How to Create an Exercise Program After Gastric Bypass Surgery

Exercise is an important part of a successful gastric bypass surgery. Done properly and under supervision, exercise speeds healing and recovery. Getting started on any post surgical exercise program is difficult. It may be even more difficult for people who were unaccustomed or unable to exercise previously due to excessive weight. If you create an exercise program based on your likes and dislikes and work at it a little each day, you will be more likely to stick with it over the long haul. Read on to learn how to create an exercise program after gastric bypass surgery.

Instructions

1. Discuss all exercises, from the first day of stretching onward, with your doctor. You will want to exercise as soon as possible, but don't rush into against your doctor's advice.

2. Acknowledge that lack of exercise may have contributed to your weight problem.

3. Commit to making a daily exercise program part of your lifestyle after gastric bypass surgery.

4. Start slowly. With your doctor's consent, try a few light stretches in bed the morning after your surgery.

5. Begin to exercise as soon as possible. Barring complications, you should be up and taking a few steps the day after your surgery.

6. Walk, walk, walk during the initial recovery period. Walk several times a day, even if you can only last for two or three minutes. Until your doctor gives the OK, walk on flat even surfaces, not grades.

7. Avoid abdominal exercises until they have been approved by your doctor--usually at least four to six weeks after surgery.

8. Burn fat, not muscle. Your body will be getting fewer calories after your surgery. To replace the lost energy, a sedentary body may burn muscle rather than fat. Exercise will burn fat.

9. Create a multi-front plan that keeps you interested and provides comprehensive exercise, including cardiovascular, aerobic, flexibility and endurance portions.

10. Lift weights after your doctor has informed you that your wounds are sufficiently healed. Gastric bypass patients are at greater risk for osteoporosis. Weight bearing exercise is a great way to battle bone loss.

11. Enroll in a water aerobics class after your doctor has released you to be in water. Swimming really works the abdominal muscles, so delay actually doing that until you have received the go ahead from your physician.

Bariatric vitamin supplements are a must-have in your diet after gastric bypass surgery. Your stomach can hold only a very little bit of food, and you run the potential risk of vitamin and mineral deficiencies. You might be wondering why you should specifically have bariatric supplements, and here are the major reasons why.

Gastric Bypass Surgery Results In Less Food Coming In

It's really no big surprise that the gastric bypass surgery results ultimately in you eating far less food than you're accustomed to. In fact, you're eating far less than people who have never had weight problems.

The issue is that whereas they have the ability to get all the vitamins and minerals they need from food, your surgery has hampered your own ability to do so. You have to supplement your diet.

Now you may be thinking, "Okay, great. Why shouldn't I use regular over the counter vitamins after bariatric surgery?" The first problem is that most of these vitamins take up a lot of space (with fillers) for how much nutrition you get out of them. Your available stomach space is about the size of a tennis ball now, and you need to fill it wisely. You need bariatric vitamins with no additives to deliver what you need, not what you don't.

Bariatric Weight Loss Diets Mean Watching Your Calories

Even after your surgery, you can bet that you have to watch your calories in your bariatric weight loss plan. You may not have known before that regular vitamins have empty calories in them.

By and large, the stuff that they throw into vitamins to form a pretty pill or to make them taste good includes ingredients that are best to avoid. Vitamin filler can also hamper your body's ability to absorb vitamins and minerals!

Weight Loss After Gastric Bypass Surgery with Bariatric Vitamins

Overall, weight loss after gastric bypass surgery is much easier if you use bariatric vitamins instead of the run of the mill vitamins. Your process of weight loss isn't slowed down and you're better able to eat normal food.

There's one more thing that you may not have thought of: Bariatric vitamins should be more soluble than their standard counterparts.

It's pretty common knowledge in the nutritionist community that most vitamin supplements don't deliver all the vitamins that are in each pill. They may not even deliver most of them.

This is why many of them say that they provide 200 or 500 percent of your USRDA on some vitamins. They're in the pill, but there's no guarantee that much of that will be absorbed by your system. Choosing vitamins with no fillers or additives is your best bet for your best health.