Hi All!

How soon after surgery did you start vitamins again?

Because I was on full liquids (protein shakes, etc) that afternoon, I was instructed to start vitamins one week after surgery. It will depend on the doctor. I would have a supply of liquid/chewable vitamins available before your surgery date.

It really depends on your surgeon/program.

In my program, we started sublingual B12 & chewable multivitamins immediately after surgery. 3 weeks after surgery when we began soft foods, we could resume our full vitamin regimen

It definitely depends on your surgeon. Yesterday was one week post op, and they said I could start the chewable multivitamin and not worry about any of the additional supplements for now.

My surgeon asked me not to take any for two weeks but do take them up til surgery.

I was instructed to start taking mine immediately once home for the hospital.

It really is program dependent so I would ask your surgeon/dietitian. I started all of them right away except for B12 - we were given that as the monthly injection in the hospital so we didn't start that until 1 month out. My program said to focus on the multi-vitamins first and then add in the rest as we could tolerate them. It probably took me 2 weeks to get into the full routine of vitamins with the calcium taking me the longest because I couldn't swallow the bigger pills and it took some time to find a chewable that I could tolerate.

I was instructed to start the day I went home.

It’s true—it depends on your surgeon’s recommendation. For me, personally, I was allowed only chewable multivitamins (two of the Flintstones Complete chewable tablets for kids) and sublingual B-12 immediately following surgery. I had to wait a week before starting my other vitamins.