I'm only 11 months post-op and I've been stalled since Christmas. I haven't lost a single pound my entire spring semester and this week I even gained a couple back. I had short stalls here and there in the first 7 months, but they quickly resolved when I upped my water or salt intake. Now I have been tweaking my diet, my exercise, my protein intake, my water intake for 4 months and NOTHING HELPS. I'll admit the last month or so I haven't been a star bariatric patient with my carb and sugar intake, but I think that only started because of how frustrated I was with how long I'd been stalled despite doing everything I needed to be doing.

I've always been the kid who constantly tried to eat healthy and exercise and could never lose the freaking weight and now I just feel like I'm right back there the way I was pre-op. I keep going to my surgeon and nutritionist and do what they are telling me to do and it still doesn't work.

I recently added a weekly cheat day for the sake of my mental health and I found it helps keep me on track during the week. Every Saturday I eat to my heart's content with no guilt in the hopes that it will shock my metabolism a little bit. However, despite being completely clean during the week and going to the gym at least 3 times a week the scale is not budging.

I try not to count calories because my surgeon always advised against it and I think it's a little unhealthy too. And before anyone tells me to restrict my calorie intake, I have TRIED and I just get shaky and lightheaded throughout the day and feel like I'm starving myself. I'm over here trying to build a healthy relationship with my body, not trying to starve it.

If anyone has any words of advice or crazy outside-the-box tricks that got them out of a long stall, I'm all ears.

On ‎4‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 9:58 AM, Amy1234 said:

Hey Alexandra. I am right there with ya, have stalled for 6 months and I’m only 8 months post op. It’s hard to be enthusiastic cuz how long can u when you see no weight loss? I do sugar free everything , obviously no soda .. my surgeon and dietician were of no help. I’m also hypothyroid & have history of pcos. I’ve started metformin pills again, hoping it would help. My weight moves 2-4 pounds up and down but has always been on this weight since 6 months. Very annoying! Motivation is a finite source and can’t just keep going on like this! There’s got to be something else going on but I don’t know what it is. I exercise 5-6 times a week for an hour & half with cardio HIiT & weights for 45 mins. I’ve no clue what to do and frustrated... I dont have cheat days although yes once in a way I might eat out but even then I pick healthy options! And come on even if we cheat we can only consume like 70ml of whatever! I can’t even have an entire drink !
Give me some info bout u...
do you have hypothyroid pcos?
What was your start weight? How much have you lost so far? I lost only 44 pounds from Pre surgery till 3 months post op and stopped altogether!

Be careful with doing everything "sugarfree". See what the sugarfree substitute is and what is the fat content, etc. Sometimes they make up for the lack of sugar by adding things that actually work against you. I try to stick to things that have Truvia (stevia) as the substitute, everything else sugarfree I stay away from. Also i'm weary of metformin it made me extremely ill, my doctor switched me to Januvia, I have a copay but its worth every penny. I'm presurgery but this is just my experience from losing in the past. Is hypothyroidism the one that makes you gain weight? I get hypo and hyper confused, but you may need to see if they need to change your thyroid meds since your surgery.

My hypothyroid is under control, hypo makes u gain weight by slowing your metabolism.
I do look for stevia.
Consulted a family friend who is Batiatric surgeon , he said there are certain ppl genetically such that this surgery will not benefit and we cannot test for those genes yet ☹️☹️☹️ I hope I’m not one of them.
I’m doing my weights n getting steps in ! I’ll cut all carbs for two weeks n see if my weight changes.

Is there anything that’s worked for breaking stalls ?

My nutritionist said she’s had patients who never lost any weight !! Wtf

37 minutes ago, Amy1234 said:

Is there anything that’s worked for breaking stalls ?

Amy, is it possible you are the ONE person, sure but possible and probable are not the same thing.

How old is your last complete blood panel. If the answer is more than 90 days get it again. You need to rule out a medical issue.

Zero sugar

Then - cut the carbs to under 50g with all of those coming from veggies

Protein - and Fat should fill out the rest of your calories.

The goal is to get to fat burning and that process has a defined route. You must burn the stored glycogen in your muscles followed by the sugar in your blood followed by the sugar in your liver (the cause of a fatty liver)

When all of this has been worked down then the body will process stored fat for energy. Stored fat is the very last energy source our bodies tap cause it is the energy of last resort and we are programmed to survive.

If at any time you spike your blood sugar with sugar, carbs, protein your insulin will rise and you will enter Fat storage mode and can not return to fat burning mode till insulin levels return to normal.

You mentioned hormones and you are correct all weight loss and gain is hormone driven. The longer you were overweight the more issues with metabolic syndrome you will have. If you have other medical issues as you have stated you will have that to mess with your hormones as well.

Dont eat if your not hungry, dont eat late at night it delays the start of fat burning when you Fast and everybody Fast's when they go to sleep unless you sleep walk to the fridge i guess.

Dont start your day with any carbs at all. Protein and fat only

If your not a breakfast person wait for first meal till you feel like it.

If you have a workout in your routine and you can, do it in the morning before you eat.

lifting weights followed by 20 minutes cardio minimum.

Do with this what you want but you have to get as much control over the hormones with your diet as you can.

It is critical that you use a food app to track all your Macro's

Remember there are Essential Amino acids(protein) and Essential Fatty Acids(fats) but there no essential carbs

You cant control what you dont understand and that starts with tracking your food.

I wish you luck and hope you find a way to go forward with your weight loss.

Protein is so important to hit your numbers for weight loss.

Are you exercising? If so you may need to increase your calories.

Dr now

Amy how are you? Gosh I hope things are getting better!

On 4/24/2018 at 10:58 AM, Amy1234 said:

Hey Alexandra. I am right there with ya, have stalled for 6 months and I’m only 8 months post op. It’s hard to be enthusiastic cuz how long can u when you see no weight loss? I do sugar free everything , obviously no soda .. my surgeon and dietician were of no help. I’m also hypothyroid & have history of pcos. I’ve started metformin pills again, hoping it would help. My weight moves 2-4 pounds up and down but has always been on this weight since 6 months. Very annoying! Motivation is a finite source and can’t just keep going on like this! There’s got to be something else going on but I don’t know what it is. I exercise 5-6 times a week for an hour & half with cardio HIiT & weights for 45 mins. I’ve no clue what to do and frustrated... I dont have cheat days although yes once in a way I might eat out but even then I pick healthy options! And come on even if we cheat we can only consume like 70ml of whatever! I can’t even have an entire drink !
Give me some info bout u...
do you have hypothyroid pcos?
What was your start weight? How much have you lost so far? I lost only 44 pounds from Pre surgery till 3 months post op and stopped altogether!

What was your weight on day of surgery? I'm worried about the same thing! I'm 228 pounds

On 4/24/2018 at 10:58 AM, Amy1234 said:

Hey Alexandra. I am right there with ya, have stalled for 6 months and I’m only 8 months post op. It’s hard to be enthusiastic cuz how long can u when you see no weight loss? I do sugar free everything , obviously no soda .. my surgeon and dietician were of no help. I’m also hypothyroid & have history of pcos. I’ve started metformin pills again, hoping it would help. My weight moves 2-4 pounds up and down but has always been on this weight since 6 months. Very annoying! Motivation is a finite source and can’t just keep going on like this! There’s got to be something else going on but I don’t know what it is. I exercise 5-6 times a week for an hour & half with cardio HIiT & weights for 45 mins. I’ve no clue what to do and frustrated... I dont have cheat days although yes once in a way I might eat out but even then I pick healthy options! And come on even if we cheat we can only consume like 70ml of whatever! I can’t even have an entire drink !
Give me some info bout u...
do you have hypothyroid pcos?
What was your start weight? How much have you lost so far? I lost only 44 pounds from Pre surgery till 3 months post op and stopped altogether!

What was your weight the day of surgery? My weight is 228 lb right now what's a tentative date of September 24th. I don't want to go through this procedure if I'm only going to lose 30 lb!

Some good advice. Taking it to heart myself. I’ve been losing extremely slowly and now that I am only 6 weeks from my surgiversary, I really want to lose the last 6 lbs by then, but I only lost 2 lbs in all of May. Sigh.

While ive lost so steadily with my program of no carbs except veg and root veg*, no sugars, no fake sugars, nothing that tastes sweet for 6 months, and I highly recommend that to anyone in a stall if they haven’t given up sugars and carbs, now I’m really plateauing more. I just want to lose the last 6 in the next 6 weeks.

*eating potatoes and other root vegetables is essential for the gut bacteria. They need some of that, also seeds or nuts or beans. But keep your carbs down to 50g a day or so. Once you are done with sweet tastes, you won’t even want it and you will feel sick from them. I would never eat sweets or desserts except over 90% dark chocolate, which ends up being a healthy fat antioxidant food rather than candy at that point. It isn’t sweet. Sweet food makes me instantly sick feeling.

i could use more water I guess, and I could try to limit my 90% dark chocolate more. I have added 1/2 c of berries in to my diet for nutrition only. I don’t eat other fruits because they are just too sweet. Vegetables give us all the vitamins anyway without the sugar.

but if I can tag onto this late in the first year stall issue, anyone have tips how to lose the last 10 lbs? All month it was like pulling teeth to get 2 lbs down.

I do work out and lift, and try to play actively with the kids when I can.

On 5/4/2018 at 7:04 AM, FluffyChix said:

So I'm going to just address the naked king in his new clothes standing in the middle of the room.

IMHO, you are both maintaining. You are NOT stalled for 4 months. You are eating the amount of calories along with your surgery that allows you to maintain. But beware. You are both approaching the end of the honeymoon period within the next year or 14 months ish. Then those same calories you're taking in right now, will quite likely cause you to start creeping up on the scale.

It's impossible to help you. You're not giving us enough information. I could come to you and ask the same question. But because I track every bite of food, good and bad, I can present samples of my day, I can present an excel spreadsheet showing the relationship of macros in a month to average weight loss. I have a LOT of data to look at and tweak. You don't have any of that, even a food log.

How can you possibly know what it takes to lose weight? You've no earthly idea. This is not magic bean surgery. It's WL surgery. It's SCIENCE!!!!! You HAVE to count sh*t. The End. And any RD who says you don't has a butt-load of peeps keeping her in job security who never forking make goal!!!!

I read yesterday that this surgery is 40% surgery and 60% you. I don't know if that's the exact ratio, but the reality is, weekly cheat days are just that...weekly events that derail your progress. They can do nothing but create a GHDWL situation (Ground Hog Day Weight Loss=where you gain and lose the same 2lbs over and over and over again until you want to chew your own leg off to see a drop on the scale).

Go back to basics. For me, and from a lot of vets, the ideal losing phase is a caloric intake average of about 600-900 cals per day. Maintenance is personal--anywhere from 1000+ depending on so many variables.

1. Go back to no eating or drinking 30-30
2. Water >64oz per day
3. Vitamins every damn day
4. Exercise (walk) every damn day--don't go cray with working out right now
5. Weigh and measure everything (60-80g Protein for the day; <30g of carbs daily; around 30g fat for the day; <10g naturally occurring sugars for the day)
6. Log EVERY bite that goes down your piehole
7. If you're drinking alcohol--stop that sh*t right now!!!!
8. Eat 3 meals a day + 1 snack (no grazing, no crap foods, no slider foods)
9. Eat your meals in a window of 15-30 minutes
10. Protein (dense) first 3oz per meal
11. Veggies next
12. Healthy Fats next
13. If any room leftover then low glycemic fruit/berries (but if you have more room, fill up on fibrous veggies)

Accept that you are gonna feel like jack sh*t for about 2 weeks. You're eating carby crap and sugar. What do you really expect. Sadly it WILL be fuc*ing hard! You don't have the excitement of the looming surgery, you've got diet boredom, you've lost faith in your tool, and you're being self-indulgent and going back to bad habits. It's gonna hurt and you WILL have to force yourself to get over that hump. Get mad! Do it! Suffer. And do it. In 4 days it will get easier and each day after.

If you do those things, I can ALMOST guarantee you will both start losing again. And remember, you can NEVER out-exercise a bad diet.

Oh and get your butts to the counselor (someone who specializes in bariatrics).

P.S. And I "get" that you want to have a normal relationship with food. I "get" that you want to eat intuitively like all the other skinny girls in the world. But what you don't realize is that many (maybe most) of those skinny girls are secretely limiting calories, fats, sugars, foods or worse, purging, or anna stuff to "effortlessly" look like they are naturally skinny girls.

If we were capable of having normal relationships with food, we would have never made it to the obesity ball in the first place. If we didn't have seriously, and I mean SERIOUSLY broken metabolisms, we would never have become MO.

Once you are MO, the "normal" rules of skinnydom no longer apply. You can not take the set of rules for naturally skinny people and apply them to the subset of MO and formerly MO people. You just can't. It's like trying to feed a lion a peanut, or trying to feed an elephant a dead gazelle. It's apples and oranges. DUE to our disease, we will ALWAYS have to be more vigilant, try harder, do more, and live differently if we EVER want to maintain our weight loss.)

I so needed this! I was so pissed at first reading this but exactly what I needed...THANK YOU!