I recently lost about 40 pounds without trying and all my doctors freaked out (I had my DS in 2014). A dozens tests later and I'm healthy, and the weight loss stopped. But my point is that they prescribed me digestive enzymes to help absorb more of what I was eating and therefore stop the weight loss. I also added 3 protein shakes a day (90 grams of protein total) in addition to what I was eating. I've been stable for several months now.

Ok, I see what you're saying. That makes a bit of sense. I have to eat fat with my protein or else I can't get it down. I tend to eat a lot of ground beef, since that's what my body tolerates well (and I don't mind burgers). I'm not trying to lose weight right now but I stopped weighing myself a couple of years ago. I realized that it didn't matter if the number was up or down, it made me compulsive about food (if it was up, I felt I couldn't eat, which made me HAVE TO eat. If the number was down, I wanted to keep the weight off, so I felt I couldn't eat- same thing). A few months back everyone started commenting and my pants were loose, so I stepped on a scale and I'd lost 25 pounds. I did contact my doctor and she's run a bunch of tests, which have all come back good, even though my weight is still dropping. Idk- maybe I just plateaued for 7 years or so??????

So, I had a talk with a nutritionist today. She told me to go low fat because when fat is not absorbed it takes nutrients along with it, as a part of the malabsorption (she tried saying that protein was one of those nutrients but hello- protein and fat are completely different and absorbed differently).

Is there any truth whatsoever to malabsorbed fat sucking up other nutrients and carrying them away? I can only eat meat that has a significant amount of fat in it or I can't get it down, and I'm running protein deficient.

This nutritionist told me I was doing everything wrong, then told me to stop losing weight so quickly. I'm 9 years out from surgery.

It would be nice if our bodies stopped changing all the time!

Have you talked to your doctor about pelvic floor exercises? It helped me quite a bit. I understand that you would like to stop the loose stools (but keeping it in is also the issue). The exercises helped me while I was figuring out what foods were giving me so much trouble and (knock wood) I don't have nearly as much trouble as I used to.

Another thing that might be useful: I would wear a pull up over my underwear at night, just in case. It stayed clean that way so that I could use it every night and not waste a bunch of them, but it was there if an accident happened.

Best of luck to you.

So glad I came across your posts. Thanks for the advice- I'll get on this. :)

Hi Jenny- I had gastroparesis before I had wls and I did not have reflux or any of the other symptoms you mentioned. It started with vomiting and having food in my stomach that I had eaten the day before. Eventually I would get full off of just a bite or two of food. It was very up and down- some days I could eat a little, some days almost nothing. I weighed almost 400 pounds when it started so no doctors took it seriously. I lost about 100 pounds and it just went away. I haven't had it since. I had RNY surgery, later revised to DS and have not had any gastroparesis symptoms at all during any of it (but wls was a breeze compared to gastroparesis- I'd take the surgery side effects over gastroparesis any day of the week).

I hope you figure things out soon- I know this is not fun.

Call Dr Rabkin's office. If there is a way that it can be done, they will walk you through it. I have Kaiser (through MediCal) and they walked me through all the appeals processes. I'm not saying that they will accept Anthem Blue Cross MediCal but if you're in San Francisco it's worth a phone call. Good luck to you- I know how discouraging this whole process is.

Sue

Throwing in my two cents- I had an open RNY to DS in February 2014 with Dr Rabkin and I say what everyone else here is saying: do it right and have it done by an expert. Dr K is one of the only surgeons experienced at this, and you need to have it done properly. You will be glad you traveled to have it done. 

Hi- just wanted to share what worked for me. My surgeon (Dr Rabkin) had me on Prilosec for 3 months. He said that in his experience that if he keeps his patients on it for three months that they rarely have trouble with reflux. And he prescribes compazine for everyone when they go home because we do get nauseous at first. He also said to hold off on taking iron for the first few weeks until nausea calms down. He was exactly right. Maybe you could speak with your surgeon to get something for nausea as well- it sure helped me (I'm 5 months out). Best of luck to you. 

I talked to my surgeon today and he has me cutting out all dairy to begin with, and if that doesn't do it, cut out gluten also. I have an appointment with him in a couple of weeks and if it's still an issue we take a look at c-diff. I have already tried cutting out dairy but I'll give it another go to say that I've done it. Thanks for your input- it helped me realize that it was time to contact my doctor.

And I took another look at my vitamins. I bought Bariatric Advantage high in aedk, Vita4Life ADEK support and AquADEK. Looks like the only one worth a hoot is the AquAEDK (and of course that's the most expensive one). I also take a prenatal vitamin (as advised by my dr) and that has a large amount of iron in it. I had my blood tested a couple of weeks ago and my iron levels were good.

Thanks again for your advise- it helped.

OK, first of all, I know that the DS gives you diarrhea. Having said that- I am desperately trying to find what makes it worse some days. Right at 3 months (I am currently 5 months out) I started having diarrhea up to 10 times a day. It was so bad that I soiled myself several times.  THis went on for a month. Before that I had good days and worse days but never as bad as it became. I started tracking everything I was eating and all the meds/supplements I was taking and could not find an answer. I was on Prilosec for the first 3 months so I finally tried taking it again and it pretty much did the trick. Not sure why but I was thrilled.

I am willing to take Prilosec forever if that's what it takes but if something else is causing this, I would like to take care of that. I take multi vitamins, calcium citrate, a probiotic and Prilosec every day. My diet did not seem to make much of a difference- dairy is fine, veggies fine (except corn products). Too much grease increased it but that seemed to be short lived.

Any advice? I can even live with running to the bathroom except that (sorry to be graphic here) it sometimes bubbles out before I can get there. I want to make sure that I've done my part of eliminating or adding things to my diet/supplements before I go to my doctor.

Has anyone else been through this? How did you handle it?