Lately I've seen a TON of posts about lucky sleevers that drop 100 pounds in six months.

Congrats to them and to their loss. And I would never, ever begrudge anyone the right to crow about a fantastic success. It's part of why we're all here, to share the ups and downs of this surgery!

But frequently, these posts are followed by folks that feel frustrated because they aren't losing at the same pace. All too often, we forget that everyone loses at a different pace. It's easy to lose sight of the real goal (long term maintenance) in the face of the scale goals we set for ourselves. And it's also easy to forget that this isn't a race and that there's no special prize waiting at the end for reaching goal more quickly.

I would like to contribute my loss pattern so that people can see that there is more than one way to achieve a goal. Being successful is about reaching your personal goals, overcoming your personal food demons and maintaining your weight loss for life. It's not about hitting goal in nine months.

I encourage everyone else with a slow loss story to contribute their successes here as well. It's hard to research this surgery and find only the stories about extremes - people completely thrilled with surgery or people that regret every minute of life post op. The same goes for loss. When people search out stories on this, it's too easy to only find rapid loss or stall posts but nothing showing the more realistic and moderate journey many of us take. The sleeve is a permanent tool that does not have a special window of easy weight loss. There is no reason to feel discouraged when you haven't reached goal at one year out, or even two. There is nothing preventing you (short of your own body's natural stopping point) from achieving or re-achieving goal at any point post op.

I lost 60 pounds in the first five months after my surgery.

And I slowly lost 32 pounds over the next seven months.

It took me another five months to shed the final 15 pounds to my goal.

I lost 107 pounds over the course of 17 months. I stalled twice for nine weeks each time. I had months where I only lost one pound. I regularly experienced a gain of three pounds around my cycle, and often only lost weight in the last week to ten days of the month, after sitting at the same weight for nearly three weeks.

I am a success, and at 2.5 years out (and currently pregnant) I still have good, healthy eating habits and maintained my weight loss quite easily. Even 30 weeks pregnant, I am still wearing a size 6/small (in maternity clothes, of course) regardless of how I feel about my expanding body!

I learned what was important on this journey and am in better health today (not just physically, but mentally and emotionally), than I have ever experienced as an adult.

Good luck to those currently on their journey, and I encourage everyone to share their stories here so that newly sleeved folks can see that slow vs. fast loss doesn't really matter in the end.

~Cheri

Great post! Congrats on achieving your goal and the baby!

Love This Post! and you look adorable with your baby belly Congrats!

My inspiration!! You look fantastic!!

This is a wonderful post, thank you. I'm just starting with my sleeve (12/29/12) but I had a similar experience with my lap band. It took me 18 months to lose 70 lbs. It was hard for me to see others lose their weight so much faster, but 18 months isn't really so long in the grand scheme of things and for me it was safe and steady. I was the world's slowest runner but eventually was able to run in Bloomsday in Spokane WA, which is 12K (the largest foot race in the US). Then I had a baby, and my lap band broke. (Literally.)

Already I am doing better than I ever did with my lap band. But I expect, for many reasons, that I will still be a relatively slow loser, and I have to keep remembering that it is okay!

Thank you for this very encouraging topic.

Lately I've seen a TON of posts about lucky sleevers that drop 100 pounds in six months.

Congrats to them and to their loss. And I would never' date=' ever begrudge anyone the right to crow about a fantastic success. It's part of why we're all here, to share the ups and downs of this surgery!

But frequently, these posts are followed by folks that feel frustrated because they aren't losing at the same pace. All too often, we forget that everyone loses at a different pace. It's easy to lose sight of the real goal (long term maintenance) in the face of the scale goals we set for ourselves. And it's also easy to forget that this isn't a race and that there's no special prize waiting at the end for reaching goal more quickly.

I would like to contribute my loss pattern so that people can see that there is more than one way to achieve a goal. Being successful is about reaching your personal goals, overcoming your personal food demons and maintaining your weight loss for life. It's not about hitting goal in nine months.

I encourage everyone else with a slow loss story to contribute their successes here as well. It's hard to research this surgery and find only the stories about extremes - people completely thrilled with surgery or people that regret every minute of life post op. The same goes for loss. When people search out stories on this, it's too easy to only find rapid loss or stall posts but nothing showing the more realistic and moderate journey many of us take. The sleeve is a permanent tool that does not have a special window of easy weight loss. There is no reason to feel discouraged when you haven't reached goal at one year out, or even two. There is nothing preventing you (short of your own body's natural stopping point) from achieving or re-achieving goal at any point post op.

I lost 60 pounds in the first five months after my surgery.

And I slowly lost 32 pounds over the next seven months.

It took me another five months to shed the final 15 pounds to my goal.

I lost 107 pounds over the course of 17 months. I stalled twice for nine weeks each time. I had months where I only lost one pound. I regularly experienced a gain of three pounds around my cycle, and often only lost weight in the last week to ten days of the month, after sitting at the same weight for nearly three weeks.

I am a success, and at 2.5 years out (and currently pregnant) I still have good, healthy eating habits and maintained my weight loss quite easily. Even 30 weeks pregnant, I am still wearing a size 6/small (in maternity clothes, of course) regardless of how I feel about my expanding body!

I learned what was important on this journey and am in better health today (not just physically, but mentally and emotionally), than I have ever experienced as an adult.

Good luck to those currently on their journey, and I encourage everyone to share their stories here so that newly sleeved folks can see that slow vs. fast loss doesn't really matter in the end.

~Cheri

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Wow you look great!! You look like you were my starting size and to see the change looks so good! I got sleeved 1/10/13 a week ago w a goal of having a healthy pregnancy in a year and a half. I am afraid ill lose the weight than gain it alllll back once I'm pregnant. Do you eat the same?? Get more tired? You inspire me because this week has been hard to remember why I did this.

70lb in 9 months for me, currently been as same weight for 3 weeks. Cheri you have been my inspiration on these boards as you post regularly and your story really does motivate and inspire me. I want to lose 100lb and I thought it would take me 12 months but looks more like 15 now. But hey if it take 18 or more so be it.

I am down 32lbs in 3 months. I know it could've been more. I feel I can still eat whatever. NOTHING bothers my stomach. I am a grazer at work, a habit that I HAVE to break. I just started exercising the past 3 weeks, mostly walking..i wear a fitbit and work on 10k steps a day. I have many weeks where i gain and it stays with me for a week or so. Thats when i really want to kick myself

I am six months out and have lost 73 lbs. Some would find that tragedy since its not a 100 lbs. or more in six months. I have been a slow user but I have been continually losing and Im very proud at what I hv lost. I have went from a size 22-24 pants to now in a 16 that are baggy. Whoohoo. I also went from a 3x shirt to a medium shirt size and sometimes large...depends on the shirt. I feel so much better and feel confident I will lose the rest.

Don't get discouraged if you feel you're a slow user. It will come off!

You are my hero!

4 months out 35 lbs down only 4 lbs lost in 9 weeks . I wish I could be fast but I don't think I will be it will come off when it wants to I just have to stay on plan. It's hard when you can eat anything many days I want to just give up .

Sent from my iPhone using VST

I love your posts Cheri,always so refreshing to hear ! It was a great idea to show how different people's journeys can be. I was sleeved 11/7/12 and have lost 40lbs since then so I am not losing at warp speed but I am still plugging along

Does it help that I'm 19+ months out and STILL losing? I DID lose 100 pounds in my first six months, but that was less than half of my excess weight.

Folks, it's not a race. Learn your stuff and get it done. Stalls are normal, frustrations are normal. We keep saying "it's not about the finish line, but about the journey" and it's annoying, but VERY true. At this point, I'm losing 1 pound per week, on average (it comes in big spurts... I'll lose 2 pounds in a week and then nothing for two weeks). BUT it's been that way all along, just the amounts have gone down as I get closer to goal.

I've lost over 200 pounds. Heck, I've lost more than some of the STARTING weights I've seen from the really short folks. If I can do this, you can do this. There's no time limit or expiration date on your sleeve. Treat it well and it will be good to you for many years to come.

LOVE this post, Thanks so much Cheri.

It really does strike a chord and gives some much needed peace of mind for those of us whose expectations may not be living up to "ideal" in our minds.

I recently sent direct messages to some Vets to get their feedback on my own perceived "slow loss". As I expected, their responses were encouraging, spot on and consistent with your mentality.

Thanks for your many thoughtful, direct and inspired posts!

I would say, by definition, I was a slow loser. I had a total of 80.5 lbs that I wanted to lose to my goal after I had my surgery.

In the first 6 months, I lost 55 lbs. Then, it slowed to a crawl.

In the next 6 months, I lost 21.5 lbs

I stalled at this point for 3 months and I actually thought I might be done losing, then I lost 3 more pounds, now at 15 months post op.

Once again I stalled for about 2 months and thought I was done losing, still about 5 or so pounds from goal, but I was really that worried about those 5lbs.

Then, 18 months post op, I hit my goal weight of 140lbs and 80.5 lbs lost. In the months following, I dropped a few more pounds!

Now I have a 3-4 pound weight fluctuation. My cycle is a major factor in how much I weigh, so I try not to let it bother me. I can go up as much as 2 or 3 lbs during ovulation and 3-4 lbs during TOM. My weight loss near the end only really occurred in the 2 weeks in between Tom and ovulation, so I highly encourage women to really pay attention to their bodies. I also get wicked cravings and have a very hard time not wanting to eat everything in my path. How do I cope with the cravings? I do not keep anything in my house that I know I will eat.

Now I am over 2 years post op and have not had many issues maintaining for the last 8 months. I am still learning as I go and I still make mistakes. But over all I would say I eat healthy 90% of the time, and 10% of the time I don't. If I am going to be truthful, I never counted anything (calories, carbs, protein), I never weighed anything, and I don't exercise by definition regularly. I did follow my post op guidelines. I rarely eat bread (but I will eat garlic bread when out for supper) and I eat very little other "white carbs" like rice, Pasta, flour, sugar (notice that I did not say never). I do not drink with my meals, I still occasionally drink Protein shakes, I eat a lot of greek yogurt sweetened with stevia, drink 2% milk, eat nuts, and enjoy veggies AND fruits. I will still have an ice cream cone once in a while, I will still eat chocolate and I will still have other treats as well. I just do not keep them in my house so they are not tempting because I do not have any more will power now than before surgery if food is sitting in front of me (hence a 4 lbs weight gain over Christmas that I am happy to report is all gone again).

I wanted to make changes that I know I could live with, maintain, and be happy with for the rest of my life. I am happy with the weight I lost, and even though it was slower in the "sleeve" world, it was still faster than any other time I had tried to lose weight in my life. My new habits are firmly entrenched, and even if I stumble now (like Christmas), it is not difficult to get my head back in the game. I would not change what I did and how I did it and I love this tool that I have been given!

I would say' date=' by definition, I was a slow loser. I had a total of 80.5 lbs that I wanted to lose to my goal after I had my surgery.

In the first 6 months, I lost 55 lbs. Then, it slowed to a crawl.

In the next 6 months, I lost 21.5 lbs

I stalled at this point for 3 months and I actually thought I might be done losing, then I lost 3 more pounds, now at 15 months post op.

Once again I stalled for about 2 months and thought I was done losing, still about 5 or so pounds from goal, but I was really that worried about those 5lbs.

Then, 18 months post op, I hit my goal weight of 140lbs and 80.5 lbs lost. In the months following, I dropped a few more pounds!

Now I have a 3-4 pound weight fluctuation. My cycle is a major factor in how much I weigh, so I try not to let it bother me. I can go up as much as 2 or 3 lbs during ovulation and 3-4 lbs during TOM. My weight loss near the end only really occurred in the 2 weeks in between Tom and ovulation, so I highly encourage women to really pay attention to their bodies. I also get wicked cravings and have a very hard time not wanting to eat everything in my path. How do I cope with the cravings? I do not keep anything in my house that I know I will eat.

Now I am over 2 years post op and have not had many issues maintaining for the last 8 months. I am still learning as I go and I still make mistakes. But over all I would say I eat healthy 90% of the time, and 10% of the time I don't. If I am going to be truthful, I never counted anything (calories, carbs, protein), I never weighed anything, and I don't exercise by definition regularly. I did follow my post op guidelines. I rarely eat bread (but I will eat garlic bread when out for supper) and I eat very little other "white carbs" like rice, Pasta, flour, sugar (notice that I did not say never). I do not drink with my meals, I still occasionally drink Protein shakes, I eat a lot of greek yogurt sweetened with stevia, drink 2% milk, eat nuts, and enjoy veggies AND fruits. I will still have an ice cream cone once in a while, I will still eat chocolate and I will still have other treats as well. I just do not keep them in my house so they are not tempting because I do not have any more will power now than before surgery if food is sitting in front of me (hence a 4 lbs weight gain over Christmas that I am happy to report is all gone again).

I wanted to make changes that I know I could live with, maintain, and be happy with for the rest of my life. I am happy with the weight I lost, and even though it was slower in the "sleeve" world, it was still faster than any other time I had tried to lose weight in my life. My new habits are firmly entrenched, and even if I stumble now (like Christmas), it is not difficult to get my head back in the game. I would not change what I did and how I did it and I love this tool that I have been given![/quote']

Great job! What is your height? Your stats seem close to mine and your story and strategies also sound comparable! Great story! Thanks for sharing!