Hi all,

I had my VSG surgery in April. I started off at 410lbs and am currently 300.9. I just weighed in today, last week I was 296.3lbs. But I will say that for this last week it was my husbands birthday and I didn’t go to the gym so I wasn’t exercising or eating well. So I expected some weight gain.

But I’m really worried about the way I gain weight back so quickly. Just one week off and I gained 4.6 lbs back. Is this normal? And will I have to deal with this the rest of my life? I’m already slightly disappointed because in the beginning I was losing so well but for this past few months I can barely lose 5lbs a month if that!

I know weight loss slows over time and that I’m literally a month and a few weeks away from making my year…but somehow I feel like I’m not doing something right and should have lost way more weight by now. And that my weight gain comes back so quickly! I go back to the doctor on April 19th…my goal weight for then is 280lbs. I’m praying I can make that, if I don’t I feel like my doctor will be disappointed. Better yet I feel like I’ll be disappointed in myself.. I just hope it’s enough.

So much of that is likely water if you weren’t eating right. When I was closer to that weight I could easily fluctuate by 5lbs of water. Just reset your course and it should be off by Thursday this week if you stick to your advisements and avoid sodium.

to gain 4.6 lbs in a week, you would have had to have eaten 16,100 extra calories - that is, calories above and beyond what your body needs. So unless you've eaten that many extra calories this week, then the "gain" is likely due to water retention or very full intestines. In either case, it should be gone in a couple of days.

and yes - you do have to monitor your food intake for life, unfortunately. I gradually put on 10 lbs over the course of a year because I wasn't monitoring myself as closely as I usually do. Working on taking that off now (have lost 7 lbs of it it so far - YAY!). This is a lifelong battle.

P.S. weight loss does slow down a lot the further out you get from surgery. After i hit the year mark, my weight loss slowed down to a crawl - some months I'd lose like a whopping 2 lbs. But I kept at it, and it did eventually come off. The issue is, the smaller you get, the fewer calories your body needs to function. If at your previous weight your body required say, 3000 kcal/day to function, and you were only eating 1000, you're going to lose weight fairly quickly. But if at a lesser weight it only takes 1600 to maintain that weight and you're eating 1000, you're still going to lose weight, but it's going to come off slower.

15 hours ago, catwoman7 said:

P.S. weight loss does slow down a lot the further out you get from surgery. After i hit the year mark, my weight loss slowed down to a crawl - some months I'd lose like a whopping 2 lbs. But I kept at it, and it did eventually come off. The issue is, the smaller you get, the fewer calories your body needs to function. If at your previous weight your body required say, 3000 kcal/day to function, and you were only eating 1000, you're going to lose weight fairly quickly. But if at a lesser weight it only takes 1600 to maintain that weight and you're eating 1000, you're still going to lose weight, but it's going to come off slower.

Thank you for this advice! It makes me feel a lot better. And I’m not sure if I ate that many extra calories. It seems a bit hard to believe considering my stomach still is not normal size yet. But it was my husbands birthday week so I did enjoy myself… nonetheless I’m back on track this week with going to they gym 4 days a week and watching what I eat.

side note: I also have PCOS which is one of the main reasons I got the surgery. If you don’t know what that is long story short it’s a form of insulin resistance. Basically makes it hard to lose and easy to gain. So maybe that’s part of why I gained so quickly?? I’m not sure just guessing. It seems to be under control now that I’ve lost so much weight. But maybe that’s just what I think and it’s not under control after all.

but despite all of this I’ll try to stay positive and do my best! An exciting thing is after April me and the husband will be trying for kids so that’s a something that keeps me motivated! Haven’t been successful in the past so I’m hoping this time around is different.