WOW

I am overwhelmed by the thoughtful and insightful responses to my earlier "pity party" post. I cried as I read what you all had to say. I truly feel as if we are friends, all of us bound together by our common denominator -- March 2004 WLS. You're the best. Thank you. I wanted to share with you that I spent some time discussing this slow weight loss issue with my surgeon today. He told me the two most important factors in how fast the weight comes off after surgery are (1) a person's age, and (2) your metabolism. If you are a person who has been morbidly obese for many, many years (like me), the metabolism is totally out of whack, especially if you spent much of that time testing one diet after another. Think of it this way: if your mind is confused over what diet to try next, your body certainly is as well. He also stressed that the older you are (I'm soon to be 48) and especially if you have lived a sedentary lifestyle for many years, the worse off your matabolism is. I fit the profile he defined. I have not seen numbers under 300 lbs. in almost 18 years. The older and bigger I got, the less I moved. So, my body is simply going "Huh??? You want me to do what???" He did not offer me words of encouragement. He said he expected me to lose around 100 lbs., no more, no less, given my profile. That will leave me at around 230 lbs., which I flatly refuse to accept! But it was good to get some common sense information about what I'm feeling from a person who certainly should know. I hope this helps those of you who are feeling likewise. Bottom line is we need to get MOVIN' -- that's the only way to stoke up the metabolism. You guys are the best, truly. Thank you, thank you. God bless and be well, Maureen

Thanks to you for bringing the issue to the forefront, and thanks a million for sharing the info your surgeon gave you regarding the slow weight loss. This gives me hope since I've been heavy all my life and have not exercised on purpose in a really long time. I'm with you - I refuse to lose just 100 pounds - I want to get to goal which is 150, which is half my size now. Thanks again!!! Good luck to you!! -Wendy

Hi Reenie please dont beat yourself up over this, The important thing is that it is comming of, are you walking at all, I feel this really kick started my weightloss I am walking over a mile now and this is someone who wouldnt even walk to the mailbox, God is good keep the faith and remember it will come in time everyone is different, but it's going to come off God bless you sweety! Hugz Mary

Well Maureen - I see his point. Just means that we have some logic to put behind our lagging and stalling. Go figure - years of deprivation and trying to fight the battle of the bulge and we end up shooting ourselves in the foot because we toast our metabolism. Dina

That was very valuable information! It makes sense too! For me it is important emotionally to set my expectations conservatively so that I stay enthused instead of disappointed. By the way, you don't look 48. But then I checked your profile and your logs are all dated AUGUST instead of March! Maybe you are in my generation after all! Joy