Ok, I do one problem with the recommended diet post op and just thought I would ask. My doctor's office recommends switching to sugar free stuff, margarine, etc. My problem is this. Having children with autism I have had to dive deep into the things that make up our foods. A lot, and I mean a lot, of the things recommended are filled with chemicals, cancer producing things, and are worse for you than the real thing. I have changed some of these things in their diet and have noticed improvements in behavior. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

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Immediately post-op, I drank RTD shakes and sugar-free everything, just because I had no idea what my body was doing and so many people had been successful following the standard post-op diet that I didn't really look into it. But now, 6 months out, I don't eat the way my practice's dietitian wants me to eat. She's very into heavily processed, low-fat, sugar-free 'food'. I hate sucralose, won't ingest aspartame and avoid most things labeled 'low-fat' unless they're naturally low fat. (My one exception is sugar-free popsicles. They don't taste sugar-free to me and I love them)

I eat regular dairy, use stevia or monk fruit for sweeteners and try to eat only whole foods. The only advice I've taken from her is to avoid white flour and sugar.

I'm all about grass fed butter (kerrygold) and no processed of artificial sugars. Stevie is OK. Good fats are body needs,not artificial substitutes.

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Julie, I too have changed my relationship to food (and many other things) due to my daughter's severe autism. Shes 16 now so these changes are ingrained in my functioning. It requires creativity but does not hinder my journey. It limits some snack and Protein options but I don't mind. When I required the sf products most was in my first month, in particular the two week full liquids. I chose things she would have no interest in so I could limit my exposure and not risk hers. This can be done but I would consult a nutritionist with biomedical treatment knowledge.

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I don't use much non sugar sweetener and we use only butter or olive oil.

I find the ideal of substituting real food for lower calorie substitutes suspect since nice Americans use so many low fat and sugar free products yet we have been growing steadily fatter year after year.

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Both my kids are high functioning ASD - I know what you mean! We mostly avoid artificial/processed food, but the pre-op diet was tough. I'd already picked up a few Sucralose products during the insurance mandated diet, but went full chemical sugar free for the last few weeks of super low carb. Man, it was *nasty*. But I've seen the pictures from my surgery and my liver looked FABULOUS, so I'm pretending it helped my liver shrink and am moving on.

Like elisa5150, I did use sugar free stuff the first month or so - especially the sugar free popsicles - but also Gelatin, Protein powder, and some protein hot chocolate.

Now, I use flavored stevia drops for kefir or yogurt (yay live cultures!) and a little xylitol (a sugar alcohol) in my tea. Some of Protein shakes (Orgain) have stevia and erythritol (another sugar alcohol) or monkfruit and inulin (Jamie Eason Lean Body for Her). Personally, I do really well with xylitol and okay with erythritol (though their "naturalness" is highly debatable). And while current research increasingly makes it look like sucralose and other traditional artificial sweeteners are really messing with gut health, there doesn't seem to be any evidence that stevia, monkfruit, xylitol, or erythritol have much effect one way or the other. There are natural(-ish) protein powders out there - as long as you can keep the carbs and protein where they're supposed to be. (My NUT recommended youbars - they make custom Protein Bars with options for natural sweeteners.)

We love grass fed butter and cheese, though I'm sticking with olive oil and coconut oil for now. I do have a tub of natural coconut oil based vegan butter spread I use every once in a while, but I wouldn't give up grass fed dairy for margarine if I had a choice.

Mostly, though, my new stomach prefers savory moderate to low fat food, so I try to work with that as much as I can. When I was still eating dairy, I discovered I could mix herbs (Penzey's Fox Point seasoning) into low fat Greek yogurt and use it as a dip. Still got my protein, but didn't have to sweeten it.

Which is probably for the best. I don't think living on artificially sweet or fatty things is necessarily better than living on real sweet or fatty things. So, good fats when we eat them - grass fed beef; pastured eggs; olive & coconut oil - and all in reasonable amount. If a dish is too fatty, I can't eat enough to meet my protein goal. Sort of a self limiting problem, so I don't see the need to drag margarine into it.

As for sweets... research just keeps making it look like artificial sweeteners wreck your gut and make you crave more sweets. Which kind of makes sense since some "bad" gut bacteria has been tied to increased sugar consumption/desire for sugar. And sweets have gotten me into a lot of trouble in general, so I feel like this is the time to develop better habits. Thank heavens I did full on high fat/low carb Keto before surgery - I rarely had sweet things anyway and it still kicked my butt! But it really did kick the sugar cravings and I am so glad I didn't have to deal with that post surgery! It's made it way easier to explore healthy options that don't involve so many chemicals.

Now to try and get back on my gut health protocol and try and get my kids onboard.

Wow - sorry this is so meandering - it's the middle of the night and we have a small herd of cousins over for the first Christmas break sleepover. Brain. Fried. Let me know if you need product ideas - I feel like I've researched them all .

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Great information. Thanks for sharing your research!

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Totally agree, once I'm cleared for real food, I'm not keeping artificial stuff around. Moderation, portion sizes will be my focus. I'm looking at the quality of foods and how REAL they are. You're not alone in your concerns on the chemicals we put in our bodies. The book Skinny Bitch made me into an overnight Vegan after reading it. Oh that phase didn't last but it opened my eyes to the CRAP we put in our foods!

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Honestly I didn't stick to using SF anything. Prior to surgery I knew it made me sick. I was able to do the protien shakes shakes for a little bit but when I went to post op I couldn't tolerate it. I use Genepro for protien boosts but I try to get the protien through

Foods (unprocessed or minimally processed)