Hello People - let me dispell a few myths here for you.
Post op eating - Your put onto liquids and then sloppy to allow the the joins in your intestine and the staple line across the stomach to heal properly, forcing hard foods in may pop the staples and require surgical revision, also this time allows the bruising to subside and the new pouch time to get used to its new function ! - the longer you can go on the liquid and sloppy stages the better your eating will be when you do return to normal eating, all consultants give different lenghts of time you must follow, but the general rule of thumb is that if you progress to soon and something hurts, then your not ready yet, listen to your bodies, it will tell you when its time.
Pouch stretching - This isn't something you need to worry about, your pouch is made from the top section of your stomach, which has the thickest muscle band, its been set to hold about 2oz at the moment, and in time will stretch out to hold about 6-8 oz, the pouch is made small to give your weight loss a really good kick start now and its designed and intended to stretch out with time to allow a great eating range.
To actually stretch your pouch takes some real dedicated abuse over many months if not years of over eating, bypassers that do not understand or eat to restriction are the most likely to long term stretch there pouch, some bypassers dont like the feeling you have when you reach restriction and therefore avoid it by eating softer foods that dont cause the discomfort, the softer foods allow the pouch to hold more without pain and thus stretch's it out over time. Any bypasser here on this forum that has been successful with there weight loss will understand and use restriction when they eat !
Dumping - some will dump and some wont, there's nothing you can do about it until it happens, and you need to understand and know what makes you dump, so dont worry about it, although the symptoms are very unpleasant they are not life threatening and your body will sort itself out. In my view it would be better to experiment and work out what makes you dump in the safety of your own home rather than when your out for the day or in a resturant !- but try not to worry about, like many others if you dump you will learn how to deal with it and what food types to avoid in future.
At your stages you really dont need to worry about stretching, or anything elase, just make sure you are getting fluids down and take whatever you are eating slowly, when you feel right then slowly experiement with slightly harder foods and see how that goes, if pouchy doesn't like it, then it will let you know !
One last thing - Your currently where hundreds of us have been before, at the moment it feels like a really big deal, the learning curve is 90 dgerees for you at the moment, it does get better and easier to manage, you will get your head around eating properly again and its so worth the agro and hassle when your a year out and 10 stone lighter
