Episode 165: Bariatric, Gastric Bypass, & Sleeve Surgery

Bariatric surgery, gastric bypass, and sleeve procedures are tools, not lifelong solutions. Discover why understanding nutrition and fueling the body properly can make all the difference when it comes to maintaining results and building lasting confidence. 

Check out my (free) workshop, How to Fire Up Your Metabolism in Menopause and Beyond right here: www.MindStrongFitness.com

Transcript

Becoming MindStrong Episode 165: Bariatric, Gastric Bypass, & Sleeve Surgery

Speaker 1  0:00  
Welcome back to the Becoming Mind Strong podcast. My name is Rachel, and I'm the founder and CEO of Mindstrong, where we help peri and postmenopausal women not just lose the weight, not just heal their metabolisms, but have what I like to call a new tool bag, right? The 20, the tool bag of our 20s, 30s, early 40s, it doesn't work anymore. If it did, we wouldn't be here. It doesn't mean we're broken, it doesn't mean all hope is lost. It means we need a new tool bag for this menopausal life, and we're here to give it to you. So, in today's episode, I'm going to talk about a question that I get time and time again. Many of you, if you are a long time listener, you know that one of my biggest pieces of content out there in the interwebs is my how to fire up your metabolism workshop, and at the end of that free live training, we always do a Q and A, and one of the questions that I get, I'm going to say almost every time, without fail, is what happens if I've had some kind of weight loss surgery in the past, whether that's bariatric surgery, whether that's a sleeve, whether that's gastric bypass. If I've had some kind of weight loss surgery, will this work for me? Check it out. Welcome to the Becoming Mind Strong podcast, the official podcast of Mindstrong Fitness. My name is Rachel, and I'm the CEO of Mindstrong. And we are here for two things: we're here for hope in a stage of life where it feels like we are doing everything right and nothing is working. I am here to tell you, you are not broken. This is fixable, and I promise there is hope. And number two, we are here for truth in an industry that is designed to keep us confused with shake systems and point systems and frozen meals. I promise you, it doesn't have to be that difficult. Someone can teach you the skill of riding a bike, someone can teach you the skill of knitting, and I can teach you to master the skill of nutrition. So, are you ready? Let's rock and roll. As mentioned in the intro, this topic has come about just by being asked many, many, many, many times, usually when I do those live Q and A's, there's some version of what if I've had X, X being some sort of weight loss surgery. So, my answer to this question is always a two-part answer. First and foremost is the individual individualization part, and then secondly is the more important blanket answer in terms of when I say more important, I mean in terms of urgency, so the individualization answer comes down to what this journey looks like is going to be dependent on where you are, and here's what I mean by that, many times when people have various versions of weight loss surgery, their doctor puts them on a caloric restriction, meaning you cannot go above 900 calories, right, because we've just shrunk your stomach and it will expand, or whatever the case is for that specific surgery. If you are in a place where you are on a caloric restriction from your doctor, then of course that has to come first. We are always going to abide by that caloric restriction, and what I'm going to say in part two becomes maybe even more important, even more - I don't love that word, but it becomes uber important, is what I'm going to say there. So category one, and if you listen to podcasts, you know I hate categorizing people, it gives me the heebie jeebies, but we're doing it here. Category one is you're on an active caloric restriction from your doctor, that of course is going to stay into place. We're going to abide by your doctor's orders, and again, what we're about to talk about in part two becomes even uber important. I'm going to say for some people, we'll call it category two. The caloric restriction no longer applies, meaning when you first had the surgery, you were given 900 calories a day, and because our stomachs expand, or you've had a device removed, right over time those calories have crept up to where now the rules don't really apply. We're not really on the caloric restriction that was once in place.

Speaker 1  4:26  
If that's you, then the journey is going to look the same as someone who hasn't had weight loss surgery, and what we're about to talk about in part two also applies. So, for the purposes of part one, the individualization part, the answer is yes, and yes, this will work for you, coming up in part two. And if you're on a caloric restriction for your doctor, we are always going to abide by that, and part two will play into part one here. If you're someone who used to be on a caloric restriction and you're not anymore, then the journey is going to look more like someone who hasn't had weight. Surgery, it's more of the standard journey, standard journey, meaning still incredibly personalized to you, but without the caloric restriction from your doctor. Part two is that one of the most important things we can do for our health. I'm going to say maybe the most important thing we can do for our health is fuel our body with the correct proportion of carbs, fat, and protein. If this episode happens to be the first ever episode that you've ever listened to of the podcast, pause, go listen to my hundreds of episodes. That's an exaggeration on macronutrients and why I consider them to be the single most sustainable approach to nutrition that every human's body is designed to run on a balance of carbs, fat, protein. So, with that said, one of, if not the most important thing we can be doing for our body is running, is giving it the correct balance of carbs, fat, protein. If you're someone in quote unquote category two, you're not on a caloric restriction for your doctor anymore. The journey is more of the typical individualized journey. Real quickly, before we keep going in this episode, we are talking a lot about metabolisms in menopause. In today's episode, so I want to offer you a chance to deepen your knowledge. If you haven't yet checked out my free workshop, How to Fire Up Your Metabolism in Menopause and Beyond, it is one of my go-to favorite pieces of content that I have out here in the interwebs. You can use the link in the show notes below, or go to Mindstrong fitness.com and you'll get a cute little pop up that'll get you straight into the workshop. Now, let's get back to the show again. That's that's the norm. We're going to figure out where your body is now, we're going to figure out where it needs to be. We're going to slowly bridge that gap. That's what I talk a lot about in this podcast. For the purposes of this episode, I want to talk specifically about people in category one. If you are currently on a caloric restriction from your doctor, the reason I was hesitant to say it becomes even more important, and I'm going to use the words, it becomes incredibly important, uber important, is if you are eating that low calorie, for most people, it's around 900 calories a day. If you have had weight loss surgery, and your doctor's orders are you can't go above 900 calories a day, unless you are being incredibly intentional about it, you are most likely not getting anywhere near the protein you need, probably not carbs or fat either, right? Just by nature, because your calories are so low, so in a situation, and this is the same conversation with with a GLP one, because as much as, and again, if you've listened to the podcast, you know I am not a fan of GLP ones, unless it's for diabetes, which is what it was created for, unless if you are on a GLP one and you've got the same situation that you have to eat 900 calories or less, this this part is the same conversation that if you're going to do that, and some people are surprised, we do have people in our program on GLP ones, I'm not a fan of them, but you have to do what feels good for you, and just like this weight loss surgery conversation, the work becomes so important because when you're eating that low calorie, it is very difficult to get the correct proportion of carbs, fat, protein, specifically enough protein in your body, unless you are being extremely cognizant of it.

Speaker 1  8:11  
This is one of many reasons why, when people go off a GLP one, or on the other side of weight loss surgery, and the calories start creeping up right, if we haven't addressed number one, the habits, that's a bit of a bigger conversation, but number two, what those correct proportions look like. Of course, you gain the weight back, and then some. With GLP ones, it's a little bit of a different conversation, because you've overridden your metabolism. But for the purposes of today's episode, we have to understand biologically, not according to Rachel's laws of health and fitness, but biologically, how our body needs to be fueled properly, and with that, if there's a caloric restriction in place, we still need to understand how our body needs to be fueled with that correct proportion, knowing that for most of us, especially the conversation about protein, it is going to be very difficult to hit those numbers if you're not cognizant of it. So, all that to say, we have women in our program who still choose to be on GLP ones because they haven't transitioned off of it, or whatever the story is there. We have people who have gone through weight loss surgery, are on the other side where they don't have caloric restrictions, we have people in the program who have gone through weight loss surgery and have caloric restrictions. At the end of the day, where we take your total calories will be impacted by those things, but the most important part I'm going to say, in terms of the balance of carbs, fat, protein, that is true for everyone, and to really drive this point home, if you are someone on a caloric restriction, it becomes incredibly uber important that we're focusing on this, because if we are not giving a conscious effort, it is very, very, very rare that we are getting that correct balance of carbs, fat, and protein. Now, last thing I'll say on this topic, and I kind of alluded to it earlier, but I want to dig a little bit deeper here, because I think it's incredibly important. My whole spiel is making this a sustainable lifestyle, right? I would not be in this industry if I had created Rachel's 12 week diet and was like, here you go, you'll lose some weight in 12 weeks, and then you'll gain it all back on the other side. As an educator, I want to give people the keys to the kingdom. I want them to understand how to do this for life, and the challenge for a lot of people is when we do something like weight loss surgery, or when we go on a GLP one, we're not understanding nutrition as a skill, right. We're not mastering. Here's how you knit a sweater. We're buying a sweater every time we need one. The problem is, in the world of sweaters, that's okay, right? We can get away with that, because not everyone needs to know how to knit. In the world of nutrition, if we don't understand it, we are going to gain the weight back on the other side, and at this point I'm going to split these. This conversation is not GLP ones, but since we're down this rabbit hole, I'm going to split these into two. GLP ones are a bit of a different conversation. I have past episodes about this because you are overriding your metabolism, so if your game plan is not to stay on it forever, you will gain the weight back on the other side, and then some. It's not, will I, it's you will. So we need to have floodgates in place of, okay, if I'm going to come off this thing, or when I'm going to come off this thing, what is the game plan to make sure that doesn't happen? Little different conversation, but what are the kids say? Same, same, different, right? There's there's an element of that here as well, with any kind of weight loss surgery. We alluded to this with our two types of categories of people. If we are not being cognizant over time, our stomach can stretch, right? This is why you heard me say, if you're still on a caloric restriction from your doctor, or is that kind of a thing of the past?

Speaker 1  12:01  
Have we stretched that literally and figuratively right over the years to where we're not on that restriction? The reason that happens is what I just said, because our stomachs can stretch, so at some point if you're not abiding by the doctor's orders, it just kind of undid itself, so to speak, and the problem for me as an educator, is in situations like that, of course, we're going to gain the weight back, and then some, because we don't understand nutrition as a skill, right? If we lost a bunch of weight by having surgery, fantastic, we kind of hit the reset button, we got ourselves back to a solid footing. Now, the whole point, right, none of us did that to say, well, now I can just start over and gain it all back. The intention behind that, I would, I would hope, I would assume, in my 10 years in this industry, is okay. I hit the reset button, I got myself to a healthy place. How do I sustain it? And if we don't have these tools in our tool bag, of why would anything be different, right? If you do what you've always done, you've got what you've always gotten. Of course, you're going to gain the weight back. So, to me, it's not just a conversation. If you've had weight loss surgery, yes, super incredibly important that we need to fuel your body correctly. And to me, as an educator and someone who will die on the sword, that we need to master this as a skill. I want to give you the keys to the kingdom. I want to teach you how to master this, so that this wasn't all for naught, so that we have the skills to do this for the rest of our life, and we never have to go back to another surgery, or another pill, or another injection. When we master nutrition as a skill, that's it. Right? You hear me say a lot on this podcast, if you know how to ride a bike, try to fall off the bike, and if you've put your body through the process of surgery, let's get us to a state where we never have to go through that again, because we understand the how and why, where in the driver's seat, and then that's it, we've got the skill for the rest of our life, do For more information on Mind Strong Fitness, or to apply for a free one to one strategy session with my incredible all-female team, visit www dot Mind Strong fitness.com

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