Effective Tips on How to Lose Weight After Surgery

By | October 4, 2019

You’ve been preparing for your gastric bypass surgery for years. After many consults and visits with your surgeon, procedure day has come and gone. But yet, the number on the scale isn’t going down.

What gives?

Weight loss after surgery isn’t a given. You’ll have to work hard to achieve your goals. But with our tips below, you’ll be getting off on the right foot.

Keep reading to find out how to lose weight after surgery.

Watch What and How You’re Eating

home-dinner-with-happy-family-eating-homemadeTo encourage weight loss after surgery, you need to choose healthy foods. If you were to turn to a diet of fast food and potato chips, you’d end up back where you started. Your surgeon should provide you with nutritional education pre- and post-surgery.

You’re going to need to pay closer attention to how much you’re chewing your food now, too. You’ll feel nauseous after meals if you haven’t taken the time to chew your food thoroughly.

Food that hasn’t been chewed enough may have issues getting through your digestive tract. You’ll be in pain if any food gets lodged in there.

We recommend also keeping a food journal so you can stay accountable for what you’re eating. Smartphone apps like MyFitnessPal are great if you prefer to journal on your device.

If you need outside accountability, enlist the help of your friends or family. If everyone in your household is on board, the process will be much easier.

Eat the Right Things

man-eating-in-a-restaurantThe main focus of every meal should be protein. Not only will it help you stave off hunger, but protein will also assist in the maintenance of muscle mass. If you find that you’re getting full fast, eat your protein first, so you know you’re getting enough.

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Try to avoid drinking your calories, unless you’re opting for a healthy protein and fruit smoothie. Though alcohol can be tempting, especially after a tough day, it has no nutritional value whatsoever. It can also cause stomach ulcers, something you may be at risk for already after your surgery.

Don’t forget to eat your fruits and veggies, too. As your stomach expands in the years post-surgery, you’ll want to be conditioned to reach for high-volume, low-calorie foods. Vegetables will fill you up fast and have very few calories.

Work on Your Mindset

close-up-of-a-happy-senior-woman-and-a-her-youngYou may have already spoken with your surgeon or a counselor about your relationship with food pre-surgery. It’s essential to keep working on that as you progress through your recovery. Examining how you look at food can be a complicated and many-faceted process.

Weight regain can happen if you haven’t made any changes to your relationship with food. An emotional eater who hasn’t taken steps towards recovery may still reach for food post-surgery in times of stress.

Pay close attention to the emotional connection you may have with food. Reach out to a counselor for help changing these patterns pre-surgery to get you off on the right foot.

Find New Ways to Deal With Stress

stressed-office-worker-with-anti-stress-ballStress eating is a very real problem for many people. Thirty-eight percent of adults report overeating or reaching for unhealthy foods in times of stress.

If you tend to overeat when you’re stressed, it’s time to find a new coping mechanism. You need to focus on a past-time that isn’t food-related to break those bad habits. Taking a walk, reading, or exercising are useful stress-busting techniques to try instead.

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Make Exercise a Priority

Reduces-Stress-and-AnxietyWhen your surgeon gives you the ‘ok’ to exercise, try to be active every day.

You don’t need to hit the gym for two hours a day to see results. Even something as simple as a thirty-minute walk will benefit you. That’s not even touching on the other benefits of walking.

For best results, try incorporating both aerobic activity and resistance exercises. Lifting weights will help you to build muscle mass and promote a healthy metabolism.

If the mere thought of exercising exhausts you, keep searching for something that excites you.
If you have bad joints, running will be too hard on you. Why not try something low-impact like cycling instead?

CrossFit might be too hard for you if you’re starting out. But Zumba provides an excellent workout for beginners and advanced exercises alike.

There are infinite ways to stay fit. The goal is to find something that lights you up and doesn’t make you dread staying active.

Sleep Enough

a-woman-sleepingGetting too little sleep can promote weight gain.

Sleep deprivation will cause changes in how your body regulates hormones. The hormone leptin will suppress your appetite. Not getting enough sleep will reduce your body’s levels of leptin.

Ghrelin, a hormone that triggers hunger, increases in your body after too few hours of sleep. This leads to you feeling hungry even though you’re not.

To outsmart your hormones, you should aim for six to eight hours of shut-eye per night.

Why You’re Not Losing Weight After Gastric Bypass

closeup-of-obese-elderly-womanIf you’ve had a gastric bypass or the Orbera procedure, it can be frustrating to not see results on the scale. Let’s look at a few common reasons you may not be losing weight after surgery.

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Lack of Compliance

These procedures will not cause weight loss on their own. You must commit to a healthier lifestyle if you wish to see weight loss after surgery.

Diabetes

Studies show diabetic patients are less likely to achieve weight loss post-surgery.

Water Retention

You need to ensure you’re drinking enough water to aid in your weight loss efforts.

Gastric Sleeve Complications

Those these are rare, they do sometimes occur. Talk to your doctor if you’re doing everything right but still aren’t losing weight.

How to Lose Weight After Surgery Made Easy

smiling-woman-presenting-weightloss-appIt’s not always easy to know how to lose weight after surgery, but living a healthy lifestyle will be key. Our weight loss tips will help you be successful in your post-surgery weight loss.
Check out the Diet area of our website if you’re hungry for more weight loss tips.

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