Not cheating.....did any of you "skip" stages in your post-op phase? I ate soft foods before I was advised to. YES, it's wrong. I already know that. Was just wondering about you other guys.

Edited December 10, 201312 yr by MississippiQueen

You are not the first to do it.. Nor will you be the last..

It usually ends up in a fight around here because people have very strong opinions..

You are a grown woman you will do what you want to do..

But a question, who or what are you cheating?

I am curious why? Hope things continue to go well.

Edited December 11, 201312 yr by MississippiQueen

To a certain extent the sleeve is still about willpower and taking personal responsibility.

I think this is why fights erupt here sometimes...

You may eat that pizza and be ok, you may not..

Like I said that's all of our choices to make.

But those of us further out know that a "cookie" is not just a cookie, it represents so much more.

the deeper issue I think is the behavior. We did a serious thing to ourselves having this radical surgery..

But it is not a miracle or a cure.

Many people find ways to "eat around" the sleeve. We got here because of our disordered eating so it's not a surprise that we would try to figure out ways to eat still, even right after surgery.

This is something we need to face and work on changing in the early days. Because it will get increasingly harder to do it the further out you get.

Edited December 5, 201312 yr by laura-ven

To a certain extent the sleeve is still about willpower and taking personal responsibility.

I think this is why fights erupt here sometimes...

Because those of us further out know that a "cookie" is not just a cookie, it represents so much more.

In the beginning the consequences of eating off plan can be very dangerous..

But it's more than just that really..

the deeper issue I think is the behavior. We did a serious thing to ourselves having this radical surgery..

But it is not a miracle or a cure.

Many people find ways to "eat around" the sleeve. We got here because of our disordered eating so it's not a surprise that we would try to figure out ways to eat still, even right after surgery.

This is something we need to face and work in changing in the early days. Because it will get increasingly harder to do it the further out you get.

I couldn't agree more. It will never be easier to make good habits than early on. Going back now will be easy. Six months from now? Not so much.

I ate some crackers and bean/pea type Soups a few days earlier than I was supposed to but I made sure to be up front with the nurse and doctor about it. I was very hungry. I was very careful to let the cracker dissolve in my mouth and that nothing solid actually went downmy throat.

I'm 4 wks out and on whatever I want to eat as long as its mush before I swallow. Rough couple days! It seems like solid food sits like rocks in my stomach. Hope this feeling doesn't last long

Well, I didn't really go through all that because my doctor gave me 2 days of liquid, 3 days of soft, and by day 6, he told me I could eat most things (with an exception list) but to experiment one thing at a time, and very small and well chewed portions. I didn't follow what he said because I felt I needed more time on liquids. I was just not feeling up to eating at all the first week.

And by the way, not to steal your thread away, lol, but I must say... You veterans absolutely terrify me with the "wait till x months go by, it'll get so hard"... Oh man... I can't count how many times I've read that on here. I'm so terrified of when that moment comes :-(

I guess it is better to be prepared, and be scared, that way I watch myself a lot more... But I'm scaredddddd. Everyday I wake up thinking "ugh I've probably stopped losing, it's over for me." Lol.

Edited December 5, 201312 yr by EarthyGoalie

I think at this point it's less about "cheating on a diet" and more about making sure your body has enough time to heal. I'm not a surgeon but I've watched a couple videos on the VSG surgery. They disconnect your stomach from from where it attaches to other parts of your body and then they start cutting, then stapling. With your surgery being on November 21 you're still very new to healing. I believe that's two weeks today and after only 1 week you were eating solids!

My doctor moved my diet on quicker than most but please just be careful so you don't have a complication. And as mentioned by the vets around here the struggle is only going to get worse. Have you seen a therapist? The surgery doesn't take away emotional issues and is something that I have to work on every single day. Good luck.

I had my surgery on Nov 20, just advanced to mushy and am on that for another 6 weeks, before regular food, do I think that's a bit over the top compared to most other doctors, yes considering I have to wait 8 weeks compared to some who go at 4, but I chose my surgeon bc he is well known, little complications and the director of bariatrics at a center of excellence, I'll go with what he says bc he knows better than me! So far my biggest cheat was two cheezits instead of a saltine (which I am allowed) even then I was riddled with guilt lol! You are an adult choose as you wish, but please be careful! Best of luck, this is not an easy road for any of us, but we are all here to help & support each other!

To the OP, my question is what is the rush to progress to eating food(I assume solids). You will absolutely have the rest of your life to eat solid foods. The reason why Vets speak towards learning your good eating habits now and how easy it becomes to fall back into old eating habits the further you are along is because; IT IS TRUE!! You chose the surgery I hope not only to lose weight but understand why you gained weight and how to learn to keep it off. This is what the food stages and healthy eating teach us.

You are a grown woman and will chose what to do, but I have seen many members here go, that no longer post, and I wonder if it has to do with how successful they have been and did it have to do with their food choices.

I just started to experience something the OP has alluded to…and that is that when you're at the puree and mushy stages it starts to become harder to distinguish between what is mushy and what belongs in a later stage, etc.

I'm at 6 weeks now, and in mushies now. I can easily see now that there's a variety that it would be quite easy to justify pushing on to full solids (which is at least two more weeks away.) Because some parts of mushy are judgment calls, in a way that full liquids are really NOT a judgment call.

I'd urge you (as having just gone through it) to go back to your doctor's guidelines and stick with them. You don't want to be the person who causes a leak by doing something completely preventable. Because I'm so close to having completed that stage I can say yes, it sucks. No exaggeration. But one of the (only?) nice things about the lack of food choice is that if you stick to it, as monotonous as it is, you start to have a certain freedom in that. You don't have to obsess about what you are going to eat, because it's laid out for you.

Part of this process is surrendering to the fact that there is a process. (I think, anyway.) Good luck!

My surgeon had me eating soft foods after 2 weeks, soft foods for 2 weeks then progressing from there, from what I see that's pretty fast, what I tried to do was listen to the fact that there was no hunger there. The head hunger was still there but the idea of a leak freaked me out, I did start eating crème of wheat and yogurt a couple days early and man that was heaven. I understand the deprived feeling you get. I am about 4 months out and feel like I have finally figured it out, I am leaving food out of the equation for the first time in my life and let me tell you it took this long!!! Ugh I do eat foods that aren't on the OK list usually a couple times a week, maybe half a slice of pizza or a small handful of chips. But I am finding that the enjoyment I used to get is not there anymore, the demon is still there though always will be. I find that the uncomfortable full feeling is not fun and try to avoid it. I am now listening to my body. not my head. I will never be carb free or anything "free" but for now I guess I am trying to say is give yourself some time, step back and really look at how you eat when you eat and so on. It can be scary!

The main reason I didn't cheat on my post-op diet was because I was terrified something would go wrong. I was deathly afraid I would be that one person who had a leak or tear out a staple or something. The fear of me having to go back into the hospital outweighed my need to eat food. Just something to think about, because if, God forbid, something does go wrong, you then have to tell your surgeon "well, I was eating this and this" just to hear "you're not supposed to be." It wasn't worth the risk, in my opinion.

I can only speak for myself... have no idea if this applies to anyone else. I have been very successful with the sleeve.... maintaining at goal and am a transformed woman, weight and looks wise. One of the things I had to do was be a little humble and accept that my surgeon had a "program" that is very successful for many many people. I many not understand or agree with 100% of it - but letting go of my arrogance and sort of surrendering to the process, the program, the guidelines is the only reason I am here today at goal.

I have a lifetime of dieting, weight watchers, etc etc etc and could probably teach a class on nutrition for all the reading I have done. It was always hard for me to to accept that my "knowledge" wasn't getting me any where and I needed a new path.

So, there are lots of people who do for example weight watchers as "Jane's plan" - you know, I will follow it sorta when I feel like it but tell everybody I am following weight watchers. In general, those lots of people don't have the best results compared to those who do.

As time goes on, you do find your way. Maintaining at 150 is much easier then the daily battle i used to fight to keep from gaining more weight when I weighed 300# so don't be afraid. What vets are trying to tell you is that you never even get a chance to find your own path if you don't do what needs to be done to get to your own personal goal. And alot of people lose about half of what they want and kinda grind to a halt. If you picked a surgeon with an excellent track record and good results, why WOULDN'T someone follow their instructions to maximize your own odds of getting to goal?

btw, my comments are not actually directed at the OP as she has already decided, it is for others who read this and wonder why not...whats the harm in following "janes plan". I can tell you why, because Jane's plan never got me to goal, it was my surgeon's plan who did. The sleeve just enabled me - he even asked me "what are your secrets to success" since he knows the sleeve does not do the whole job, it is up to each of us individually. That applies no matter what WLS you have.