Good Morning. Dr E's -- What Kind of Eater Are You?

I posted this on my profile and in response to Getting Started thread this morning. I thought you guys with the various surgeries might want to comment, state your pros and cons, and reclamas to the info I posted.

Y'all have a Good Friday or Passover or end of your workweek or what have you.

--gina


Here's the run down my surgeon uses to help patients decide which surgery might help them address their eating demons the best. He describes our eating demons by categorizing eaters in 3 ways: 1) the bloater--eats one or two big meals a day, doesn't snack and is pretty active (busy) throughout the day. 2) the sweeter--is addicted to sweets/carbs/sugar and may need some help with volume eating. 3) the grazer--eats or nibbles pretty much constantly and may eat a meal for longer than a half hour.

The bloater may do well with a restrictive surgery such as the band or the VSG. With the band patients can expect 50-60% weight loss. It's a failure for sweeters and grazers. With the VSG expect 70% weight loss. This surgery can be converted to DS easily. (Note: we have seen lightweights be 100% successful with both the band and VSG here on this board. My surgeon sees about 55% weight loss maintained after 5 years with the VSG but he makes his sleeve larger than most.)

The sweeter may do well with the RNY using negative reinforcement of dumping on sugar and fat. There is a 20-25% chance of late regain after 2-3 years--a regain of 20-30% of the initial pounds lost. When successful, expect 60-65% weight loss. (I think these numbers are also more for heavy weights because we see much better success in the lightweights who stay hooked in here on the board.)

The grazer may do well the DS and has a 80-90% success rate long term. Patients can expect 90% weight loss. It is also puts type II diabetes in remission for approximately 90% of patients long term. The DS works well for sweeters, grazers and bloaters but can be beat with excessive sweets, fats and grazing. (My surgeon calls the DS the bazooka of weight loss surgeries. Some surgeons won't do the DS on lightweights but some will reduce the amount of malabsorption and give lightweights the DS using a longer common channel. For more info on the DS, see www.dsfacts.com. There aren't that many surgeons skilled enough to do the DS. Don't jump into this one without doing a lot of research on your surgeon. Surgeons who don't do the DS will use scare tactics and lies to dissuade patients from pursuing the DS. We call them bait and don't switch surgeons, or outright greedy lying *******s.)

Gina,

I've seen you post about different eaters, but I haven't seen you lay it out like this before.  VERY HELPFUL!  I am a sweeter...no surprise!

I'm going to bookmark this post for people that ask me questions about the process.

Thanks and Happy Friday!

Kay

You're welcome, Kay. Have a good one, babeeee!

You might want to add that RNY and the sleeve also affect diabetes.  There was a recent study that was highlighted on TV and the sleeve had almost as good a recovery from diabetes as RNY. 

It does seem that our lightweight friends do better at losing 90-100% of excess weight than our heavier friends.  My friend who had lost 200 lbs is a success but she still has many many pounds of excess skin and it is hard to tell how close she is to goal because of that. 

Regain?????  We all know it is possible to eat your way around any of the surgeries.

Was the type II diabetes remission rate about 60-70% with RNY and VSG? That's close, I think. I'll have to look up the studies.

This one perhaps? www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22027284

Geeze, who knows.  It was just a blurb on the news.

In terms of eating habits, i think I basically had a pretty healthy diet in terms of types of food, I just ate for someone 6'4" instead of 4'11".  So I think most of the surgery types would have worked for me and RNY was a good choice.  I think I have been more sweet addicted since surgery than before.  I just now do it with SF options most of the time.

I love this explanation.  I was a sweeter along with some volume eating.  RNY worked for me so far.  It takes a good bit for my to have a reation to sweets/carbs so I'm pretty much on my own to limit these items. 

My surgeon does not do the DS, but when I discussed it with him, he told me it was my option and he knew someone that he would refer me to if after my research that was the surgery that I wanted.  He did tell me of the surgeries that he did - he felt RNY was the one for me.

My diabetes went into remission the day of surgery and my A1C has stated in a great range.  I wonder if a lot of this has to do with diet and exercise since I was Type 2 not Type 1 and only on oral medication. 

I could see how I could regain, if I ate all day and lots of carbs.  That is one reason I like the protein drinks - feels like I have something in my hands/mouth all the time and that really helps me.  I like the Nectars so that is for my sweet tooth!!

Thanks Gina for the info.

Linda

My surgeon would not do DS on me.  I hope this attitude will change.  I wanted the most aggressive solution possible, and I think DS is that solution.  I know I can stay successful with RNY; it may take me more effort and vigilance and less peace of mind.  I think the DS is easier to maintain from all I read.  What you posted was the same for me except the % weight loss for RNY was higher.

Having trouble reading without tilting my screen. Very strange black lines with gray writing in your post.

I agree, I thing LWs have much higher success rates regardless of surgery type.

--gina