Vegans Help - Post VSG

I second the recommendation for Dr. Weiner. I'm biased as he is my surgeon, but I have been following his Pound of Cure diet for just shy of two years now and LOVE it. His diet is not vegan, or even vegetarian, but would be SUPER easy to tweak and make it so as he already recommends AT LEAST one non-meat protein meal daily as well as no dairy.

I am not vegan or vegetarian, but I only consume about 3 oz of meat a day at most (many days I have no meat) and little to no dairy (I've recently added in yogurt, but this is by my choice, and is not recommended per Dr. Weiner's plan). When I travel for work, I often go a full week without eating any meat.

I have no issues with his protein recommendations, but I know they are on the low end of average when it comes to bariatric recommendations. My blood work has been excellent and just take Centrum Multivitamin (2), and Iron Supplement and a B12 Supplement (which I probably don't truly "need"). I'm 21 months post-op.

You probably will not be able to do it and do low carb (which is enormously popular around here) as a lot of your non-animal proteins (beans, lentils, etc) are very high carb. I eat a tremendous amount of carbs compared to the average bariatric patient, but I eat virtually NO refined carbs (no rice, no pasta, NO SUGAR, etc). I, personally, see no issues with carbs coming from fruit, veggies, beans, lentils, etc. I lost over 100% of my excess body fat in 9 months (loss of ~180 lbs) and have been maintaining for 12 months.

Hi Ana,

Congratulations on your surgery!

There seems to be more and more post weight loss surgery people looking for an alternative. If you have not communicated this to your surgeon please do so. Check out Dr. Garth Davis, he is a weight loss surgeon and a very serious vegan supporter for post weight loss surgery patients.

We also did a search for you from others that have posted about this as well.

http://www.obesityhelp.com/search/?q=vegan%20eating

Good Luck to you

Thank you.

I will be talking to the surgeon on my first follow up about this..

But I will definately look up Dr. Garth Davis!.

Thanks for the link as well!!

A

They make vegan greek yogurt, usually from coconut milk.

It's hard without soy. You can still have seitan and some other protein sources which are wheat based. I wouldn't rely on legumes alone for protein... we have less stomach acid post-op and legumes have phytates. If they're well cooked I imagine it's less of an issue.

Make sure to eat a wide variety of food, like tamarind and spirulina, and other stuff, to be sure you get the full range of amino acids.

Thanks Donna!

DAIYA - a brand here in Canada - makes vegan 'undairy' products.. I am still mustering through DAIRY greek yogurt but the guilt kills me.. I try not to dwell and remind myself this is only temporary to get through these initial stages but.. it's not something that I enjoy consuming..

A

My gorgeous recently married therapist is a lifelong vegan ... not by choice ( by gagging ) she says lol.

Seriously the woman is BEAUTIFUL ( and spiritually beautiful too ... she builds schools in India digs wells in third world countries on her few vacations. She's been trying hard to get me to give up dairy products.

I like Vegan food particularly the ready=made dumplings available in NYC ... but do I have any relevant advice?

I ate a lot of rice and peas just out of surgery.. still drink a ton of fresh-squeezed kale juice ...I KNOW you can eat vegan and be amazingly successful at this . This is from a handful of long -term vegetarian and vegan friends -all of whom look half their age have all of their chicklet like teeth , stand up so straight , have all their height and beauty and ( frankly) laugh at the rest of us garbage eating stoopidz.

I have to wonder why it's relevant to this question that your therapist is beautiful and recently married. If she was ugly and divorced would it make her a less successful vegan?

Rice is not an appropriate food for immediate post-ops, or anyone else trying to lose weight after surgery.

Are you calling everyone on the boards (who eats meat) stupid? Classy.

My daughter is a vegetarian, and is thinking of becoming vegan. She is also contemplating a revision of her VSG, done in 2012. Dr. Garth Davis wrote this book about becoming a vegan. And he believes that WLS patients don't need as much protein as doctors are telling them to get. https://www.amazon.com/Proteinaholic-Obsession-Meat-Killing- About/dp/0062279319/ref=sr_1_sc_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1512441063&sr= 8-1-spell&keywords=garth+davis+proteinaholis

Congrats on your surgery and your new journey. I am a long time vegan way before my surgery and have been very successful. It definitely gets easier as you get further out from surgery. I haven't had much problem meeting my protein goals. I still start my morning with a protein smoothie (protein powder, frozen fruit or veg and water). I do eat "faux" meet products, many of them are high in protein and some are pretty soft so I started incorporating them when I was on the soft food phase. I also eat a lot of seitan. I found the best way to get all my amino acids was to be sure to have a variety of diffent protein sources each day (some from soy, some from seitan and some from beans). As suggested above tofu doesn't have to be a hunk of tofu but can be puréed and disguised in other foods. If you are much of a home cook you can also make your own soy yogurt. I did this and strained it so it became a pretty concentrated source of protein. I also found some low carb, high protein bars that really help me when I'm not at home (no cow bars). Feel free to contact me directly if you want to discuss. I love my post VSG vegan life!