Losing too fast?

I had my surgery about 40 days ago. I started my pre-op diet 2 weeks before that, so I've been on a restricted diet for about 55 days now. My starting weight was 415 and I've since lost a little over 50lbs. Although I'm thrilled, I have to wonder if losing 50lbs in about 55 days is a bit much. I'm drinking my 75 grams of protein each day with my protein shake. I'm taking a multi-vitamin. And also recently, I'm forcing myself to eat a half an avocado each day because I was concerned I wasn't getting enough fat in my diet to be healthy. The weight keeps falling off. I am drinking at least 64oz of water a day, and trying to make sure I get enough salt in the food I've been eating. I've had to adjust my blood pressure medication already because my BP was getting a bit low after losing the first 30 to 40lbs. My diet plan is doing a low carb high protein diet, combined with intermittent fasting (although it would seem that the intermittent fasting doesn't seem to matter much. I lost just as much weight eating throughout the whole day as when I just eat in the afternoons. I'm getting about 500 to 800 calories a day from my protein shake, 1/2 avocado, and "regular" food each day. Bowel movements are normal and daily. I haven't yet started working out although it's past the 30 day period where I was not suppose to. Honestly, things feel fine with my body. I have lots of energy in spite of only being able to sleep about 5 to 6 hours a night now. I'm just curious if this rapid of weight loss is something people have seen before. Much of the "conventional wisdom" about weight loss out there today is a bunch of hogwash, as I'm sure you've found in your research, as have I... but I still feel a bit of that old fear about losing weight too quickly. Just wanted to see what this community thought.

The bigger you are when you start, the faster you tend to lose. The BMR for a male of 415lbs is easily over 3,000 calories per day. Post surgery you probably take in quite a lot less than 1,000. The weight loss will slow down considerably at some point, trust me!

Make sure to take your vitamins, get your protein, and stay hydrated. You have a lot of fat to sustain you on the way down. I think I lost about 25lbs in the first month and was a 230lb female, so I'd say your weight loss is very normal.

Thank you so much for your reply! Makes me feel better.

Honestly, you sound like you are doing fabulously, especially keeping your protein high and doing the vitamins. My understanding is that your VSG removes that area that secrets most of the grehlin (which makes you feel hungry) and increases your leptin, which makes you feel full. Of course those are hormones. And they do affect your sleep cycle until you get used to them.

I take 5 mg of melatonin 30 min before bed, and have a pretty established routine helping to signal my body that now we go to sleep. For the most part, it truly helps.

Keep posting! You are an inspiration!

From all I've learned leptin is stored in the fat cells, and while there is medication to increase leptin to signal satiety, it's not applicable for humans (mice do great on one leptin hormone treatment, but it didn't translate for us...there's a long story there, but to date there is no simple solution.)

i am thinking it may be that the sameness and somewhat boringness of the diet post op and during the first 6mo-1 yr simply removes the triggers to want the foods that were satisfying, and unhealthy, before? We know the ghrelin signaling area is likely removed by the surgery, but leptin is another challenge, sine more than one to one action takes place.

Some research has shown that not giving the brain a dopamine reward of sugary/salty/fatty (desirable) foods is what causes the leptin to just say "Ok this is boring food, I've had enough already!"

If you know of some info on leptin changing specifically in relation to WLS I'd love to read it?? thanks.

Since leptin/ghrelin are only recent discoveries in the 1990s there are still unknowns and unknown interactions of hormones, and even some not yet discovered. (it was the belief that a leptin pill would earn $$ billions, so a company bought the research & rights early on, and after a rollout of product they found mice are not humans, and they lost $$$ millions.

I think you are doing amazing! As long as you keep up with the protein, hydration and vitamins your body will do the rest. At some point it will slow down, but for now keep up the good work! I hope you come back to OH and let us know how you are doing. Join the menu threads, it's a great place for information and support.

IMO you are very smart adding avocado to you daily diet. And increase salt. Look also at other minerals like magnesium and potassium. They can be critical to avoid muscles cramps. I try to eat olives and use good fat to prevent liver stagnation. If you gave sill GB ,- adding some fat may help moving the bile from GB, hopefully preventing gall stones or sludge.

Unfortunately I was told to follow a very low fat diet post op, and I did. That and my genetic predisposition to GB issues caused enough problem. I needed GB removal surgery app 7 months post op RNY.