help and learning healthy ways to deal whatever life brings us. We are responsible for learning to deal with our feelings in appropriate ways. We are responsible for learning to work through losses, past abuse or neglect, present hardships, frustrations with family and friends, and all of life’s realities. Without the use of addictive chemicals or actions. The addictive substance or behavior, whatever it is, isn’t the problem. Sure, alcohol is a problem for alcoholics. Certain foods are problems for food addicts. Shopping is a problem for shopaholics. But those are only the surface problems. Addictive substances and behaviors are symptoms of the real problems, which are almost always rooted in shame: “I’m not good enough.” That shame stems from many possible places. To treat addictions, we must first remove the substance or behavior. No, one cannot eliminate food from their life. But they can eliminate the food(s) that cause them problems. Once we are free of chemicals or the addictive behaviors, we can work on the real problems and choose who we want to be. When we don’t “use,” our actions can reflect our values. “Connie – you’re an addict.” WHAT A RELIEF! I understood why I couldn’t STOP doing things I didn’t really want to do. I finally knew there was hope. I knew I could learn to live life in healthy ways and according to my values. But I first had to be willing to live without the addictive chemicals and behaviors. So I needed help. I couldn’t do it alone. And I didn’t have to. Together, we can support one another into a life of RECOVERY. What a relief!