JamieLogical

Definitely follow YOUR surgeon's instructions. All of his/her post-op care is going to be built around the idea that you are following their plan. If there are problems, it will be easier for the to assess what might be wrong if you are doing what THEY tell you to do. I do think that if you are struggling to drink water, you should discuss that with the surgeon, because forcing yourself to try to drink too much too fast can make things worse. It's definitely important to get in your liquids, but there can be real, physical limitations to doing so if you have excess swelling or inflammation. So that's something you should discuss if it's an issue.

Definitely get that stuff out of your house! You don't need a safety net to fall back on. Plus you are going to need the space for all your smaller, more stylish clothes!

A couple of possibilities. First, you could legitimately be hungry. How far out from surgery are you? How long are you going without eating? For me, if I don't eat every 3-4 hours, I definitely get legitimately, physically hungry. Another possibility is head hunger. If the TV your watching include commercials, I will still, to this day, see certain food commercials and thing "I NEED THAT RIGHT NOW". I can usually talk myself out of it pretty quickly when I assess how I'm really feeling, what I've already eaten that day, whether or not I am physically capable of eating whatever it is, etc. Yet another possibility is that you still associate watching TV with snacking. I know that pre-op, I had certain Snacks that I associated with certain shows. I would ALWAYS eat ice cream while watching Survivor, for instance. Or chips & dip while watching Nascar. So I had kind of a trained psychological behavior of eating snacks while watching certain things and that association didn't magically disappear when I had surgery on my stomach. Finally, it could be excess acid mimicking hunger. Most people who experience GERD experience it more in the evening or at night. So even if you don't have acid issues during the day, you might still have it at night. If the "hunger" you are feeling is stomach rumbling/growling, then this is likely the culprit.

Everything you've experienced is normal. The first few days can be rough, especially the gas. Hang in there!

Usually they want you to lose some weight to prove you will be able to stick to the post-op diet. The trick is to not lose so much weight that you no longer meet their BMI requirements.

How do you manage it? A serving is half a cup or one small fruit. If I ate that much, I'd have no room for Protein. For me it would be a half cup of veggies OR 3-4 ounce of meat, not both. Unless I ate 10 times a day so I was eating veggies/fruit at half my meals and meat/protein for the other half, I don't think I could manage. At best I think I could do maybe 2 full servings of fruits or veggies a day and still get my protein in.

I really really hope things come together for you to be able to pay for this. There has GOT to be a way to make it happen!

You will eventually get to eat some fruits and veggies, but likely only a few bites at a time. Not the 5 full servings per day that are recommended for most adults.

Definitely not intending to knock anyone down. I would just hope that everyone closely examines how a food like that would fit I to THEIR plan. I was told by my nutritionist to try to get up to 100 grams of protein as quickly as possible post-op, so I was always looking for "protein bargains", because I could eat so little food, I really needed to make sure the food I ate was pushing me toward that daily protein goal. To me, the calorie to protein ratio on the food you mentioned didn't fit that bill. If others can work it into their daily totals, more power to them!

I haven't used them, but do they not provide compression garments? The surgeon I used provided them. If you have to buy your own, you could try makemeheal.com

For me, my main way to get back motivation is to set a fitness goal for myself. Last year it was to run 5k races, so I did Couch to 5k and signed up for a different 5k every month of the summer from April through September. This year I've been training for a half marathon. Doing my first one April 24th and hoping to do another to end the summer in on September 18th. Will just maybe do some 5k and 10k races in between. Having a goal that I am working toward really keeps me motivated way more than just thinking "I have to work out 4 times a week". And it helps keep my nutrition in check too, because it's really hard to work out when you've been eating crap! You have to eat the right kinds of food to fuel your body.

Not sure there's such a thing as "normal". One of the guys who had his sleeve the same day as me had a lot of drainage and had to empty it multiple times a day. I had almost none and didn't empty it once. Both of us ended up just fine, so I don't think it mattered in the long run. If you are very concerned about it, you could give your surgeon's office a call and make sure there's nothing to worry about.

You are in the home stretch now! Glad to hear you are doing well with the pre-op diet. It can be pretty tough. Just hang in there and keep your eye on the prize. You'll be joining us on the losers' bench in no time!

Congrats!

I bet it's from the 35,000 calories they force-fed you while under anesthesia....

Worrying is accomplishing nothing. If you start to develop severe pain or fever, THEN you should start worrying. Until then, you are just making yourself crazy. Esophageal spams are VERY common post-sleeve while you are healing. I had them with every single little teeny tiny sip I took for the first 2-3 weeks post-op and ultimately they went away as I healed and I was just fine. If you aren't in pain, aren't running a fever, and are able to get in your liquids and protein, then just focus on the things within your control and don't worry so much.

Glad to hear it! I never understood why some surgeons had crazy rules about having to take chewables or liquid Vitamins for so long post-op when my surgeon had swallowing small pills from day 1 and big pills from day 7 with zero ill effects.

@@4MRB4PHOTO Too funny!

Yeah the surgeons on that show are all terrible. It's sad that they are so bad they have to refer "difficult" cases to Dr. Now for his "expertise"!

I've actually spent time scouring the internet for ideas on how to keep my fingers from turning purple while I use my keyboard and mouse at work... any gloves thin enough to type with wouldn't be warm enough.

Morgan killing someone was the only truly good part of this episode. Well, aside from Abraham's classic one-liners. As far as character and plot development, Morgan shooting someone was the really interesting moment, along with the mystery horsemen who turned up immediately after (Hilltop residents maybe?). That was WAY more interesting than the over-hyped Negan reveal and his 30 minutes snore-fest of a speech.

I was always cold even when I was fat. Now it's worse! Leave my space heater running under my desk all day long at work. Stay under a blanket at home. Wear my coat or a hoodie at restaurants and movies. I feel like I'm never warm.

I had that in my early days post-op. It must have been associated with the swelling, because it did go away a couple of weeks post-op. Do the bubbles come up into the back of your throat? That's what mine did.

I love them! The Cinnamon Twist are my favorite. The only thing I'd point out is if you are still losing, you might want to use them sparingly because they have slightly more calories and carbs than Quest. In maintenance I haven't had any issues at all with them. I have 2-3 a day now because I'm training for a half marathon and have to eat a ridiculous amount of food to not keep losing weight and they are very convenient.

Head hunger early on was a real challenge. Now, at 19 months post-op, I occasionally get a craving or some head hunger, but nothing like in the beginning. As for real, physical hunger, I do get that if I go about 3-4 hours without eating. Usually it manifests as "hanger" more than anything. I don't even notice it initially myself, but people around me do. I turn into a total Snickers commercial apparently. I have also noticed that on my long runs for my half-marathon training I will get dizzy and kind of nauseous if I don't intake some calories at regular intervals. I started eating an energy gel packet every 3 miles to ward that off.