What's on your Wednesday Menu, RNYers?

I've yet to have more than a couple ounces (volume). I'm a red wine girl but I've always enjoyed tasting beers, just not really DRINKING beer. I dabbled in fermentation for awhile, making my own wines, beer, fermented teas, milk products, etc... I've also been to a lot of micro-breweries and beer master dinners. Many of my friends are beer snobs. I couldn't trust myself with a six ounce pour of a beautiful red wine, but the beer is easy to ignore after a few small sips.

My love for alcohol has never been about getting the buzz (at least not my adult love for alcohol, back in the mid 80s it was a little different!).

I told my NUT and NP at my one month follow-up about having tasted some beers. They said that the two issues are the impact on the surgical sites, and the potential intoxication. I've been choosing low alcohol beers (one was only a 2 ABV) not sipping it until I had some protein in my pouch, and stretching the couple of ounces over an hour. The NP said it was still a 'No' but that this was because of the slippery slope, and because if I'm saying I'm having an ounce, I'm probably having half a beer. But I both weigh and photograph my food before and after eating so I have a pretty good check in place for my own lying eyes :)

"I told my NUT and NP at my one month follow-up about having tasted some beers. They said that the two issues are the impact on the surgical sites, and the potential intoxication."

Wow. That's really odd, isn't it. You've previously posted what your surgeon's office said about alcohol. Do you remember? If you need a refresher, follow Julie's link.

They most certainly had more than just those two concerns you've sprouted here. One of the biggest risks - and you mention it yourself in that thread - is to your liver. It is already working overtime right now, processing your weight loss.

edited to add: Do you remember posting this? It's what your bariatric office had to say when you asked them about alcohol:

"I just spoke to the Barbaric office about a few lose ends before my next appt, and I brought this up as a (joking) concern. The woman I was talking to asked me to hold and when she came back she said that the patient documentation they have only has a hard limit for the first year. She gave me the same general concerns as most of you have here:

1. Whether it's do to the psychological impact of dieting, or it's due to some biochemical trigger, many patients become MORE susceptible to alcoholism post surgery. She said it's the most common "side effect" for patients that drink alcohol prior to surgery (like me).
2. My liver will have to work twice as hard so it's important that any alcohol be limited in both quantity and frequency.
3. Don't drink at all if I am going to drive as any amount of alcohol can produce unexpected levels of practical intoxication."

First, I'm trying not to be defensive. But the fact that I'm even writing this clearly indicates I'm feeling pretty defensive.

I do remember the above, and I remembered it as I entered the post and follow-up comments today.

In my own (clearly fallible and biased) mind, the first response meshes with the second. I can't have "a glass of wine, or an alcoholic drink" because just one serving is too much. A fraction of a serving seems to qualify for the original advice. I'm not an addiction expert, I'm probably basing my knowledge on health class in the late 70s, but addiction, to me, would require regular consumption, like at least weekly. My beer tastings have taken place twice, the first one three weeks out from surgery and the second was last week.

It is occurring to me that even if I were some magical unicorn exception to all the rules, my including my poor choices on my daily menu could be pretty destructive to others not blessed with equally magical systems.

The question I'm pondering is why I've felt the compulsion to taste a beer at all. Why pay $5 for a taste? Peer pressure? (I am part of a group that posts beer pics and reviews online) Is it some sort of anti-social rebellion against all these new rules? Is it a head hunger?

Tonight I'm meeting up with a fellow member of the beer review group. She's in town for the night, so going to a microbrewery is pretty much the point. My plan was to do the same as the last two times and find an interesting ale with a low ABV to taste.

I know all of this is good constructive helpful feedback from folks who want me to succeed at this. It might not FEEL like it is, but I do KNOW it is

What ever I decide, I will avoid posting menus that include poor choices, and leave the ugly for my "actual" (as in edited the next day to reflect what I actually ate) MFP entries. The only thing worse than messing up my own WL journey would be causing someone else to fail.

I think alcohol addiction has less to do with quantity consumed and more to do with the mental aspects. You're working very hard to justify/hold on to your consumption. Your program said no alcohol for a year, but you justified it at, what, three weeks out, because "it wasn't a full serving?"

Please take a long, hard look at that behavior and try to see it for the huge, red warning flag that it is.

Thank you for recognizing that the intent is not to harm you or anyone else or hurt feelings. Most of us really actually do want success for everyone gifted with this live-saving surgery. And of course that includes you.

Alcoholism is a big deal and a rightfully touchy subject. How we approach alcohol post op is as individual as what we end up eating (or not eating). But there's not any getting around that early out we have our biggest chances of succeeding when we stick with our surgeons' instructions. And that really is the bottom line.

Hiding poor choices doesn't make them any less wrong.

This advice all must seem harsh, but alcohol at this stage can literally be a life or death decision. You can talk yourself into all sorts of excuses about low alcohol content, and only a few sips, and... but at the end of the day, you must know that making excuses to drink against all good advice is the hallmark of a problem. I hope you can look inward and find the answers you need. This is serious.

Not jumping in on the alcohol ?? at all 'cause I know "nuttin 'bout nuttin" as my granny used to say. But what is a NP?

Nurse Practioner

In this instance Nurse Practitioner