Officially Approved!

My relationship with food has changed - I'm more mindful and aware of what I'm putting into my body. This is only tangentially related to surgery though, as surgery was the motivator I needed to see a therapist, work on my mental health, get diagnosed and treated for Binge Eating Disorder (BED), etc.

It does feel easier to maintain a heathy lifestyle, since I've got a lot invested in this and I'm too stubborn to waste that investment :P

I do still crave crap from time to time, but I don't let myself indulge the way I used to. That's less about the surgery and more about working on my mental health.

Hunger is a weird thing. I was never hungry before WLS because I was always eating. I wanted food, but hunger was unknown to me. I actually get hungry post-op, but I get hungry when I should get hungry. For example, if I go out to run in the morning, which I do before eating, I'm going to be hungry by the time I finish running, stretching and showering. And, seriously, I should be hungry then, know what I mean? It's sort of nice to feel hungry now, because I know that's how the body should work. And I know that I can ignore the feeling if I want to.

Cravings, however, are totally different than hunger. When my BED came back in full force a few years post-op, I wasn't ever hungry... but that didn't keep me from binging.

My relationship with food is different, when I'm stressed I try to walk or drink water if I'm unable to walk

i do eat fried food, junk food, bbq and sweets but rarely, maybe once every 2 months but it's pretty rare it is usually for one day, I do have months where I will not eat meat, bread, pasta or carb loaded foods like I did last month. But I did have a cup cake and fried food on May 1st for my dad's bday. I do not celebrate many ppls bdays with cake and carb loaded foods only a few ppl

I rarely have food cravings, I am 7 yrs out I try to stick to what my nutritionist taught me and I reach out to her if I have I'm having difficulty bcuz it's hard at times to stay on track I like cooking healthy and I rarely eat out and if I do I keep it simple a salad with out dressing with grilled meat or something grilled

I totally agree with Sparklekitty! Read everything you can here - just start your way in the front and work your way back in posts. I did that in the months prior to surgery and learned SO much. I wrote up this list of WLS promises for myself and I've edited it post-WLS.

WLS Promises

1. I will not panic if I stop losing weight for a few weeks. Instead, I will re-evaluate that my eating is on plan and wait until the stall has lasted 4 weeks before I start to panic.

2. I will not ask OH what I need to take to the hospital, I know these things. Chapstick and a pillow. And the pillow really just needs to be in the car for the trip home.

3. I will not lie when people ask me how I've lost the weight. I will either be honest and tell them "surgery, diet and exercise" or I will tell them "I'm not comfortable talking about this with you." These are the options, lying by omission is not one of them.

4. If I screw up, and I will screw up, I will forgive myself and return immediately to plan.It's okay to screw up, it's not okay to beat myself up for it or let it become the start of a downward spiral. It's also not okay to say "I'll return to plan tomorrow."

5. If I don't start losing sizes right away, I won't freak out. Chances are the clothes I wear now are too small and tight, and I just deal with it. It might take awhile for my current clothes to fit correctly and that will happen before I can get into smaller sizes. (This was true, I think I lost about 50 pounds before needing to buy new clothes.)

6. I will own my mistakes. They're mine and result of my own choices, no one is ever going to hold a gun to my head and make me eat crap, I control what goes into my own body.

7. I will not compare my weight loss to that of anyone else. I'm me.

8. I will do everything I can to find a therapist I can work with. This will help me out in the long run. (Therapy = awesome. Our stomachs are never what make us obese - our brains do that. Surgery will fix our stomachs and give us a powerful tool, but we need to fix our brains so that we can sustain this forever.)

9. I will be hyper aware of potential addiction transfer issues and especially aware of getting too caught up in numbers as I already know I am want to do.

10. Extra skin is a fact of life, get the **** over it.If I really hate the way my body looks, I can save my pennies and nickels for plastic surgery once I've maintained for a year or two. People will still have sex with me if I have weird skin, and lots of places sell compression gear. I will, however, have every issue with my skin documented. (This didn't happen as planned, but hey, life rarely does. People did still have sex with me even if I had weird skin.)

11. I will be kind to myself. I will keep getting to my monthly massages, I will keep engaged in my hobbies, and I will spend time with my friends.

12. I already know that being a "hero" about medication is stupid so I'll work on remembering that when the time comes.Pain keeps us from healing, it's not noble.

13. I will only weigh myself once a week. I will not let myself get obsessed with the scale. See #9. (LOL, this definitely didn't happen. I weigh daily, but I don't obsess thanks to TrendWeight.)

14. My stomach will probably gurgle after surgery, this is normal. Just don't go to silent Meeting anytime soon.

15. I will not worry if people don't comment on my weight loss. I will assume that they're being polite and not commenting on another person's body, which is what they should do. (I wish people didn't comment on my body.)

16. I will work to break the compulsions to "clean my plate" and to "not let food go to waste." Sure, there are starving kids in Africa, but throwing away food will not change the situation.

17. There is nothing to be done for hair loss, assuming that I'm eating on plan. It will happen, or it won't, but I will remember that it will grow back eventually. I will be a shavee with St. Baldricks six weeks post-op. (And I've kept my hair short ever since.)

18. I understand that my hormones will be all messed up after surgery. I will do my best to remove myself from the company of others instead of taking my hormonal changes out on them.

19. I won't weigh myself for the first two weeks post-op because I know that I'll gain weight from all of the fluids and swelling that surgery entail. I'll wait to weigh until I'm off liquids. (I made it one week...)

20. I will not panic if I don't feel restriction immediately post-op. Chances are restriction won't kick in fully until I'm eating dense proteins and that will take 4-6 weeks on my plan. (This, indeed, was the case. I never had any issue with liquids.)

And things I've learned since then:

• Life will still happen, your dad will still die, you'll need to gain all the coping skills and tools you can in order to make it through that without reverting to your old habits. But you can do it.
• Body dysphoria is real. Take pictures of yourself with other people for reference. Take pictures of yourself in the same doorway of your home. Look at these pictures so you can get a sense of your body. Talk to your therapist about it. Time will help. It's weird to feel disconnected from your body.
• Apparently you have an eating disorder, who knew! Thankfully your weight loss will help you feel confident enough to talk to your doctor about it and get treatment.
• People will make all sorts of comments about your body, your hair, your clothing, etc. It's annoying.
• Clothing is expensive. Apparently you will come to love bright colors and clothes that fit well - who knew? Good fitting bras are super important. Ditto for shoes.
• You'll learn to love exercise and even running. What the hell? All weather running gear is expensive but totally worth every penny.
• Your butt will hurt a lot since, apparently, there are bones there. Your PSIS (posterior superior iliac spine) will also hurt. It sucks, you'll survive.
• You will be cold all the freaking time. You will acquire a robust jacket and coat collection as a result and learn to take a jacket of some sort everywhere you go regardless of what the temperature should be.

This is such an informative post. I will definitely make a list reminding myself of why I did this and why not to freak out when I stall. I also am looking forward to throwing away all my "fat clothes" which consists of bland colors and mostly black sweatpants and t-shirts, and big jackets to hide my size. Also I'm looking forward to losing most of my boobs and being able to wear cute bras. I can't wait to completely update my closet and style lol. Lose skin was a concern but then I was like I rather have lose skin than this extra 115 lbs.

ARGH BRAS.

Bras have been so weird for me with weight loss! Once I needed new ones, I went to a specialty bra shop and got fitted for one. Then I bought two and just alternated until I needed a smaller size, because good bras are expensive! But the style of bra that worked for my boobs totally changed as I lost weight. So getting fitted and figuring out what worked well in a store was great for me.

And then, having found an amazing style of bra that I loved... I had a mastopexy. I figured I'd just need to get a different size after, right? But no! My boobs changed and required not just a different size bra, but a totally different style/cut of bra. WTF!!

I swear. Bras are hard.

I know right! I think most of my loose skin will be on my boobs so skin removal on them will be necessary and hopefully then I will be able to find one that will fit me well! Did your size fluctuate a lot during weight loss?

I just checked my order history out. Strangely enough, I really didn't go through that many sizes during weight loss. Looking at my measurements, pre-op I was probably wearing a 42DD or DDD.

Thanks to being able to tighten hooks and straps, those worked for me until a year post-op, when I did the sizing thing and got 36DDDs. I think I needed 36DD about a year after that.

After my mastopexy, I ended up in 32DDs. (I did have an upper body lift as well.)

Definitely lucky to be able to have had such flexibility with your bras. I can only hope to lose most of my breast as I am currently a F/G cup depending on the cut of the bra. I hope to get down a lot with the weight loss and not have much loose skin in other areas.

I'm printing this if it's ok? So good.

Sure - print away! Thanks :)