10 Weeks Out and Pondering a Few Things

I've never had difficulty swallowing, nor have I felt restriction often.  I'm wondering if I should purposely spend a few days eating those things that definitely let me know they are "there" in my stomach, if that would help me in some way.  So far that would mean shrimp, chicken breast, cherries, steak, sausage. 

Oh, and in case I haven't mentioned it lately, I love OH almost as much as I love my sleeve, and that's a lot!

If I wasnt feeling resctriction on certain foods, I would probably eat the dense proteins that you mentioned. I haven't tried cherries but all the other proteins fill me up quickly. Good luck!

I'm doing fine with weighing and measuring, but thought it might be interesting to experience the more "typical" sleeve experience. 

Well, I'm doing fine as long as I don't ea****ermelon or cantalope.  Those are my major sliders, and probably because they chew down to hardly anything at all, I can eat way too much of them.  I've been a huge watermelon lover since I was a wee girl!

Yes, without a doubt you should eat dense lean protein for many reasons, and one of those reasons is to feel the restriction and delay hunger by utilizing the properties of your pyloric valve. 

Thanks. I eat them but also eat a lot of Greek yogurt, cottage cheese and such. This morning along with my CC I ate 5 cherries. I definitely felt the difference from when I eat it with blueberries or w/o fruit at all.

Are there other reasons to eat the dense proteins besides restriction and hunger?

I don't really ever feel "restriction" ie full. I dont feel a whole lot of anything. Last night, I was eating my normal dinner, and I ate wayy slower than I normally do, never felt uncomfortable, and then all of a sudden, i had the worst case of foamies EVER. I was stuck hovering over the toilet for 10 minutes absolutely sure I was going to puke. Not even sure how that happened, but personally, I wouldn't try and push the limits of your sleeve. My personally philosphy is that this WL/journey/success is going to be 90% me, and when my will power totally fails, the other 10% will be the times when my sleeve reminds me enough is enough. But, for the most part, I try to avoid using my sleeve and feelings of restriction as a guide for choices I make as to quantity/quality of food.

I've never had the foamies or any of the other symptoms of being too full.  But when I eat those dense foods, I do feel their presence.

But knowing you have accomplished all you have without the restrictions so many depend on is a huge boost to me!  I think that measuring and weighing (and eyeballing when I have to) is real forever, where restriction will eventually change.  My grandfather always said, "Start out as you can hold out," and since I don't have restrictions like so many do, this has forced me to be that way, because otherwise I could be eating a lot more.  It also made it possible for me to spend a week in Hawaii having to eyeball things about half the time without gaining weight. 

I'm going to throw this out there for you and maybe I'll find out that I'm wrong from other responses, but.... here goes.....

I think most successful VSGers do not rely heavily upon restriction. I think most of us use portion control and have found the right size portions to feel satisfied but not full. I personally HATE to feel my restriction. It's icky - like the food is sitting in my throat just at my colar bones. And it can take up to an hour for that feeling to subside. I try to be pretty careful not to feel it!

I think it's important to feel satisfied and not hungry. My hunger kicked back in sometime between month three and four. (Still, my hunger is NOTHING compared to pre VSG and it is never, ever an emergency now.)  I found that eating the dense proteins kept me satisfied much longer than greek yogurt and cottage cheese. So much so, that I don't spend the calories on cottage cheese anymore. I'll grab a piece of grilled chicken breast instead for a snack.
So, yes, I would recommend you start eating more dense protein rather than the full liquid types of food you're eating. I think it will help you a great deal to feel satisfied for a longer time between meals.

I agree with you about success and not depending on restrictions.  And it was my surgeon who stressed to me the benefits of eating dense proteins for satiation.  I actually like cottage cheese and Greek yogurt so even though I have been adding a lot more dense foods, I'm still eating a lot of the soft ones, too.  I think the experiment avoiding the softs totally for two days might be interesting.