aNYCdb

Hells to the no!!! Based on advice from folks who made the mistake of telling co-workers about their surgery and having having been judged for it, I was told that I would have to be crazy to tell anyone about it.

That's a good point I've been using these because I've eaten them before, but I should also look at other brands that are high protein (I would stay away from the WW meals because of the sodium). Has anyone tried the south beach diet meals sold in the supermarket?

This isn't really a recipe, but I've been mixing it up with Stouffers Fit Kitchen microwave meals (they are mostly protein and not super high in sodium) and I get at least two meals out of them. From a cost perspective when they are on sale that turns into ~$1.50 a meal. Plus the knowledge that this is portioned (at least for me) as two meals makes it easier to make sure I don't have too much food available for grazing.

In my experience so far, I usually need to wait at least 30 minutes after food to drink, but I can go from drink to food comfortably in about 10. That said everyone is different so try different combinations until you have one that works for you.

Protein shakes, tuna fish pouches, egg whites, pickles, and gazpacho (I whip it up in my little blender "a la minute").

I had a family member ask to see my incisions (this person was neither a child or someone qualified to judge how I was healing). Otherwise it hasn't really come up and I've only told a small number of people and everything else has been explained as "I'm on a diet."

Perhaps your insurance is great, or perhaps she is talking about the referral you need to see the surgeon. Approval for the actual surgery may be a completely different process. That said either way congratulations on starting this journey and let us know how things progress (even if your process is faster than most).

I think the general rule is 6-8 weeks due to the risk of blood clots, but talk to your surgeon about what they recommend and if there is something that can be done to mitigate the risk (blood thinners, wearing those inflatable boots, etc).

I'm confused are they using the endoscope to see how big the pouch that they made during a VSG is or are you having an Endoscopic Sleeve Gastroplasty (ESG), where they create the pouch using a suturing machine at the end of the endoscopic camera. The idea being that if they do the surgery from the inside with no external incisions that it is much lower impact.

Pre-surgery just focus on cardio with only a light amount (or I should say intense amount in small doses) of strength training (to help minimize muscle loss while losing weight).

Not from Michigan, but congrats on starting the process.

Congratulations!!! I'm from Huntington, but I had my VSG surgery in the city about a month ago.

Ah, I should have guessed by the "h" in "yoghurt" that it was a British thing.

Of course if they have altered their behavior to mess with you then hit them all with a wooden spoon (they deserve it). That said I wanted to ask how is you recovery going? The way that you are talking about the living room it almost sounds like you are using it as your dedicated recovery space, which begs the question how is your recovery going? I ask because for the most part while pain is normal you should be out walking quite a bit at a week out (I'm assuming surgery was VSG or RNY) and stairs shouldn't be an impediment. I think that if pain was preventing me from being up and about for that long that I might start getting frustrated with nearly everything my family did even when it wasn't intentional (or at least not malicious).

To one extent or another I think most of us have gone through a pre-op diet with the goal of shrinking our liver. While most of these diets are high protein low carb (getting into ketosis is the quickest way to shink your liver). They also run the gammot. For me it was a reasonably manageable protein shake for breakfast and lunch, followed by a dinner with a lean protein as the star. Some folks have 100% liquid diets and there is even someone who was forced to drink nothing but skim milk for a month. I am curious was that last line a typo or are you really being asked to eat squash?

I can completely relate to the frustration that you are experiencing, and obviously if these folks (I'm assuming family) are intentionally overplaying their interaction with their food then obviously that's a d!ck move. That said, to some extent you are wrong for "asking them not to eat in front of me." Yes it would be great if they could rejigger their routines to try to minimize putting you in situations that that make you uncomfortable, but as @frust8 rightfully points out you could just as easily leave the room. At the end of the day most of us have had these surgeries to help us get healthy and help us adjust to what have probably been long term unhealthy relationships with food. While it's great when our families go that extra mile to make our recovery easier it's on us to remove ourselves from those situations that cause us this discomfort.

From what you've said I'm not 100% sure I understand what the problem is. Are the people around you trying to enable bad behaviors while you are in (I'm assuming) the liquid phase of you post op diet. If they are simply eating and that is bothering you, I can totally understand though I don't think they are being insensitive. For now you have your food and they have theirs, that shouldn't stop you from "sharing" a meal together with these folks (even if your meal is a protein shake). Everyone is different with how they recover, but can I ask, is the issue that their eating is making you feel genuinely hungry, or is it just that you wish you could be eating whatever it is that they are?

How many calories do you think you are burning in a day? 2000? If so 2000-550 = 1450 net caloric deficit a day. A pound is about 3500 calories, which means you should be losing about 0.4 pounds per day, which is about 3 pounds in a week. Perhaps you are burning more calories than 2000, but I don't know what you BMR is or how much exercise you are doing. Obviously there are so many other factors that go into this that could impact this, but 3 pounds a week is nothing to sneeze at.

Thankfully/Unfortunately I have a wardrobe that ranges from Medium to XL as my weight bounces around over the years, so no need to buy anything.

I wish, but I'll be happy when I get to at least no longer be in the obese category.

Not to sound like I'm defending poor customer service, but having insurance approve without any of the presurgical hoops they make you jump though is a bit abnormal, but ever plan is different and congrats for being approved without all of the presurgical things they generally make you jump through. As someone with UHC I wish they didn't make me jump though all of those hoops, but like the commercial says I must have picked the wrong plan.

It's interesting when you account for the changes in the population size that the drop in the RNY and Band seem to be absorbed by folks opting for the sleeve. It's also interesting how low the numbers still are for the DS, which anecdotally I would have thought was increasing in popularity recently.

***Updated with a poor before picture.*** Exactly one month out from Surgery, down 27 pounds from the day of surgery and about 65 pounds since I started on this process. CW 205 BMI ~31 Shirt is slim fit large, jeans are 34 inch waist. Sorry I didn't really take any before pictures. Hopefully these will serve as my before pictures as I loose the rest. Not quite comfortable going shirtless, but if folks are interested I have some strechmarks that run from my triceps down my sides, but otherwise nothing is hanging too loose. Before

It’s really hard to make a high protein shake without protein powders. You could try unflavored and see if that’s still gives you issues or try a different form or grade of protein (if you are using whey switch to a whey isolate or soy/pea protein). You could also try a non milk based shake (isopure zero carb)

Don’t worry about it, if you’ve lost 10 pounds on the prop diet you will be fine.