I asked my surgeon at my one-year checkup about stretching one's pouch, since it is often discussed on this forum. She said it is almost impossible to stretch the pouch after surgery and that this is an urban legend that has been perpetuated on the internet.

So, I'm asking: Has anyone been told by their surgeon that they have definitely stretched their pouch? I want to hear from those who have personally been told that by a doctor.

I don't think pouches really stretch. More likely, the stoma (the opening between the pouch and the small intestine) can stretch.

Dr Bass out of Florida has been doing this for years - I asked him this weeks ago and he said out of the 10000 surgery patients he has never seen a big stretch. However he did say you can open up your stoma and flow calories thru rapidly, However that is also very hard to do.

He stated that people who fail go back to unhealhty choices, He gave a example of a guy who would eat 3 family size bags of chips a day, all day would just consume consume consume them.

I am with above Urban legend!

Ha. Maybe my surgeon wants to scare me? Cuz she says she has personally seen it in a very few of her patients. So she believes in it. Maybe it's the stoma that stretched? Maybe it's the tool? Dunno. She just told me to be careful of portion sizes forevs.

2 hours ago, catwoman7 said:

I don't think pouches really stretch. More likely, the stoma (the opening between the pouch and the small intestine) can stretch.

So what happens if the stoma is stretched? Can that lead to less restriction?

51 minutes ago, Recidivist said:

Can that lead to less restriction?

Yes it opens the gate to slam food thru More and More Like pulling the drain plug in a sink so free flowing, Do not worry this is rare and you have to have issues to work hard to get healthy then fall back to being unhealthy. But I am fairly new to this and they all say the 3 year mark is a b***h

The pouch after surgery is very small, about 2 ounces or 50 mL. Even if you could stretch your pouch say 50%, that would be 3 ounces or 75 mL. If you eat a healthy diet and stop eating when your pouch is full can you gain weight with an extra 1 ounce of food per meal? Probably not. If you do not eat a healthy diet you will gain weight regardless of your stomach size. WLS does not mean automatic weight loss, we still need to use the tool to help modify our poor eating habits that made us obese.