Newbie -- Alchol after WLS?

drink all you want as soon as you are ready for weight loss to stop and gain to begin.

I'll be six months sober on September 17th.  I was a person who liked two glasses of wine most nights with Dinner and occasionally more on the weekend.  After surgery 3 years ago, I didn't drink for a while but started to add the wine back in.  The calories and weight loss was fine but I started drinking more and more.  I didn't drink during the day and maintained my job, marriage, house, etc., but I soon found I was drinking 2 bottles of wine most nights.

I went to in patient treatment last March for a 30 day program.  The addiction I had to food went to alcohol.  I learned my first addiction was sugar and it went on from there.  I also found out that at my rehab facility of 24 people, five of us were weight loss patients.

Anyway, I'm doing great!  I have been in counseling since for addiction and go to AA once or twice a week.  

Also, this probably would have happened whether or not I had surgery - it just speed up the process.  (I went from normal drinking to alcoholism in less than 1 year).  It's just something to be aware.

Thank you so much for sharing this. It takes real courage to put your story out there.

Every time I see a brand new person ask about alcohol, and insist they'll be fine, I want to cry. I've seen so many people start down that road. If they are very, very lucky, they will have your strength and get help. Most don't.

We all hot obese by indulging ourselves in what we wanted. It used to be food. I hope those that read your story decide to not make it alcohol.

Thank you Heather that is really eye opening. Congrats on how many days sober.  Wow, so much to sink in.

Congratulations on your sobriety. It does take a lot of courage to share this. It is not easy to see ourselves in this light.

I also an alcoholic. I was one before surgery. Stopped thinking I could control my drinking. 

I did stop losing weight when I started back to drinking. 

Thank you for sharing

 well said, both of you.  

We all need to realize that the marketing of booze is the new (or old) ploy with smoking.

 Why does anyone need to  KNOW they can have alcohol?  Does it add anything to quality of life? ..NO, does it cost $? ...YES... does it affect your mental wellbeing?.. YES.  Do you need it to function in society?... that answer hopefully is NO, but if not - personal examination is needed.  There are so many things we all need to control about our lifestyles why add something so useless into the mix?

I don't find anything wrong with having a social drink with friends or family.  Do we need to have 80 inch screen tvs do we need to have brand new cars?  Many things in life we do not need or that new pair of shoes that makes a feel great.  Like I said I as others like to have an occasional drink and for research for WLS if we are being honest we need to check out everything before making that final decision for each one of us.

Most of us got morbidly obese because we are **** at moderation, boundaries, and gauging what is enough. That holds true for alcohol as well as food. Add in that many of us used food as a coping mechanism, and it is easy to see how a drink or two could become problematic. It isn't a leap to substitute food for alcohol and its affects.

I tried a bit of wine about a year out. Instant stomach ache, and it made me woozy. Not worth it to me. I've been here long enough to see that alcohol can be a very real problem in our community.

Whether or not you find it right, wrong, smart, or foolish is COMPLETELY independent of what an expert would consider in the same situation.

My opinion is not the popular opinion but I'm still going to put it out here because I think it's valid. I didn't drink almost ever before surgery because I get migraines and alcohol can severely effect this. So I would have wine when I got together with out of town friends maybe 3 times a year - and that's not an exaggeration. So I truly did not care about alcohol one way or the other after surgery.

My migraines got better after surgery (yay). I wanted to see if I could drink alcohol, I had read that alcohol absorbs differently and MUCH faster after RNY so I wanted to do it safely, I tried a small glass of wine while with my husband. It got my very drunk very quickly.

So I am still not a big drinker but I do drink when I see my friends who live out of town or maybe New Year's, so I'd say 6-7 times a year now instead of the 2 or 3 before. I would never, ever, ever drink more than 1 glass of wine and never with people I trust a TON because it effects me so greatly. I can see how someone who enjoys drinking a lot could get addicted to it even more after the surgery. But for me I haven't bought anything to bring in the house because it's not something I care about.

I know others see it as something that is a huge problem but for me it's just not.