Vegan

[Bill S.]

Well I saw my surgeon today and he put me on a Vegetarian diet yuck. Has something to do with my heart. Also told me to stay away from artificial sweeteners like diet tea and diet Snapple which I started drinking. Can have one as a treat once in awhile same with meat but he wants me to be a full on vegetarian . Told me to eat six small meals a day and water water water.Im on the soft food stage for six weeks then I can have regular food . Gonna join a gym when I get back from Chicago next week . Surgeon said I should exercise for 2 hours a day . So now the things I use to hate Exercise,veggies have to do now.

 

[Brenda2010]

Well I saw my surgeon today and he put me on a Vegetarian diet yuck. Has something to do with my heart. Also told me to stay away from artificial sweeteners like diet tea and diet Snapple which I started drinking. Can have one as a treat once in awhile same with meat but he wants me to be a full on vegetarian . Told me to eat six small meals a day and water water water.Im on the soft food stage for six weeks then I can have regular food . Gonna join a gym when I get back from Chicago next week . Surgeon said I should exercise for 2 hours a day . So now the things I use to hate Exercise,veggies have to do now.

Damn Bill, your doc is STRICT!!! You have to do what's best for your heart but I feel for you. And exercise 2 hours a day? Good thing you're retired! I hope you're able to find a way to balance that with your life. On the bright side, you'll probably be in the best shape of your life within a couple months! Congrats on making it to the next stage.

 

[Bill S.]

Yeah it was actually the surgeons assistant and yeah I thought he was kinda strict when he was telling me all that.I already knew about the heart problem.Dmt remember what it’s called .Vegetables I can deal with I don’t have to be strict about but he said the more the better as for the 2 hour of exercise no way except I’m going to join a fitness club and get a personal trainer which will help but 2 hours I don’t know about that

 

[Brenda2010]

Yeah it was actually the surgeons assistant and yeah I thought he was kinda strict when he was telling me all that.I already knew about the heart problem.Dmt remember what it’s called .Vegetables I can deal with I don’t have to be strict about but he said the more the better as for the 2 hour of exercise no way except I’m going to join a fitness club and get a personal trainer which will help but 2 hours I don’t know about that

I'm sure you'll do your best with everything Bill and that's all they can expect. You're already doing great so anything more is just gravy on the green beans.

 

[dianeseattle]

Wow, that's weird. Did he say how much time you'd have to be a vegetarian ? And did you get a list of approved foods to go along with that?

I've been an ovo-lacto vegetarian once, for 3 years, and the last year, I was pregnant*. I worried a little about protein but in those days, I was told I only had to get 25 grams a day. So I ate a lot of brown rice with pinto beans and peanut-butter sandwiches on whole wheat bread.

I was told those combinations created a perfect set of amino acids to constitute protein. But later I found out our common white rice, processed in the US, was better for me because after they polish the hell out of it, they add tons of nutrients to it and it's better for you.

And you still can't get enough protein from eating vegetables. You'd gain 100 pounds trying to.

I ate a cup of steamed broccoli last night and it only had 2.8 grams of protein. How are you supposed to get your required protein in?

I have to say I think this is nuts. I'm second-guessing your surgeon's assistant. Please tell us more, in detail. It worries me a little. Even the American Heart Association doesn't advise a vegetarian diet for people with heart disease. Why is your surgeon's assistant giving you nutritional advice? That's the province of the dietitian/nutritionist you should have included with your team.

Does your diet include milk, cheese and eggs? I know with most heart-healthy diets, eggs are STILL frowned upon. And some people are just really dogmatic about it.

I'm gonna wait for more information from you before I get too judgmental about it. But if I'd had a post-op exam, showing the weight I'd lost, with them already knowing about my heart problems, I'd be calling that guy up and asking him A LOT of questions. And I would never go on a vegetarian diet because someone told me to.

As a consolation prize, remember that you can get 35 grams of protein from a 4-ounce piece of skinless, lean, roasted turkey and only 94 grams of cholesterol. You're allowed between 2,000 and 3,000 grams of cholesterol every day. And before you changed your diet, I'll bet you were consuming twice that much.

If you have congestive heart disease, it's a different story, but if you just have a lot of risk factors for heart attack and stroke, I can't see the harm in using lean meat in your diet.

Sorry, this is upsetting to me. Here we are, telling newcomers to stick to their diets and listen to their doctors, and that in time, they'll be able to eat regular food using portion control and healthy choices. I've never heard anyone say that the change in life should be going vegetarian. It's a very difficult diet to balance and I'm not sure it could be very effective in post-op, older patients.

*and the baby weighed 8 pounds, 9 ounces and was 22 1/2 inches long! He looked like he was a month old the day he was born, he was so healthy.

 

[Bill S.]

Hi Diane yeah it’s not a complete vegetarian diet. I can have meat soft food stage you know turkey chicken blah! Whatever that’s in the soft food stage for 6 weeks but he wants me to be more of the vegetarian kinda person. I have a Valvular in my heart what ever that is. Something with the heartbeat I think and he just doesn’t want it to get worse with all the bad foods I’m not eating anyway . He said eating those greasy fried and sugar laden foods are what caused it . What I’m saying I’m not going complete vegan jus eating more healthy like we’re supposed to after surgery. Most foods on the list he gave me I can’t eat anyway bread,rice,chips,pasta, and tortillas. I can still have dairy products like milk and cheese. Ive been getting my protein most with beans , cottage cheese, yogurt and I forget what else . He said I can ween off the protein drinks and I can have fruit without the skins .Basicly the same things I already know what to eat. Just more vegetarian like. Hope that answers your questions.

 

[Brenda2010]

Hi Diane yeah it’s not a complete vegetarian diet. I can have meat soft food stage you know turkey chicken blah! Whatever that’s in the soft food stage for 6 weeks but he wants me to be more of the vegetarian kinda person. I have a Valvular in my heart what ever that is. Something with the heartbeat I think and he just doesn’t want it to get worse with all the bad foods I’m not eating anyway . He said eating those greasy fried and sugar laden foods are what caused it . What I’m saying I’m not going complete vegan jus eating more healthy like we’re supposed to after surgery. Most foods on the list he gave me I can’t eat anyway bread,rice,chips,pasta, and tortillas. I can still have dairy products like milk and cheese. Ive been getting my protein most with beans , cottage cheese, yogurt and I forget what else . He said I can ween off the protein drinks and I can have fruit without the skins .Basicly the same things I already know what to eat. Just more vegetarian like. Hope that answers your questions.

Good Bill! I get what the assistant was advising because of your heart but we need to enjoy food occasionally too! Of course we're all aware that we were killing ourselves with our food choices before surgery but we need a realistic, lifelong plan that works with our lifestyles and tastes.

Do you have another appointment with your nutritionist/dietitian before you get on solid foods? If not, I'd make one. You can discuss this advice and the foods that you enjoy and come up with a realistic, healthy eating plan that doesn't feel like a total sacrifice.

 

[missdarmitage]

Yeah it was actually the surgeons assistant and yeah I thought he was kinda strict when he was telling me all that.I already knew about the heart problem.Dmt remember what it’s called .Vegetables I can deal with I don’t have to be strict about but he said the more the better as for the 2 hour of exercise no way except I’m going to join a fitness club and get a personal trainer which will help but 2 hours I don’t know about that

When I came home and was in the first week or two after surgery, I had it in my head I was going to exercise for two hours a day.... but there was no way! I managed walking that long while I was at home by splitting it up into smaller increments, but once I got back to living life normally, there was just no way unless all of my time was devoted to work, sleep, eating, taking vitamins, and working out. Need just a little bit of fun in there somewhere!

 

[dianeseattle]

I'm gonna take it one step farther and agree with whatever anonymous person famously said, "Food is Life!"

I love food. I love cooking, baking, eating, savoring, looking at glossy photos of brightly colored vegetables (why do you think all those post-renaissance Dutch painters did all those gorgeous still life paintings?) and preparing it into a salad or something roasted or steamed or broiled or sauced... In addition to being very good for you, food is beautiful.

Brenda & Miss D make good points. Life should be enjoyed and both eating and moving are part of what makes happiness possible. And when I was fat, or more accurately, when I was sick with my food addiction, I was desecrating the sanctity of food and punishing myself with exercises that did nothing. So the American version of still life painting is:

There's no way that doesn't look like something that should be swept off the table into the trash can. But once upon a time, I would have eaten as much of it as I could fit in.

Anyway, I think I found my new signature line:

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”
― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own

That may be the key to life. The holistic incorporation of human body functions, melded sanely together in a celebration, no shame, and a sense of having lived a good life. Or as de La Rochefoucauld famously said, “To eat is a necessity, but to eat intelligently is an art.”

It's time to let food come out of the closet and become part of your joyous existence. Even the great, thick, brobdignagian Orson Welles knew that. “My doctor told me to stop having intimate dinners for four, unless there are three other people.”

 

[missdarmitage]

I'm gonna take it one step farther and agree with whatever anonymous person famously said, "Food is Life!"

I love food. I love cooking, baking, eating, savoring, looking at glossy photos of brightly colored vegetables (why do you think all those post-renaissance Dutch painters did all those gorgeous still life paintings?) and preparing it into a salad or something roasted or steamed or broiled or sauced... In addition to being very good for you, food is beautiful.

View attachment 2343

Brenda & Miss D make good points. Life should be enjoyed and both eating and moving are part of what makes happiness possible. And when I was fat, or more accurately, when I was sick with my food addiction, I was desecrating the sanctity of food and punishing myself with exercises that did nothing. So the American version of still life painting is:

View attachment 2344

There's no way that doesn't look like something that should be swept off the table into the trash can. But once upon a time, I would have eaten as much of it as I could fit in.

Anyway, I think I found my new signature line:

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”
― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own

That may be the key to life. The holistic incorporation of human body functions, melded sanely together in a celebration, no shame, and a sense of having lived a good life. Or as de La Rochefoucauld famously said, “To eat is a necessity, but to eat intelligently is an art.”

It's time to let food come out of the closet and become part of your joyous existence. Even the great, thick, brobdignagian Orson Welles knew that. “My doctor told me to stop having intimate dinners for four, unless there are three other people.”

I love that new signature line Diane And Orson Welles was on it! Portion control is one of the hardest things to master. Luckily, we have a tool to help with that

 

[Bill S.]

Good Bill! I get what the assistant was advising because of your heart but we need to enjoy food occasionally too! Of course we're all aware that we were killing ourselves with our food choices before surgery but we need a realistic, lifelong plan that works with our lifestyles and tastes.

Do you have another appointment with your nutritionist/dietitian before you get on solid foods? If not, I'd make one. You can discuss this advice and the foods that you enjoy and come up with a realistic, healthy eating plan that doesn't feel like a total sacrifice.

Hi Brenda no I don’t when I saw the nutritionist it was with about 20 other people it wasn’t one on one and was basically everything I learned in the options classes I took and haven’t heard of any more appointments for the nutritonist

 

[dianeseattle]

Bill, that's wrong, not to assign you a nutritionist along with your team. I mean, these guys are making a fortune off their surgery, and especially if it's a program, I'll bet it's $100-grand a pop.

Since you were just given NEW post-op eating instructions, that automatically triggers a mandatory appointment with a dietitian. Surgeons do not give nutritional advice. They're too busy being God. (that's an old joke)

You should call and get an appt. or a referral. Not only do hospitals have specific bariatric diets they're supposed to share with you, but patients are all different and need private consults with people who understand diet. I think I saw my nutritionist 5 or 6 times, and called her a bunch of times, and I wasn't even in a program 12 years ago. I was sent to a nutritionist by my very qualified, brilliant surgeon (almost God).

I'm sorry if I knew this already but forgot: did you get a written diet to follow, several pages long, with lists of protein grams and calorie counts and more lists of foods to avoid? You should have. After any surgery there's aftercare & follow-up, but for sure, after you've had your digestive system altered completely, you have to have aftercare that involves how and what you eat as you heal and move forward.

 

[Bill S.]

Nope nothing that’s Kaiser for you I guess and yeah only me appointment with a group with a nutritionist. I got sort of a list of cooked or steamed vegetables,soft lettuce,fruits that need peeled,ground lean meat,lean deli meat that is low in sodium. List of no foods include raw vegetables,whole meat like steak,bread,rice,chips,pasta,tortillas no processed foods like frozen dinners,canned veggies or fast food. That’s not just the surgeon but Kaiser’s plan too

 

[Brenda2010]

Hi Brenda no I don’t when I saw the nutritionist it was with about 20 other people it wasn’t one on one and was basically everything I learned in the options classes I took and haven’t heard of any more appointments for the nutritonist

Damn Bill, I had 2 one-on-one sessions with the nutritionist as well as the group one pre-op. And she made sure to tell me that I can I can make another appt with her anytime. That really sucks that you weren't given that option.

As Diane mentioned, I wonder if your surgeon's office would refer you to one. Or maybe your primary doc could suggest someone? I'd feel so overwhelmed navigating this new plan without one

 

[Bill S.]

I suppose if I asked I might be able to . They did say if any questions to call but I hate talking on the phone.

 

[Brenda2010]

I suppose if I asked I might be able to . They did say if any questions to call but I hate talking on the phone.

You're such a guy Bill!