Still finding my way post op

I weighed 309 lbs this morning. That's a loss of ten pounds over the past week, and 15 pounds since my RNY surgery three weeks ago.

But I also felt very weak, light headed and lacking energy this morning.  Perhaps because I only ingested a little more than 700 calories yesterday... even though I ate more than 100 grams of protein.

I looked at a suggested menu in my Cleveland Clinic handbook, and notice that it allows meals every two hours, instead of every three, like I am eating now.  At the risk of "grazing", I think I'll adopt the eating every two hour plan.  I find that I can't eat any more than four ounces of food at a meal, otherwise I feel stuffed. (Translation: stomach ache)  By adding the extra meals each day, I hope to get my food intake up into the 800 - 900 calorie range. 

I'm eating more varied foods too. Today I ate 2 ounces of Wendy's chili with no ill effects.  2 ounces is about one-fourth of a small container of Wendy's Chili.  It was good, but I want to keep in mind that my doctor would like me to avoid red meats as much as possible. So I won't make it a habit. I also ate shrimp, yogurt, cottage cheese, two cups of milk, ricotta cheese and a whey protein shake today.

Once again I ate more than 100 grams of protein, 50 carbs, 7 grams of fat, adding up to about 725 calories. 

I want to go back to work next week, and hope to have this new way of eating figured out by then.

Having 6 small high protein meals is nothing like grazing.  Grazing usually involves almost constantly eatly carbs and other low nutritient quality foods.  You are being concientious with your post op diet. 

I hope you can help some of the other men who are facing the same problems you have faced.  You will find that helping other men on this forum will strengthen your own program.  You will soon find that you actually benefit from sharing what you have learned with other men following in your footsteps.  I've always liked seeing recent post-ops helping ever more recent post-ops.  My memory's a bit fuzzy about what I did right after surgery while your memory is fresh.

I'm obviously writing this to you and to all other recent post-ops hoping they will become active on this forum.

Cooked vegetables may help...cooked spinach...Also add a small amount of salt to your diet.  I would try and grab for energy the first few weeks and it just wasn't there.  Before we would grab some KFC or a candybar...Not today.  It gets better and the energy will come back...but it is hard to say when...Some days it wasn't there then others it was.  Brian

You don't mention fluid intake so I will throw this in. Being light headed could be from dehydration. It can cause your blood pressure to drop.

pan head

You posted that you only had one protein shake..my dr has told me to plan on drinking three a day for a long time after the surgery..maybe you need to try and work another shake in or some more fluids might help..just an idea

this is the men's forum, please go and post on one of the 100s of other forums dominated by women.

It's amazing how differing doctors do things different.

Three weeks out I was just getting out of liquids and to "soft" foods, yogurts, mashed beans, etc.

And 700 calories? that's a LOT considering the size of your pouch. I'm 6mo out and told I shouldn't be eating much more than that in a day, and bout 1/2cup total food at a meal. (so that's 4oz volume not weight).

You're about where I was at when I had surgery (322 morning of) and I averaged just over 5# a week loss for the first couple months.

At three weeks out, you're going to be tired and weak... you just had major surgery! 

Just remember to stay hydrated, rest when you feel you need to... your body will do a good job of telling you what it needs if you take the time to listen to it.

oh, and for what it's worth.. at just over 170 pounds lost and six months out, I'm still "finding my way" in many ways as well.