Lifestyle Changes After Having Bariatric Surgery

Written By: Rachael Kaine

Weight loss surgery Washington DC offers patients a chance to lead full, happy and healthy lives. These changes all are made possible by having the procedure (which involves shrinking the size of the stomach to a fraction of what it truly is to promote consuming less food) done at a time when patients realize that they need to make changes in order to live better lives. After having the surgery done, you’ll need to make many different changes in order to ensure that it is as successful as it can be, and to keep yourself living comfortably for many years down the road.

Bariatric Surgery Lifestyle Changes

In addition to changing the amount of food you consume, you’ll need to change the types of foods that you eat. Eating less means that there is less of an opportunity to consume vitamins and nutrients that you need. It is recommended that you take vitamins and supplements to ensure that your nutrition doesn’t suffer.

Slowly reintroducing exercise into your day is necessary, too. Bariatric surgery Washington DC patients often have not extensively used specific muscle groups for long periods of time, but even five to ten minutes of activity per day, like walking, stretching or simply moving are enough to slowly strengthen these muscles. This will allow you to work up to doing more over time, which is extremely helpful and something all health care professionals will recommend.

Dietary Changes After Bariatric Surgery

To begin, patients that have recently had bariatric surgery will not be permitted to eat or drink for about 48 hours to give their stomach a chance to begin healing. From there, liquids will be reintroduced slowly. This leads up to soft or pureed foods including lean ground meats, eggs, cottage cheese, and soft fruits or cooked veggies that have been blended and mixed with liquids like broth, juice or water.

You may be really sensitive to certain things like spicy or heavily seasoned foods, and your stomach may also react to consuming things that are either very hot or very cold. This will improve over time, so be patient. Weight loss surgery DC patients go through stages as their stomachs heal, meaning that after a few weeks of pureed foods, you can add in things like canned fruit, cooked veggies and even ground or diced meats. This will transition to solid foods after two months or so. But even at this point, nuts, popcorn, carbonated beverages and tough meats should be avoided.