20 pounds regain normal?

What the others have said...

The long-term data I've seen on the sleeve suggests regain is most common between year 3 and year 6 and has everything to do with eating 'non-compliance' (i.e., eating crap).

Studies show the hormonal effects of the sleeve are about the same at 5 years post-op as they were at 6 months post-op.  The sleeve still 'works' over time if you work it  whereas caloric mal-absorption with RNY stops after about 2 years. 

If you follow the VSG maintenance board, at all, you'll note that those *****gain still retain the ability to lose if they so choose by going back to sleeve basics.  From everything I've seen, read, or heard, if you don't want to re-gain weight in the first place it's pretty straight forward -- exercise, don't eat crap, and treat GERD if you have it (i.e., take a PPI).  


 

Thanks for this info.  Of course this is true of most weight loss.  I am a lifetime member of WW and it would be true to say that I could have lost weight again if I'd gone back to that program.

Not that I'm naysaying the sleeve.  I love my sleeve, and am extremely pleased to know that my stomach will never allow me to gorge again the way I have in the past, and that my hunger hormones will not be as strong when they come back.

I haven't been following the maintenance board yet, but they were extremely helpful to me when I was asking whether to have my surgery done before my son's wedding or whether to wait.  Clearly, I didn't wait.  His wedding is next week!

All true.

The  big difference between non-surgical weightloss and RNY  and the sleeve is hormonal.  Losing weight makes you produce more grhelin when you have fundus.  With non-surgical WLS or RNY where the fundus remains intact, the body produces more ghrelin at 'goal' than it does when you start out.That's part of what makes it harder to maintain than to lose in the first place. 

The 'sleeve advantage' is more than just ghrelin reduction which is permanent.  It involves other hormones in the intestines and mechanisms that signal 'fullness' that are mechanical as well as hormonal. That's what makes choice rather than volume more important down the road.  

With a sleeve you can't 'gorge' per se, but you can eat around the sleeve with calorically dense foods.  I eat 1700-1800 calories a day with the same 'capacity' I had at 3 months when I ate 600 calories a day.  My restriction still works just fine, I just feed myself differently in order to get enough calories.  It's not a matter of hunger -- I don't have any per se, it's all a matter of choice.

 Almost had the RnY (hence the username). Glad I got the sleeve.

I am lucky, I guess.  No matter how miserable after surgery or how much pain or nausea in the first few days, I never once regretted or questioned this choice.  And I still don't!

Long term, you may find a difficult recovery to be a blessing. One of our long term post ops was noting that when she has an occasional indulgence of ice cream or the like, she thinks back to her difficult recovery and thinks, 'OK, i can enjoy this now, but I'm not going back to where I was, so no more - not taking any home to have in the freezer...' So, that is something that you may be able to use in the future to halt a slide - enjoy something once, but keeping it an occasional treat rather than a habit.

Louisamay, I love your new picture! It really shows your progress, and how much younger you're becoming. :) You're going to have a wonderful time at your son's wedding!

My surgeon believes that RNY patients often see a rebound in weight because of the caloric absorption correction between 18 adn 24 months. However, he told me when discussing which surgery would be best for me that most of his RNY patients that do experience bounce back or regain also simultaneously slack off on the rules - especially eating and drinking at the same time. My good friend with RNY started drinking with her meals again and lo and behold has put on 8 pounds in the last 3 months. She mentioned that she's more hungry than she used to be. DUH!

As for us sleevers, he said that the restriction will always be there and that IF I learn to eat correctly and learn what my maintenance calorie level is and continue to track and eat using the rules, there is NO REASON to expect regain. However, he did say too, that many patients stop being compliant once they approach goal and ease up on tracking and do gain back weight. BUT he holds that weight regain with the sleeve is all about choice, not metabolic or mechanical.

Hope that makes sense. Basically, in the end, like any maintenance plan, it's going to be up to us and the choices we make. The sleeve is a tool to help us get where we're going, give us a window to relearn to eat, and then, Baby, it's up to us to use what we got to our advantage!