Hi All,
I read on the webpage for my local hospital that does bariatric surgery that the post-op patients are required to eat three meals a day, drink 64 oz of water, exercise 30-60 a day and have no snacks. My immediate reaction is if I could manage that now then I wouldn't need the surgery.
Is there something about the operation that makes any of this easier? Like rapid weight loss?
I am still struggling with binge eating and am at my wit's end. I am going to two different surgery seminars this week and hope to hear something hopeful.

I read some behavioral books on binge eating and I am proud to say since then I have not binged since- this book really spoke to me:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/074..._ya_oh_product

You can say good-bye to binge eating for at least the first 6 months after surgery, as your new pouch will be MUCH smaller than yoru current stomach. You simply will not have the capacity to hold the amount of food you take in now. If you have a procedure with a sleeve instead of pouch, you will always have capacity restriction. With a pouch, you will need to be careful not to stretch out the pouch and stoma in the future.

I had the same reaction as you back when I first thought about surgery. If I could follow the post-op rules, why not just do that instead of slicing and dicing? But it really IS different. Some people's tastes actually change after surgery. Everyone's stomach capacity is limited. And you learn to follow new rules because it is literally a matter of life and death, not just doing whatever you feel like doing.

Jilly's right - the surgery - no matter which form you choose - changes the amount of food you can eat, and in some types of surgery, the way the food is absorbed. it's a TOOL to help, not THE ANSWER.

but, as you'll hear in the seminar, there are a lot of things that you'll have to think about. binge eating is one - there are people who try to binge, and if they don't get control of it beforehand, they have a tougher struggle dealing with the surgery.

same thing with stress eating.

as for the 3 meals a day, no snacks, that's true. however, with most forms of surgery, you won't feel like eating and it'll be hard to eat that much for the first few months. And, for many people, it's impossible to meet your protein goals if you eat only three meals a day. but once you're on real food and able to eat 1/3 of your protein at a sitting, then you really do have to be more careful.

but again, the surgery will help you feel full even then.

be warned, though: people who don't deal with their eating issues have the worst trouble.

i still struggle from time to time - and always will. but let's be honest - do you know ANYONE who eats whatever they want whenever they want and remains at the weight they want? Neither do i!

You may also want to have a bit of counseling to help you with the binge eating. WLS can only go so far and the reasons why you eat have to be addressed as well.

when you go for your psych eval you should tell them about the binge eating. that alone will disqualify you for WLS until you work that through. At least it did me. I had to work much harder than my husband with no binge issues before the LCSW would approve me for surgery and I'm grateful she did.

every plan is different but the basics are:

drink enough fluid (minimum 64 oz a day a water bottle will become permanently attached to your hand)
eat enough protein (60-80 grams per day means in the beginning you have to use protein supplements such as protein powder)
get some exercise.

some doctors require eating every 2-4 hours
some require 3 meals and 2 snacks

i'm a little over a week out and a cup of sf hot chocolate with milk is breakfast now... and it fills me.

lunch is some cottage cheese (a couple of spoonfuls is plenty)

dinner is an infant size serving of thinned cream of rice or oatmeal made with milk and thinned with RTD protein drink or some creamed soup

I struggle between meals to get enough fluids in and make sure that my fluids currently are protein packed.

you will also have to take supplements every day for the rest of your life.

this is a great tool we are given but it's plenty of hard work and it's not magic...

Binge Eating will not go away just because you have surgery. I am 3 years out and I struggle with this now. You'll need to get therapy at some point.

The point of WLS all together is that it allows you to rapidly lose a large portion of weight. This makes you more mobile to exercise. It will get the weight off quicker and will increase your mobility considerably in a quick amount of time. What you do after wls will make the difference as to whether you get to goal or not.

Definitely get help BEFORE your surgery to stop binge eating. The best reason is that if that is actually the only reason you are overweight, getting help may allow you to lose weight the "normal" way making WLS unnecessary. Believe me, the surgery is no picnic and you don't want to have it unless you consider it a life-saving procedure.

If you still cannot lose the weight and decide to have WLS, then knowing ahead of time that you will not sabotage it by binge eating will go a long way towards making your WLS journey more successful and less fraught with complications.

I hope you are successful in making your way to a healthy life, no matter what you decide to do.