food to avoid

thank you you also are doing great.

  susan

@ joes wife
its time you post a pic of yourself.  congratulations!!

Hey Doc, isn't that the truth!!! I will very soon, some before and afters or shall I say during...I am really busy this week with my business. Cookies and Christmas you know, and then next week my daughter is having her weight loss surgery. So I will do it as soon as I can.

Love you lots, hope all is well.

A good reference to read up on is this article from dsfacts.com -

http://www.dsfacts.com/weight-loss-stall-or-plateau.html

Diana does a great job of explaining the stall/plateau mechanism and things to try to break them.

Certainly make sure that you are tracking what you are eating (and exercise, too) to see if something has changed to create the stall. Water, as you will note in the article, is an essential part of the puzzle. A shift in calories and/or carbs, in either direction, can break a stall. The very low carb plan of under 40 or so g per day can induce a ketosis state that may enhance or accelerate your loss or break a stall if you haven't been doing so previously. Or it may not - there are many variations between us all and how we react to these changes. I never had low carb in my plan and was generally in the 80-90g per day range thru most of my post op time, and also never had any significant stalls (I've only had one week where I did not show a loss) - even the dreaded three week stall was just the expected shallowing of the loss curve as I moved from the initial carb/protein/glycogen burning mode to the more calorically expensive fat burning mode. Who knows whether the two are connected or just coincidental, though it could be that since I never really got into a serious glycogen deficiency that my body didn't need to go into stall mode to rebuild its stores. That said, the ketosis type diet may still yield somewhat better weight loss even if it has more stalls along the way (assuming that my hypothesis is correct, which could be a big assumption....)

The other end of the scale, so to speak, is that if one is particularly active then the low carb approach can inhibit loss by not supplying enough energy for one's needs. I have found that the classic fitness nutrition advice of having a meal/snack of lowish fat, medium protein and medium to high complex carbs provides a good boost to a workout an hour or two later. If I shift the composition of my lunch from a lowish carb meat salad to a higher complex carb meat/cheese sandwich with whole grain bread (but same basic calorie level), that I can workout longer and with greater intensity in the pool, though that approach doesn't seem to do much to my resistance workouts. So, days that I'm in the gym I have a salad ahead of time and a protein shake after to rebuild muscle, and days that I'm in the pool I start with a sandwich and have some yogurt and fruit afterward.

The short lesson here is that there is no one size fits all answer or plan. There are approaches, like the low carb one, that works well for many who fit a common profile of WLS post-ops. If you fit that profile, then its a great place to start, or return to, and see how it works. If it doesn't, there's nothing sacred about it and it's worth looking at other approaches to see what fits you best.

Thank you for the great information.. I know not to compare weight loss to others but its hard to see people around my date of surgery or a month or two before and they are like down almost 100 lbs. so i think i am doing something wrong.. i am going to start more on the water and exercise see if that helps.. thank you again.

                    susan

 Not to sound rude but I think you answered your own question...=) Foods to avoid: Chips, pasta and ice cream =) Increase the water and cut the carbs down under 40 during weight loss. Good luck!

I will just address the specific foods you mentioned. I decided early on that I would not eat pasta or bread until I was at or close to goal. And with the exception of the one bite of mac n cheese I had at Thanksgiving, I have not cheated. I have eaten crackers here or there with tuna or peanut butter in the place of bread (no more than 2 crackers). The only time I have eaten chips is at a Mexican restaurant once and I only had 2 chips with guacamole. As far as ice cream goes, Blue Bell sugar free vanilla is good as long as you can limit yourself to 1 serving and then stop. I think my calories is between 600 and 800 per day. 

At a little less than 3 months out, I am very happy with my weight loss and I think it is because of the food I will and will not eat. Take what you want from what I said. Everyones journey is different but this is what works for me. 

Good Luck! 

thanks for the advice

                     susan