I'm a year out from my surgery and at my last dietitian meeting we discussed maintenance calories which I have been looking forward to that discussion for forever but I was really shocked and I can't believe I didn't know this after all of my research before and after surgery. He said my calorie goals for life should be between 1300 and 1500 and I had no idea that was going to be so low. I honestly went into surgery thinking that the average calories a person eats is 2000 so I must be eating 3000 or more to be so over weight and I just needed to get back to normal. I thought that I would be able to use the surgery and lack of hunger to eat super low calories and lose the weight and since month 3 I've been at 1000 a day. My hunger is back and 1000 is a struggle now and I'm using all my years of diet experience to fill up on low calorie food as well as hitting all my protein and water goals. I thought that soon I'll be able to eat more so it's just a temporary situation, but now I'm worried about long term success. If I'm hungry at 1000, I don't think 300 more calories is really going make a huge difference. So now I'm wondering if the reason why so many people gain the weight back after surgery is because to keep it off we have to keep our calories so low forever? Also, why do we have to keep our calories so low? Why is the average calories 2000 but for bariatric patients 1300 to 1500 is the goal? I always thought that anything under 1500 wasn't a safe number but when I asked my dietitian all of these questions he didn't know. He just knew that to maintain the weight loss, that's the normal goal and that if I wanted to eat more I could exercise more. So did everyone else know that the calories after surgery were going to be low for life and I just somehow missed this important fact? Anyone know why our average doesn't match the so called normal average? I was really excited to be close to goal but now I'm scared because I can see now how easily it can all go away.

12 hours ago, maintenanceman said:

I have never heard anything about the surgery boosting your metabolism. Can you elaborate?

Metabolic Effects of Bariatric Surgery | Clinical Chemistry | Oxford Academic (oup.com)

Bariatric surgery is also known as metabolic surgery because how the surgery changes the digestive hormones & therefore the patients metabolism.

There are lots of academic papers about it like the one @BabySpoons provided. I found this fact sheet from a bariatric surgery clinic which explains it in more straight forward terms.

https://nevadasurgical.com/bariatric-surgery/how-does-bariatric-surgery-affect-metabolism/

I messed my metabolism up with years of restricted eating & deliberately not eating meals. Now I eat regularly throughout the day to keep my boosted metabolism burning. Don’t want to lose it again.

At first I was a calorie counter about 6 months. Now I just watched what I eat. That being said I stay away from only man made carbs and small portions. Unfortunately I need to start counting loosing to much?

On 10/5/2023 at 2:26 AM, Not sure said:

I’m getting to the 1 year post operative point and just to slow my weight loss my minimum calorie intake was set to 2300 calories, very hard to do and follow my desire to only eat whole non processed food, so they have asked me to stop exercising until I can get 2300 a day and stay at a steady weight. It’s actually really hard to consume that whole foods to hit that 2300 calorie goal. Anyone else have similar problems?

Not sure why anyone would advise you to stop exercising? Surely that's a big part of your new life and maintaining your loss.

Also - why does your loss need to be slowed - who decided this was best for *you*?

What is YOUR goal? I say focus on that and how you can achieve it. Stick to your non-processed foods if that's best for you in the long term.

You're in charge. I wish you the best of luck.