Supposed to lose 50% of goal by 3 mos?

i have spent many hours using the search feature looking for many of my lurking questions. Yesterday I was reading about calorie intake and a few old posts mentioned that their docs said that if they wanted to reach goal they needed to lose 50% of their weight by 3 months post surgery. Is this true? I had dreams about this last night.

I am losing slower than anyone else I've noticed on this board. I have thyroid and anemia issues, and could never seem to lose any weight dieting before surgery. My best hope on a diet was to just stop gaining. That is why I had the surgery. Am I failing this too? I'm nowhere near 50% of my goal and am 3 mos. out. Did YOU lose 50% by then?  Thanks so much for your input!

I have never heard this before. I think I lost about 68lbs by then including pre op diet. I still have a ways to go. I'm hoping to hit goal by 1 year. 

My losing has slowed down significantly but that has a lot to do with my choices. I'm still losing but at a much slower rate. Carbs have been the main reason. When I cut those back down the scale moves.  

My my suggestion would be to watch the carbs and make sure you get in those fluids. 

Aww I can feel your fear & frustration but really it's unfounded. There is no standard amount of weight loss in a specific time period and any Dr that said there was is well umm... a quack. Some lose slow, some fast, some slow and steady, some in bursts with major no scale movement periods. We are all different... our metabolisms, our health conditions, none of us the same. 

I lost about 10 pounds a month (talk about slower), stalled several times, one stall was for month-long (8 month mark.) Went on to lose 158 pounds well beyond my Dr's goals for me and have maintain that weight loss now for 8 1/2 years. 

Concentrate on making the lifelong changes... healthy eating choices, moving your body every day, vitamin & water regime, working on emotional "stuff" and let the scale do it's thing. It will and you will have all the groundwork in place to keep the numbers at bay in the future. 

Best to you,

Michelle "Shelly"

Everyone is different in their weight loss... I'm a slow and steady or at least it feels that way. Don't worry about trying to make a 3 month goal that may be unattainable for you. Just worry about sticking to plan. The weight will come off. :)

I have NEVER heard this in the 8 years I have been here, other than from two people who have one particular VSG surgeon.  I have always heard 50% by SIX months post-op.  I cannot imagine anyone except someone who is a "lightweight" (with less than 100 pounds to lose) being able to lose 50% of their weight in just three months!  The numbers -- the caloric intake versus caloric expenditure, and the resulting weight loss -- just don't add up for that, no matter how little you eat!  

If you weigh 300 pounds, for example, it takes roughly 3000 calories per day for you to just breathe and keep your heart pumping at that rate.  (Let's just assume you do nothing physical at all during the day... Which isn't the case even for the most sedentary people... but it eliminates the variable of activity level AND it makes the math easier.) let's say you need to lsoe 150 pounds. If you only eat 500 calories per day been through the ENTIRE weight loss process (which, again, isn't going to happen), that would give you a caloric deficit of 2500 cal per day, which is a 17,500 caloric deficit per week and will result in a loss of 5 pounds per week (with metabolic, non-linear weight loss, and stall issues aside). Even if you maintained that rate of loss (which you actually wouldn't, because as your weight goes down so does your caloric deficit), after 12 weeks you would have potentially lost 60 pounds, not 75 (which is half of the 150).  

Everyone loses at different rates becUse of body composition, metabolism, activity level, etc., but FWIW, I was down exactly 100 pounds the week after my 6-month mark, and ended up losing 190 overall to my lowest weight.  So I was just slightly over half way there at 6 months out.

Keep in mind that people who are larger lose faster because they have more to lose (it takes more calories to maintain a 350 pound body than a 250 pound body) and therefore the daily caloric deficit is higher (and weigh loss will be faster) for someone who is 350 pounds than for someone who is only 250 pounds.

As long as you are doing everything you are supposed to be doing, don't make yourself crazy with timetables and comparing your weight loss to that of others.  BOTH of those things will only drive you crazy with negative thoughts and emotions... Which may make you want to revert to old, bad habits.

Lora

I have to agree with this comment. I'm what most people call a light weight. Im almost 3 months post op and i've lost 48 pounds. My start weight was 235 pounds and i now weigh 187 lbs. My doctors goal is 160. My personal goal is 130. Im not going to do all the math to show my point. What im trying to say is that it doesnt matter when we lose the weight, whether it's at 3 months or 8 months. All that matters is that we hit a healthy weight. I personally would rather lose weight at a healthy pace, then melt and suffer from dizzy spells, shakyness and nausea. At least were loseing and keeping it off.

Takes most people six months to lose 50%.

Thank you all so much for responding. You have made me feel better. I appreciate it very much!

Calling BS on this 50% weight loss at 3 months. 

Some things to consider. 

• Weight loss is not a race.
• Don't compare yourself to others, especially those without thyroid and anemia issues. 
• Even if you do fall off track, nothing is stopping you from getting back. 

From the numbers you've posted it looks like you're making good progress. It doesn't seemed like you've failed at all. 

Since you asked about this... 50% of excess weight at 3 months would put me somewhere in the 95-120 lb range. I'm nowhere near that amount of loss.  However I have made a big change in diet and eating habits, see a downward progression with my weight over time,  and am working out constantly, so I don't predict failure in the near future. 

I lost 50lbs by 3 months and that included my pre-op weight.  It took me 2.5 years to make it to goal of 138, I started at 283.5, and I just celebrated my 10 year anniversary of my surgery.  I have been at or less goal for 7.5 years now.  It makes buying clothes so much better, when you are tossing them because they actually have gone out of style instead of being too small.