aroundhky

Abs? What are abs? I think like "Inline" stated, there will be skin issues. Also genetics plays a key role as well and how body fat is positioned around your body. I know I would like to get rid of my "man boobs", but I think genetics is working against me there. But they are a lot smaller now. I know when I was in high school, I actually had abs then, and I rarely worked abs directly. Seems body fat percentage (along with genetics) are normally the two biggest factors for showing abs, and with us on this message board, the loose skin is a big factor as well.

Any kind of exercise I'm sure is a good thing. Seems a little complicated to keep up with, so I'm sure writting all of that down and scheduling it helps. Long cardio (45+ mins) CAN deplete muscle some as your body wants to use it up for energy, so you may want to make sure to get some protein in right after the workout. Good luck with the exercise and the surgery!

Thanks you all! "coops".... I appreciate it, I'm still overweight by BMI standards, but less than I used to be. Had my body fat percentage checked the other day and on that chart, my body fat is now in the healthy range for my age.... 18.8%. So I'll go by that standard, but my doctor I'm sure will still use the BMI chart.

I wondered that too until I started thinking...... we need 60-70 grams or whatever of protein a day. How do we put these into a pill? Let's say we just had these broken down into 10 pills a day for math's sake. That would be a 6 gram pill and one that I'm guessing none of us would be able to swallow (probably close to the size of a ping pong ball). I'm guessing the average pill is..... say...... 500 mgs, which I think is half of a gram. But perhaps we could all swallow something as big as a 1 gram pill/capsule, etc, which may be pushing it to swallow something that big. But let's assume we can do that and get 30 grams of our daily protein from the food/meat that we eat. That would still leave us with 30 one gram pills to take daily, which is more than most of us would want to take and may even be worse than trying to tolerate the protein shakes. I think the sheer volume of protein needed makes it prohibitive for us to take it in pill form. I went over this a lot in my head, and probably way too much, but I was getting tired of the shakes and was getting desperate as well. But now, I'm able to consume and hold more food, so I'm pretty close to getting all the protein I need from food, except for the days I lift weights, then I have a shake after working out. Maybe one day they will mainline it and we can carry around an I.V. bag with us..... anything to avoid those shakes!

Jimmy....it's not FOR gaining weight, but it does add about 3-5 pounds water weight on me. But since I love lifting, it's worth the added muscle energy and muscle water retention to help my strength gains in the gym. It does not add fat, or muscle for that matter. But it does help your muscle stay hydrated enough and energetic enough (ATP retention) to hit the weights hard and get the maximum from your workouts. I checked with my Dr and he gave me the go ahead as long as I consume even more water while on creatine since your muscles saturate themselves with water while taking creatine and you want to make sure the rest of your body stays hydrated as well. As soon as I stop taking it for 3-4 days, I immediately drop those few pounds of water weight. But I can tell it does help me get the most from my workouts, so I use it for about a month or so at a time.

Hang in there "esheldon"..... you'll be glad you had this done at some point and the regret will be long gone. It does suck early on with the mushy and liquid only stage, no other way to put it. But it's temporary and shall pass. When those cravings hit me early on and I couldn't eat those types of foods, it helped me to distract myself some and go for a walk, play with my kids, do chores, etc. Basically whatever may be fun and/or can help distract you from that food. Pulling for ya man!

Oh I defineately did! Well the first week of it anyway. The 4th day I had to have some solid food, so I remember eating that grilled chicken breast and it was sooo good! Then like 2 days later I remember eating a beef patty with some cheese. After that, for the next week plus I kept to it and had only liquids. But the two times that I did cheat, I made sure to cut out the carbs, which I think is the main objective..... to shrink that liver.

Good idea to not cut out your carbs that week! I'm doing a Warrior Dash in a few weeks and I AM NOT a runner. But I've committed to it and went for about a run the other day and got about a mile in before I stopped. This race is 5k as well (along with obstacles and rope courses). So I am planning on doing about a half mile at a time and walking briefly in between. The intervals that BlackBerryJuice mentioned are also good for preserving muscle. Usually my cardio consists of sprints, high paced walking or 20 minutes on a stationary bike, so this is pretty new to me too. Also, make sure to stay hydrated. Good luck and let us know how it goes!

Congrats and you look fantastic! Way to go "Koriswlj"!!!!

Welcome Raven! Your goals to cure (comorbitites) sound a lot like mine. I had uncontrolled BP, lots of joint pain and high cholesterol. I've made a lot of progress towards aleviating those but not quite there yet. Hang in there! I can't relate to the hair loss thing as I've been bald for 10+ years. Even if you are still on meds, I'm guessing you still probably feel better right? Hopefuilly you'll eventually get rid of those things and be a lot healthier. Just keep those end goals in mind and good luck.

Welcome! Keep those end goals in mind and enjoy the ride!

Congrats!!! Way to go!!!

If doing resistance training, you surely want to get some protein in within an hour after your workout. Also a few slow digesting clean carbs like broccoli, grean beans, etc about an hour or two after your workout. The juice idea is really good immediately after lifting and exercising, like as soon as you walk out of the gym door...... if you can. If it's a good hard workout, your glycogen levels in your muscles will be depleted and any simple carbs (sugars) you consume right after the workout will go directly to your muscles and not stored as fat or in the liver. It will also help you recover better. Just be sensible like "Pookey" said and just drink a few ounces. What I do is consume my protein shake (with just a few of those quickly digesting simple carbs) as I'm walking out the gym door. Then about an hour or so later, I eat my lean meats with veggies. But everyone is different. Experiment and see what works for you and go with it. Good luck!

In my personal opinion, I think it's good to do it before the surgery. I kept lifting a lot before my surgery and up through the first week of the liquid pre-op diet. Then I hit the wall from carb depletion and stopped working out for the last week of the liquid diet. Your muscles want glycogen to repair themselves after being broken down in the workout and with the no carb or extremely low carb pre-surgery liquid diet, you MAY do your muscles more harm than good once all of the stored carbs are gone from your liver during that last week or so of the pre-op diet. That's just my guess. It would be interesting to hear other people's thoughts on this. But lifting all the way up through the beginning of the liquid diet sounds like a good idea to me. Muscles have memory, and I think I got my strength back a lot sooner after my surgery due to this muscle memory. However, muscle size was really slow to come back. Also, after doing more research on this, I wish my Dr would have recommended also taking L-glutamine and branch chain amino acids during my weight loss. These supplements are known to preserve more muscle (along with the protein) during rapid weight loss. So that might be a good idea as well. BCAAs and Glutamine are relatively inexpensive and there are some already in many of the whey protein supplements. "Inline", it sounds like it may be worth looking into these supplements if you are a lifter. We work hard for our gains in the gym, might as well do all that we can to preserve those muscles you earned. Good luck and keep us updated!

On the more expensive side, I would say Nectar Strawberry is really good (though it's a little more expensive and doesn't mixes fizzy-like), but it's a high quality whey isolate as is Unjury. A good quality less expensive one that I've turned to lately is Body Fortress, which can usually be found at Wal-Mart as well as other places. I like their vanilla and it mixes well in blender with blueberries, strawberries, etc.

"Kayte"....some people say that you can't really get too much protein, but I would have to disagree. It is true that it takes your body more effort/energy (calories) to break down protein, but protein is still calories and doesn't have negative calories, and can eventually lead to weight gain in my opinion if consuming too many. Especially if you are getting plenty of protein from solid foods, then chugging 4-5 Protein shakes a day in addition to the solid protein. Eventually your body is going to get more protein than it can use and at some point (since they are calories), they will be stored as fat if you have too many. I think for us, it would be fairly difficult for us to get that many grams every day without drinking a ton of them. How many grams each individual needs varies and depends on factors such as overall body mass and it's composition (muscle), one's age, activity level, etc. I know for me, I don't go with the "1 gram of protein per pound of body weight per day" theory like a lot of the other gym rats I lift with. I can't imagine consuming 240+ grams of protein, especially now. I don't care how lean that protein is, that's still a lot of calories. However, I probably do get in a lot more than most people on this message board. I'm guessing I get on average of 100-125 grams of proetin now. I lift weights very heavily and at a very high intensity and there is a lot of muscle broken down during my workouts, so they need the extra protein to repair and rebuild. But if I didn't lift weights or do much cardio, I would probably only shoot for around 60 grams of protein a day. But that's just my opinion as I know what works for me. Kayte, I would discuss this with your nutritionist as I'm sure he/she has a pretty good idea of your situation and needs. http://www.livestron...ou-gain-weight/

Hang in there! That regret will one day change to "I wish I had done this years ago". : )

About 6 or 7 hours a week here. About 5 hours resistance (weights) and another 1-2 hours a week in HIIT cardio (3 to 4 half hour sessions).

You rocked it like it's your birthday!!! Congrats!!!

Awesome! You look very fetching! Congrats and nice point on the board as good motivation.... I second that!

Thanks Dorrie, you can count on it!

"noexcuses"..... you will be fine if you work hard in the weightroom and adhere to nutrition guidelines for us sleevers. Skull crushers are fun....haven't done those in a while, very good for triceps. Since you mentioned those, I think I'll add them in with my dips next time. You'll notice some muscle/strength loss initially during that rapid weight loss, but try not to get too discouraged, when the weight loss slows just a bit, the muscle will come back. When your Dr gives you the go ahead, just ease back into for the first few weeks, don't want another surgery.

Wow, that's a lot of miles! Way to go!

I am still a good way off from my overall goal weight of 215, but I am a little over 5 months post op and have met many goals so far. I am off my blood pressure medicine, off my cholesterol meds, free of joint (knee) pain, a little more energy than I had before and my strength is coming back to where it was pre-sleeve. One of my main concerns about the surgery and weight loss was my overall strength. If I had ANY real reservations about having the sleeve, it was due to my concern about a loss of muscle/strength, particularly a loss that I wouldn't be able to get back. I've lifted my whole life and have enjoyed what weightlifting (resistance training) has given back to me. It's great therapy and the testosterone rush it gives us guys for a few hours after lifting makes me feel great! I like being moderately strong (at least for my age/mileage), but I am FAR from being a "powerhouse". Anyway, a good test of overall body strength is the deadlift. It works almost the entire body and is a good way to measure overall strength. Before my surgery I was deadlifting 450ish and I weighed around 300 pounds. Today, I hit one benchmark which is my weight on the scales. Before I got into lifting today, I weighed myself (usually do about once every week or two) and I was 252 (I'm now down 50 pounds from 292 since surgery). I know that's a bit of a slow loss compared to many people with the sleeve, but I'm totally fine with that. That slow loss has helped me maintain muscle, with the exception of the first month and a half after surgery (lost a lot of muscle/weight during that time). So next up today was my lifting session at the gym. I've been flirting with 400 on the deadlift for several weeks now. I took last week off from deadlifting since it can take quite a toll on the body and I think it helped me. I busted through that 400 plateau big time and ended up deadlifting 425 pounds today!!! It felt great and I got it up fairly easily, I think I could've seriously pushed the 450 mark today. Not bad for a guy who is 6'-3" to 6'-4" (harder for tall guys to deadlift). The main thing is, this tells me that my pre-sleeve strength is pretty much back, minus the 50 pounds of fat that I've lost. Thanks to the sleeve, Vitamins, Protein, hard work in the gym and you all on this message board! There's been times when I haven't been happy with getting the sleeve (especially right after surgery). But I am very thankful for it now and wish I had done it 10 years ago (when I weighed 320). I feel great, I'm healthier and I'm strong again! Thanks for the sleeve and thanks for everyone on here who has had so much great insight to share in regards to the sleeve, nutrition, supplements, exercise, etc! You've all been very very helpful and I thank you! Next goal...... 215 on the scales and 450+ on that deadlift!

I am still a good way off from my overall goal weight of 215, but I am a little over 5 months post op and have met many goals so far. I am off my blood pressure medicine, off my cholesterol meds, free of joint (knee) pain, a little more energy than I had before and my strength is coming back to where it was pre-sleeve. One of my main concerns about the surgery and weight loss was my overall strength. If I had ANY real reservations about having the sleeve, it was due to my concern about a loss of muscle/strength, particularly a loss that I wouldn't be able to get back. I've lifted my whole life and have enjoyed what weightlifting (resistance training) has given back to me. It's great therapy and the testosterone rush it gives us guys for a few hours after lifting makes me feel great! I like being moderately strong (at least for my age/mileage), but I am FAR from being a "powerhouse". Anyway, a good test of overall body strength is the deadlift. It works almost the entire body and is a good way to measure overall strength. Before my surgery I was deadlifting 450ish and I weighed around 300 pounds. Today, I hit one benchmark which is my weight on the scales. Before I got into lifting today, I weighed myself (usually do about once every week or two) and I was 252 (I'm now down 50 pounds from 292 since surgery). I know that's a bit of a slow loss compared to many people with the sleeve, but I'm totally fine with that. That slow loss has helped me maintain muscle, with the exception of the first month and a half after surgery (lost a lot of muscle/weight during that time). So next up today was my lifting session at the gym. I've been flirting with 400 on the deadlift for several weeks now. I took last week off from deadlifting since it can take quite a toll on the body and I think it helped me. I busted through that 400 plateau big time and ended up deadlifting 425 pounds today!!! It felt great and I got it up fairly easily, I think I could've seriously pushed the 450 mark today. Not bad for a guy who is 6'-3" to 6'-4" (harder for tall guys to deadlift). The main thing is, this tells me that my pre-sleeve strength is pretty much back, minus the 50 pounds of fat that I've lost. Thanks to the sleeve, Vitamins, Protein, hard work in the gym and you all on this message board! There's been times when I haven't been happy with getting the sleeve (especially right after surgery). But I am very thankful for it now and wish I had done it 10 years ago (when I weighed 320). I feel great, I'm healthier and I'm strong again! Thanks for the sleeve and thanks for everyone on here who has had so much great insight to share in regards to the sleeve, nutrition, supplements, exercise, etc! You've all been very very helpful and I thank you! Next goal...... 215 on the scales and 450+ on that deadlift!