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6/22/22 - I received a call from the surgeon’s office that they got the go ahead from the insurance. I was instructed that I would need to complete some on-line courses, sign some paperwork and pay the $400 co-pay, prior to scheduling the surgery. I was able to print, sign and scan the paperwork and send back via e-mail. I took the online courses, which rehashed almost everything I’ve been told to date. My patient navigator says she had everything and will be moving my chart to the scheduling office and that scheduling will reach out to me within a few days. More waiting... 6/23/22 - Thankfully the scheduling office called back this afternoon and finally, we can schedule surgery. July 14th is the day I get my sleeve. I do not have a pre-op diet plan, although the day before surgery is to be clear liquid only. 7/11/22 - I went to the surgical center for my pre-op appointment. They did an EKG, Chest x-ray and took a few tubes of blood. No one told me to fast and no one asked me if I fasted, so hopefully they won’t have issues with my blood samples, since I had a few beers on Sunday. My weight is up from the weekend, but I am planning to be good for the next three days. Now that I'm caught up, I guess my next post will be on my surgery day.

5/13/22 - I had my visit with Cardiologist. I got an EKG and saw the doctor. They scheduled me for a Transthoracic Echo (heart ultrasound thing?) and a stress test at the hospital on May 18, and I have a follow up with him on June 3. 5/18/22 - I had my Echo-thingy and stress test at the hospital. Everything went well I think. The stress test was telling. I got my heart beat up to 137 in three minutes, and did another minute on the treadmill before asking if I could call it quits. It took me 4-5 minutes to get my breath. I am so out of shape, but at least my heart didn’t explode. 6/3/22 - I had the follow up with Cardiologist. What a waste of time. Cost me $40 co-pay for him to say I was good to go for the surgery. He wants to see me in 6 months and says I might be able to get off some of my medicines. We’ll see if I make the appointment. I called my patient advocate at the surgeon's office to tell her I had finished all my appointments. She was still waiting on clearances from my cardiologist and my primary. I’ll call back on Monday. In the mean time I'll call my primary and find out why they haven't sent their clearance letter yet. 6/5/22 - I had a chat with my neighbor’s wife this weekend. She got her sleeve a few years ago. It’s kinda scary to think about my life after surgery. I’ve been drinking beer for years and I enjoy socializing with friends. I enjoy eating. These things are going to have to change. I am not going to be able to drink beer anymore, or at least I probably shouldn’t. I'm thinking about vacation in August. If I get my surgery in early July, I will miss out on that fresh Iowa sweet corn. I'm thinking about fantasy football drafts. Tailgating for the Saints' games and Talladega in early-Oct. This is going to be a challenge if I can’t drink alcohol. Sigh. 6/7/22 - Only 3 days till my 3rd/last visit with the surgeon. I checked with the office and found out they had no received the clearance from the cardiologist. I scanned a copy of the letter and sent it via e-mail. 6/10/22 - I weighed myself at home and I am down to 295.8. That's 21 pounds I've lost since March. At the surgeon’s office, one of the ladies behind the counter seemed excited for me since they had all the documents. I signed all the consent forms with the doctor, but they have to send the package to BCBS and we will have to wait a few weeks to get the final okay before we can schedule the surgery. Hah. Just when I thought the waiting was over. LOL.

So you actually do have your restriction it’s just that it occurs with a certain behaviour. The power of the restriction does fade over time. We learn behaviours to avoid it & your body learns how to process what you eat more effectively like how we can eat more as we progress. I still have my restriction at three years out but I only feel it if I’m not careful say if I eat too quickly or drink too much & then I know about it.

In three days, July 14, 2022, I am scheduled to get my sleeve. My insurance company had me jumping through hoops for over three months to get to this point and I am excited to get this thing started. I've lost weight before by restricting calories and carbs, but I would eventually lose motivation and the weight would come back. Twelve years ago I dieted and went from 250 to 198, before I gained it all back. Nine years ago I went from 250 to 184, and I gained all of it back, plus a bunch more. In 2020 I was at my highest weight, But two years of working from home, I had gained another 25 lbs. Wearing gyms shorts, t-shirts and flip flops has been great, but there's no motivation like having to put on some khakis that don't fit and a tight polo shirt to drive into the office. My pants won't stay up and it looks like I am carrying a sack of groceries under my shirt. Embarrassing. That was the end of March and that was when I decided to talk to a surgeon.

I may be the only guy in this thread. My surgery date is July 14, so only three days from now.

How fast did you eat it? Remember it takes time for messages to get through & maybe you ate so quickly you didn’t get the message until it was too late. It can be easy to do when not eating mindfully. I know I’ve done it & bet others have too. Some days we slip and that’s okay. See it as being a good reminder. My full signal takes a while to kick in (up to 90 mins sometimes I discovered to my discomfort) so it would be easy to eat more than I need. I try to eat until I’ve had enough not until I’m full or I feel my restriction. It’s why I ask myself if I need the next bite or just want it. I’ve served all my meals to a portion size since surgery three years ago. Though some days I eat less of my serve. Like I haven’t eaten all my usual serve of my breakfast once this week. Didn’t want it. I ate what I needed & put the leftovers in the fridge. Certainly you are able to physically eat more as you progress until you are able to consume about a recommended portion of most if not all foods. How long until this happens is an individual thing. For me it was a few months after I reached goal.

Yep, that will be the one they used to remove part of your tummy & use the most during the surgery. It’s usually the slightly larger incision, cause more discomfort & take the longest to heal. How long will depend on how you heal. You had three surgeries in one so you had quite a workout & may take longer to heal & recover.

If you look on pintrest there's loads of recipes for biatric patients and some recipes from the start of biatric three to protien

I’m on day three from having a revision surgery to take out my lapband, fix a hiatal hernia, and have a gastric bypass. I’m doing decently except for when I try to stand up from my bed or my sofa, the big incision on the right middle of my torso hurts like crazy. Burns, stings, sharp pain — more than just “sore” like the other incisions. It takes my breath away. I’m guessing this big incision is where my surgeon took out the port from the lapband and did most of the work, since it’s the biggest and most painful one by far. I don’t remember having one incision be this painful after my two other laparoscopic surgeries (appendectomy and lap band). Anyone else have something like this post surgery where one incision is far, far more painful than the others? If so, how long until the intense pain went away for you?

I was told I could swallow everything the size of pencil eraser (and smaller) as soon as I got home from the hospital. That was all except two pills. I had to wait about three weeks before I could tackle those - fortunately, they were ones I was told would be safe to wait on. So I never had to crush anything.

It sounds like you did but just in case for you or for others reading this, make sure to check with the pharmacy before opening or crushing anything. With some medications this can actually be harmful. Now to answer your question. I did not have anything as big as a capsule but I did have three pills I needed to take and I took them the next day after surgery (as in swallows them whole) without any issues. Some people do have more swelling though and pills can be hard for a few days. If so, most can be opened or crushed and taken with a bit of applesauce.

Thank you everyone. Just feeling a little down and defeated, I guess. I know I'll get through it because I have to in order to better my life and hopefully get rid of this awful Diabetes and excessive insulin (two of three main goals behind doing this, the other of course is losing weight). Also, I tried to update my profile to include all the stuff you all have under your names like weight, surgery date, etc, and I couldn't figure out where to do it. I'll check some of the help boards now.

I am 38 and started with a BMI of 57! Three and a half months post op my BMI is now 43! I am not far enough out to talk about long term success but as far as I am concerned (and my team), right now I am killin' it! I had an easy recovery and easily slipped through each phase and into my new normal life. I wish I did it 10 years ago. My surgery was extensive, basically 3 surgeries in 1. (Bypass, Hernia repair and esophagus repair and "trimming" due to damage from the years of GERD.... Took about 5 hours. I know everyone is different, but I also know positive stories help when people have the jitters. I was/am pretty healthy. My only medical issues were high blood pressure and severe GERD. So I didn't have a lot of risk with surgery other than the normal risks that just come with any surgery. My surgery was extensive, basically 3 surgeries in 1. PS: Bypass seems to have cured my GERD! You got this! Relax and enjoy the ride, it is so rewarding when you see your efforts paying off!

I was 49 when I had my VSG and had a BMI of 50.7. Three years later at 52 my BMI is now 24.6. Life could not be any better! I’m happy, healthy, and active. Shopping is delightful! I could not have made a better decision for myself, my only regret is not doing it sooner.

I was never faced with a multi course tasting menu until I was well into living with Gastric Bypass long-term. Pre-op it never appealed as my family was about volume over quality. I've since faced down the multi-course tasting menu with style and aplomb, generally by not worrying about my rules. No matter what happened volume would sooner or later become an issue. Sipping during meals has always been something I was more than willing to do. I usually took a taste of most courses unless it simply did not appeal. Unless a course was just the bees knees I didn't take more than two or three bites, I'm not gonna waste that all important space on something that was not worthy of it. There was usually one or two courses that were just that good to merit in depth exploration. Often it came down to "Let's make a deal"... Would you like to finish this course, or wait for the next course which has a cream sauce your sure to love, or this course that has lobster just the way you love it, or this later mystery dish later that will be something new? At any rate, we all have our approaches and our deals with ourselves and the devil. I just don't dance with the devil that often. Good luck, Tek

I’m a left over freezer not so much planned food prepper but the idea is similar. Most things I cook is three or four days worth (or longer) & I simply freeze two or three single serves. I freeze just about everything. Leftover vegetables, soup, meat sauces, meat balls, steak, lamb cutlets, pork tenderloin, chicken tenders, corned beef, etc. Just defrost & reheat. All I usually have to prep is vegetables & I can do that in a couple of minutes. I use a lot of zip lock bags but others use specific food containers. Have a look at the Food before & after thread, @Starwarsandcupcakes is an avid meal prepper plus there’s other general meal ideas too for home & eating out.

Don’t worry, a lot of us felt that way some time even with support people about. You’re really learning how to eat all over again in many ways. The other challenge is discovering what works for you. You could do exactly the same as someone else but you struggle simply because you are not exactly the same psychologically or physiologically. Take our ideas & experiences as somewhere to start. Maybe try to find a nutritionalist close by who has experience with bariatric weight loss. Someone on here may even be able to refer someone. Also some bariatric clinics put their plans etc. on line so you could refer to them for additional ideas. Glad you’re giving soup another try. You may find that with other foods too. You easily ate it yesterday but today it’s no way. Then three days later it’s fine again.

I take a different approach to meal prep than what you describe. Instead of cooking one meal and eating the same thing all week, I've built up a collection of meals frozen in individual portions. Soup, chili, and stew freeze really well. I also make various meals that consist of meat, vegetables, beans, and sauce (there are lots of Instant Pot recipes like this) to freeze in individual portions. Most recipes yield 10+ portions, so I can cook three times and have a month's worth of dinners. I highly recommend Souper Cubes, which are like giant ice cube trays. They're available in several sizes, and the 4-ounce size is perfect for a single serving. The portions stack easily, so you can store many portions in a small space (much more compact than Tupperware containers). For a quick and easy meal, I dump some riced cauliflower in a bowl, throw in a souper cube, and heat in the microwave. Sometimes I also have a side salad or a side of veggies. I have enough different meals that I can eat a different one every night of the week. Here are a few of my favorites: White chicken chili Egg Roll in a Bowl Zuppa Toscana Chicken Divan Pork Chile Verde Brunswick Stew Creamy Chicken and Spinach Soup (I omit the tortellini and use more chicken)

Brunch with my BF 2 eggs w/ potatoes, crimini mushrooms, zucchini, shallots, red peppers, baby spinach, melted mozzarella, herbed goat cheese whole abs whole grain toast. Coming in at a whopping 1310 cals. I estimate I had about 300 cals worth. I’m sure the majority of the hidden cals were from butter or oil while cooking. I can’t help but think of I made this at home it would be 1/4 the calories. But this will be either two or three more meals depending on who finishes it.

You will likely soon hit the "three week stall" (do a search for it here) where your loss will slow or stop and possibly even increase a bit. This is entirely normal and totally unrelated to what food phase you are in (people who are still on liquids as well as those who have been on soft foods since the start go through it.) It has to do with the matter that initially you are losing a big chunk of water weight associated with your glycogen stores (basically stored carbohydrate) being depleted due to your low calorie intake. Once that is depleted, your body shifts gears to burn your stored fat, which burns more slowly, so the weight loss slows a bit, too. Entirely normal. In our program they specifically tell us that their patients tend to do better as they move into real food - not strictly from a loss rate perspective, but for the sake of feeling better and more energetic, which leads to being more active and helping to maintain a more sustainable loss over the long haul. I was starting to nibble at the gym again after a couple of weeks, not for the sake of boosting loss rate (it didn't need it...) but for maintaining the habit (and not allowing my wife to use me as an excuse for not going!) I was certainly not burning any more calories there than at home, but more just starting to get a bit more variety in activities.

Everything that @catwoman7 said. I’d just add: 1: Haven’t heard of any breathing issues post surgery, but if you are a smoker this may be something to watch. See #3. 2: Vomiting is a possibility post surgery but haven’t heard of any one vomiting blood. When I had the awful diarrhoea attack day 3 it was very dark & I presumed it was old blood. 3. Some require you to stop nicotine before surgery. Nicotine will slow your recovery & increases risks for surgical complications. 4: I had trouble swallowing for about three days because of swelling. I was spitting up a lot of saliva. Though not easy, I was still able to sip & swallow meds. I found warm/hot drinks are more soothing that cool/cold. 5: Missing the odd vitamin is ok. We all forget at some time but don’t make it a habit. You don’t want be become lacking in an essential vitamin, mineral or nutrient. I am someone who was allowed off my multivitamins - at 8 months which was 2 months after I reached goal. I was having blood tests every three months (sometimes more) & my surgeon told me if there were any drops I’d be back on the multi vitamin. Three years out & my bloods are still good. Lethargy & energy drops in the weeks post surgery aren’t uncommon. You’re healing, recovering, & on a reduced diet. Adding an electrolyte drink can help, as does getting in your fluids, protein & vitamins & resting when you need to. 6: Pre existing reflux usually rules you out for a sleeve as sleeves are predisposed to develop reflux/gerd post surgery. Being prescribed a PPI (acid reducer) post surgery for a couple of months is pretty common as your tummy tends to produce excess stomach acid while healing & in response to changes to your digestive system & eating. Personally, I’d had reflux for years before my surgery. It was pretty mild. I controlled it with dietary choices & rarely took medication - a couple of times a year maybe. I still have reflux. It’s still not very bad but it manifests differently. I still watch my food choices & take a PPI every day.

I joyfully kissed all my shakes away on day one week three. It was always my goal to rely on real food to get all my nutrients in & not depend upon supplements or meal replacements. My surgeon was also okay if I was not hitting my protein goal while going through the first stages as long as I was making an effort so that took off some pressure. But as @ShoppGirl said it does depend upon how much you can eat. (I wasn’t able to eat much but usually hit 40-50g of my 60g protein goal.) I found a good high protein yoghurt (15-20g) & a yoghurt smoothie (22-30g) to keep my protein closer to goal. I also did things like make my scrambled eggs & rolled oats extra milky to get in a little more protein. But being lactose intolerant I realise this isn’t quite as easy for you. Were you given a caloric goal or a recommended carb intake or limit? How many extra carbs or calories are you getting in by consuming lactose free/dairy alternative products? Because we eat so little it would take a lot to really have a negative impact on your weight loss. I drink a lactose free milk because I can’t drink a lot of ordinary milk. (No issue with other dairy though.) And even though it has about double the calories, it didn’t have an impact on my weight loss. Milk alternatives can actually have fewer calories than cows milk (per 100mls): Full cream cow’s milk – 281 kilojoules (67 calories) Rice milk – 255 kilojoules (61 calories) Regular soy milk – 241 kilojoules (58 calories) Oat milk – 213 kilojoules (51 calories) Reduced-fat cow’s milk – 191 kilojoules (46 calories) Reduced-fat soy milk – 153 kilojoules (37 calories) Skim cow’s milk – 142 kilojoules (34 calories) Sweetened almond milk – 123 kilojoules (29 calories) Sweetened cashew milk – 123 kilojoules (29 calories) Coconut milk – 95 kilojoules (23 calories) Unsweetened cashew milk – 73 kilojoules (18 calories) Unsweetened almond milk – 69 kilojoules (16 calories) Same with carb content. Macadamia milk: 1 gram of carbs/cup Hemp milk: 1.3 grams of carbs/cup Soy milk: 1.6 grams of carbs/cup Almond milk: 1.99 grams of carbs/cup Flax milk: 2 grams of carbs/cup Coconut milk: 3.38 grams of carbs/cup Oat milk: 9 grams of carbs/cup cows milk: 12grams of carbs/cup Have a chat with your dietician. They should be able to recommend lower calorie or lower carb alternatives if your intake is excessive for you to try. PS - Stalls rarely have anything to do with the calories or carbs you are consuming but are a natural part of your weight loss journey. Your rate of loss is never constant but zigs & zags, ups & downs & plateaus. Your body stalls or takes a pause (as I heard a surgeon say recently) to catch up with the changes - surgery, weight loss, change in diet or activity, etc. Think of it as your body is stressed & it needs time to recover & accept the changes. Just like you do if emotionally or mentally stressed.

We’re all different in how much & what we can eat. Were you given any portion size recommendations? I scrambled my eggs from purée stage & two eggs were breakfast for three days. It took me months to eat one egg. (I remember ordering one egg scrambled at 8 months while on holidays.) Still can’t eat two eggs three years out. Tread carefully because all your cut nerves are still healing and your full signals & messages you’ve had enough aren’t getting through or aren’t getting through in the same way. It’s why portion size recommendations are helpful at the beginning. (I was told 1/4 - 1/3 cup from purée.) Burping signals you are swallowing air while eating not that you are full. Also aim to eat until you’ve had enough (do you need the next bite or just want it) not until you are full. It takes time for the full message to get through so when you feel full you’ve really eaten too much. Sorry soup made you sick. I loved soup. Could it have been too thick or something in the soup - a flavour or ingredient??

I thought the sleeve made you less hungry but it’s four days after surgery I stomach growls and I can’t drink more than 2 ounces but I’m diabetic and my blood sugars have been low all four days and I’ve had to turn my insulin pump down three times. I’m counting the days till I go to soft foods and I’ve watched at least 20 YouTube videos on how to make soft and parade foods fake hamburgers shepherds pie summer from nursing homes where all the patients have no teeth but the recipes look good

I am over a year out and in maintenance. I still choose to have a shake for breakfast daily 160, one of a handful of lunches that I know are around 300 calories, a choice of dinners under 500 and a couple of snack options right around 100 calories each. I have never eaten a ton of variety because I am pretty picky so this works for me. Someone with a lot of variety this totally wouldn’t work for. I can keep a pretty rough idea in my head. I basically just know if I ate to plan yes or no for my meals and how many snacks I have had and then I know if I’m on track for the day or not. (I know how many I can have after working it out actually logging for quite a while though). Some days my dinner may be less calories but other days I am super hungry and I have an extra snack so it balances out. Basically I semi log my food at this point but I do it in my head counting by 100’s. But I agree it is very good to do it in the beginning and do it for a good while because we first need to figure out where our calories need to be to lose and to maintain but also because there are foods that we just really don’t know how many calories are hidden in them. For me a big one was baby back ribs. Odd I know. I guess I just assumed it’s a meat. It’s innocent. It’s not a desert or a dreaded carb, right? And I knew the sauce was bad but the meat itself doesn’t have sugar so when I found a descent sugar free BBQ sauce I thought I had this meal all figured out. Well, did you know a HALF rack of baby back ribs has 668 calories WITHOUT sauce and 45 grams of fat!! That’s only about 4 oz of meat so a comparable chicken breast is only 190 calories sans the sauce. I am in my 40’s and I just learned this about ribs. I had never logged them because I don’t eat them often enough but I had a couple ribs on Father’s Day and I’ve been craving them ever since so I researched them a little. Guess I may just have to wait till next time i can have a couple off someone else’s plate, lol Anyways, my point is logging foods helps you to learn what is in most foods so you know if they are totally safe (green light), sorta pushing it (yellow light) or a total splurge (red light that you can run on occasion if you are in maintenance and have budgeted for it). Logging also helps you to learn little tricks you can live with for your favorite meals like the sugar free sauce, veggie substitutions, lower carb bread options, etc to make them a little better for you. Once you learn these things about most foods you will encounter day to day, a more “intuitive version of eating” seems more doable in my opinion. For me the ribs are a definite non runnable red light as I have gained 3 pounds above my happy weight I am not allowing myself ANY red light or yellow light foods until I drop these three pounds (I have also cut back on my snacks for the time being to make it go a bit faster). At almost 16 months out now this is the first time I have gained past my happy weight so I am making this up as I go but so far I have lost a pound and a half with this plan so it seems to be working for me. A lot of people like to use apps like my fitness pal for logging. Like anything else It takes a while to get it set up but once you do they say it’s goes pretty quick. I did it the old fashioned way which allowed me to keep a page of frequent meals so I could quickly add those. It’s just whatever works for you. Some people on here say they take a day off each week from logging or they only log on weekdays, etc. just commit to what you can because anything is better than not logging at all.