Excess Skin - best ways to minimize it ???

The other day I watched an episode of "Big Medicine" and they had this girl on who lost an incredible 220lbs after gastric bypass.
So far for the good news.

As we all know we will suffer from excess skin after WL and she was a severe case of that. She looked like one of those "Shar Pei" dogs who have wrinkles and skin folds over their bodies.

I felt so bad for her but then she had plastic surgery and that helped her to lose the majority of that. It seems pretty clear that if you lose a siginificant amount of weight that lose skin and skin folds will be a result of that but it scares the s..t out of me as I don't think I wanna have plastic surgery where they slice me open like a fish all the way around.

Question now is, and I am sure this has been discussed here already xxx times, what are the best practices to minimize the symptoms.

Everybody is different, elasticity is different with men/woman, age etc. but I just wonder what exercise etc. should we include in our activities to do the best we can to minimize the problem.

Any good advice? I am 3 weeks out and wanna get started soon on specific exercises in addition to the 2-3 miles I walk already.

I don't think there are specific exercises you can do to hide all the excess skin, but you're lucky-as a man you will put on muscle mass pretty quickly, especially following a higher protein diet as we should.  Start with just walking now, getting in the cardio will get the weight off and usually docs don't want weight lifting until you're at least 6 weeks out. 

Good luck!

There are so many factors that affect this from what I have heard.  How resilient your skin is, how young you are, how damaged your skin it, etc.  I just plan to exercise and hope that my skin shrinks as I do!

Hi there,

To date I have lost well over a 100 lbs and I cannot say that I am free from the flabby skin however I can say that I have seen a significant improvement in my skin's appearance being less saggey, and muscle tone definition since I started weight training. I have also seen it in the amount of inches I have lost between the month's. I use to just focus on cardio and regular exercise until i noticed how nasty my arms and thighs were looking.  Please note there is no such thing as spot reducing,  you have to provide your body a total workout to see the benefits everywhere.


I hope this helps!


Take Care,


Broom

Broom,
I just checked out your profile and you have done an amazing job!  I think you are one of the biggest losers I've seen on the band board.  Truly amazing.  I was blown away that you lost 100 lbs. on Weigh****chers, wow, the best I could do with WW was 25#.  Way to go...and you have such a healthy attitude, you're an inspiration.  Keep it up.
Greg

 My dietician said that weight/strength training helps tighten things up all over.  I mean, if you have 220 pounds to lose (for example), there's gonna be a lot of extra skin no matter how elastic it is.  

Personally, I have noticed that doing upper body weights at the gym is helping with my arms.  They're flabby for sure, but I can tell they're getting smaller and tighter.

Wait to get the green light from your surgeon and then slowly start working weight training into your routine.  Check with your gym to see if there's a trainer you can work with that will help you come up with a safe and efficient routine.

Good luck and congrats on your recent surgery!

Genetics are a big part of the skins elasticity.  Unfortunately, no matter what there is going to be excess skin if you have a lot of weight to lose.

Toning exercises are the best way to fight it.  Building lean muscle will take up some of the slack left in the skin.  Good old weights and sit ups, crunches, lunges, etc. are the most effective.  I do Pilates for my "core" muscles, (stomach and legs especially), but I'm not sure that would appeal to you.  My husband does it to humor me on occasion but...

Regarding plastic surgery I'm already counting on it.  Yes, it's scarry, but the hanging skin can lead to other health problems too like skin rashes, etc.

Luckily I don't have to worry about that right now but my day will come!

All the best!
Lisa O.

Everyone has given you good advice.  I would have to agree that cardio is #1 to lose and maintain weight loss, but the strength training really helped me tone up my abs and arms.  The "wings" were getting pretty nasty, but with a lot of arm strength training and push-ups...they are looking better.  I don't do real heavy weights but focus on more reps, that has worked well for me.  At the beginning, I could barely do 10 push-ups, but now I can do 2 sets of 35.  It's a slow process but it does work.  Good luck to you!

Hi Olli:

For me it didn't matter so much what exercise as long as there was lots of it. I certainly have extra skin but I definitely think exercise has made a difference. I do cardio (treadmill, bike, stairmaster), weights, and classes so a bit of everything.

My brother works out and trains quite a bit, and he's been helping me to figure out what to do.  I'm worried about all that also.  I've been loosing quite fast so, excess skin is kinda of freaking me out, what the other guy said is pretty much what my brother has told me.   Reps are good.   I suppose it doesn't much matter if what you lift is heavy, it's reps.    They told me , a can of beans. (somebody laughed at me when I told them that the other day)  but you work up from that.     When I pointed out I wanted to work on that "wing" area of my arm, and that I dont have much strength, (so i can't really do the traditional push up right now)  you can do pretty much the same thing bracing against a door frame and doing "push ups" like that.    Anyway, I don't think you asked specifically about the arms, but...   Hope that may have been helpful.