Should I do a pre-op diet anyway?
My clinic doesn't require any kind of pre-op diet other than liquids only the day before surgery and NPO the day of surgery.
Am I weird for wanting to do kind of a step-down diet over the next three weeks, just so that it's not all just one "AARGH!"?
My thought is to replace one meal a day with a Protein Shake this week, reduce fruit, and step from 2 cups coffee a day to 1 cup (and no sugar in the coffee, which is about the only place I still eat sugar).
Then the second and third weeks, replace two meals a day with Protein Shakes, and eliminate fruit and coffee entirely. If I get too hungry, I'll have something protein-y like plain skyr. (Skyr is a dairy product that's like yoghurt but is made from skimmed milk and is higher Protein than regular or Greek yoghurt.)
Any other suggestions from veterans? What was hardest for you post-op that you wish you would have dealt with pre-op? I have been practicing "sipping" for a couple of weeks and it's annoying as H-E-double hockey sticks but not undoable.
My pre-op diet was one of the less restrictive ones. It was shake for Breakfast, mid morning high Protein snack, shake for lunch, afternoon high protein snack, dinner is 4-6oz lean protein, veggie and small carb if you want it, if still hungry another Protein Shake for after dinner snack (I generally skipped this).
High protein Snacks included hard boiled egg, Jerky, lunch meat, string cheese, 2-3oz lean protein, greek yogurt etc. Basically at least 10g protein and less than 200 calories.
It worked out to around 1000-1200 calories per day, 80-100g protein and less than 100g carbs. Definitely less restrictive than all liquids but I still lost around 10-12lbs I think and it was livable.
Something like that may be easier to stick to since it's not enforced by your program.