summerset

I think this is true. However, the farer people are out, the more the advice they give will vary as even with the successful vets*** strategies will vary a big deal as everyone can see who's browsing the boards. --- *** What's a successful vet anyway? Someone who went from BMI 65 to 31 and maintained for a year? Someone who maintained a BMI of 21.4524 for 7 years?

Regarding vets giving advice (or not giving advice) - I noticed something that rubs me the wrong way all along: There is a thread started, someone is asking for help. Several people respond with more or less helpful answers - and the thread starter seems to have vanished into thin air all too often. Means: there is no appreciation or feedback. Too many times thread starters don't appreciate the time and effort other users put into answering their questions. Now I don't expect detailed answers to every post, but a simple "thanks everyone for their time to respond" isn't too much to ask for, or is it? The lack of feedback is also frustrating. A simple "thank you, I'm going to try this" or "thank you, I already did that and it didn't work" or "thank you, I did what you suggested and it helped" (or didn't help if that's the case) would be much appreciated. Don't know about others here, but I'd like to know if the advice I gave was helpful or not.

Well, there are certain "hot irons" that cause people to go wild again and again.

You do it because you've most likely fallen off the "dieting wagon" (as was to be expected because surgery doesn't magically make strict diets work long term that failed long term before). This is something I completely understand. I set a reminder for my vitamins and minerals on my iPhone that reminds me daily to take them. Also try to make things as easy and pleasantly as possible. - take Vit D once a week in a appropriate dose - get a monthly Vit B12 shot - buy vitamin and mineral supplements that you actually like and don't balk at the little amount of sugar or carbs or calories or whatever that might go with them 17 months is a very long time already. I assume it's way harder for folks that have really a lot to lose because the time span their bodies spend in a calorie deficit is much, much longer than it is for the folks on the lighter side so hopefully another user might chime in here with advice. Did you start falling back into "bad habits" once your weight loss slowed down or stalled? I could absolutely understand that and I experienced it myself from the "old dieting times" as well. IMO this is a very critical time: having already lost quite a bit of weight but goal weight still seems to be soooooo far away. Getting motivated again to ditch most of the junk is much less hard when you're only a few lbs away from goal or when you're at maintenance (though I'm sure not everyone will agree with this). This is a very, very hard time you're going through and I hope you can find your way back to healthier eating. What helps me eating not so much unhealthy food is the thought "Well, that stuff isn't healthy, it's bad for the body - any body, including the thin ones - regardless of how many calories it contains."

Well, there is a starvation mode but it's usually not what people think. The hormonal changes like e. g. impaired thyroid function or changes in cortisol levels seem to be very real and not a myth. "Starve mode" is worth a read IMO.

I think what bella bloom said about rules carries a lot of truth for a lot of WLS patients. Of course there might be the "f*ck rules" people that were always like this, however, I think what most WLS patients experience is a severe "dieting burnout" where you're simply no longer able to follow any rules because you're so burnt out from years and decades of "following the dieting rules" that it seems to be virtually impossible. The surgery usually gives a ton of motivation but that doesn't last and the burnout kicks in again, maybe harder than before. And that's very different from "eff it, I'm not gonna live with rules".

Not necessarily. I still prefer the same tastes.

It offers quite a lot for free already and the lifelong subscription (if you want it) is quite ok as well.

Because it might still be in a calorie deficit after all?

That's still a good weight loss rate. It means 120 lbs in a year.

I can understand you want to lash out at me and I knew you would the moment I pressed "submit reply" but like it or not - your cancer analogy is an even worse scenario. If a patient with brain cancer asks you how you've conquered your cancer and you answer is e. g. "with herbal teas and meditation", leaving out the surgery detail - do you really think it's alright to raise hopes in a severely ill patient that you can treat a condition like this without surgery and with herbal teas and meditation only? When it comes to weight loss you give the impression that you did it without the help of surgery, raising false hopes in them. Why not tell them "I don't want to talk about it" instead of indirectly lying to them? --- Ah whatever, luckily you hold the opinion that people are not responsible for other people's emotions and choices... that gives me room to tell you what's my opinion within the rules of this board without having to fear that I'm responsible for your further reactions.

HIPAA? That's for medical professionals only. If Auntie Ethel and Uncle Bob or Your Best Friend choose to tell everyone you had WLS - nothing you can do about it. You're clearly overreacting here and I think you know it. I absolutely get that a celebrity wouldn't want certain information to be shared with the world. Of course they would want only the information shared that serves the purpose of making them more popular but that's not how it works and I think that all the stars and starlets are pretty much aware of this. The only possibility to prevent this seems to be - not to become a celebrity.

Well, leaving out that surgery part makes you hiding a very essential part of the truth. Of course nobody can force you to tell people you had surgery when asked about how you did lose the weight but leaving out that little detail makes you quite a bit of an impostor who's hiding a very powerful tool that helped her achieve her goals.

Well, they're celebrities... The cameras made them famous. They need the cameras. Otherwise they would vanish and wouldn't be famous anymore. They put themselves out there - with the good, the bad and the ugly. Once you're famous you aren't able to say "Oh, I don't want the media to write about this!!!" - once you have decided to put yourself in front of a camera you are in front of the camera. It comes with their job. Every job has its downside and that's the downside of being a celebrity (I'm not keen on working nights, weekends, holidays and 24 h shifts either but it comes with my job).

I would ask myself the question "What is the reason for this?" first. Start with the "Why did this happen?" and then go from there. (Please exclude "It's because I have no willpower" from the possible answers. )

Have you ever looked into books about normal eating? I found them quite helpful when it came to thoughts like "I want junk food all the time and if I let loose I'm going to eat nothing but garbage and gain a ton". I never though I would start craving the "healthy stuff" as well, but I did.

This is crazy weight loss already when you think about how many calories a body must burn to incinerate 1 kg of body fat. Totally fine to eat this stuff. Some people tend to throw out the baby with the bathwater when it comes to carbs. They're so afraid of eating "carbs" that they miss out the nutritional benefits of fruits, legumes, starchy vegetables and grains just like other people are so afraid of "fats" that they miss out the benefits of nuts and seeds.

Doesn't have that amount of protein as well. Protein cookies or brownies are very filling. I used to eat them in the beginning (got tired of them after a few weeks though). I don't buy into this "might as well eat"-mentality. Black and white. With protein cookies or brownies you eat only one - and that's it. With regular cookies... well, I suppose there might be room for a few others after the first? I also don't get the hype about quest bars. They taste like pure artificial sweetener to me. *YUCK*

Or not enough calories...

Like feeling deprived and making up for it later? That stuff's a b***h. Conquer her by eating the food you want.

What are your current food choices and what are the foods you eat when you "don't watch it"? Do you see a way of incorporating the foods you obviously crave into your daily routine in a way that doesn't make you gain weight?

This is the group for vets - it's just not very active. Start posting more in here and it will become more active. Setting up a special group (do you mean Facebook?) would drain even more vets.

The liquid phase varies. Some have to do a week, others two weeks. Some surgeons don't require the liquid phase at all. Other patients need to lose more weight before surgery and need to be on liquids several weeks.

I dislike OH as well. A "view new posts" button would tremendously help. It's a pain in the butt to navigate that board. I think that's completely normal. Of course there was a lot to learn in the beginning but now you're at a point where you know your stuff. Maybe there isn't that much to learn now? What exactly do you miss? What's putting me off is the amount of zealots with black and white thinking that are still within the first year or half year of surgery. Like WLS is some kind of religion you converted to there is quite a bit of bigotry around. I get that itch to respond (and not always nicely) and then I hold my virtual tongue because people don't want to hear what I have to say about certain things anyway. Not worth the blood pressure raise. I totally get the "some veterans are rude and mean" though - it simply was that way a few months ago.

"Bad habits?" Some people would consider it a "bad habit" to cut out fruit, starchy vegetables and whole grains and subsisting on meat, eggs and cheeses. Others damn a banana down into deepest hell. If a dietary habit is bad or not depends on the dietary philosophy people are following. And there are plenty out there to follow.