To Exercise or Not to Exercise??

Hello All,

I haven't logged in for some time now. I have been struggling hard to lose more weight since the birth of my son. How many of you sleevers lost the weight by incorporating exercise into your new lifestyle? I have just been relying on diet alone and I see that is getting me no where with weight loss. Thanks in advance.

Over time the only way to lose weight is to have a calorie deficit. You have to expend more calories than you are taking in.

So, you have to either increase expenditure or decrease consumption over time. So you have to either eat less or move more.

Note that if you begin exercising, it will need to be something that you can continue. For, if you begin an exercise program, you will need to continue in some form or fashion. When you stop, you run the risk of gaining weight as your calorie deficit will turn around unless you reduce your consumption.

Fluids also play a role. Fluids are important to prevent dehydration and you body needs it to burn fat.

Here is a question: Are you logging what you are eating? Sometimes, it is easy to be overeating or eating things that are not conducive to weight loss. Logging what you eat allows you to look back and tweak things over time.

Exercise is great for overall health, including our mental health, but diet makes much more of a difference as far as losing weight. What does a typical day look like for you? Maybe we can give you suggestions on improving your diet as you also add exercise.

For me, getting a fitbit was the best thing ever. It makes me focus on staying active and that works for me. Put your son in a stroller and start walking (but make sure your fitbit is in your pocket or it will not track your steps).

Typical day for me is either a premier protein shake or 2 eggs with cheese in the AM. For lunch I'll have cheese and some type of meat with it. For snack I usually go for something quick like a few crackers or something. For dinner I'll have meat with some type of veggie and maybe cheese with it. I don't drink any calories and I'm not big on sweets. I try mainly to do low carb higher protein and fats. I forgot to mention I got pregnant 5 months post op and since then it has been extremely hard for me to lose any more weight. I'm very down about that.

The short answer is, "What Ladyblu wrote". She pretty much nails it.

Exercise in and of itself is not going to produce a lot of results, unless you have all day every day to do nothing but exercise. And once you stop, the weight will come piling back on. BUT... Exercise - even just heightened activity - will help you run a calorie deficit. You HAVE TO keep track of what you eat and drink. And therein lies the key.

Find something you like to do, and then do it. Do it regularly. Find something else you can do and then be prepared to do it when you can't do the first thing. For me, I love to ride my bike. But it is too stinking cold out now to ride, so I am doing more walking. It is getting to the point where it is too cold to do that, for various reasons, so I am looking for something else.

Going to the gym might help if you love doing that sort of thing, but for most people it is a short lived experiment. Most people don't have the time/money/inclination. Whatever habit you get into, you will find you need to maintain, or you will not maintain that calorie deficit, and the number on the scale will start going up again.

It comes back to knowing how many calories you are taking in every day. Once you know that, and get a handle on it, you can begin to tailor an exercise program that suits your lifestyle and which you can maintain. Along with that, you may (probably will) need to adjust your calories and the types of food from which you get them.

My success is in my numbers. I am down 208 lbs in a little over 14 months. For the first time in that entire time, I am hovering, gaining and losing the same 3-4 lbs over and over for the past few weeks. It is the holidays? Maybe. Is it the dreaded stall? That's possible too. Did I reach the most I am going to lose? That is another possibility as well. I attribute it to the fact that I have not been exercising as regularly as in the past, and I am bobbling around at the break even point of too many calories or just right.

Not worth it.

The best thing you can do to lose weight is to weigh and track everything you put into your mouth using something like MyFitnessPal. Weight is lost with diet.

What are you eating each day? Give us a sample menu and we can try to troubleshoot for you. Are you getting at least 60 grams of protein and 64 ounces of liquid?

That said, exercise is important for physical and cognitive health, so you definitely should be exercising. Recommendations are a minimum 150 minutes a week of moderate intensity exercise and two or more days a week of muscle strengthening targeting all major muscle groups.

I don't log my food anymore it became a chore for me. I do try to eat mostly protein and stay low carb. I haven't been great with water lately at all. How many ounces should I be consuming? I am a ways out from surgery now. My surgery date was March 10th 2016. I feel like I've failed my sleeve miserably.

Well, it sounds like you know what you need to do! Yes, logging is a chore, but it's the only way you can know what you're eating. And, if you're not losing weight, you need to know what you're putting into your body so you can make the changes necessary. Eating "mostly" protein and, as you mentioned before, crackers here and there... these are really easy traps to fall into that lead to eating too many calories and from sources that won't benefit your weight loss. So, even though it sucks, start tracking.

My plan recommends 3 meals a day with no snacks. My meals at 3.75 years post-op are about 3-5 ounces of protein and 0-2 ounces of not-protein. Total meal weight is always in the 4-5 ounces range. Meal #1 is usually always a protein shake for breakfast and then Meals #2 and #3 are solid foods.

There's not much use in feeling like a failure - yes, you might have screwed up, but this doesn't mean you've failed as long as you get back to work. You can lose the weight you want to lose, you just need to get back in the game.

Track everything you consume to make sure you haven't fallen into portion creep or carb creep and then adjust as necessary.

First off, it is only failure if you don't do anything about it. You screwed up, maybe in a big way, but you still have your sleeve. It isn't like it reexpanded on you or anything. It is what you decide to do and then do going forward that can make you successful. So you've got two choices. You can look back and get down on yourself, or you can move forward, looking forward, resolving to do better from here on out

How many ounces of what should you be consuming is my question, but here are some for instances. Water should be at least 64 oz per day. That should be your starting point, not your goal. More is better. Water is the lubrication that makes our bodies work. It improves our ability to do just about everything (except avoid trips to the bathroom).

Ounces of food? That is body size and metabolism dependent. Protein should be somewhere between 60-100 grams for most people. I'm a large framed man, so I end up at 100-120 grams. By the time you eat all the protein you should, you should not have a lot of room left for carbs.

As for carbs, people are divided on that. Some say no carbs, some say low carbs, some say balanced carbs. As my RD (registered dietician) says, a carb is a carb is a carb. From an absolute point of view, it doesn't matter whether that gram of carbs comes from a donut or broccoli. From a very practical point of view though, it does matter. It matters a lot.

Donuts, pasta, rice, potatoes - you know, all the really good stuff - is very highly processed, and will slide right through your system doing nothing but gratifying your taste buds and leaving you with a jonesing for more, while depositing fat back on your bones. Carbs from beans and the good vegetables come from sources that at least provide some bulk and other nutrition that is more positive.

You need to identify what is good for you (not necessarily good to eat) and then get the rest of the bad stuff out of your life. This is a very hard thing, and requires a lot of effort. But it is how it's done. I joke about the diet that works like this - If it tastes good, spit it out! There is some truth to that, but in reality, there is lots of really tasty stuff we eat that is good for us. Sugar and other processed carbs ain't in that group though

Fat is not all that bad, although some will disagree. How much you can eat depends on your total calorie allotment and how well your sleeve tolerates it. Fat does not really cause fat. Carbs cause fat. But too much fat can cause an excess of calories and that puts the weight back on. But some fat helps with taste, and keeping you feeling full.

I use My Fitness Pal for tracking. If you enter in your current weight and your target weight, it will calculate how much you need to eat of what to get to where you want to be. Start using it religiously. You can't control what you are eating if you don't know what you are eating. As you get used to using it, you can make manual adjustments in its amounts to tailor it to your specific needs, but the stock parameters work well for me.

If you put your food in while you are eating each meal, it is less of a chore. If you eat the same things on a regular basis, it is even easier. And no matter what, logging your food should be less of a chore than getting out of the hole you are in. But if you have the mindset to do it, you can do it. Your most powerful tool is your brain. Use it to get out of the spot you are in. If you need outside help beyond this forum, seek it out. You already have the sleeve. It will not let you down if you do your part.