JupiterinVirgo

I really try to put fruit in my body every day. The sugar in an apple or a strawberry is not the same thing as the snickers or a Coke. My body needs these nutrients and I find I actually lose more weight when I eat more real organic food, especially fruits and nuts.

I want to thank you all for your positive comments and feedback! This place has helped me through this process since before I even had my surgery and I'm just so glad to have such a supportive virtual community that I can talk to about my weight loss and the challenges that sometimes come with it.

I never fully subscribed to the bariatric gospel as I call it. My personal experience has been that long term I was guided to eat in a highly and balanced way that had consequences to how well I felt. So my tip is, listen to your body. If it is asking for nuts or a certain kind of cheese or certain fruits or vegetables, eat them. I have found that my body loses weight the most efficiently when it is well nourished. I have never counted calories since I had my surgery.

I have to be honest with you: I never followed a daily meal plan. Certainly immediately after surgery but since then, I have followed my intuition. I have slipped, and slid. I have binged, and exercised. I have worked really hard, but I never ever let this become a diet. And I honestly think that for me that has been one of the biggest keys of success. Diets made me fat. And now I eat whatever makes me feel good, and my sleeve helps me not to overdo it. I generally try to stay away from highly processed junk food. My digestive tract can no longer handle it anyway.

Because sugar lights up the same areas of the mind-body complex as cocaine, anybody who has eaten it on any ongoing and regular basis for any extended period of time is addicted. The good news is, like with other drugs, the cravings for it dissipates greatly once you remove it from your life. That said, for me it is still a struggle and I sometimes backslide. I find this tends to happen especially when I have hormonal fluxes, or when I have been under nourished for too long. I have found this to be a little much less of an issue and I am getting adequately nourished by organic foods, including fruit and lots of veggies.

Yogurt, cottage cheese, smashed avocado, I also was drinking a lot of tea with raw honey and cinnamon. Raw honey is so healthy for you even though it has sugar. I still use raw honey with cinnamon anytime my stomach is acting up and it seems to do the trick! At three weeks I was also eating soft tuna, soft scrambled eggs, and generally anything high protein that was very moist and did not upset my stomach.

I recently moved to Mexico, where you can buy vitamin B 12 shots over the counter. I just started using these and I feel better already

Mostly because it's poisonous and acidic. Also, some post bariatric patients experience discomfort from carbonated beverages.

I have had some issues with this. In all fairness, I had some issues before surgery, and did not know then what I know now: teeth decay is the nutritional problem not a hygiene issue. Your body polls nutrients out of your bones to replace the ones you were not getting. Also issues with blood sugar can affect your teeth quite a bit. If there's too much sugar in your saliva and blood, it can cause your teeth to decay. This is a real issue that needs to be addressed for people who have bariatric surgery. We are not informed, about the real consequences of malnourishment and undernutrition.

Strongly. In fact, before I even had my surgery I made a point to discover where I could get organic, non-GMO protein supplements. I do the same for my vitamins. I strongly prefer organic but I insist on non-GMO products. I believe GMOs are counterproductive and harmful to my goals to become healthier. I'm down 150 pounds! And I don't eat GMO protein powder or use vitamins that have GMO's.

Rice tends to swell in the sleeve so it really depends on whether you can tolerate it. I recommend eating very very slowly and in very small quantities.

From the moment I made the decision to have the sleeve, I was open about it and so if the support of my inner circle alone. This included my mother, my sister who had already had the surgery, and my closest friends. I was afraid, and my body is my own business, and I didn't want other peoples opinions, thoughts and feelings to disturb the process I needed to experience to claim a better life with better health. That is, I kept it close to my chest until I stopped feeling raw about it. Now I'm a year and a half out of surgery, down 150 pounds, and lower then the goal weight I chose for myself. I speak about having had weight-loss surgery openly infrequently. But only because I'm truly OK with it. Bodies are very personal. Health is very personal. When it feel safe, and you are inspired to, then speak about it. Until then, consider allowing yourself to feel how you feel and be as private as you want.

From the beginning, I threw away my scale at home. I only weighed in at the surgeons office for the first six months. My sister also had the sleeve and she weighs herself obsessively on a daily basis. This causes her a lot of stress and fear and anxiety. I spent a chunk of my life dieting. Living and dying by the scale on a daily or weekly basis. Since the surgery was a permanent move toward permanent improvement in my health, I decided that above all else I would not have a dieter mentality about it. My first way in after surgery happened six weeks later. The next one at three months. The next one at six months. Steadily going down. At six months I had lost 80 pounds. I still do not own a scale at home and only weigh myself when I have an opportunity-or roughly every 3 to 4 months. My weight is still going down! And I don't obsess every day about everything I eat or how I move. I just keep losing weight without obsessing about it too much.

I chose the sleeve. Best decision of my life. It is well known that people have gastric bypass often have more serious long-term complications. Trust your "gut" and do what's right for you!

Not really. But what really helps is somebody thumping you on the back with the side of their hand. My sister is a nurse and she did that for me right after I woke up and I felt better

Nine months is around when my weight-loss slowed down also. Now I only weigh myself every 3 to 4 months. Your body will still lose weight, but at a slower pace. Each time I hop on the scale and I'm down a few more pounds, but I do it very infrequently. This is help me to avoid becoming discouraged Or thinking like a dieter. I weighed myself around the holidays and came in at 190 1/2 pounds. I weighed myself a week ago and was down to 168. That's only 4 to 5 pounds a month. That said, I am already underneath my goal weight which was originally 180 and I wasn't sure I'd ever get that low. Now I'm going for 150. Then I'm going for plastic surgery.

It is recommended that you do not smoke post surgery. That said, I am a smoker and always have been. There is a greater risk for ulcers after sleeve with smoking. I smoke cigarettes and I also smoke a ******. I love a good ****** lounge, but if you're looking for permission on this forum or reassurance that it's OK to smoke, or medical professionals agree that it is not. It's a personal decision, and like all decisions we have to live with the consequences of them. So it's up to you!

What an inspiration!

Skin elasticity does improve slightly over time, but if you lost a substantial amount of weight you can forget the fantasy that your body is capable of making your skin look as though you had never been highly overweight. I'm down 150 pounds with a few more to go, and my skin has tightened up a little bit, but everything is sagging. Like most bariatric patients, I am in very serious consideration of having plastic surgery to remove the extra skin, which makes it hard for me to see my real body, and cause a strain on my bones. I have heard your question asked so many times in this forum over the last two years in so many ways. It seems to be a huge concern for bariatric patients, but the bottom line is that bariatric surgery is only step one. After you lose weight, you need another surgery to remove excess skin unless you are comfortable with how your body looks after weight loss. There is no cream or shortcuts to getting around this. Successful bariatric patients either live with the consequences of having been fat, or get plastic surgery to deal with the skin. This is occasionally not true for patients who had the bariatric surgery with a low BMI. Some of those people really don't require plastics, but most of us do. At least, if we want to feel like we have undone the damage, and put an end to the yo-yo for life. I know, once I invest in plastic surgery, there is a much much lower chance of me falling off the wagon and putting the weight back on. But that's my personality. Not a side effect of surgery in general. But to me, my bariatric surgery and the sacrifices that came with it are a big deal. Investing in plastic surgery, and going through the pain and recovery of that, is a huge investment for me personally. And I think it is a way to sort of seal the deal in my own head, by healing the perception I have of my body.

It slows down but weight-loss continues. At a certain point, I don't even weigh myself except for once every few months. And every few months I am surprised to find I've dropped another 20 pounds even though I thought I wasn't losing weight anymore. I had my surgery in late November, 2015. And I'm still losing.

I had my surgery in November 2015. I am down 150 pounds and have surpassed my initial goal weight by 12 pounds. I am now going for the blue ribbon, and attempting to lose another 18 pounds. This would bring me much lower than I ever thought I could physically get, and it will be time for plastic surgery. Amazingly, for unrelated reasons, I just moved to Mexico. Of course, I will be doing a lot of research, but I always figured I would come to Mexico for plastics anyway. I am almost 40 and I'm not trying to get the body of a 20-year-old girl who never had weight problems, but it is my intention to get the Fluer-de-lei tummy tuck and to have my breasts lifted. My question is to those who have had these procedures, how does this affect the vaginal mound? I do not want to have surgery on my labia or Clitoral area, but I do have extra skin above there that is not technically my stomach, but a fleshy mound that grew around my clit, and has now deflated. I do not want to have a tummy tuck that makes it look like my stomach and my vagina do not belong next to each other vertically. Does anybody have any experience with this? Is it a separate procedure? I do not want to risk having any nerves severed around my clit or labia. I just want the top of my ***** to blend in with the bottom of my belly when the surgery is done.

Yes and it looks fantastic! I've never seen results that nice that didn't involve the muscle tightening on the inside, which I wish I didn't need. I just didn't want to come out Square. You look great!

Thank you all so much. That is such helpful information! Unfortunately the picture @scamps isn't showing, but I would certainly love to see it. How is the recovery ladies?

I would definitely go for at least two weeks. I didn't begin to feel substantially better until 10 days and I was exhausted for three months

I think in situations like this there are a few obvious things in play. The first one is that there is an established social order in this particular click of women. That is, this group of women socializes by going out to eat and that is no longer something that appeals to you. Second, you, knowing how painful it is to be very overweight in a culture that doesn't allow women to a joy to have body variety, in addition to whatever torment the individual holds that causes them to over eat to the point of becoming unhealthy, you represent the trigger. You have taken redemptive action that takes a great deal of courage, and your friends aren't there yet. Can you imagine how triggered they might sometimes get to see you accomplishing what they perhaps dream of doing? Most people do not have the skills to express their emotions lovingly when they hurt. Maybe be a little easier on yourself and your friends and invite them to do something that they can physically handle that does not center around food, or, begin finding yourself a new group to hang out with that is more active. Or both! Best of luck.