Changing Your Lifestyle Before and After LAP-BAND® Surgery
When it comes to bariatric surgery, it's important for patients to consider it as a type of change for the better. The procedure is designed to help people lose weight rapidly but safely. Change does not come suddenly. In fact, the change associated with LAP-BAND® surgery means making adjustments to your lifestyle before the procedure and afterward.
The team at Tijuana Bariatrics has discussed lifestyles changes previously on our blog, but we'd like to consider how pre-op and post-op lifestyle changes are part of the overall treatment process. They are just as important to your lasting health as the surgery itself.
Building Healthy Habits Before Surgery
Prior to LAP-BAND® surgery, patients are encouraged to make a number of lifestyle changes. These changes are designed help patients get used to post-op lifestyle changes. These initial changes include avoiding cigarettes and alcohol, altering your diet, and keeping a food diary. These all seem minor or expected, but they are important parts of promoting weight loss and lasting wellness.
Making Exercise Part of Daily Life
Before and after LAP-BAND® surgery, patients need to lead more active lifestyles. While the banding of the procedure will help reduce a person's weight, regular exercise is what will help improve the rate and nature of the weight loss, maintain the results of the weight loss, and promote overall respiratory and cardiovascular health.
Even regular walks and light cardio can make a difference. We can help you consider numerous exercise options that improve flexibility, strength, and cardiovascular health.
Understanding What You Eat and How It Makes You Feel
The food diary we mentioned above is an important part of your changing diet. You will record what you eat in a diary and then keep track of how you feel afterward. This can help you identify what foods lead to discomfort or pain, or that may be harder for you to eat. The food diary is also a good way of counting calories and determining what your nutritional intake is like each day.
The process of keeping this food diary can help deepen your relationship to the foods you eat, and help you develop the right kinds of eating habits for your body.
Necessary Dietary Changes
After you undergo any kind of bariatric procedure, your diet will change in a number of ways. You'll want to eat only certain kinds of foods, and you will want to consider drinking water between meals rather than during meals. Getting used to these changes can be a challenge, though patience and your food diary can help immensely with these matters.
The Emotional Components of Health and Wellness
In addition to the physical wellness, mental health is an important component of total health. Losing weight and making all of these changes can be challenging, so it's important that you get used to sharing your concerns with people close to you. If you're worried or frustrated, let people know it. Talking about these issues can help you and your loved ones make sense of what is happening.
You may want to seek out support from other bariatric surgery patients after the procedure. Sharing stories, swapping tips, and offering each other encouragement can mean a world of difference as your body changes following the LAP-BAND® surgery.
Improving Health, Opening Up the World
Think of LAP-BAND® surgery this way: you've opened a door to a new world. With a new world open to you, change is the name of the game. There are so many new possibilities to consider, and you will adapt to them.
Learn More About LAP-BAND® Surgery
To learn more about LAP-BAND® surgery and how it can help you achieve a more ideal weight and lead a healthier life, be sure to contact our team of weight loss surgery specialists today. The team here at Tijuana Bariatrics will work with you to ensure ideal outcomes with low risk and exceptional results.
