I was being a good girl and following the "no Water 30 minutes before or after" eating...but I would get hungry during that time period, and it would not stop until my 30 minutes were up and I had water. Water helps me get and stay full.

I did what research I could to determine if water would be harmful, but all I could find is that it essentially just pushes food through more quickly, thus enabling you to eat more. True?

I now incorporate fluids around (not with) meals and I am doing a LOT better with fullness.

Is this a huge no-no? Is it true water + food can "stretch out your sleeve"? (I doubt this highly, but I've heard it, and it's the last thing I want to do).

Does anyone else only avoid water with the meal itself, rather than before and after? I find water so useful for feeling satisfied, it's weird. Water had helped me avoid snacking after meals, and it's helped me avoid "desert" (usually a small piece of chocolate, but still!).

Am I bad?

My surgeon said that it pushes the food through more quickly so you don't get the nutrients needed. Also, it can stretch the sleeve out in time. You can barely eat as much as before so you need all the nutrients you can put in there. Drinking water is wasting the money you are spending on healthy food in my opinion. I was told to wait 1 hour before and after eating myself.

I was only told to stop drinking 15 minutes before eating and that's pretty easy, so I usually do. I'm supposed to wait 30 mins after eating to drink, but I usually make it 15-20 mins before I have a drink. There are so many 'myths' about WLS and what will/won't happen to your sleeve if you do X, Y and Z. But I'm a fan of scientific evidence, and I've not seen any about the eating/drinking thing for sleeve patients, especially vis-a-vis stretching anything out. I've not even seen compelling evidence that a sleeve CAN be significantly stretched regardless of what people try to do to it.

But that thing your (MoonSiren) doctor said about washing things through too quickly and not getting the nutrients? That kinda doesn't even make sense, as we get most of the nutrients out of our food in the intestine, not in the stomach. So washing it through faster (if, indeed, that actually happens) would not have any impact on the nutrient absorption that happens in the intestine.

What makes the most sense to me personally is that Water and other liquids can make you feel full too quickly so you don't actually get enough food in there. But water on an empty stomach will pretty much go right on through, there's no need to wait a full hour IMO...!!

I hate playing according to stupid rules based on pseudo-science or just straight-up superstition about stretching things. So I have a wee bug about this topic LOL.

My surgeon told me to wait 30 minutes before and after a meal. I sometimes will have a sip of water during my meal if I'm at a restaurant. I hope I'm not disposing of any nutrients . Anyways, I'm finding alot of differences in surgeons.

From what I understand about the sleeve and digestion, Swizzly's right. I don't stop drinking before meals because it goes right through and I wait half an hour or so afterward because when I tried drinking sooner, it came back up.

My nutritionist and surgeon's PA told me the reason for the no drinking after eating is that it washes the food out of your stomach into the intestions (where the nutrients are absorbed). BUT, it takes 20 minutes for your brain to register you are full, once you start putting food in your stomach. If you drink while you are eating, the food will be washed out of your stomach prior to you feeling full, and you will want more food. So the no drinking rule is to help you lose the most weight, by controlling the amount you need to eat to feel satisfied.

I drink up to the point I start eating. I have always broken that rule - and in fact my NUT told me I could do it with no problems

I'm with Swizzly. I have never stopped drinking before, after or during meals. Our pyloric sphinctor (between the stomach and intestine) is stil intact, which means our stomach will empty in the same manner as a non-surgical person. I agree that there is a lot of information being given out, even by surgeons, that is based on Roux-en-Y surgery that is not applicable to sleevers. The bottom line is I decide what is best for me. If my doctor's advice makes sense, I follow it. If not, I put it aside. BTW, my doctor has no restrictions on drinking whatsoever!

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I agree that there is a lot of information being given out, even by surgeons, that is based on Roux-en-Y surgery that is not applicable to sleevers. The bottom line is I decide what is best for me. If my doctor's advice makes sense, I follow it. If not, I put it aside. BTW, my doctor has no restrictions on drinking whatsoever!

The only place I heard the non-drinking rule prior to my surgery was in a pre-op group meeting with mostly RnY patients, where the nutritionists were giving quite general guidelines (we all got our specific plans and rules in separate one-on-one appointments, several of them...) and I heard the drinking thing and she said something to me that I didn't really catch (it was all in German), but I think she actually said it didn't apply to sleeve patients, but to be on the safe side, I kept to the 15/15 min thing just in case.

Actually, for me it is NOT true that liquids 'wash anything through.' Quite the opposite. There have been times I wish it were true, I'd have loved to have washed through something not sitting well or that I'd inadvertently eaten too much of. But if I drink whilst I'm eating, I get extremely, uncomfortably full, so I generally don't do it.

My program says 15 mins before and 30 mins after as a rule. However my NUT told me it was ok for me to do what I need to do - I was having alot of problems getting fluids in the more I ate because of the rule. I was told I was imposing too many rules on myself but was just trying to follow the written rules!

The stretching this is what scares me, as the size of the sleeve is really the basis of how it all works.

What is the physiological/scientific explanation behind how Water + food = stretching of the stomach? I don't see how that combination could somehow cause the tissue to expand.

The concept scares the #%^}* out of me!

I don't think there is any evidence that water + food stretches out a sleeve, at least not in those patients who are portion-compliant. However, in RNY patients (who have a 'pouch') the tissue used to make the pouch is the stretchy part of the stomach and the pyloric valve is bypassed. Those pouches CAN enlarge over time with food and liquid taken to excess. I think a lot of bariatric "advice" comes from clinicians who mainly have dealt with bypass patients.

Well then how do people who have not had surgery stretch their stomachs over time and can consume more food?

Well personally I CANNOT NOT drink in a meal, while I drink a lot LESS fluid than pre-op I still must drink in order to wash my food down. This may be in part due to the fact that I have a Schatzki ring ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schatzki_ring ) that predates my surgery, I have always HAD to drink with a meal. I find that if I control my portions properly I don't need to worry about it and go ahead and drink with my meals.

A secondary reason is that I get kidney stones at the drop of a hat and the only way I can keep them at bay is by drinking a LOT of water, one of the times I can sit and consume it at meals so I drink with meals.

The sleeve is made up of the muscle part of the stomach. The stretchy part has been removed. Doctors I've talked to (5 only) say it doesn't stretch. You'll throw up before you stretch it. Drinking water with meals will push the food through faster and make you hungrier sooner, but it shouldn't stretch the stomach. The water/food may come back up if you put too much in there, though.

The sleeve is made up of the muscle part of the stomach. The stretchy part has been removed. Doctors I've talked to (5 only) say it doesn't stretch. You'll throw up before you stretch it. Drinking water with meals will push the food through faster and make you hungrier sooner, but it shouldn't stretch the stomach. The water/food may come back up if you put too much in there, though.

I hope that is true!

I find that a little bit of fluid after my meals makes me feel satisfied, and then I feel ready to just drink water by itself 15-20 minutes later.

I don't understand how a stomach could be stretched out by merely adding water to the food equation.

My personal experience has been that adding water or other liquids in with food just makes me SUPER FULL (uncomfortably so) and stops me eating on the spot pretty much. I have sometimes really WISHED that liquid would 'push' food through; for me it has not been the case.