"Food Funeral" was today...

And I actually cried. As I sat in the food court at the mall eating my last few bites of fried noodles from my favorite Chinese restaurant, a song came on over the speaker system and I couldn't help myself. It was the song that goes "and I want to thank you... For giving me the best days of my life" and my emotions got the best of me. I realized the huge impact food has had on me for my whole life and how much I'll miss being able to turn to food. I know that other things will take its place and I will eventually begin to retrain my head not to use food as my go-to comfort.

Except that I'm not really feeling that way right now :( I know what I need to do, and I've committed to myself to being healthy for myself and my family and especially my son, but my confidence in myself is wavering at the moment. 

Did anyone else feel this way in the beginning? I don't even start my 2 week liquid diet until tomorrow and I am already feeling this way. Does this mean that I'm not going to be strong enough to go through with the post-op requirements and make a life-long changes? 

I know that I'm the only one who can answer that, but it would help to know if my feelings are common for others in similar situations. 

You're totally NOT alone in feeling that way. I'm on day 10 (technically) of my pre-op diet and I had planned to have my "last meal before the execution" the night before I started. I never did have my "last meal" only because I couldn't decide what I wanted. I wanted everything!

Really, though, I look at it this way.. It's not like we're never going to eat again. It's not like we'll never have the food we have loved so much our entire lives again. We can still eat the things we like (eventually), but the sleeve will give us the ability to walk away and be satisfied sooner. Of course, there will be new rules to follow, we'll have to adapt to new tastes for foods that are healthy and those foods will take priority. But, we will learn to enjoy healthier foods just as much as we enjoyed the foods that were bad for us. And you will be able to eat the (bad for you) foods you used to enjoy too.. just not as often and you have to plan for ithem. And when you do eat them, you'll only want a little before you're satisfied. 

And by the way, as time goes by, the separation anxiety becomes much more manageable. It's almost like you forget what it was about those foods that were so satisfying because it's been so long since you had them. If you've dieted for long periods of time, you probably already know this. 

Instead of a funeral, think of it as an amicable divorce. Yeah, I know, divorce is sad too. 

"I know that other things will take its place and I will eventually begin to retrain my head not to use food as my go-to comfort."

Yup.  You have to make the effort, but the sleeve can be such a powerful tool in getting there. 

This doesn't mean you'll never enjoy food again, or that you'll be eating gruel for the rest of your life, but it DOES mean that you can put food in its proper place if you do what you are supposed to do. 

It's common to have doubts preop.  I almost talked myself into the laughable fantasy that I could simply stay on the preop diet and just keep losing weight without having the surgery.  Almost.  Then reason and reality kicked me upside the head and reminded me that I had once lost well over 100 pounds, only to regain it all back plus a bunch more.  I had the surgery, I follow my rules, and I haven't looked back since, nearly one year postop.

Hang in there, hon.  :)

Have you ever had a friend or a boyfriend that you loved dearly but was toxic?  You know that you have to separate yourself from them for your own good, even though it hurts like hell.  

You have to make a choice here - you, or likely an early death due to complications of obesity.  Your feelings are not uncommon at all, and I'll give you the same recommendation I would give to a friend going through a breakup.  If you can't move past your feelings and move on to a healthy life, seek help from a good therapist, who can help you understand the feelings and give you tools to deal with them.  VSG is one tool, but won't do a thing to stop the feelings you'll be dealing with.  Willpower ain't the answer baby - you have to deal with what got you here to begin with.

You CAN do this with the right support team.  You are on your way to a new healthy, fulfilling life!

I  know this is hard to really wrap your mind around pre-surgery..but you'll be amazed at how you'll be able to look at food you once loved (I'm looking at you Costco Pecan Pie) and have a good memory of enjoying it once but are not even tempted post surgery. Part of it is that your head is in a different place, part of it is that your appetite urges are profoundly reduced and, at least for me, part of it is that I don't want to experience any discomfort in my stomach by eating the wrong thing/something that's hard for your stomach to digest. I'm a little over 2 weeks post-op and if someone had told me I would look forward to SF jello, low/no sodium broth and bariatric cream soups I would have laughed myself silly.  

I agree with finding....

pre surgery it's hard to imagine that your never going to enjoy the "quantities" of food you have in the past, but I have to tell you and I had this conversation with my hubby just this weekend...I don't even desire the old food anymore...it's very weird but I have no interest In it...I like eating on plan, I like seeing the results...even with the stalls along the way, it has taught me more about myself than anything else...do I eat off plan?.....sure, but there's really no craving, or compulsive gotta have it moments anymore... I have a couple bites and Im done...I don't feel like I want to plow thru food anymore..I'm satisfied and happy...that being said, I'm almost 7 months out and in the beginning you will experience head hunger and that's your bodies rebellion of not eating the foods you went overboard on, it will pass and it gets really simple if you don't self sabotage..

You will definitely find the strength.  When the scale starts moving down and the clothes start getting loose you will feel amazing.  I'm only 4 weeks post op and I too felt like oh man what have I done to my self prior to surgery.  I love food, especially carbs, and hate to admit it but red wine was my a nightly comfort for me.  Won't lie and say I don't miss the potato chips and vino, but not nearly as much as I worried I would.  I'm starting soft foods today and I'm looking forward to discovering all of the wonderful healthy choices there are out there.   Good luck....

I felt the same way pre op. But I agree with a few other responses that said that you have to think of it like a breakup. This is what causesd the "Ah ha!" moment for me. I started thinking about my new relationship with food in terms of an ending to an abusive relationship. We had been SO good together, but at the same time, we were SO bad together. In the end, my relationship with food was doing nothing but causing me pain. We had to call it quits. Not a "we still hook up on the weekends" breakup, but a "forget my number, forget my name, you need to not exist" breakup. I know that, eventually, I'll be able to see food on the sidewalk and have a short, polite conversation, and then walk away back to my normal routine without feeling the need to dwell on and disect evey word we uttered, but that time isn't now. Now is the time for ME. Now is the time for hanging out with foods that are nice to me and don't leave me hating myself at the end of the night. 

Now is the time for ME. 

I cried over pizza on my preop diet. I'm talking big ol' alligator, snot running kind of cried. I look back and can laugh about it now. Im 18 months out and have been at "goal" for months. I can eat a piece of pizza if I wanted. Funny thing is that I dont. I dont even really care for it now. Your tastes will change. Your desire for certain foods will not be the same. It is not to say that I dont still want the "bad" food...it is just that food isnt all that it seemed to be before. You will do great!! Trust me, most of us felt that way at one point or another.