Can someone ease my crazy ridiculous paranoid questions?

Hello LJohn, Pippa and OkiDokiJoy, what an interesting thread!
I had my first after surgery consult with my surgeon on Friday, (I'm three weeks out) and he said something which you may think interesting:
He explained that it is really important that I only eat until I no longer feel hungry, and am just satisfied and to not eat until I actually feel full. He talked about practicing this like a new skill as it is they way I will need to eat from now on - he explained that I should avoid eating until I feel full or tight as doing this repeatedly over time could result in the eventual stretching or enlarging of my stomach to some degree.

His words have sort of been ringing in my ears since Friday (although it was only a few days ago, I may not have quoted you the exact words he used) and I am practicing restraint, with emphasis on practicing as I am still learning about this new tummy! Yesterday I just ate a little bite too much of something a bit too solid and it was really awful as I felt pain, paranoia and nausea at the same time. Gosh, it was the worst feeling, and I started worrying about my staples...Ugh.

Now for the old (pre-sleeve) me, actually stepping back from a meal without filling my stomach up to capacity would have totally gone against every fibre of my being.... I think I am coming to love this sleeve as I just don't feel very hungry, and feel satisfied so fast.
It is such as relief to feel free from being always hungry, hungry, hungry - and just wanting to stuff my poor old stomach as much as I could. Bloody hope this lasts!

Best of luck - and congrats on the very impressive loss LJohn! I want to be like you!

Great work Oki - so easy to understand and straight to the point.

I would add one thing Ljohn - if you are worried at all about anything to do with your sleeve contact your surgeon, he will have heard every worry and have an answer to your questions, email if you can't make an appointment (everyone's busy at the moment).

Hope this helps - I'll put my mum hat away now xox.... don't forget to clean behind your ear (oops!)

Hi Ljohn my understanding is this:
After surgery, normal peristaltic action stops (muscle contraction). Instead, the bottom of the stomach is closed (where the pylorus is) and the top sphincter is open. Food goes into your banana :) shaped tummy. When food fills to the top and touches the top valve, the top sphincter closes then yells out Bombs Away! to the bottom valve. The bottom valve opens and food moves thru. So for 6 months (some a year) you know when you are full, not one more bite, etc.

After 6 months, normal stomach action resumes. This is where food enters the stomach, and is massaged through and out. Stop- Eat, Stop-Eat (grazing) never sends the signal back of full because the tummy just keeps on breaking down and massaging thru to intestine.

For lifelong habits to change, dieticians try to get us to eat then stop (3 meals a day, no snacks) to ensure there is no late weight gain. 6 months to set in new habits. Eat what you can at dinner time, say 20 mins, then put it away to next meal time.

So yes, its normal - you wont be able to bolt the whole lot down in 2secs, or eat massive amounts quickly, but if you graze you can fit most things in... I doubt its stretched, just getting used to being fed over long periods of time (an hour).

Restaurants are a nightmare for that - couple of hours with friends, plates not cleared from table.... Pick. Pick. Pick! Good luck!

I haven't really looked at these forums for awhile. I never really was very active but it was a huge help reading all of the responses and experiences other people were having and was able to help me make my choice.

Anyway, I was sleeved last Feb and since then have dropped about 60 kilos down to 90kg. As soon as I was able to I started exercising and sticking to a fairly decent diet (aiming for red meats, organic food, protein, non-filling foods etc) until about 6 months in. After that I pretty much started eating whatever I wanted although most of it was healthy but there was a lot of cheese and a few fast foods and repetitive dishes / frozen foods. As long as I kept up my 30-40 minutes per 3 day running (started with couch to 5k program) and 3 day lifting I still had really good results. I missed my 3 month nutrition and 6 month checkup in this period although got a blood test and everything was ridiculously improved and fine except drinking a bit more water.

Hmm. A lot of that isn't really relevant to my questions but I thought I might as well post my general progress / experience of being sleeved at a pretty young age.

At the moment I'm on holiday and I've been eating a bunch. I've noticed that I'll accidentally eat way too much (like I do a lot of the time pretty much.. I'm still bad at it especially at amazing restaurant since I still eat out a lot) and I can now fit WAY more in that I could before.

In fact, it's not that I can eat so much in one sitting (I still can eat a decent amount more) but it's that I can a lot in like a period of an hour.

I'm not really sure how to measure it so to use MacDonalds universal measurements: I originally could only eat a double cheese burger and feel horribly full. Then like 6 months in I could eat a Big Mac and feel horribly full. Now I can eat a quarter pounder and a big mac within an hour (spread out). Not that I should be doing any of these things obviously but just to illustrate.

Here's where my paranoia kicks in. I'm worried that I've stretched my stomach or something too much. And that's not a bad thing because I'm scared of regaining (I am a bit but I think that honestly I have the motivation to keep up the exercise and mostly healthy eating) but I'm scared that my stomach may be weaker because of it. Something like a complication with the operation and it causing a late leak.. or bleed.. or something? I have no idea but it's been worrying me, probably because it's the only part that hasn't really been checked out since my surgery and i've basically been living by myself for the last few months. Is this ridiculous? Should I get checked out? I'm having some dumb nightmare where overeating this much this early causes me to die at 50 after all my hard work heh.

Sorry for the huge post. I've been reading for awhile so I felt like at least including a bit of extra info and I tend to ramble.