VSGAnn2014

The more personally accountable I've become this last year, the less guilt there is in planning for and enjoying good-tasting food and some occasional treats that I don't eat every day or even every week. I now enjoy, in moderation, wine, chocolate, ice cream, good breads, even burgers and fries. The point is, however, that I don't have these things every day. And when I do have one or two of them in a single day, I cut back the next few days to compensate for these things. I continue to plan my menus and track my food on www.myfitnesspal.com and don't wonder or guess at how much I'm eating and what kinds of food I'm eating. I know. And that knowledge gives me power over all the food choices I make. It's a comfy place to be right now. I'm in charge of my food choices. Food is not the boss of me.

Alex's post makes me want to double down and say: Succeeding at WLS is not complicated at all. It's very simple. Do what he said. I see people who think they're smarter than all that. Or nobody's the boss of them. Or they are "creative" and believe they can figure out a better way. Or just stupid, bless their hearts. Or "just want to eat normally" (in cultures where "normal" turned them into obese, sick persons). There are good reasons for your surgeon's instructions. Just do each day what you're supposed to do each day. You will lose all your excess weight. And then you can learn how to maintain your new healthy weight.

@@Invictus ... I can't believe you're 150 pounds overweight, and you wonder if it's worth it? I have lost 89 pounds (am now at goal), and a year ago I could hardly move. Now weighing 146 pounds and 4 pounds below goal, I honestly do not understand how I survived being that heavy. For the record, I had become a nearly helpless agoraphobic. Today, I cleaned my house from top to bottom, lifted weights for an hour, did an hour-long challenging yoga class, walked for exercise and had a delicious and romantic dinner date at a beautiful restaurant tonight with my husband. Just so you know -- today is typical of how my life is many times better than it was a year ago. It's astonishing how much more engaged I am in life. If you want to live a full life, instead of struggle to make it through the day, please have this surgery. Please. And while you're losing weight please do what you need to do to conquer the demons that brought you to this point. The surgery will help you lose weight. But you have to build new habits and tools to help yourself keep the weight off. You don't have to live like this.

@Bluesea71 That is so awesome! You're inspiring me.

Although I knew being obese was very stressful for me, I had no idea how very stressful it was. I have so much more empathy for heavy people now than I ever did before, even when I was one of them. As I've said before, I have NO idea how I could function at all when I weighed almost 90 pounds more than I do so. But I'm afraid the answer to rhetorical question is: Not very well at all.

@@Kindle I wish this hadn't happened and you and your friend's family and other friends weren't having to deal with this aftermath. I strongly encourage you to see a grief counselor. And I hope like hell that she/he is a good one. You may remember I'm seeing a shrink related to my self-care issues. He's been a tremendous help. I'm not saying we shouldn't feel bad when we feel bad. But I think in a situation like you're in it's dangerously possible to get stuck in an emotional eddy and just swirl round and round there for a lot longer than we need to before managing to get back into the main life current (weird metaphor, sorry). Anyway, I hope you can find someone you can relate to who is a very good therapist. I'm the toughest b***h you haven't met yet, and I'm not too tough to recognize and appreciate the support I've had from my therapist. Sometimes we need an external perspective and some better tools to deal with bad s**t. Ann

@chunkylover About the carbs ... One thing I do watch is Fiber grams (women need at least 21 grams daily). Fiber is found in high-carb foods that are unprocessed, e.g., colored vegetables, fruits, whole grains. On days when I reach 21 grams of fiber are days when I eat: 2 pieces fruit (e.g., apple, orange, mango, cherries), 2 pieces high-fiber, whole grain bread, 2 colored veggies (e.g., Beans, zucchini, tomatoes). I find that when I plan to eat "good" carbs that I don't crave the "bad" carbs. Just a thought ....

For two months pre-op, I started cutting down on food, drinking lots of Water, eating slower, moving more, etc. I thought it made sense to start building new behaviors as soon as possible. I was right. One of the other things I did was to cut down on coffee. And guess what -- with greater exercise and less caffeine I started sleeping better. And we all know that getting sufficient sleep is important for our health and to maintain a normal weight. For one thing, when we're up late at night with insomnia most of us tend to hear the siren call of the refrigerator. Right? Now that I'm post-op and have reached goal, my coffee / caffeine intake is still waaaay down from what it used to be. Most days I have either half a cup of coffee (with half a cup of heated skim milk -- a homemade skinny latte) or when I'm really tripping two of those skinny lattes. My mood is less volatile, too. But then these days I'm not nearly so pissed off about being a fat cow in arthritic pain -- so the coffee may not be a factor there.

I could not have eaten 5 ounces of chicken 16 days post-op.

That video is truly a no-bullshit, must-watch for anyone who's at or near maintenance or struggling to get their act together during the losing phase. Thanks, @@CowgirlJane for posting it over here.

@@NoBsVs pretty much said it the way I would have said it myself. I was so done with not living. In some ways, I felt "dead" before WLS. I sure don't feel that way anymore!

I'm glad you're getting medical attention. You're in the right aisle and moving forward. Good job.

The Pew Research Center is the gold standard for research about religious issues. In 2014 Pew found that, since 2007, self-identified US Christians declined from 78% to 71% of the adult US population. The survey also found that 22.8% of adult Americans identified as religiously "unaffiliated," up 7% from 2007. These respondents included: 3.1% atheists 4.0% agnostics 15.8% "nothing in particular" http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/americans-christian-atheist-agnostic-survey-article-1.2219229

@Elizabeth21 Check out this video by a bariatric surgeon about why patients regain. Spoiler alert: Despite the video title, it ain't because their stomachs stretch. It's really worth the watch for anyone who is worrying about or struggling with regain.

@Elizabeth21 Have you ever eaten 1,000 calories for months / years at a time and remained overweight? If not, then don't worry about that happening to you in the future. For the record, I've never done that before. Heck, I've never eaten 1,500 calories for months/years at a time and remained overweight. It was always more like 2,000 or more. And I wasn't moving much at the time. For now, I'm eating 1,400 calories a day and maintaining my weight. I would like to get that up to 1,600/day. We shall see how that goes.

Very cool. Thanks for posting this.

And that, ladies, is why the human race has not evolved into women and a sperm bank.

@@sdocforce ... I really hesitate to respond to this, since I just got to my goal a few weeks ago. Generally speaking though, I'd say you've GOT to change seriously your night-time grazing behavior. I (think I) know what would work with me, knowing my own psychology pretty well. No guarantees it would work for you though. But if I had the patterns you had, I would turn this into a big ole science experiment and study my eating very hard: At what times of the day am I eating? What am I eating when? Where am I eating? Who's around (or not) when I'm eating? What else am I doing or what else is happening when I get the urge to graze? What are the macronutrients (carbs, fats, protein) in my food throughout the day? What other factors are present in my environment when I am most triggered to eat? What other patterns do I see in terms of my eating behavior? And perhaps more. From that I would hope to discover the most obvious things I need to change. Another thing I would do is get back in touch--very strong touch--with why I want to lose the regain, reach goal, and regain control about my eating and nutrition. WHY do you want to make those changes? What rewards are waiting for you at the end of all that? Several months ago, my shrink told me this: "Most people regain because they are no longer receiving the positive reinforcement they once had while losing weight. The compliments peter out and then stop. The scale stops moving. Life goes on. Losing weight and the thrill of losing weight is no longer the focus of your life. People who don't regain are able to find a new focus / new reasons / new motivation to remain healthy and become even healthier." And amongst all that, I would find my way back to the path I wanted to be on. But your reasons won't be my reasons. The reasons for you to remain healthy and normal-sized will surely be very personal to you. And not long from now I'll be where you are, trying to find a new motivation to stay healthy and normal-sized. Very, very best to you. Ann

@@Kindle ... I'm thinking about you, too. Please reach out if I can be of any help to you.

Rog, you have my support to gain 4 healthy pounds slowly. And like you, I am not in the mood to eat crap (ice cream, chips, etc) to stop losing. Not in the mood at all! For my part, I'm trying to eat more whole grains than I did while losing. And I'm now eating 1,400 calories/day most days. Yea, me!

Alex, you rock. I would love to see you and Huizenga debate this on one of the national morning TV shows. Very seriously love to see that!

Thanks for the word. My husband (who has not had WLS) has always had this condition. Interestingly, he characterizes it not as sneezing upon satiety, but upon over-eating.

I'm with @@Bluesea71 -- sounds good to me. I started at 235.7, weighed 216 day of surgery, and reached my goal of 150 at 8-1/2 months post-op. The first 4 months post-op, I lost 10-11 pounds a month, which slowed in months 5-9 of losses from 4-7 pounds. It's obvious why we lose less as we go along -- over time we weigh less (and are burning fewer calories) and we're eating more (in my case, on purpose, since I didn't want my body to learn how to maintain on a starvation diet). You don't say what your weight was when you started or what or how much you're eating. Without knowing that, I can't say much more than "Yea, you! Keep going!" FYI, at 6 months post-op (like you), I was down a total of 73.2 pounds and down 53.2 pounds since surgery. P.S. BTW, good on you for exercising so well. And for losing 13.2 inches in your waist already. Those are wonderful changes you've made.

Big-time congratulations to you. You did everything. The sleeve helped a lot. But YOU did it.

Humans have a bad habit of projecting like crazy on each other 24/7. We imagine how WE would feel in your situation, and we assume you must feel exactly like we'd feel. Yeah ... no. It's a good social skill to learn how to give compliments in ways that invite others' opinions about their own situations. For example, here's how not to do it: "Your husband / wife probably can't keep his hands off you now!" says SO much more about the person who made that comment and their relationship (or their lack of a relationship) than it does about you! "You must be so much happier now that you're not overweight," comes with a built-in invitation for you to b***h slap them. "I bet you don't even remember what it was like to be heavy / fat / overweight!" Seriously? How do you know what I remember? "I bet you wish you'd lost this weight years ago, huh?" Actually, I did lose this weight years ago. About five times, as I recall. And if you're giving out free wishes, I'd wish I'd never had this weight problem to begin with. Bottom line: Don't tell people how they feel, what they think, or what they want. Instead, compliment people in general terms that describe your (not their) feelings or thoughts, and then invite them to tell you how they feel: "Wow, you look wonderful! How are you feeling?" "I'm so impressed by your new look! How are you doing?" "You look amazing! What's going on with you?" Even when we luck out and describe how the other person is actually feeling, doing so can rob them of the chance to express their own feelings in ways that are more authentic for them. Or they may simply say, "Thank you." Not everyone is comfortable talking about themselves or changes in their appearance.