i have posted about this before.......

Hey yall, Should I feel different???? Should I feel like I have had a surgery? Since my pain has left me I feel like I never even had surgery..... I know about the weighing all the time but i just cant help. That devilish scale hasnt move a bit...I called the nursethis morning and asked was it normal and he said no but it does happen sometime... They average around a pound a day and I havent even lost that... The 23rd will be a month....and I am down only 26 pounds since surgery----37 since the 2wk liquid preop diet....I know that it wont come off over night but I didnt even meet the goal of 30 lbs......this does have me worried. I dont feel like I am over eating... I ate most of a chicken wing for supper but I felt like I could have eaten more but I didnt.  Does that seem like to much, I figured it was around a ounce and a half. For breakfast I had a ounce and half of chicken salad. and for lunch I sucked the juice out of a pickle and ate a little of the inside maybe half of a small pickle. I was out and they were serving hotdogs so I just ate some pickle and drank water... I really dont want to mess this up. My body is craving vegetables not meat......Maybe I just worry to much----I really pray I lose some more weight.....Thanks for listening-----CArol

Carol, Are you getting all your protein in everyday? 

I was just talking about this at a seminar Monday night for pre-oppers... somebody asked how long it took me to recover post-op and I said I kept telling people I swore the surgeon never did the surgery... he laughed saying many patients feel like they didnt have surgery early out. When you move onto more normal eating is when you will 100% know that you had surgery... the liquids, the soft foods... those all go thru the pouch pretty easy... when you start eating things of substance you will quickly know :-) Also remember you are still healing... it will take a while for your brain to figure out whats going on with its new plumbing... it wasnt until around 6+ months out did I start noticing I was full... before that it was either I was ok or I ate too much too quick... its all a process!  Congrats on the 26lbs... take that "down only" out of there... 26lbs is great!! My surgeon gave a wider range when it came to his patients first month f/u... he said 20-30lbs was the average. Some people have surgery and go busting out of the gate with weight loss... others have a slower start... when I left the hospital I weighed exactly the same as I went in... well - the first 2 weeks post-op I lost nothing!!  Its hard to be patient but keep your head up... the first few months are the hardest... by 6 months out you will look back and laugh at how you were and see other people going thru the same thing :-) Just make sure you are focusing on protein... you said all you had for lunch was pickle juice and a few bites of pickle.. need to get that protein in girl! :-)

Carol -

Try not to be so hard on yourself. A 26 lb. loss in in 27 days is almost a pound a day. Don't forget that pickles are full of salt and can cause you to retain water.

I do understand not having the scale move ... I dropped aoout 15 lbs in the first 10 days and then NOTHING! I know I'm not messing it up ... there's not much to mess up at this point, but it feels like it. I'm just going to keep whistling in the dark as I drink those darned protien shakes, drink water, take my meds and walk. Hopefully, it will start moving again.

I really think that you are doing great and remember that most folk**** "the wall" just about where you are now.

This too shall pass.

Take care,

Barb

Carol, I think 26 lbs is great!!!  Have you ever lost this much in less than a month in the past?  Or more importantly, have you ever kept that much weight off for a significant amount of time without gaining it back plus some more???  I'm guessing the answers to those questions would be NO!!!  So don't beat yourself up so much.  You are doing great and even though I am still post op and don't really know a whole lot about what happens after surgery, the others here have given you some good sound advice.   Hang in there -- you are doing great and I'm sure everthing will fall into place for you soon! Hugs, Donna

Carol, Sorry I couldn't answer your call tonite.  It was you I believe,LOL.  I was in a school board meeting for a charter school and it was my last meeting after 8 years and a hard one.  In any event.  Don't freat.  I gained a pound and I am 14 days out now so only 17lbs down compared to alot.  Remember I platoed a few days.  Keep in mind what time of the month is it.  You had pickles, high in sodium and it is very hot and humid.  All three things combined makes our natural instincs retain water.  You said your ankles were swollen.   Have you been walking!!!  Chase kids and swating at them is not arobic exercise LOL!  I tried that excuse one time.  Drink, Drink your water.  Tomato juice is high in sodium also.  Remember you haven't had alot of sodium this last month and now we are adding to it and the body is like yea, help me keep the fluid in.  As we are mostly all dieter guru's after years of exploring the new fads, don't stop reading labels.  I know your limited on what you can get right now but if worse comes to worse, protein drinks, YUCK I know, SF pudding or just plain eggs to kick start for a few days.  And stay off the scale!!  It has never been our friend!  I know these things is probably what my 1 pound gain and slow up is.  It is my fault becasue I shouldn't be doing these things yet.

Hi Carol.  I just wanted to point out, for the sake of argument that a 30 pound average means that the doctor has had some that are over achievers that lost 40 or better the first month and others that lost 20 or less.  At 26 pounds you are just 4 pounds shy of "average".  That is a great accomplishment and nothing to be concerned over.  Really if you do the math, that's an average of .87 pounds a day as opposed to 1 pound a day.  That's really not a large difference.  Congratulations on your success!  You will have many more! Take care. Ellen

i think we tend to hear more here from those who are doing especially well. some people find it intimidating or maybe discouraging if they only see those with big losses post. there are lots of people with average or slow losses out there who are doing well but who maybe aren't posting here. and usually all we see is the number of pounds lost. few people post their start weight, their height, their BMI, etc. without all those stats, just comparing your # of lbs lost to someone else's # could be comparing apples to oranges. keep up the good work!