OutsideMatchInside

You were in ketosis with your liver shrunk. Then as soon as you could eat purees you went on a carb binge, beans and potatoes and expanded your liver and knocked yourself out ketosis. That is why you gained weight. Try low carb purees. If you keep eating carbs like that you are going to have a hard time losing long term.

Scale. I weigh everthing. Mayo, salad dressing (even though it is calorie free) and the cream for my coffee. Measuring cups and spoons are not accurate.

I set my protein goals at 1 gram of protein per pound of lean mass. You can't have too much protein as long as you have healthy kidneys. You can only absorb 30 grams or less at a time according to the ASMBS and most Doctors. I usually have 20 to 30 grams 5 times a day.

I think bio oil is great on scars. It helped with my surgery scars. Did nothing for my loose skin at all.

I'm almost 2 years post op and I can still feel my sleeve. I can point on my body and tell you exactly where it is. Depending on what I eat and drink I can feel every inch of it. The only time it is painful is if I overeat or eat too fast. Your body is telling you to slow down or ease up. Early on right after surgery I could not tolerate cold liquids. That eased up over the first month. Cold was ok but ice cold or too cold was like daggers.

The good thing is, you can mask most of it with clothes. I have come to accept I will never look perfect naked. Even plastics won't help because there will still be scars. I'm okay with it. People that start under 300 have no idea what it is like to be 300 plus, what it does to you. You won't find too many people here that start over 300 and lose anywhere close to a normal BMI. Most people start in the 200s or they start in the 300 plus and just bottom out in the 200s. Losing a whole entire grown man like I have there are very few people that post here in that situation. You have 3 inches on me so that is to your advantage your skin might not be stretched as bad. You were right in your assumptions about the areas with stretch marks. My areas with the really bad deep dark stretch marks have the most loose skin. The areas with light stretch marks or no stretch marks have snapped back the best.

Make sure you really have your eating disorder in check before you have surgery. WLS makes it very easy to fall into eating disorders or have old issues resurface. I suggest you start working with a counselor and continue to do so through the whole process and for up to 2 years post op. WLS is basically a person with an eating disorder dream. You can go hours and even days without eating or feeling hungry and you can make yourself vomit very easily. If you feel depressed and worthless now, the hormone dump from rapid fast loss and the rapid changes to your body will only make you more depressed. You need to get to a good place mentally before you are ready for surgery. Losing weight won't solve all your problems, you will just trade them for different problems.

Nothing but plastic surgery is going to really help. With that dismal outlook. There are lots of things you can do that are low cost and even if they don't help, won't hurt. Over 100 grams of protein per day Collagen supplements pick any good one A super moisturising lotion with aha and Collagen enhancements Massages Fascia Blasting Lots of hydration A few months ago I almost had a nervous breakdown about my skin. Nothing is going to fill the skin from losing literally half your body size. Each month I am under 200 lbs, it gets better, it is adjusting and shrinking. Also continuing to lose helps too. There is a worse before better stage.

I'm not really sure that is a pretty unique situation and honestly most people here don't strive to maintain ketosis or even know what it means. You could ask some of the keto groups on Facebook or try /r/keto on reddit. Also I would try a 3 day fat fast, Google it. Or an egg fast and see if that jump starts things.

@cdeisroth I thought it was vanity sizing too but I had some items from college to try on and these items were 20 years old. I weighed a lot more at the time when it tried them on, a good 30 to 40 pounds more than I weighed when I wore them in college. I told one of the guys at work I weighed 190 and he was totally shocked. If you use a size calculate someone my height and weight should be a 14 or 16.

I have a pretty face but I am not about the short hair life. I have curly hair and now I feel like I am more of straight hair person so now I wear long straight hair wigs. Which is a huge departure from my naturally curly hair. My face shape is different and straight hair looks better.

Find a different doctor.

Several doctors have told me that being morbidly obese changes your body. Your body has to adapt to carry the additional weight. Your bones are denser (mine are about 3x as dense as the average woman my age), and you have more muscle mass. I weigh more than I did in HS but I am about 2 sizes smaller. Most women in the 190 weight range at 5 foot 6 inches are not wearing a size 8 dress, but I am. Loose skin has something to do with that but the information from my DEXA scans let's me know that my body is different tham most.

@Heather I WLS knocks some people out of menopause and others into it.

A thigh lift is a complicated surgery usually with lackluster results. You are not going to find many doctors that do it, fewer before and after and even less likely to be low cost. If my thighs looked like her before I would be happy. https://www.realself.com/review/miami-fl-medial-thigh-lift-43-years-dr-mel-ortega?offset=6# You should be able to poke around Real Self and find someone you want to contact.

Net carbs 25 grams or less, you can subtract the fiber. It sounds like you are suffering from Gerd in addition to making bad food choices. Available proton pump inhibitors include: omeprazole (Prilosec, Prilosec OTC) aspirin and omeprazole (Yosprala) lansoprazole (Prevacid, Prevacid IV, Prevacid 24-Hour) dexlansoprazole (Dexilent, Dexilent Solutab) rabeprazole (Aciphex, Aciphex Sprinkle) pantoprazole (Protonix)

If you can swallow pills you can take pills. Those chewable vitamins are digusting

At 3 months out you don't eat real food?

It isn't common or normal, this is a 7 year old thread for lap band patients. If you are cramping when drinking call your Dr.

The more carbs you eat the hungrier you are going to be. Meat keeps you full. Think of you sleeve as a muscle, if you don't exercise is won't work as well. So if you don't eat meat, you won't be able to eat meat. 900-1000 Calories are fine if you are under 25 grams of carbs a day, and exceeding your protein goals It also sounds like you could use a PPI if you aren't already taking one.

Nope. I have eaten 3 strawberries in the past 20 months. I think the number might actually be 2. If you are hungry drink water.

You answered your own question. You added mayo and mustard, liquids, to make it mushier and easier to eat. If you add liquids to things making them sliders you will be able to eat large amounts of everything. You are working around your sleeve. That aside, being able to eat 2 mushy eggs doesn't mean your sleeve is too big. If anything it means you are healing well.

If the skin is really stretched nothing is going to help it. Especially not push ups . Those "loose" skin in those pictures aren't even loose skin. I could show you real arm loose skin, it isn't filled to the brim with fat like those picture, it is actually loose empty skin. Trying to fill the skin with muscle, if you have a large amount of loose skin is impossible/pointeless. My thighs are literally 1/2 the size they used to be, about 40% of my thighs are just loose skin. I can't make enough muscle to fill that skin in, if I did, I would be massive in size. How much loose skin you have if you have any is going to depend on how large you were, for how long and how much weight you lose. When I just lost around 100-120 pounds I didn't have much loose skin, but when I lost the last 50 or so, it started appearing. I am sure when I lose another 20 it will be worse.

I gave up alcohol before surgery. I had the occasional mimosa with brunch because I am civilized. I had communion at 2 weeks, not thinking. It burned really bad. And communion wine is watered down. I imagine real alcohol would burn like hell. It is your birthday do whatever you want, you are an adult, but you have been warned, it might really hurt. I'm not even going to bother with empty calories and all of that, because it doesn't even matter.

@loveley_tai I didn't tell people besides my close friends because I didn't want to be stuck with the WLS label forever. 1.5 years later I know I made the right choice. After the one year mark I felt pretty regular and not like a weight loss surgery patient at all. I used to work with a lady that had RNY. 5 years later, at work, people would still comment about her surgery, gossip about what she ate and comment she was still, well a large lady. 3.5 years from now I don't want to be stuck with the WLS patient label, especially when I will be doing all the work at that point. Your sleeve stops doing the work for you at 6 months. The rest of it after that is your will power, and ability to make life changes and learn good lessons from the first 6 months. Since most people think diet and exercise work, if people see you changing your eating habits and working hard, they will assume that is why you are losing weight. And if you read around here from all the cry baby posts, people are not dropping 50 pounds a month like some episode of Supernatural. You lose 8-12 pounds a month on a good month, the only thing is it just keeps happening with no back tracking. You don't lose weight fast enough that people are alarmed and most of the time by the time people have noticed your loss, you are down 50 pounds. It is an easy "secret" to keep. This is a hard enough journey without having other people put their pressure and opinions on you. Keep it to yourself. You can always change your mind later, but you can never untell once you tell.