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I eat carbs before my workout and this is the only way that I'm able to actually run and not feel tired. I purchased some Isopure for after my workouts and to drink daily because I'm struggling to get in my Protein.< /p>

I'm black and I haven't lost any hair and I was sleeved 9 months ago. I made sure to get in my Protein and Vitamins. I'm not sure if that helped but it didn't hurt. My hair is still thick and long. I've dyed and relaxed my hair several times since surgery and haven't noticed a change and haven't seen any breakage or excessive shedding.

Well today was my 1 week weigh in for Weight Watchers and I lost 2.8 pounds! I definitely wasn't expecting to lose that amount since I ate all of my activity points and weekly points. Going to the meetings definitely recharges my battery because I was feeling a little mentally weak yesterday, plus I have a head cold and that always makes me very hungry but I stayed within my points I definitely believe that I will be more successful with WW than MFP. I think the MFP calorie totals screw me up because it's hard to believe which calories are correct and WW tells you how much weight equals how many points. They don't have several different calorie totals for the same food item. WW keeps it very simple for me and I'm way more accurate. I could ramble on but this head cold is making me very tired. Good Luck everyone. Oh and I should add that I've stopped weighing myself at home daily. I only weigh in at the WW meetings. I am less stressed now.

I finally joined Weight Watchers yesterday. I've been calorie counting since July and I've only maintained. In the past the only way that I've ever lost weight is by attending weekly meetings. Hopefully this will get the scale moving again. I'm not using WW online but I do have the WW calculator and that keeps track of my points usage. I will let you all know how it goes.

Well today was my 1 week weigh in for Weight Watchers and I lost 2.8 pounds! I definitely wasn't expecting to lose that amount since I ate all of my activity points and weekly points. Going to the meetings definitely recharges my battery because I was feeling a little mentally weak yesterday, plus I have a head cold and that always makes me very hungry but I stayed within my points I definitely believe that I will be more successful with WW than MFP. I think the MFP calorie totals screw me up because it's hard to believe which calories are correct and WW tells you how much weight equals how many points. They don't have several different calorie totals for the same food item. WW keeps it very simple for me and I'm way more accurate. I could ramble on but this head cold is making me very tired. Good Luck everyone. Oh and I should add that I've stopped weighing myself at home daily. I only weigh in at the WW meetings. I am less stressed now.

Quit worrying and enjoy life.

Well today was my 1 week weigh in for Weight Watchers and I lost 2.8 pounds! I definitely wasn't expecting to lose that amount since I ate all of my activity points and weekly points. Going to the meetings definitely recharges my battery because I was feeling a little mentally weak yesterday, plus I have a head cold and that always makes me very hungry but I stayed within my points I definitely believe that I will be more successful with WW than MFP. I think the MFP calorie totals screw me up because it's hard to believe which calories are correct and WW tells you how much weight equals how many points. They don't have several different calorie totals for the same food item. WW keeps it very simple for me and I'm way more accurate. I could ramble on but this head cold is making me very tired. Good Luck everyone. Oh and I should add that I've stopped weighing myself at home daily. I only weigh in at the WW meetings. I am less stressed now.

I had my 10 month post-op visit with the nurse from my program yesterday. I had gained a pound since my 8 month visit. Considering that I had rotator cuff surgery a month ago and am unable to exercise like I was, AND while home not being able to drive I had a crazy uncontrollable love affair with popcorn, of all things! I wasn't surprised. We talked at length of how my weight has stayed the same for a while even when I was exercising 6 X a week (and not obsessed with Skinny Pop popcorn) and eating about 1000-1100 calories per day.
It may be that this weight is where my body wants to be. I'm good with that if that's the case.
I can begin start walking now, but no weights, no zumba, no strong women classes, no 30/30 classes for a few more months. If by my 1 year anniversary I'm still at this weight then I will consider myself at goal.
I'm really happy with my health (off all meds for HBP, diabetes, high cholesterol) and I FEEL so healthy and happy - energetic. Plus I am wearing clothes sizes that I hadn't seen for decades.
I love this thread - it keeps things so in perspective for me.
I do like the idea of being accountable weekly by attending WW though.

Well today was my 1 week weigh in for Weight Watchers and I lost 2.8 pounds! I definitely wasn't expecting to lose that amount since I ate all of my activity points and weekly points. Going to the meetings definitely recharges my battery because I was feeling a little mentally weak yesterday, plus I have a head cold and that always makes me very hungry but I stayed within my points I definitely believe that I will be more successful with WW than MFP. I think the MFP calorie totals screw me up because it's hard to believe which calories are correct and WW tells you how much weight equals how many points. They don't have several different calorie totals for the same food item. WW keeps it very simple for me and I'm way more accurate. I could ramble on but this head cold is making me very tired. Good Luck everyone. Oh and I should add that I've stopped weighing myself at home daily. I only weigh in at the WW meetings. I am less stressed now.

One year out I have joined weight watchers. I find it helpful as there are no surgery support groups where I live. I don't follow the points too strictly, but I find the support and strategies for eating well helpful.

Well today was my 1 week weigh in for Weight Watchers and I lost 2.8 pounds! I definitely wasn't expecting to lose that amount since I ate all of my activity points and weekly points. Going to the meetings definitely recharges my battery because I was feeling a little mentally weak yesterday, plus I have a head cold and that always makes me very hungry but I stayed within my points I definitely believe that I will be more successful with WW than MFP. I think the MFP calorie totals screw me up because it's hard to believe which calories are correct and WW tells you how much weight equals how many points. They don't have several different calorie totals for the same food item. WW keeps it very simple for me and I'm way more accurate. I could ramble on but this head cold is making me very tired. Good Luck everyone. Oh and I should add that I've stopped weighing myself at home daily. I only weigh in at the WW meetings. I am less stressed now.

I usually don't post on topics like this because I always end up looking like a crazy person for saying what I do. Well here it goes: I've dealt with Constipation since I was a very young child. My butt has been through a lot of painful stools and I wouldn't be surprised if my butt hole has actually shrunk because of all the ripping and tearing that I've experienced over the years (scar tissue). I now squat to poop. I know it sounds weird but it helps get all the poop out and not just little pellets. I use a squatting platform. I'm not saying that squatting to poop makes the issue of constipation go away but when your poop is impacted and very hard to push out, squatting makes it easier. I honestly believe that the way that current toilets are designed is the reason why we have so many problems going. Toilets are often to high for us short people and it's not natural to poop in a sitting position. If you're in the woods and need to poop you will more than likely squat and find that your poop is longer and you wont feel like there is more poop left in your bowel, you will have complete elimination. My husband thinks it's weird what I do but he's tall so he doesn't understand how hard it is to poop when your knees are below your hips and I used to spend hours on the toilet just trying to push out poop and would be so frustrated. Not being regular really effects your mental state.
I don't want to go too deep into the theory and most times when I post in these threads I feel as if I'm wasting my energy because most think it's stupid advice but if you happen to be one of those people open to trying something new then definitely google "squatting to poop" and you will find tons of articles on why it's beneficial and that you wont have to deal with constipation as much. I don't use stool softeners or laxatives because they cause problems days later and you will more than likely end up back in the same situation. Drinking lots of Water has helped me and so has squatting. Good Luck

everytime I have something with over a few gramsd of sugar, Im in the bathroom with the runs within 10 minutes.... Call it dumping or whatever you want, it is NOT pleasant....
at first I thought it was just too soon post-op so I avoided sugar for a while, but I had 2 Cookies a few days ago ( Im days short of one year post-op) and low & below, to the porcelein god I was shackled...

I've been stalled also (205-209 lbs) for about 5 months. I joined Weight Watchers yesterday and will be attending meetings every week. I've been counting calories for the past 3 months and I've only been maintaining but it may be because I'm getting the wrong calorie totals on MFP. I'm looking forward to having face to face group support. There are plenty of people like us but they don't seem to post anymore :/

I finally joined Weight Watchers yesterday. I've been calorie counting since July and I've only maintained. In the past the only way that I've ever lost weight is by attending weekly meetings. Hopefully this will get the scale moving again. I'm not using WW online but I do have the WW calculator and that keeps track of my points usage. I will let you all know how it goes.

Did we just pick up September 2013 people??? Omg I'm almost a year out lol

I'm at Fort Carson and they have been performing sleeves on the base for a couple of years now. On post we dont have to worry about tricare because the surgeon decideds the requirements. Also I didn't have to worry about the 6 month surpervised diet and didn't have any hoops to jump through. The process has taken a little under 2 1/2 months total. I started the process late July and will be having surgery in a couple of days. Good Luck

Update....Well I hit my goal weight (215) a few weeks ago, but that didn't last long. I'm already back up to 219.....but some of that is Water weight since I started back on creatine. A well hydrated muscle gives me that extra rep on each set and extra set at each lift, so it's worth it to me. Also upped my cals slightly, by 300 or so a day. I felt a little weak after hitting my goal and really restricting my calories for a couple of months to get there. So I think the low 220's is my comfy place. I know years (hopefully decades) down the road as my metabolism slows further, the 220's will be hard to maintain.

The things that I've learned in my almost one year since vsg is that this is my journey and I have to focus on things that I can stick with and not necessarily something temporary that may get me to where I want to be (goal) but isn't sustainable in the long run. One of the most important things that I realized is that I can't crash diet. I can't pick a calorie number that's so low to where I feel miserable, deprived, and on the verge of bingeing. I do remember advice being given when I was preop and people would say that most people eat between 600-800 cals during the losing phase. That calorie level makes me want to binge and I've never been a binge eater and definitely don't want to start. Weight loss wasn't as hard the first 6 months but I definitely didn't have to try like I do now. Now that I have to try and figure out what different things work, I feel like I'm becoming more knowledgeable on what I need to do and my own needs. The first 6 months I thought I had everything figured out and if I had made it to goal during that time I don't think I would of learned a damn thing.
One of the most important things that I've learned is that I don't need to have a huge calorie deficit in order to get the scale to move. I set my calorie deficit goal at 500 (per day) and this will lead to a weight loss of about 1 pound a week or 4 pounds a month. This deficit also allows me to eat like a normal person who is trying to shed a reasonable/healthy amount of weight at a time. I've long abandoned the sprinting to goal approach and now I'm just focusing on slow and steady. There's no award for getting to goal early or losing a whole person in a short amount of time. Plus I didn't want to be one of those people in maintenance who are white knuckling it trying to stay at goal or the ones who freak out because they ate a snickers bar lol. My goal has always been to eat everything in moderation. I don't eat low carb or fat free diet(y) stuff. I'm a human and want to be able to eat normal human things within reason. Could I have lost faster? Probably! Yes the honeymoon period is long gone but I still have the tool *Yes, rambling again lol*
Oh and CLK that's how I lose also. I usually have one week where I lose all my weight and then I maintain for the other 3 weeks. I keep track of my cycles and can tell when I'm gonna gain Water weight or stall. My cycles have become shorter now 27 days, whereas before surgery it was 30-32 days. You, Coops, and another lady (can't remember her SN) have been very inspiring to us slow losers.

Good god you're prickly sometimes, woman!! We are just trying to help. And in case it's not 150% obvious to you, you are NOT in a good place mentally/emotionally, and the stress we speak of is not some abstract thing that isn't impacting you physically, it's a real issue that is blocking you all over the damn place...not to mention the fact that you're in a PTSD situation, an active war zone, with a head injury, a hernia, and possibly a new autoimmune illness, following a year or two of hard emotional hits. These are NOT circumstances under which you should be chasing super-low-cal eating. Don't like my opinion? I'm okay with that. But it's based on science (and common sense, frankly), not on VSG guru-ness, which expertise I have never claimed in the slightest.
So if it's also not clear: We are concerned about you. And *I* think you should NOT be eating sub-1000 calories. Not because I've had some la-la-la easy time of it (I haven't lost a gram in MONTHS), but because -- wait for it -- starving yourself is never a good idea, even if it's "effective" in making you lose weight. This is why they TREAT ANOREXIA instead of ignoring it. Jesus, woman.
We do it during the so-called "honeymoon phase" cos it's the only option when you're first post-op, and that is also the same time period during which most of us get pretty frequent medical check-ups too, cos it's not just a-okay to live sub-1000 over the long term. It causes malnutrition, among other problems, no matter how many supplements you take. And given your health and stress issues, you need to be effing taking care of yourself, not finding new and improved ways of punishing your body and yourself.
So yeah. There's my less-varnished opinions. <3

Amazing success story! I am sure you are very proud and you should be!
Remember that every body is different, every body loses at different rates and every body goes through phases of weight loss and what will work best. (And I do mean every body not everybody.) Age, muscle tone, body chemistry, hormone level, metabolism, etc. will all play a difference in what works for each individual.
I am certain you didn't mean to come across as condescending, but remember, you are an expert on your body and others are experts on theirs. We don't all get it right, nor do we all find success immediately and advice is ALWAYS warmly welcomed, but it's all in how it's delivered.

Stop whining about so-called stalls....
Did you know Diana Nyad eats up to 9000 calories per DAY!!!
now admittedly, Diana is an extreme example, however, the formula remains the same....
If you are working out 2 active hours in the gym as some claim, you are doing your health a MAJOR disservice by trying to survive on 600, 800 or even 1000 calories. Stop worrying about a so-called Stall..you WILL lose if you properly hydrate & fuel your body.
It isnt actually a STALL, your body is holding on to Water & glycogen for its dear life.... EAT THE food, MOVE YOUR BUTT and you WILL lose! ( which is why when some folks add in good fats that so-called stall is broken)
By design, most VSG patients, let alone most non-surgical patients do not have the physical capacity to eat that much a day... you have to be SMART about your high caloric intake... Protein FIRST BUT CARBS ARE NOT YOUR ENEMY!!
( and I am SURE some folks will come reply or start a new thread indicating that because you are a VSG patient, you are some kind of special snowflake & this doesnt apply to you)
Quotes to think about:
It's probably true that inactive people don't require much in the way of carbs. But inactive humans simply aren't metabolically normal, so the correct solution isn't to go low-carb, it's to increase your activity level to the point that you rquire carbs.
Don't fear eating carbs, fear not moving enough to not need them. (Melkor)
- you do not need to train to swim to break Nyad's records...nor even train to participate in triathlons, duathlons. etc.... BUT YOU NEED TO MOVE, IN A MAJOR WAY!!
I lost 100% EWL in 10 months.... I was 280 pounds pre-op. I am 153 pounds today... From size 22 down to size 6...
basically 1 year post-op.
the first 3 months were HELL... I was used to drinking most of my calories in a sugary way... I had trouble staying hydrated or eating enough food... I was re-hospitalized twice....Once I gave myself time to properly heal, it was ON!! I moved my body... and I ate the food required to do so...
your needs will change as your weight and exercise changes.... At about 6 months, I was eating/drinking 1400 calories PLUS exercising 2 hours per day, 6 days per week.... 3 days of HEAVY weight lifting, 3 days of swimming, 3 days of running, 3 days of biking....
I eat fat, carbs and even sugar at times... My daily staples include chicken salad made with real mayo and cole slaw ( because Id rather eat the slaw and have regular bowel movements then to need laxatives to get & keep things moving)
Despite all of that, on the weeks I did not make my caloric and Protein & hydration goals, I did not lose....and by not meet, I mean, the weeks I ate LESS than 1300 calories..
Most of 2013 I was in training for triathlon...I stopped training in July when I was prepping for 2 surgeries... both have since been postponed/cancelled so Im back in train mode trying to get a race or 2 in before it gets cold on the East Coast..
Now that I am in maintanence, I eat 1600 calories a day when I do NOT exercise, more if I do....I cut back on training in prep for a surgery that has since been cancelled... I plan to bulk this winter so for next 8 weeks I will cut back to 1300 calories per day to get down 10 pounds... Once in Bulk Mode, hopefully before Thanksgiving, I will go to ~2400 calories ( adding in 100 calories per week) then only workout once per day, 6 days per week.... 3 days heavy lifting and 3 days cardio til I get to my new goal ( which is a size, shape goal rather than a numerical goal)...I currently wear a size 6.... too skinny for my liking....I want to be more muscular.... My plan will likely require some tweaking to get there....
More info on Diana Nyad, my Shero of the week:
http://espn.go.com/espnw/features/article/6783740/how-diana-nyad-fuels-body
this article is 2 years old and her needs have probably been adjusted some by now...
another article:
https://healthylivingmagazine.us/Articles/150/
Every hour and a half (or up to an hour and 45 minutes if Nyad keeps swimming until the second "come in now" whistle is blown) the boat idles and Nyad swims over.
Bonnie Stoll, Nyad's best friend, business partner and "head handler," gives her the tube from a hydration pack filled with a carefully calibrated mix of Water, sports drink, electrolytes and "predigested protein."
Done with the fluids, Stoll hands over a tube of energy gel, then a single Clif Shot Blok. Then, a spoon with a bite of banana slathered in Peanut Butter is passed to the swimmer, who would invalidate the record she's hoping to set if she touched the boat. The bite doesn't provide much nutrition, Nyad explains, but even this small bit of solid food helps to coat her stomach when so much of her nourishment is coming from energy-compressed liquids and gels.
But staying hydrated -- and properly fueled -- will be of the utmost importance ...
Luckily, we know a lot more now than we did in the 70s.
"You see pictures of when Diana did this 30 years ago and she'd stop and drink a Coke and eat a piece of cake," said Mark Sollinger, one of Nyad's drivers. "It's come a long way."
Finding the right formula still took trial and error. What works for a marathon runner or cyclist doesn't necessarily work for Nyad. First of all, she's spending five, 10, 20 and eventually 60 hours in a prone position.
Speaking of Snacks, her daily calorie count during training is 9,000 for non-swimming days and 3,500 when in the tank. Think it’s fun to be able to eat to one’s heart’s content? Think again.
“It’s just too much food,” she tells a reporter. “Your stomach doesn’t want to take it in. I try to do some of it in Protein shakes and large three or four servings of Pasta for dinner.”

My stall broke!!! I can officially say it!!!! After bouncing between 176.4 and 174.6 for over a month I now weigh 171.8.
Missed my Labor Day goal by a pound. But who cares? scale is moving again! Goal is 169 by sept 21. Fingers crossed I get there! 16lbs to goal.