Relying on feeling full or amount you can eat versus portions

[Sharon1964 2,530]

Before WLS, I ate as much as I wanted, frequently until I was full or over-full.

Going into WLS, I knew that I (not my new tummy) would have to decide how much I would eat (as well as what I would eat). I knew that I could circumvent the surgery by drinking milkshakes all day. But good lord, why have the surgery just to try to get around it??? The surgery is not magic that is going to work no matter what you do. I knew that I would have to make serious changes, with the help of the surgery.

At just shy of 6 months post-op, I don't consider myself a veteran yet.

I see so many questions about "when do you feel full", and "I can eat xx cups of food at a meal", and "I can eat again an hour later".

For "full" question... why are you eating until you are full? Isn't that how you got here in the first place? Why are you not portioning your food and then stopping?

For the "xx cups of food"... how on earth would you know that if you portioned your food out first and stopped when you were finished eating that portion?

For the "eat again an hour later"... how would you know? It's not time to eat again, so why are you trying? Are you having problems with hunger?

I guess I don't get it. Do you veterans (that have been successful) still portion your food? Do you eat until you are full?

Maybe these are all rhetorical questions and I should have put this in the "rants" section. But I truly do want to know the answers. I just don't get it.

[Bufflehead 6,358]

I still portion my food and the only time I eat something different is when I feel satisfied (NOT FULL) before I get to the end of my portion, Looking to feel "full" or worse "stuffed" is a recipe for disaster IMO.

In a similar vein, I see people saying things like "I know I'm full when I burp/get a runny nose/get the hiccups." No -- that means you ate so much that you've managed to compress and irritate the nerves in your stomach. I.E., you ate too much and need to eat less next time. You aren't "full" -- you over-ate.

[CowgirlJane 14,259]

First few months I ste by the measuring cup and clock. Preprogrammed, rigid.

Overtime I switched to planned, but less rigidly. The most important thing for me to lewrn is to not "seek full", I eat to absence of hunger. My nutritionist was right, I didn't really know what just right feels like, so. Eating to absence of hunger has served me well over the years.

I was encouraged to have 5 mini meals per day, but that was two often for me, so I switched to 4.

Maintained 150# loss for 3 years now so far it's working.

[VDLT 244]

This is such an important post. I have worried a lot over my sleeve capacity. I have read the post of "I can only eat 3 bites" and worry. I can eat way more than most on here but I have grown to be fine with that. It is still less than I could before surgery and I hope it will be enough to maintain by being mindful.

Everyone's full is different but after reading a lot of posts, I am fairly certain a great majority of us don't know what full is anymore. I very informally portion my meals at home by eating on a salad plate or a ramekin. When going out I cut my meal in half and only eat out of one half usually stopping before even finishing that. I have only felt uncomfortable after a meal twice since surgery. I think it is a learning curve that only eating mindfully will fix.

[jane13 2,256]

@@VDLT - me too, with the uncomfortable after a meal feeling, twice. It was enough. I just sense the "full" thing now and stop, if I am chewing (it goes into a napkin). TMI - I know....

[Babbs 14,680]

The problem is as time goes by, it takes more and more food to reach that full point. Years down the road, some can eat a small dinner plate of food. Relying on fullness early out (0-12 months) isn't a big deal while losing and restriction is amazing, but getting into the habit of measuring and weighing as restriction wanes is important if you want to actually keep the weight you've lost off.

[VSGAnn2014 12,992]

These are great subjects: feeling full, feeling full vs. feeling satiety, the emotional rewards of feeling full, recognizing when you're satiated and recognizing when you're full, stopping eating before you're "too full," eating specific foods and eating in certain ways that help you feel satiated and/or full sooner than you would otherwise, etc.

Boy, does this all vary depending on whether you're 1, 2, 3, 6, 12, 18 months out -- or, as others say, 2, 3, 4, 5 years out.

IMHO, how we should behave on these fronts depends a lot on whether we're (1) still in the losing phases, (2) through losing weight and maintaining easily or (3) regaining and trying to get back on track.

I'm coming up on 18 months post-op and am currently maintaining easily. But I'm still a relatively newbie maintainer (have been at or below goal for 9-10 months now) and still learning what works for me at this point and trying to learn to eat more intuitively.

However, I'm also learning that the old, original WLS rules are just magical in helping me to eat intuitively in ways that are healthy and that satiate me and make me feel comfortably full / done / whatever other words describe that we don't need or want to eat anymore food.

What has always worked for me is when I mostly (90% or more of the time) do these things:

* Don't drink with or immediately before or immediately after my meals.

* Eat slowly, chew well, and take small bites.

* Eat Protein early on in my meals (for me, this means eat meat first).

* Eat 80-100 grams of Protein a day.

* Eat on smaller plates / bowls / cups.

* Use a smaller fork (usually just a salad fork).

* Plan my meals ahead of time.

* Measure / weigh my foods (when I'm eating at home).

* Eat plenty of fibrous foods -- colored veggies, whole grains, and fruit.< /p>

* Track all the food I eat, whether I chose "good" or "not good" foods and volumes.

* Stay hydrated throughout the day by drinking at least 64 ounces of Water and other non-calorie liquids.

* Don't go hog-wild with sweets. When I was losing weight I didn't eat any sugary foods at all. Big protip: Eating too much sugar just makes me feel crave more food in general. Weird!

Yes, the sleeve works by restricting how much we can eat. But we can sabotage ourselves by not continuing to follow our WLS eating rules. It's not that hard to learn these new eating behaviors. And it's certainly a lot easier to follow them than to battle our cravings for sugar, fast food and trigger foods the rest of our lives!

[AvaFern 3,516]

I am 29 months post-op as of next week and I don't portion food in the sense that I don't measure it out. I know that for Breakfast I make a bowl of instant oatmeal, mix in some honey, and pour in some granola...I then eat 1/3 to 1/2 of the bowl and I set it down when I get to that point because I know if I keep eating I'm going to feel miserable. I really like the Protein blends healthy steamers, and I know that I can eat half a bag (which is actually a lot for someone with a sleeve) without feeling sick, so I dump half the bag in the bowl and leave the rest in the fridge for later. If I eat Chick-Fil-A which is really the only fast food or non-homemade food that I eat, I only put half a sandwich on my plate, or 5 nuggets, so that when I'm done eating that I know that I'm done, even if it takes me 15 minutes or so to realize that I'm not hungry anymore. I learned how to eat according to portions based on how much different food and sizes made me sick, so while I don't formally mete out specific amounts of food, trial and error and almost 2.5 years after surgery has given me an understanding of visually what I can eat without feeling full or sick.

[JamieLogical 8,684]

I don't really consider myself a "veteran" yet, as I am only 17 months out as of today. But I do pre-portion my food for the most part. The only times I don't is when I am out to eat or having dinner over at someone's house and then I really just try to eyeball it and hope for the best. I do overeat to the point of fullness that way sometimes, but not often.

At home it's easy. I eat a lot of the same things over and over and i know exactly how much of them I can eat. I will either weigh them out or just put them into a bowl or cup or onto a plate and I know how much I can eat, because I've eaten out of that same bowl or cup or off that same plate a million times before.

As for eating an hour later, I only do that intentionally sometimes. I have a normal meal/snack schedule, that I stick to 90% of the time and I know I can only "fit in" special treats if I eat between those scheduled snack/meals. So if it's some sort of special occasion or we have brought in some kind of treat to the house or whatever, I know I can only eat that stuff if I squeeze it in between my normal meals and Snacks, otherwise I won't get my 100 grams of Protein for the day. I will never allow myself to REPLACE Protein with something carb-y.

[GibbsGirl 483]

I'm still at that stage I portion, but am very aware at any type of full feeling or off feeling I stop. I know that it takes a little while right now for it to kick in and I can have stopped and still get that overfull feeling a few minutes later. That to me is way to uncomfortable. Being me, I see weighing and counting etc, for a very very long time, I'm on the cautious side. If that is what it takes for me to be successful I'm more than willing,

[jane13 2,256]

I am weighing/bagging up or putting in small containers foods in 1 portion sizes. I am eliminating carbs as much as possible, which has been a problem since before Christmas (hence the stall).

I just grab what I want in the morning before going to work: 3oz chicken strips, 1/2 cup cottage cheese, 4oz of tuna, etc and go. It eliminates the carb grazing

[OutsideMatchInside 10,166]

I'm still new at 6 months but the posts of people trying to figure out what makes them full or what full feels like really bother me. It seems like a signal to me they don't have their food addiction under control or are not working to control it. Before I started working on losing weight, my goal when eating was to feel stuffed. I wanted that full coma like numbing feeling because food was like a drug to me. It calmed me down, it was a reward, it was comfort, it was a lot of things more than it was supposed to be, which is nourishment. I am still a foodie and I love food and eating, but my understand of portions is really different.

I still accidentally eat too much sometimes because as I introduce new foods, the weight and volume of different items has different effects. 4oz of fish is not the same as 4 oz of chicken. The full feeling, which is over eating with a sleeve is terrible. Your food is just sitting in your chest and for me it feels like a baby is standing on my rib cage or something. My whole chest is full and uncomfortable.

I wish people would think of trying to feel full as stressing their staple line, instead of feeling full. Early on when you are feeling full are you are going is stressing your staple line. That isn't something you want.

One thing I have learned from weighing everything is that I can't eyeball weights/portions at all. I am always over or under. I have accepted that weighing my food is something that has to happen for the rest of my life.

[Lisa_85 118]

^{_{I eat 1/4 cup and feel full right after it. Great now I am in a panic attack mode thinking I am going to stretch my stomach at 4 weeks out.}}

[JamieLogical 8,684]

^{_{I eat 1/4 cup and feel full right after it. Great now I am in a panic attack mode thinking I am going to stretch my stomach at 4 weeks out.}}

At 4 weeks out, things are VERY different than at 4 years out. Don't panic. I weighed/measured all my food in the beginning, always eating 2 ounces at a time as my nutritionist instructed. I felt overfull A LOT in those early days, because my stomach was still swollen and healing. So the full feeling you are having right now is not the same thing we are talking about in this thread. You need to be measuring your food and eating on a schedule in your early weeks, otherwise you won't eat enough food to sustain you.

[sleevedinseptember 69]

This is a timely and helpful discussion for me as stopping before that full sensation is something that I am actively working on. I measure and track everything I eat but my restriction is still really high right now since I am only 5 months out. I usually have to stop at about 2 ounces of dense Protein and by then I am already experiencing that sensation.

But I have noticed that I get frustrated by this because my brain and my eyes have still not fully reconciled or maybe even accepted that this is the new normal and in fact, this was the whole point of the surgery! I personally also need to be better about sticking to a schedule for eating because I usually wait until I am experiencing some sensation of hunger to eat (and it's not true hunger that I experience more like acid) and that could be too many hours after I wake up and get started with the day. So then I also feel a bit of pressure to make sure I get enough Protein in.

I am also reminded that I too used to eat until the point of fullness. Therapy helped me to stop being an emotional eater so I did eat due to hunger but always went overboard because I liked the sensation of fullness. I felt very comforted and satisfied by that feeling of almost heaviness in my stomach. That's what I relied on to assure me that I had eaten, was satisfied and happy. Even when I was eating mostly healthy foods, I was a heavy volume eater and that was my main contributor to gaining weight.

Now I am trying to do the work of re-training my brain, my body and my stomach in how I approach food - mostly as nourishment, that in post-surgery time I need to give myself adequate nutrition and that I need to be responsible with my choices as they will facilitate better health and of course weight loss.

So tl;dr for me is that I am not always trying to eat to the point of being full but am having trouble sorting this aspect of wls out.