VSGers: Please give me your top tips (and pitfalls to avoid) for long-term success....

Hello OH peeps,

This is the first post I've made.  I'm 10 weeks out from VSG and doing well (48 pounds gone!  woohoo  70 or so more to go).  If you feel so inclined and have the time, I would LOVE it if I could get your "top 5 or 10" tips for long term success. (food/psychological/emotional/spiritual.....whatever you feel keeps you successful).   What do you wish a successful person had told you at 3 months out?  I am COMMITTED to this lifestyle change, but I also know things will get difficult at times, so I'd like to hear the best advice.  I GREATLY appreciate anything you can share.

I suggest searching for Elina and Frisco's posts. They are both successful and follow Dr. Criangle's program. Happy Teacher is another success. She had a different surgeon and a different program, but it works for her. I am three years post-op and have been at goal for more than 2 years. I was sleeved through Kaiser Fremont and follow their program, which is different from the other two I mentioned earlier.

Here's my top tips for losing: 

1. I set myself up for success by making sure to  stock the healthy foods and drinks I like.

2. I weigh and measure my food most of the time to avoid portion creep.

3. I weigh myself daily, although I only track on Fridays.

4. I choose exercise that I enjoy. For me that is a group activity that occurs early in the day close to my house. Right now, I am walking and bike riding most mornings. I walk with a group of friends.

5. I re-evaluate how things are working for me and adjust my plan as needed. Too hungry? More protein. Not losing? Less carbs. Hungry at night? Eat more during the day so I don't get the starved feeling later.

6. When negative thoughts creep in, I ask myself "What would I say to my best friend?" and then I tell myself that instead.

7. I eat protein first, veggies second, and a little whole grain at the end of the meal (but at 10 weeks no whole grain yet and very little veggies)

8. I try to get at least 1 gram of protein for every 10 calories in protein foods. 

9. I don't eat fatty foods such as peanut butter, full fat dairy, or fatty meats.

10. I remind myself this is my Hail Mary and it's now or never. I want to be healthy and well for the long haul.

Good luck on your journey!

Lynda

 

Great advice, thank you!  I especially love the Hail Mary analogy - I'm a huge football fan :)  

Do you live in Fremont?  We just moved here in December from Virginia.

No, Southern California

I would respectfully disagree about reading Elina's posts for sound advice.  She often advocates crash dieting and not eating if you're not hungry as ways to lose weight.   Those methods are not healthy for VSG patients and no reputable surgeon or nutritionist would support them.

Here are my suggestions:

Weigh and measure everything and log what you eat.

Drink as much water as you can.  It helps tremendously with the weight loss.

Eat foods that you enjoy to avoid burn out and focus on high protein, low carbs recipes.  My daily goal is 80-90 grams protein,  30 grams carbs and 40 grams fat.

Don't worry too much about your fat intake,  as long as it's healthy fat.

Try to undereat your sleeve,  which means don't try to max out on the volume that your sleeve can tolerate. 

Eat dense protein first as it will keep away real or imagined hunger longer.

Sounds like you're doing great!  Keep up the good work. 

 

I personally do not believe that severe restriction of foods that preents an  unbalanced nutritional approach is a good idea.  Consequently, I do not fall into the low carb group.  What I quoted above however, is similar to what I did... other than managing my carbs differently and a higher protein goal  Of course, I am 6'2'' tall, so my protein needs would be more than for someone that is 5' tall.  I am hypoglycemic and through trial and error found that eating 6 times per day and alternating 30 carbs and 15 carbs worked very well for me.  I also exercised 6 days a week, usually 1 hour a day or more. 

There does seem to be a lot more long term struggles amongst the unbalanced/severe restriction group than I see amongst the vets in my support group who generally take a more moderated approach. It's that classic long term vs. short term trade-off - rapid loss at any cost means that they often don't learn how to eat healthy and sustainably in the long term, or at least take a lot longer to figure it out, much the same as those who use those rapid loss fad diets without the benefit of WLS.

I'm also a bit skeptical of the psychological aspect of aforementioned advice. Heaven knows many of us have struggled with crash diets and accepting our bodies and ourselves prior to surgery, and a lot of these posts seem to advocate-- directly or indirectly-- going back to the same black-and-white thinking that has wrecked havoc in the past.

It is important to be make healthy food choices, and there's a lot of focus there, but making healthy EMOTIONAL choices are even harder, especially when you're newly post-op and feeling a little lost. Hang in there and be critical in what you read! 

I think that for MOST people, the goal of WLS is to be both physically and emotionally/psychologically healthy.  Doing that means establishing balance and finding a path forward that allows being mindful of, and in control of, what one eats without obsessing over food or what the scale says, without resorting to liquid diets repeatedly or panicking over social events that involve food.

Being thin and obsessed by food and weight doesn't make someone any happier (or emotionally/psychologically healthier) than being morbidly obese and obsessed by food and weight...

Lora