I had the sleeve done on May 5th 2011. On the day of the surgery I weighed in at 327lbs. As of today September 21st, 2011, I weigh 231lbs. At the beginning of the month I hit a plateau of 237lbs. In the past few weeks I started working out every other day. Thirty minutes of Cardio and Thirty minutes of Muscle Toning. After the first week I have notice a few things. Besides the obvious of tightening everything up and having more energy, I have noticed that I have been getting hungry more often and weak at times. Over the past few months (I know it's natural) but I have noticed my stomach capacity increasing.

I feel like I am stating the obvious... "I am burning more therefore my body needs to consume more." With that being said I am so scared to end up the way I was...

Apart of me feels bad for being hungry.

The negative feelings that I have are associated with my past and how I negotiated, made excuses, and tricked myself into justifying food period. All that in turn made me feel guilty and ashamed. Now here I am, post surgery, down 90 plus pounds, working out and feeling hungry.

I feel so scatterbrained and I just needed to get this off my chest. Is anyone going through this or something similar? Please tell me I am not alone...

You aren't alone. I am not that far out but just recently started exercising more faithfully than before. I too find that I have been getting hungrier and noticed that my energy level dropped off and I had to take a nap. I attributed that one to only being 5 weeks out of surgery and not being able to consume a lot of calories just yet to keep my enerygy up. I have been getting dizzy as well and checked my blood sugar and my level was 68 which is low for me. After doing some research I have figured out that I need to one, eat some more Protein because I am not nearly getting enough yet and two I need to have some type of complex carbs added into my diet to give me a little extra fuel for my body. While I want to still eat low carb to watch what I am eating I know I need to get some energy from somewhere and this is a great place to get it and hope it will help keep my blood sugar from bottoming out.

Good job on your weight loss thus far. You do need to keep fueling your body, but make the right decissions verses the bad ones we made before that got us to be where we were that we needed WLS.

I started back at gym week 4 postop and it took a week before I had energy to last a half hour. For next three weeks I sweated profusely at the gym and now back to normal at 8 weeks. The fatigue and weakness should go away as you continue. It takes awhile after starting an exercise program or restarting one after a major surgery. I lost strength which is returning. I use a trainer to keep me on track and from overdoing and injuring myself (she also had other clients who went through gastric surgery).

Hunger is normal, your burning calories and if you are not getting enough in to compensate for exercise you body will stay in starvation mode. For last two weeks my weight hasn't changed but then again if I am only supposed to lose 50% of excess weight, I am there and it will be months before I see full decline.

Eat carbs, toast, before working out and Protein after. Keep in mind what your excess weight was before surgery. VSG is designed to help you lose 50 to 60% of excess weight. My excess was 80 pounds and I lost 38 in first two months so I don't necessarily think it is a stall versus metabolism evening out.

MrBear78, first of all, I want to saw WOW, you are doing an AMAZING job with your weight loss! You should be very proud of what you have already accomplished!

I think what you are going through is pretty normal. Your sleeve capacity definitely does increase over time ... I am 9 months out and can eat about twice as much food now as I could in the first 3 months post-op. So, that happens whether you are exercising or not. I believe my sleeve is pretty much at full capacity now, which is to say, still not very much! I don't know how many calories you are eating but maybe that is something to address with your surgeon and see whether you should be increasing them a bit now.

My weight loss began slowing down big time after six months, and that was when I increased the time & vigor of my exercising. Definitely when I work my muscles hard I will feel weak later. Again, I think this is pretty normal ... however, to be on the safe side you should discuss it with your doctor. Not sure if you had any heart problems pre-op, and if so you might want to get that checked out. It's probably normal but if you are worried it's bettter to be safe than sorry.

I am also one of those sleevers who never lost hunger ... I have had hunger since about a week after post-op. My surgeon told me to only eat 3 times a day and not to snack, but that totally wasn't cutting it for my hungry sleeve. I now eat about 6 times a day, small meals ... each one 150-250 calories or so (if I have a larger meal I will cut back on one or more of the othe rmini meals to stay within a decent calorie range).

The advice to eat Protein soon after working out is good. Also, be sure you are drinking enough Water (something I am pretty guilty of, myself!). If you are working out hard, maybe drink gatorade or another drink to replenish electrolytes/minerals.

You are doing really great!

Best,

Kris