Working out on the preop diet

[Lahela 83]

So I have 11 days left until my surgery woot woot! But I have set a goal to lose 15 more lbs before surgery so I have started working out again now that I have some energy again. But I am finding it is making me very hungry. Is this normal? Will it go away after a few days? Or should I not be working out?

I dont want to sabotage myself but I really want to hit my goal. Any advice or tips would be greatly appreciated!

[Hop_Scotch 1,627]

15lb in 11 days is a big goal, and yes if you are exercising you will get hungry if you are not eating enough to sustain your exercise as well as your normal every day activities.

How much exercise are you doing? How many calories are you eating?

Note those who lose a lot of weight in the weeks leading up to surgery typically don't lose as much as they expect in the first few weeks post op, as they have already lost the bloat and any Fluid retention.

Has your surgeon put you on a very low calorie diet during this time? Pre-op plans vary but a lot of people have to do a two week pre-op diet for various reasons.

[RickM 1,747]

First - you should avoid setting weight/time goals because you have little influence over them; lose 15 lb, that's great, but it might take a week, a month or two. Don't knock yourself out about it. OAGB has the right idea that you can only generate a certain level of caloric deficit to drive your loss, That said, there are variations, primarily based upon manipulating your body's Water weight.

When we first start a major loss effort, we often experience the "easy 10" which represents the typical amount of water weight that we lose early on by burning up our glycogen stores (some who start bigger with more muscle mass and fat may lose a bit more from this - maybe 15 or so). Take this freebie and run with it, but don't agonize over how much this "bonus" might be - it is what it is. Concentrate more on setting yourself up for long term success by learning how to eat a healthy, sustainable diet consistent with long term weight control vs. quickie loss.

When I was doing the 6 month insurance program, I ignored weight loss and concentrated on establishing the healthy eating habits that would need five or ten years in the future. That turned out to be worth about fifty lb, or about a third of my excess weight without agonizing over the scale. Learn to eat healthy and let the surgery do its job for you.

Good luck,

[Lahela 83]

11 hours ago, Hop_Scotch said:

15lb in 11 days is a big goal, and yes if you are exercising you will get hungry if you are not eating enough to sustain your exercise as well as your normal every day activities.

How much exercise are you doing? How many calories are you eating?

Note those who lose a lot of weight in the weeks leading up to surgery typically don't lose as much as they expect in the first few weeks post op, as they have already lost the bloat and any Fluid retention.

Has your surgeon put you on a very low calorie diet during this time? Pre-op plans vary but a lot of people have to do a two week pre-op diet for various reasons.

My surgeon has me on a 800 to 1200 calorie preop diet. My surgery is 10 days now. I was staying at 800 calories during the 1st 2 weeks but since I have started hitti g 14,000 steps per day and burning 2800 calories per day I have come closer to 1200 calories because I am hungry.

The preop diet is like this: 1st meal Protein Shake

2 to 3 hrs: later a cup of fruit or vegetables

2nd meal: Protein shake

2 to 3 hrs: later cup of fruit or vegetablea

3rd meal: 3oz chicken or turkey, 1 serving of whole grains, 1 cup of vegetables.

Snack: 1 serving low fat dairy

Keeping in 800 to 1200 calories.

[Lahela 83]

35 minutes ago, RickM said:

First - you should avoid setting weight/time goals because you have little influence over them; lose 15 lb, that's great, but it might take a week, a month or two. Don't knock yourself out about it. OAGB has the right idea that you can only generate a certain level of caloric deficit to drive your loss, That said, there are variations, primarily based upon manipulating your body's Water weight.

When we first start a major loss effort, we often experience the "easy 10" which represents the typical amount of Water weight that we lose early on by burning up our glycogen stores (some who start bigger with more muscle mass and fat may lose a bit more from this - maybe 15 or so). Take this freebie and run with it, but don't agonize over how much this "bonus" might be - it is what it is. Concentrate more on setting yourself up for long term success by learning how to eat a healthy, sustainable diet consistent with long term weight control vs. quickie loss.

When I was doing the 6 month insurance program, I ignored weight loss and concentrated on establishing the healthy eating habits that would need five or ten years in the future. That turned out to be worth about fifty lb, or about a third of my excess weight without agonizing over the scale. Learn to eat healthy and let the surgery do its job for you.

Good luck,

Great advice thank you so much!

[Lahela 83]

9 hours ago, OAGBPal said:

To lose 15 lbs in 11 days, you would have to lose around 52,500 calories in 11 days, or 4,773 calories a day. If we assume you burn around 2,500 cals a day - wait, let's say 3,000 to be on the safe side, you would need to eat nothing AND burn off at least 1,773 calories on top of that.

Let's say you're a 250 lb (113 kg.) woman. You would have to run 15 kilometers at a pretty fast pace, every day, to make this happen.

So the calculation would be:

LOSS: 4,773 calories
- from 'existing': 3,000
- from running 15 kilometers every day: 1,744
- from doing pushups at home: the last 30 or so

As you can see, this is completely unattainable, and you should never stop eating. So unless you're in the mood to run 30-50 kilometers a day, this won't happen.

Now could you lose some Water weight? Sure! There's tons of that to go. But my advice would be to set some realistic goals

🤔that is a lot to take in, but you are right. Thank you for helping me, I appreciate all your information. Im 10 days away from surgery, I guess I will have to drop my expectations and just stay on track with the diet and go with it. Thank you so much

[Jnfinney 516]

I didn’t set a weight loss goal for the pre op diet, nor did my surgeon. I lost around 13 pounds the whole 2 weeks, which I think is good because my starting weight was 228 lbs.