Weight Gain Question

I haven't yet....Thankfully. But I have read about people gaining 10, 20, even 30 pounds with the sleeve and getting back on track. So, my question is, CAN you get back on track and "get back to basics" so to speak? Is your sleeve stretched out by gaining weight? I am still pretty early out at only 8 months, so hopefully this will not be an issue for me for a while. But my biggest fear, as I'm sure it is on the minds of most of us, is that I will fall back into old habits. Mainley portion control. Sometimes I still eat more volume than I should. Luckily though I still am making good, healthy choices, But the fear of stretching out my sleeve is overwhelming sometimes. I beat myself up terribly. Something as simple as a whole apple will make me more full than I should be, and in my mind I feel like I have eaten a supersized meal at McDonalds, so afraid that I have just stretched my sleeve! The fear is good to some point because it holds me back, but what happens when I no longer have that fear a year or two down the road?

I think your fear is very healthy. Hang on to it.  I am 2.5 years out and I am scared of regain.  At this point it's harder to shed two pounds than it used to be.  A couple of years ago someone wrote that she gained 8 pounds over the holidays and was having a terrible time getting them off.  That scared me away from certain aisles at Whole Foods.  

Let that fear be your guide to not test your sleeve. If you don't fall back into old habits, this post will never apply to you.  It seems that we all work at it in our own way.

You can do it!

I am one of those that gained 30lbs back and lost it again. I think if you put in the search box at the top "how I got that regain off", my post will come up in the results.

Obviously, it is better if you don't regain in the first place, it did take me about 8 months to get it all off, and it was a lot of work. My best advice is to start excersizing now, building muscle will help you maintain your weight.

I do exercise, quite a bit actually. I guess i'm just worried because before my surgery my problem was not eating because I was stressed, or bored....my problem is VOLUME eating. I would never feel like I had enough until I was so full I was sick. Literally could not fit another bite in. I still feel like that sometimes. Like I KNOW I feel full and satisfied in my stomach....but me brain tries to tell me to keep eating because it was so good, or there is more left, or Im just not full enough. Luckily I have been able to keep that in check so far by measuring and being diciplined. Frisco gave wonderful advice by saying dont rely on restriction. I guess measuring is the key. Im just scared that if I get into the old mentality of needing to feel full, Full. I will stretch out my sleeve. Thanks for the advice. I rely on everyones opinion on here.

The best advice I can give you on this, since I have tended to be the same way, is to measure out and put everything away before you start eating. That's all you get.

Before, when we wanted more it was literaly RIGHT THERE. I would eat however much food there was. For me, the trick early on was to set a rule that never, ever, ever did I get more than I measured out. Now at 17 months it's a law of life.

Okay, this whole sleeve stretching thing make me crazy! You really can't stretch out your sleeve -- it's an organ and muscle, not a water balloon! LOL Yes, if you overeat at every meal every day for months at a time, you are going to stretch it to capacity.... maybe.

The thing is, our stomachs are made to stretch a bit. Our stomachs are about the size of a Pilot pen in the beginning. But we can eat about 4-6 oz. once our sleeve matures. Obviously, a pilot pen doesn't hold 4-6 oz. The reason we can eat that much is that when we eat, our stomachs stretch out. This sends a signal up the vagus nerve to the brain to tell you to stop eating. This is how it's suppose to work! It's actually supposed to stretch.

I think this fear of stretching out the sleeve comes from the old fashion stomach stapling surgery that was done decades ago. Those people had a much bigger pouch made from a much stretchier part of the stomach. A significant minority of them gained their weight back and when they examined their insides, their pouches had stretched quite a bit and sometimes the two parts of their stomachs had come back together and reformed (since they weren't physically separated) so they were back to their original sized stomach. But that's not our surgery!

Btw, a mature sleeve is more the size of a permanent magic marker. Because over time the tissues relax a bit. Think of the stomach as more like a pair of stretch jeans than a water balloon. They do stretch out a bit over time. But there is a limit. You can't stretch a pair of size 2 jeans into a pair of size 22 jeans. But, if they are stretchy enough, maybe you could continue to wear them when you are a size 4. It's the same with our stomachs. They double in size (approximately) over time from being able to hold about 2-3 oz. to being able to hold 4-6 oz. But that's about it.

Now, there are people who will tell you that it's very important never to eat to fullness to keep the sleeve as small as possible. They will tell you that they never get the foamies and they have as much restriction as they did at one year out!  Well, I am 4 years out and I still get the foamies once in a while still. I definitely don't stop 1-2 bite before fullness every time I eat either. Yet when I do the cottage cheese test, I can't eat any more than I could at 7 months out. So I really don't think that sort of extreme care is necessary. If it makes you feel good and works for you, I'm all for it, but it doesn't work for me. It's too much emphasis on the surgery and on food for me.

By the way, I'm not saying don't worry about it at all and get the foamies all the time and everything will be glitter and rainbows anyway. I'm saying that it's not worth worrying about obsessively because it's very very hard to make happen. You'd really have to try and be very self-destructive -- to the point where I'd say you were actually mentally ill with an eating disorder -- to get your sleeve to stretch out more than it's going to anyway.

The real thing you have to worry about is not sleeve stretching. It's learning to eat around  your surgery. Things like not eating protein first, drinking with your meals, grazing ... those things will let you eat many more calories per day than if you just eat 3-6 small meals a day and always eat the protein first, keep slider food to a minimum, wait until 30-60 min. after eating to start drinking again and keep carbs and sweets to a minimum.

But the good thing about eating around your surgery is that all you have to do to reverse the damage is cut it out and everything is okay. It's not permanent damage.

 Thank you!  A voice of reason and common sense. If we stick to the rules as you mentioned, the weight loss can be maintained. ANY surgery can be eaten around, if one returns to poor choices. We have our tool forever, if we use it correctly.

I am going to save this post in My Favorites. Thank you soooooo much for this advice. I think I am too worried about stretching my sleeve out! You make perfect sense. Actually something I can LIVE with, afterall, this is a life change. I appreciate all of the input I get from everyone. My husband will appreciate this post because I think Im driving him nuts! I cant wait to bring this up at my next appointment, and support group. It seems like all they talk about is stretching the sleeve. Maybe this time I will speak up. Thank you again.

Thankyou Ms Mac !!!

I love this post, thank you :)