102 Pounds Gone, Now What?

[wright616 84]

Today I reached my surgeon's goal (Wahoo!!!), but my doctor didn't want me to get to that, he was happy with me at 160. I feel great, but I feel that I still have more to lose. Silly question, when do you know you are done losing weight? When the doctor says? Surgeon says? When I feel that I am a healthy weight?

[MichiganChic 3,262]

I say you can be done when either you feel you are done, or when your body decides to level off. As long as you are within a healthy range and eating a healthy diet, then a lower weight shouldn't be an issue.

Congratulations on your success!

[joatsaint 2,814]

I felt done when I could see how thin my skin was becoming.

All my fat areas - stomach/neck/back of arms - don't look thin to me.

But when I look at my forearms, hands, legs and feet, I can see the veins popping up.

So I know my body fat is pretty close to where I want it to be.

My doc wanted me to get down to 235, but I feel more comfortable at 205 - 210.

The insurance charts say I should be at 185.

But I figure I have at least 10lbs of excess skin, so I'm happy where I am.

And I feel I look about as good as I'm ever going to by being this weight. :-P

I have the feet of a bodybuilder!

[wright616 84]

Thanks to both of you

[livvsmum 2,370]

Great job so far! That is awesome! For me the goal became very arbitrary. First it was 150, then 145, then 140, etc. I finally was down to about 123 at my lowest weight and I started to feel that in pictures I looked a little "too skinny" or a bit "gaunt." So I put a couple pounds back on and feel that I look and feel best around 130. Could I maintain 120-123? Of course, but it would be through very strict diet control. I feel that resting around 128-130 gives me a more normal way of life for maintenance. I just kind of figured it out based on how I looked, how I felt, and what I thought was reasonable for the long run.

[BLERDgirl 6,417]

Today I reached my surgeon's goal (Wahoo!!!), but my doctor didn't want me to get to that, he was happy with me at 160. I feel great, but I feel that I still have more to lose. Silly question, when do you know you are done losing weight? When the doctor says? Surgeon says? When I feel that I am a healthy weight?

If both your doctor and your surgeon say you have reached goal then perhaps it's time to start thinking maintenance instead of weight loss. Sometimes as bariatric patients we have a disconnect with out bodies and what they should look like. There's even a small percentage who start to really like the feeling of losing weight after being overweight for so many years. Some even develop disorders where they go in the opposite direction and start losing more weight than is healthy. Please be careful.

[VSGAnn2014 12,992]

Speaking solely for myself, my healthy weight will be where I can eat as much as I want of healthy food AND I can feel great about how I look.

Oddly, I'm still losing weight very slowly, even though I'm averaging close to 1700 calories a day. So it looks like my maintenance diet may be more like 1800 calories a day instead of 1700. FYI, this morning I weighed 139.8 pounds. I'm 5'5" and 69 years old.

I have ZERO interest in being so skinny that my maintenance diet will be too low to tolerate.

So far, I feel like one of the lucky ones whose metabolism is higher than expected post-op. This is a weird thing to be going through -- needing to eat more than I think I should to stop losing weight.

But, as we all know, everything about WLS is a series of phases. I can't assume this is the way things will always be. #reallife