Indymom

No requirement here, but I plan to watch it either way. Much as I'd love to get all my protein from bacon, sausage and peanut butter, something tells me that might NOT be the best course of action.

Early on you might only be eating a few bites, but after the first few months you can typically have 3-4 ounces of food at a time. Picture a 6-oz filet (which is a reasonable sized steak). You'd be able to eat close to half of that and perhaps a few bites of salad or salad veggies. That's a "dining out" meal I feel like I can work with, and cutting that steak into small pieces and eating slowly will make me enjoy it that much more. Like Nurselisa I'm starting week 4 and eating Beans, cheese, etc.

I had a small spoonful of Peanut Butter a few days ago (even though my nutritionist has it on the "foods you should NEVER eat when you're trying to lose weight" list). She also has bacon on that list and I'll tell you right now, THIS fat girl will NOT go without a piece of bacon occasionally. NO diet is worth that! I plan to use PB sparingly once I'm released to solids on crackers for a snack/protein boost.

I can have cucumbers (and my pickles!!!) in month two, along with some other 'soft' veggies. No lettuce or other raw veg until month 3. I still have certain limitations at that point too. I'm craving salad also but i'm worried that lettuce will take up too much space, so I plan to do just tossed tomato/cucumber salads with dressing until I get better capacity.

Yep, it's too hot. I've made that mistake with hot decaf coffee before - UCK! Let it cool to lukewarm. Also some of the powders seem to be more prone to clumpiness than others, so I've been whizzing all my drinks with my immersion blender just to be safe. While the Protein drinks are pretty distasteful on their own, even MORE distasteful is a big clump of Protein Powder in a gooey ball hitting your mouth when you're just expecting liquid. GAG!!!

It's up to you what you tell people. For me personally, I'm around so many people and there are meals involved frequently (I'm in sales and do a lot of business entertainment/meals out) that it makes more sense for me to just tell the truth. I have had only positive feedback so far from people (if they are judging me they're doing it behind my back, haha!). Of course if you don't care to talk about your surgery you can just tell people you're on a restrictive diet and limiting carbs, or something else of that nature. For the pain I'd ask your doc what you can take as needed, perhaps he can prescribe something non-narcotic so you don't get drowsy.

I was never much of a soda drinker so I don't miss that, but I do miss my beer. My plan (which of course is quite a few months away) is to try a low-carbonated beer like Blue Moon, and sip sip sip!

The Nectar unflavored protein has 20 grams in 2 scoops. I do about 8 oz of warm milk, hershey's sugar-free choc syrup and 2 scoops protein and it's close to 30 grams including the milk. It's not great but not horrible either. I can also tolerate the unflavored protein in decaf coffee with some milk and splenda.

In case your food plan doesn't include this information, 2 tablespoons = 1 ounce. My nutritionist stressed that food should be measured this way and not weighed, because some foods might weigh lighter so 1 ounce of weight might be too much volume overall.

I hope to be asking a question like this someday. I do have a friend who had RNY and her docs are concerned that she's losing too much and want her to put on some weight. It's been difficult for her.

I have to take my PPI for a year so I don't have gurgling yet, but I would just laugh it off when it happens, if it's around lunchtime maybe make a joke about being hungry or something?

Now I want a popsicle too. The surgery will be like the blink of an eye for you since you'll be under anesthetic, I think at most it only takes a couple hours. All the jitters you're feeling are completely normal! I didn't have to do a 2-week pre-op diet either, my surgeon said they didn't feel like the liver reduction made much of a difference for them. I just had to do clears the day before surgery.

I live about 10 minutes from BJs Bariatrics storefront! The couple that owns it are both post-op bypass patients and REALLY nice. I don't do the bari Vitamins though, my nutritionist gave me a list of different options and I've been using NatureMade softgel Multivitamins complete and the generic citracal petites. I take a B1 weekly and B12 sublingual weekly as well.

My portion size right now is 2 oz per meal, 3 times a day. I am religiously measuring everything because my "eyeball" measuring is terrible (as evidenced from all my weight watchers failures!!!). My plan calls for me to increase to 3 ounces at 3 months, and go up from there . . . I think by 6 months I'm at 5 or 6 ounces. My nutritionist recommended I try to take a half hour to eat. That is REALLY hard, I was a very fast eater prior to surgery. I try to take a bite and put the food or my fork/spoon down between bites. I've also been surfing the 'net or reading a book while I eat so I'm not focusing on it completely.

I was very lucky in that I was getting down a ton of liquids and all my protein by day 4 (my doc had me on clears until then). Hang in there, I bet it will get easier and easier each day for you! Just remember to constantly sip sip sip . . . I keep my water bottle right next to me all day long.

I don't know about TOM cravings but I'm only in week 3 and holy cow, I took the kids for Penn Station carryout tonight and I had to actually leave the house while they were all eating. The bread smelled SOOOO good!! I could walk by chocolate all day long without a second glance, but give me bread, chips . . . I'll go nuts.

I can tell a big difference in your face already! Congrats!

Our event was today. They had 'continental breakfast' and the pastries looked so good! I settled for a small chunk of banana and the babybel I had brought from home. For lunch they had an Italian buffet - seriously??!!?? I had about an ounce of mozzarella from the caprese salad and some of the minestrone broth and a few pieces of soft carrot. They brought in Cookies for lunch, and I had a small chunk (like 1/8th) of a Peanut Butter cookie; I made sure I had a piece with no nuts or anything. It tasted divine but I don't think my sleeve liked it . . . I felt a little funky afterwards for about 15 minutes. Finally we had our after-hours event and dinner was from McAlister's Deli so there was a platter of wraps, fruits with fruit dip, potato chips (I seriously drooled!), potato salad and brownies/cookies. I had some of the potatoes from the potato salad mushed up a bit and some slices of cheese from the deli tray. It was really hard but I survived. Glad your day was better today, HDub!

I'm SO with you, I have to go to an all-day sales meeting tomorrow and I'm sure I'll be extremely limited on what I can eat. I'm getting a little frustrated about this stage too, the days can't seem to pass quickly enough!

Yep, I agree that the aftertaste is likely ketosis. It's gross! It makes me feel like my tongue is burnt. Not sure about the pain in the chest though, I'd definitely call the doc about that.

I've got a little less than 6 weeks before I can have full solids, but only 12 days before I can add some canned chicken/tuna. I've never been so excited about chicken in my life!

Mine had started to curl a little and just generally irritate me (and itch) after about 10 days. I waited until I was at the 2-week mark and then off they came. My incisions are all completely healed at the 18-day mark, although I think there's a tiny curl of a suture sticking out of one of them. I figure I'll just let it hang out and if it's still there at my 4 (5?) week follow-up, I'll ask my surgeon what to do about it.

Also, I drink my protein shake in the morning with my water because lots of times I'm trying to get my morning pills down at the same time. You don't have to wait 30 minutes to drink water after a protein shake, that's only after actual food.

I'm not familiar with them, but my nutritionist gave us a list of approved multivitamins and said if we were going to deviate from their list we needed to email them the nutritional info from whatever we were considering so they could review and approve. I am using NatureMade multivitamin complete softgels, 2 a day. They have Iron in them so I take my Calcium at a separate time of the day. The softgels are big but they go right down with a little Water.

Syntrax makes a flavorless powder - it's Nectar Medical. I've been using that, 2 scoops for 20 grams protein. I've only been mixing with milk and sugar-free hershey's syrup though, so I don't know how it would be in food.