Fast Food after Bariatric Surgery

Eating fast food is not the ideal choice after having weight loss surgery due to the excessively high calorie options and unhealthy offerings of most menus. Bariatric patients on a low sugar, low fat diet will find that fast food restaurants are not conducive to meeting current weight loss goals. However, there are rare occasions when you will find that a quick fast food meal is necessary.

 

Is Fast Food Okay for the Bariatric Patient?

You will be surprised to learn that, on rare occasions, fast food may help keep you on the path to healthy weight loss. You can easily curb your appetite with a healthy fast food option when you choose wisely. Here are some instances when fast food becomes the Bariatric patient’s friend.

bariatric Fast Food

Starving and Away from Home

After weight loss surgery, your regular eating habits are easily thrown upside down after missing just one meal. There will be times when you will be away from home and unable to buy or prepare a proper meal, one that meets the exact needs of your diet plan. You will become extremely hungry and look for public dining options. Allowing yourself to become exceptionally hungry can be difficult to control, and often leads to overeating.

Once you have allowed yourself to reach the ‘starving’ point, you will be in danger of eating far too much. A good example of this is going to the grocery store without eating first. You will sabotage your budget by buying more food than you would have if you had eaten.

You can avoid reaching this point by purchasing a small sensible meal at a fast food restaurant. It is very important that you choose the healthiest menu options available, avoiding foods that are not advised after weight loss surgery. Many fast food restaurants are beginning to offer yogurt, apple slices and other healthy alternatives, drastically reducing the calorie count for your meal.

Other tips include avoiding the drive-thru window and dining inside so you will eat more slowly, leave off the bun, order grilled food instead of greasy fried options, and avoid carbonated beverages. Water is your best option, consumed thirty minutes before or after your meal.

Reminder of Your Life Changing Decision

Food should never be considered a reward when you are dieting but dining out occasionally can be rather fun. When you choose healthy options at a fast food restaurant, you are reminded of how far you’ve come and how much you’ve changed. As your body becomes accustomed to healthier, more sensible choices, the cravings for fast food will diminish entirely.

After weight loss surgery, many Bariatric patients will decide to remove fast food from their diets entirely. With each new, healthier dining choice made, your attitude and palate also changes. You may find, after a little time has passed, your best-loved fast food menu items have become less satisfying than you recall, describing them as too greasy, too salty and/or too sweet.

Consume Fast Food in Moderation  

It is important to realize that fast food can damage your weight loss goals if consumed on a regular basis. Common sense is required with every meal chosen by those who have undergone weight loss surgery. Fast food is not off limits to Bariatric patients, when eaten in moderation.  If you make seldom visit fast food restaurants and make only smart menu choices, you will continue to meet or exceed your weight loss goals.

How the Brain Responds to Food After Gastric Bypass Surgery

Gastric Bypass Surgery patients lose more weight over the long them than those who have undergone gastric band operations.

A recent study found that obese patients who’ve had gastric bypass surgery experience changes in their brain which affect how the brain itself responds to food.  The Medical Research Council (MRC) found that this procedure reduces not only hunger, but the drive to eat for pleasure.

This was not found to be true of patients who have undergone gastric banding operations.  Therefore over the long run, gastric bypass patients lose more Gastric Bypass eat lessweight.  The research was published in the journal Gut and the theory is that physical changes made to the gut during surgery somehow have an effect on the drive to eat for pleasure.

Dr. Tony Goldstone from the MRC Clinical Sciences Centre at Imperial College London and consultant endocrinologist at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust said that  “Both procedures reduce appetite and have health benefits including long-term weight loss and improvement or even complete resolution of type 2 diabetes. However, gastric bypass surgery appears to be more effective for weight loss and has a more profound effect on the way in which the brain responds to food.”

Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) was used to measure brain activity by scientists from Imperial College London, UK.  They studied 61 men and women who had lost weight using either one of these surgical methods.  21 people had gastric bypass and 20 people had gastric band surgery.  They used a control group of 20 people who had no surgery.

Patients who had gastric bypass surgery had less activity in brain’s reward centers when shown pictures of food, compared with those who had gastric banding surgery.  Gastric bypass patients also rated high-calorie foods as less appealing and as a result ate less fat in their diet than patients having gastric banding surgery or people in the control group.

However compared to the un-operated control group, both groups that had surgery had similarly reduced hunger and seemed unrelated to their psychological traits.

Researchers could not determine what caused these changes in brain activity, but did see differences in the patients’ metabolism which might be a factor.  The gut hormones that make us feel full after a meal were higher in the gastric bypass patients.  Levels of bile, which pay a role in digestion were also higher.

Another factor that was observed was that patients with gastric bypass surgery were physically uncomfortable, even nauseous after eating foods high in sugar and fat.  So this of course influenced their eating habits.

Dr. Goldstone concluded that “These findings emphasize that different bariatric procedures work in different ways to influence eating behavior,” added Goldstone. “This may have important implications for the way we treat patients with obesity and could help pave the way for a more personalized approach when deciding on the choice of bariatric procedure by taking the impact on food preferences and cravings into account.”

 

 

 

 

 

Bariatric Eating Guidelines: Why Can You Not Drink During Meals?

Knowing how much drinking you are allowed to do is important with bariatric eating. It is essential to follow bariatric nutrition in order to avoid serious health risks. Bariatric surgery can dramatically change your life, but you need to carefully follow your new dietary regime in order to see best results and avoid serious health complications. Before you consider bariatric surgery you want to consider all the risks involved. If you have already had the procedure and want help maintaining a healthy lifestyle you need to know what to do. This article can help you understand the health risks associated with drinking during meals after bariatric surgery.

How to Eat After Bariatric Surgery- Bariatric Eating Guidelines

Bariatric surgery and the resulting nutrition and diet that you follow are a good way to help you stop over eating, but it can also come with home health problems if you don’t follow the proper bariatric surgery eating guidelines. Bariatric surgery will reduce the size of your stomach and therefore, reduce the amount of food that can be contained in your stomach. If is important to eat slowly and carefully chew your food after bariatric surgery.

bariatric eating guidelines

 

Typically, not following bariatric eating guidelines will lead to nausea and vomiting. These symptoms are the same that you would feel if you ate too fast or ate too much food. However, there are other health issues that can occur after bariatric surgery that are easy to avoid if you follow proper eating habits. Let us look at some of these issues.

Some nutritional problems that occur after bariatric surgery include the following:

· Difficulty digesting food – especially red meats, bread products and fruit and vegetable skins.

· Intolerance to certain foods – especially in the few days after the operation.

· Malnutrition as a result of vitamin and mineral deficiencies.

· Changes in bowel habits.

· Dehydration as a result of inadequate drinking.

· Some symptoms to look for after bariatric surgery include the following:

· Dry mouth

· Headache

· Fatigue

· Strong smelling and/or dark urine

· Lactose intolerance

· Gas

· Diarrhea

· Bloating

· Cramping

 

Tips on How Much and When to Drink and Eat After Bariatric Surgery

Following bariatric surgery you will need to abide by some simple bariatric eating guidelines and take daily dietary supplements and a regimen of multi-vitamins in order to avoid malnutrition and get the missing nutrients from you new reduced diet. When you eat less, you will also be consuming less fiber so it is important to drink as much water as possible, exercise regularly and eat natural fiber sources such as oatmeal or applesauce.

Since bariatric surgery is reducing the size of your stomach it is important that you don’t drink too much fluids with you meal because this will over extend your stomach.  This will increase your feelings of nausea and increase your risk of vomiting. Also, drinking with your meals causes the food to travel faster through your stomach, potentially making you hungry sooner. Some foods can also be expanded as a result of mixing with water. Therefore, it is important to drink fluids often, but before and after meals.

 

Bariatric surgery is one of the best procedures to help obese patients lose weight. If you follow the tips above you will be able to reduce your chance of complications that can make the procedure uncomfortable.