I had my first nutritionist meeting today and though it was a little overwhelming, I'm still excited. The info I received was mostly about the post-op diet and the 3 day liquid pre-op diet, but I didn't get much info about what I should be doing in the mean time, diet-wise. Of course, making healthier food choices is a given, but did your nutritionist give you any additional info at your first meeting? She did make the comment that if I lose weight pre-op, that's great and it'll be healthier for surgery but I can't gain weight which makes sense. Any tips for these next 4 months? Thanks in advance!

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1 hour ago, Nic C said:

I had my first nutritionist meeting today and though it was a little overwhelming, I'm still excited. The info I received was mostly about the post-op diet and the 3 day liquid pre-op diet, but I didn't get much info about what I should be doing in the mean time, diet-wise. Of course, making healthier food choices is a given, but did your nutritionist give you any additional info at your first meeting? She did make the comment that if I lose weight pre-op, that's great and it'll be healthier for surgery but I can't gain weight which makes sense. Any tips for these next 4 months? Thanks in advance!

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You can start by meticulously tracking your food/water intake (if not already) this will help you to: not gain any weight, maybe lose some weight and set you up for great habits after surgery!

You're on your way!!!

My nutritionists wanted me to do several things:

1) Focus on getting a protein as part of every meal. Ideally a lean protein, but they never balked at peanut butter on an apple as a snack. Low-sugar yogurts are good. Light string cheese is good. Eggs are good.

2) Get a fruit (up to 1/2 cup or 1 fruit) or a vegetable with each meal.

3) Switch from simple to complex carbohydrates. If you're going to have bread, make it whole grain--and after your protein. They weren't like "take away potatoes" (though they did encourage me not to count those as a vegetable :)), but they were like "switch from white rice to brown rice."

4) Take small bites, chew a lot, eat mindfully, put the fork/spoon down between every bite. No wolfing down food in the car, no open bags of chips in front of the TV.

5) Get 8 cups or more of water per day. If it has Mio in it, or it's an herbal tea or a decaf coffee, that's totally fine. Sugary beverages are a big no, and caffeinated beverages don't count.

6) Stop having carbonated drinks. (This is the one that I balked at the most, honestly. I knew I'd need to give them up post-op, but I had really planned to keep enjoying them until I had to stop.) If you really must have that diet soda, let it go flat first.

And I mostly followed that -- I won't lie: at least two croissants, no small amount of Chicago style popcorn, and several servings of pizza crossed my lips over the course of the two months I mostly-followed these guidelines -- and lost 6 pounds each month.

I need to lose a bit more quickly, so I've changed things around a bit -- doing a low-fat ketogenic diet which has me down near 1000 calories a day -- in order to meet my doctor's arbitrary weight goal in time to get my surgery this fall. But the rules above were pretty good, and the flexibility to break them--just a little, and only very rarely--was nice. (I hate keto. I hate that a single piece of fruit will wreck up my system for over a day. But it is a very efficient way to lose weight with mostly manageable hunger. And those refried beans in the mushy food stage will taste SO GOOD to me. I miss beans.)

Mine had me give up caffeine, alcohol and carbonation. Told me to practice "eating in order" protein first, then veggies and then carbs if still hungry. Make sure and include a fruit or veggie at every meal. Oh, and not to drink my calories and aim for a minimum of 64 oz of water a day. Also to practice not drinking with my meals.

My WLC gives every patient a specific diet to follow starting the first appointment. It is the diet we will be following when we start eating solid foods again. I am in the 5th month of my WLC 6 month required program. No matter what our insurance requires everyone they do WLS on has to go through this program, along with the required medical testing that can take awhile to complete.

Thank you all for your tips! I'm going to follow the post-op bariatric diet that they gave us and buy smaller plates. I gave up soda already and I'm going to do my best to decrease my carb intake as well. Hopefully I won't crave them as much.

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