ShoppGirl

Well this time they didn’t operate on my stomach but with my sleeve I was for sure not able to eat what I could pre surgery. I always felt like I could eat more than others at any given stage but I never tested it too far beyond what I was supposed to have. At like 6 months out I was eating about what everyone else with a sleeve could (maybe a tad bit more) and at 3.5 years out I could eat like 4” or 5”’ of a sub but probably would’ve been full if I had stopped at 3” Not that I had them often but that was a question they asked me to get a good idea of capacity and it is pretty standard and easy to visualize. Lots of people do feel extremely full on next to nothing very early out, just means more inflammation. Also, they make the stomach a pretty standard size with the surgeries but I don't think they can control how much stretch our stomachs have. That’s not anything I got from a Dr. just my own guess to explain why we are not all the exact same at the same stage. I really hope you enjoyed your crab. I found a skinny scampi recipe that I’m gonna try making the sauce to dip mine in. I know that I won’t eat much at this point but I want to find the healthy recipes now while I’m not p hungry because last time I didn’t and i think that was part of why I regained. When I could finally eat more and my body was hungry I hadn't changed what i was eating enough to maintain the loss. Then at a certain point I just gave up trying. I am such a picky eater I have been really scouring the web for recipes. A friend of me said that making tacos with ground turkey tastes the same to her so I plan to give that a try when i can have them or taco salad.

My first day of soft foods is Labor Day and since they usually have snow crabs on sale I was thinking that would be a tasty choice for my first soft food. I just want to steer clear of the garlic butter. I tried googling for lighter ideas to dip it in but didn’t have any luck. I was thinking I could make it with I can’t believe it’s not butter light but I used to have a recipe. I’m pretty sure it had sautéed onions and it used broth. It wasn’t bad, I wish I had saved it. Anyways, anyone have a recipe like this or another idea of what to dip crab in? The more I search I think it may have been intended as a lobster or scampi sauce. I found one that may work but if anyone has one that they know is good I would really appreciate it.

Ooh. I have been on the bariatric multi for a few years since I am a revision Although it is a different brand currently since I needed chewable for a while immediately post surgery plus we do have new allergies post surgery sometimes. I will definitely keep it in mind if it continues to happen. Thanks

Did you see the idea for the ricotta bake? I have posted it a couple of times but it’s really good. I will add though that with the purée stage I was eating a lot of cheese and barely any fiber and between that and the shakes the constipation was pretty bad. I ended up adding some purée oats with the NP permission and some purée veggies with Genepro unflavored protein powder mixed in and I added a teaspoon of soluble fiber to my daily proffee and all that seems to have helped. The other thing that is pretty good is puree egg salad. I just made it like normal then put it in the food processor. Well I did use less of the yolks and subbed some Greek yogurt for half the low fat Mayo to cut some fat. I thought it was gonna be really gross honestly but it pretty much tastes the same. The other thing I did was to purée a whole container of salsa and I add that to my scrambled egg beaters and my purée refried beans for some flavor.

I can’t speak to the nausea other than suggesting you call your team and ask for more of the meds that work better. My team gave me ondansetron which is also used for nausea with chemo just in case. (I would assume that’s a pretty strong one). It does say it may cause drowsiness. I’m guessing yours does too. In terms of the non drug induced drowsiness it got a bit better for me with purées but I am still taking naps at 2.5 weeks out. Honestly I haven’t really done any chores other than make the bed, a little laundry because I have the raised pedestals and of course the dishes. I did sweep the floors with a broom last week but it took me all day because I was still in pain and I’m pretty sure the dirt pile I asked my hubby to get is still in the laundry room. Even if you don’t have outside incision pain, though, your insides are still healing so try to take it easy. I was told not twisting, bending, or straining of any kind for 6 weeks at least. I believe last time it was 8 weeks for anything involving over 10 pounds of weight but it’s been a while so I need to confirm that. I know how it feels to sit here and look at things piling up in terms of chores. I’m sure we all do, but you can seriously hurt yourself if you do too much too soon. To me it’s just not worth it. Other than dusting I just don’t see what chores don’t involve bending or twisting. I figure It will all still be waiting to be done when I am ready. It’s just me and my hubby and if it bothers him then he is perfectly capable of doing it himself. Really it’s just the bathrooms and the floors that I just can’t do properly. I have used Clorox wipes on the sink area and cleaned the mirrors. I may try to do the toilets today. I just won’t do the bottom part I guess. I do have an appointment this week as a follow up to the muscle cramp thing. I probably could cancel it since the magnesium is working but i want to ask her what I can be doing physically at that point. I will be 3 weeks out. I know that I am physically healed enough to be doing some faster walking so I plan to get my treadmill out and start doing that gradually. Anyways, all this to say please take it easy. Allow yourself some time. This is a pretty major surgery and it’s not at all uncommon to need some time to get back to 100%.

If it’s inflammation causing the pain mayne tumeric will help. Ask a Dr of course since we are all on a Combo of stuff and even these vitamins can interact or reduce absorbtion and all of that but I was told to use it since we can’t have NSAIDS. May help some

My face wasn’t red, just felt Hot. Seemed like what my husband describes when his BP is really elevated I didn’t think of it and take mine though. That’s good to know about rosacea though. Seems like as we get older it’s something new everyday. I assume Noacin will be included in my one month labs but I will ask to make certain

It just dawned on me that my first day of soft foods falls on Labor Day and I usually have snow crab legs since they always have them on sale for the holidays. I usually have other stuff with them that I can’t have now but I contemplating having them. Some people do develop allergies though and shellfish is certainly a common allergy so I’m a little scared. Part of me wants to go and get a scratch test to see if I’m allergic to anything now- although I’m not sure if that’s for foods and stuff anyways or just contact stuff. I had a little regular milk the other day and that went fine but peanuts and seafood scare me as well. I suppose I can just take a bite and then wait an hour. My husband will be home with me so I should be fine.

Oh no they didn’t offer that to me this time or last. I bet that is so weird to watch. Sounds like it could be good to motivate you again if you start struggling a bit down the road again though.

I think when you go on vacation if you just tell them you had stomach surgery they will understand. Don’t have to get into what it was specifically. Just says special diet prescribed by doctor. Or even it’s delicious but I already ate. All they really care about is knowing that it’s not because you are dissatisfied with the food. I was a savory person before my sleeve too. I had kind of a unique change to where I craved sweets which was another of the things that contributed to my regain. It’s pretty uncommon according to my dr. Post SADI I don’t feel like I am craving sweet as much. Perhaps because I know I can’t have the sweets I really would want but hopefully because that reversed itself again. We shall see. I know that I have been craving fish tacos which is really weird for me. I barely even ate fish pre surgery or post sleeve. Just made myself like once a month because I know its good for me. I don’t think the caffeine restriction is really about how you will feel when you have it. It’s more about affecting your healing and I think I also heard something about it causing irritation or GERD.

I didn’t have anymore of that. I had different food about an hour later (purée egg salad) which had been fine a few times. I have since had oatmeal that has some added sugar in it though. By accident. It was them MUSH overnight oats, most of the flavors are low-ish sugar because they use fruit juice to sweeten them but a couple have added sugars to include the maple one which if course is the one I grabbed to eat without reading the back because I had already read the back on a different flavor and it had no added sugars. Anyways, I was fine with that and it puréed down quite a bit so 1/4 cup was almost half of the container. I think it may have just been a fluke. Unless it was because there wasn’t something necessary to offset it?

Like the above poster stated little fluctuations are completely normal and they can be due to a number of factors (water weight, hormones, a full bowel, etc) . I am two weeks post op from a differnt procedure but I am assuming the post ip diet is quite similar and that happened to me as well. I attributed it to my body coming out of ketosis. The liquids on my diet were all zero sugar and the purée foods did contain some sugar which is a carb. It also could have been because I was constipated from the supplements and not getting any fiber from my diet yet. Either way I went a few days maintaining that gain and then dropped 4’pounds overnight. The advice above to weigh weekly is really good. Monthly would even be better but it’s really hard to do. I had the sleeve 3.5 years ago and what I did was to weight myself daily because I just had to but to record my weight once a week so that I could see a downward trend more easily when I looked back at the log.

For anyone earlier along in the process. Not sure if your allowed artificial sweeteners but the unsweetened applesauce for the purée stage is 1000 times better with a packet of Splenda mixed in. Honestly not sure why I didn’t think of it sooner.

Well it’s always something. Our AC just went out and it’s 83 degrees already. Can’t even imagine tomorrow. ?. My husband says he has to move stuff in the garage so they can get to everything and he can’t get it all tonight so he will call at 8am tomorrow and get someone out. I took a shower and used my leftover surgical soap on my belly so if I sweat and it soaks the steri strips at least it will not have bacteria in it. I have been reserving it for days before and after I will be out of the house and sweating like that so I still have a little left. I guess it could be worse, could’ve happened the first week while I was already miserable. I am gonna feel like a lazyu person when they come in and see my house too. It’s been two and a half weeks and I haven’t done much at all. I know they don’t really care but I always worry it will further the stereotype. I just assume they are judging when they see the overweight lady and think of course she is lazy. Ooh well between my stomach pain and the current temp I’m not moving from my two fans. ?

@Mspretty86 I maybe have clarified that I did not get pregnant. I just regained. I’m sure that if you were to gain a reasonable amount with a pregnancy under your teams care you could take it off between breastfeeding and diet. I was just saying that getting enough calories after you are like 6 or so months out shouldn’t be an issue that you would just have to eat more times a day. Many of us gain way more that is really necessary to support a healthy baby anyways.

Well I had some circumstances (some out of my control but some that ultimately were) that all added up to my regain but it boiled down to unhealthy choices and increased portion sizes. Just don’t do that and you should be fine. Sticking with the support groups should be a huge help. I stopped posting here and going to my my appointments when I started gaining too much because they couldn’t offer much for me in terms of options and I was embarrassed. It was a bad decision since that was when I needed support most.

I had the sleeve 3.5 years ago and gained it all back within a little over a year. I wasn’t pregnant but I can attest that you can certainly eat around a smaller pouch if you want to. I did it without intending to. You would just need to eat smaller healthy meals more often for pregnancy. I would recommend speaking with your Dr and nutritionist now if that’s the plan. There may be changes you can make now to prepare.

@draikaina8503 I was just thinking that if you’re allowed if you may want to use fat free milk or almond milk instead of water to add to your shakes. It will add more protein and probably taste better.

I had sleeve 3.5 years ago and I gained all my weight back because I was too embarrassed to ask for help before it was too late. You already taken a big step in reaching out here for help. I would also reccomend that you make an appointment with your team for further support. I thought for sure mine was going to chastise me for messing up but that couldn’t have been further from what happened when i finally did. All they wanted to do is help. I ended up doing a revision but my preop diet was pretty doable and detoxed me from sugar and carbs. Mine was two shakes a day and then low carb dinner of 3oz lean protein with a cup to a cup And a half of lower carb veggies. Something like that may be a Reset of sorts but you shouldn’t do it without consulting a doctor. Anyways, doing that I noticed that each day it got easier and easier as my body stopped cravings the sugar and carbs so I didn’t feel like I was starving myself anymore. For me, that’s the biggest obstacle. If I’m not starving I can make the better choices. You may also reach out to your dietician. Be honest about what you are eating as ask for help to make small changes to get you back on track. Keep posting and let us know your progress of struggles.

I suffer from GAD as well (and bipolar and ADHD). I am 2.5 weeks post op from a revision to SADI and doing great. Taking the vitamins have taken a while to get used to but honestly it’s not that bad now that it’s habit. I take my multi in the morning and get out three calcium’s to take throughout the day and then take my magnesium at bedtime (you may not need it). The bypass type surgeries are quite a bit more scary. I think it’s because they are not as straight forward as just making the stomach a little smaller seems but honestly a cut is a cut and the risks aren’t much higher than the sleeve. What you need to ask is what are the risks of all the weight related diseases And illnesses if you do nothing. Not to mention your quality of life with GERD. What I found most helpful to get through all of this was reminding my team about my anxiety when I felt myself freaking out. I told them I just need patience and I can deal with this. I asked loads of questions. I scheduled a couple of extra appointments in order to get everything answered and I over prepared. The day I walked in for my surgery I knew that I had done any and everything humanly possible that I could do to control the situation for the better and I let the doctors and nurses take the wheel. All the while continually reminding myself that they do this procedure every day and that chances were it was going to go on without incident but if it didn’t then I was in the absolute best place to be and get the help that I needed. Best of luck with your surgery. You’ve got this!!

Its your decision. Some people choose to tell everyone, no one, or a select few. You should do what works best for you. Keep in mind it’s kinda hard to hide for a little while post op if anyone will be eating around you. But it’s far easier to divulge the news after the fact anyways. Fingers crossed you get a surgery date on.

I found a “recipe” where you mix 1/4 Cup of low fat or non fat (if you can find it) cottage cheese in with two scramble eggs and it comes out to 18g protein. It made almost 3 1/4 cup servings so 6g per serving. To me the cottage cheese tastes kinda salty so it adds a bit of salt and creaminess to the eggs. I’m not sure how soft the eggs will be leftover though (may be too dry for us right now)! so I think next time I may just make one egg at a time. I am curious to try it with just egg whites to reduce the fat and up the protein even more because I can probably use 3 egg whites for the 3 servings.

@draikaina8503 for the boiled chicken you just bring it to a boil and then reduce to simmer and cover it. It’s been a while but if I remember correctly it took close to 15 minutes for a giant chicken breast like you get from Walmart. You just take it out and cut it or use a meat thermometer to know it’s done but after you’ve done it a couple times you will pretty much just know time wise.

Make sure you ask your team about bubble bathes before you take them. I was told no bath or swimming for a while. I would have ti look at the paperwork but I think it was 6 or 8 weeks maybe. I love that your hubby is on board to eat the healthy foods with you, that will make it a lot more fun. Maybe you can do a blog or a thread on here with recipes if you have the time?? And your sister being so supportive is amazing. I found That I used the food processor instead of the immersion blender in the purée stage but it was super sweet of they regardless. I got a little 3 cup one. Actually splurged Quite a bit on the kitchen aide one so it wouldn’t bugg me to leave it out but bf budget doesn’t permit for that they have them far more reasonably priced. I have puréed eberything. I also found these little containers from dollar tree to be super handy to store leftovers in individual portions. They are 2.6 oz I think. 1/4c is 2oz and I am allowed 1/8 to 1/4 on puree so then take up a lot less room in fridge than all the big leftover containers and I can keep a pretty good variety that’s grab and go. They are basically little baby containers if you don’t have dollar tree I’m sure Amazon has something. I also got a couple of packs of their little desert sized paper plates for now and spoons so I don’t have to deal with as many dishes for a while. in terms of weighting it was really hard for me not to weigh everyday but what I did with the sleeve was to record my weight in my phone notes once a week so that when I got discouraged I could look back at that and see the overall downward trend. You can do it in the Baritastic app as well or on this app but doing it was than daily sort of reinforced it to my brain that little daily fluctuations didn’t matter. I’m curious to see what pill organizer you got. I have added magnesium at night now so I have five doses a day. I didn’t think they made one big enough for all these big vitamins so many times per day. Although I figure that most times I will only need to take the calcium while I’m out. Then again it couldn’t hurt to keep a couple multi vitamins with us just in case we would get stuck out unexpectedly. I do that with my rx meds and these are just as important ooh and if you like the fruit flavors chews you may like the caramel to change it up as well they are sorta like weathers original flavor but better because they are chewy.

Thanks for the suggestion. I’m adding a couple to my Walmart cart right now.