binge eating and wls

Okay guys, I need to hear from those who have had the surgery and been successful.  I'll probably post on the sleeve board as well since that is the surgery that I'm leaning towards. For those of you who have had surgery and have problems with emotional eating-does it go away?  If you are a compulsive eater or being eater does this diminish with wls ? I ask because I'd be fooling myself to think I don't have an emotional attachment to food, or that I have a healthy relationship with food.  The bottom line is that I do over eat, I have binged and a lot of the time my main coping mechanism is to eat.   Advice needed

Oh my. i got on here tonight because I am 5 years out now and have considered myself successful, until lately.
I had an undiagnosed ulcer for almost 5 years and was unable to eat alot of thigs without bring it all back up. a doctor figured it out and put me on prilocec and now all the pain is gone and I can eat anthing thing and do. I am also a late evening eater, I am fine until dinner then not 2 hours later it is on I am eating all night. I keep trailmix by my computer and if i dont have that I will find something..I have not changed in my brain at all not from the fat person 5 years ago. I AM addicted to food just as out of control as anyone else with addictions to drugs or drink. where do we go what surgery can we get now for this. the tool is there but I can cheat it, with denial, grazing,diet pills,and useing all the same things that didnt work before. diets didnt work for me then and they wont work now. I have to find the key to fix the brain. HELP

terri

Ever write up a really long, well thought out response only to have your computer wa**** all away before you can post it? Lovely! Ok I guess I'll make this short and sweet then... i am an emotional eater still for sure. I am also a binge eater after about 7pm just like I always was. The main difference now is that when I binge eat, I eat about the amount a "normal" person eats instead of eating an entire cow like before.  As a bandster, I have the unfortunate ability to consume as much ice cream as I want without dumping. this can be great if I could keep with the moderation- and for the most part I can't.  I find that it really helps to come on here and confess it all to people. I feel more accountable for my actions and I try harder to not repeat it the next day.  Something that I think helped me out a lot is losing so much weight and seeing a new me in the mirror. It made it that much harder to think of food as comfortable. I started remembering that this old way of thinking is what got me into this mess. Now I see all the saggy skin and I can't forget how bad it had truly gotten.   I had a few significant comorbidities and now I'm about as healthy as they come. I still want to lose another 50 pounds but i'm not morbidly obese anymore and I pretty much wouldn't even be able to qualify for weight loss surgery now- trust me I know because I do those little computer analyzers now just to remind myself of how far I've come. good luck! so much for making it short and sweet huh?

I am 3yrs post op and have been maintaining my weightloss for about 1.5yrs now within a small window that I allow myself to bounce around in. I am an emotional eater for sure!!! When I get stressed I find myself with the cupboard doors open wide as I search for something, anything, everything. Sometimes I stop myself and sometimes I give in to the stress and eat, but I am aware of the behavior so that helps me to struggle thru most of the time. Obviously I can't eat as much as I did before, but I can still put quite about away at this point in the game. Whenever I do that to myself I always end up wondering why I would want to hurt myself like that?? the person that upset me has no idea and could probably care less that I just went and ate cookies and hoho's b/c they upset me so really I wasn't hurting them at all, only myself!!!! Ahhhh, it drives me crazy and I hate feeling out of control of my emotions and my eating!!!! I have found that seeing a therapist that specializes in eating disorders has helped me some. I didn't realize that I needed this until 2yrs post op, but wish I would have started from the beginning talking to someone and trying to get to the root of this behavior. That would be my advice~find a therapist that understand eating disorders and they will be able to help you to find coping mechanisms to deal with this. My therapist also enlightened me on binge eating~I have struggled with this on and off for years, but never understood it. She explained to me that you can binge on 2 cookies or on 20 cookies~its how you eat the cookies that really matters. If you slam them in your mouth and inhale them in a fit of rage or stress, not really even tasting them andconsuming them for reasons other than hunger or desire of a cookie that's a binge. If you sit and enjoy those 2 cookies, chewing them, tasting them its a completely different experience with those same 2 cookies. This was eye opening to me b/c I always viewed a binge as eating everything around to the point of feeling like I could explode. Of course after surgery I'm unable to do that, but I can certainly "binge eat" on a few cookies and yes I have done that. I guess its the feelings behind why we eat that are the problem.  So, the bottom line is Yes, this can still be a problem for us as post ops, BUT there is help to deal with it so don't let it scare you off from having surgery. Also, the first year or 2 is such a high~you feel good about yourself, you're into what to eat, when to eat, how much you've lost, how happy you feel inside and out............its so good. This is the time to retrain yourself at eat properly, learn what real hunger feels like, get on an exercise routine, etc. I wish you good luck!!!

I was and am (i suppose) an emotional eater.  Does that really ever go away?  If you look at it logically the first 6 months post op, you will "work" to eat.  I had the DS, so my stomach is very similiar to the VSG.  But after 6 months, you can and will be able to add in "other foods" ....simple carbs and such go down really easily.  At 20 months post op, I can tell you from first hand experience that as an emotional eater, I could have out eaten a VSG....I need the malabsorbtion of the DS.  Can I binge eat?  Sometimes.....(just being honest), not to the extent that I could preop..and some days I can't at all...you get a real sense of fullness after the VSG.....and can't really over do it at one time...but that doesn't stop you from grazing all day long, or binging on carbs...YES you can binge on simple carbs, they really go down easily. I don't know what exactly you are looking for...if it's a question of will the VSG work for you or not, I'm not sure, I actually thought about getting the VSG preop....but now in hindsight....I'm thankful that I got the full DS because I would never have made it to goal or been able to maintain my weight loss with the VSG alone. Scott

My answer would be like Scott's. Except I'm a very distal RNY. Without the malabsorption, I'd be AT LEAST 50# heavier. Although I have a pretty good handle on my eating, there are times when I can eat (yes, even with RNY), some of this, some of that, some of this, some of that. And can eat on top of eat, tho the actual portions are small.

I'm retty regimented 95% of the time, so I do my meals, fit my special wants into my parameters, but when I break my own rules, I gain wt EVERY TIME. As it is, only sugar makes me gain wt as a regular crime., but if I didn't have this malabsorption,. and EVERYTHING I ate "cost" me? OMG! I cannot think about it!

Hi, about this malabsorption question. I figured you could give me the answer. I was proximal and have been told by others that after a period of time we no longer can count on malabsorption, that after awhile you body adjusts and absorbs as before. thank you for you imput in advance. terri

OK, well, my opinion, as always, not medical, but based on real ppl with real faces, real labs, real issues.

There ARE studies on hypertrophy. Yes. It shows the intestine grows more villi or "fingers" as time goes on. It becomes thicker, thicker walls, and longer. That is all factual, in studies and has been measured in friends of mine. If you FORCE your ileum (poop end of small intestine) to try to BECOME a duodenum (food end), it will do its level best to become one. It will stretch and grow and try to grab as much as it can.

HOWEVER, if you try to keep the whole thing a secret from it, make sure there is always enough nutrients (note I did not say calories--a whole NOTHER topic), it will not necessarily be in any hurry to figure out that you've messed with things. We are, by the nature of our disease, super absorbers ANYWAY, so take away ANY of it, and our bodies react as if we've been dropped on a desert island! The object being to keep all those labs tested, and hold the levels so your body does not TRY to compensate. It will do some eventually despite your best efforts, but you can stave that off by keeping a full load of the nutrients (as in supplements--not calories) on board.

Now, all that said, regardless of if you were set free on "eat whatever and get everything you need from food", and now have hypertrophy of your intestine, you will ALWAYS malabsorb:
iron
B12
calcium
vit D
Those will be bad.

Maybe too,
vit A
vit E
vit B1 (tho yoru pair of multis often covers this if you are not a daily puker OR a consumer of alcohol)
zinc
protein

Some ppl have to fix their potassium all the time, but that's not across the board.

Thank you so much for the info.  Sounds like I need to do a better job of getting what I need. thanks again ,Terri

Hello PM: Thanks for writing - a lot of people have issues with emotional eating.  One of the most difficult things about food is that you just can't quit it.  We all must eat daily to survive.  We get tripped up when we go beyond the comforts of eating for health and satiety vs. eating because of boredom, sadness, anger, frustration.  This may be because we can physically feel when we're no longer hungry; when we're comfortable.  But it's hard to physically feel when we've stopped feeling angry or frustrated.  It's easy to numb ourselves from emotions with food.      I like to refer to myself as "reformed" binge eater.  I used to occasionally go through an entire box of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts and feel terrible, only to go back to do it a week later.  I wonder what two things: 1)  When do you tend to binge?  At work, in the afternoon, before? 2) What are you binging on - crunchy, sweet, salty, liquid? 3) What triggers you wanting a "snack" or "sweet treat" that turns into a binge?  Is it a specific time, being in a specific place, having a specific interaction with somebody . . . any ideas? 4) (IMPORTANT) What do you say to yourself as you're going to go eat - at the moment you know you're going to "binge."  What are the actual words?  When you have time, please let me know what you think about these questions.  They will shed light on your primary motivation, and there may be some super simple things you can do to curb this.     I am proud of the fact that you're searching for these answers . . . it means you want a change.  Keep going for it and you'll find what's right for you. Sincerely, Joanna