My understanding was that since the stomach is a lot smaller, you can only handle small portion sizes and that’s how you end up losing weight and having it stay off. I do coding for a medical clinic and I see a fair amount of chart notes of people who had the procedure done (and not the temporary one where they can remove the band, either), and they end up gaining a ton of weight back a few years later.
How/why does that happen? Is it the body adjusting somehow?
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I had Roux en Y surgery about 12 years ago. I lost about 145 pounds in about 9 months.
Over the next 11 years, I slowly “adjusted” and gained about 85 pounds back. It was a slow process overall, but the surgery is just one “tool” toward losing weight and keeping it off.
When you get the surgery, they teach you a lot of things, some that are good habits for anyone and others that are specific to this surgery.
With this surgery, my stomach pouch is not just smaller, but different anatomically. They say for best results, don’t drink while you eat. Drinking washes the food out of the stomach pouch – defeating the surgery’s ability to make you feel full faster. It’s not hard to break those new “rules” over time and begin to lose the benefits of the surgery.
About 6 months ago, I was pretty unhappy with where my weight has gotten to, so I started making heathy decisions about when I ate (dinner by 7 and no snacking after), what I ate (more things like fish, and traded in the fryer for an air fryer), and how much I was drinking during meals.
I’ve lost over 40 pounds from my max weight (post-surgery).
The benefits from my surgery are still there – if I take care to follow the guidelines they originally set for me.
If I don’t drink anything while I eat, one little lunch meat sandwich can really make me fill full.
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