Bariatric Surgery Must-Haves: 10 Items You Can’t Live Without

Bariatric Surgery Items You Can't Live Without

As a bariatric patient, there are so many changes and new habits being formed after surgery. It can be overwhelming finding products that are useful to have after surgery because there is so much out there. Through experience, I have found that there are some items you must have after surgery to be successful. Here are some of those items:

1. Activity Tracker. Whether it is through a Fitbit/Apple watch or an app on your phone, you must have something to help track your food and exercise. This will help you keep yourself accountable.
2. Water Bottle. Dehydration is serious after weight loss surgery and must not be overlooked. Finding a good water bottle to help you reach your water goals will be extremely helpful. I found it helpful having one that says the time on the bottle. This helped me stay on track and drink the appropriate amount of water each hour.
3. You will be using a blender a lot! I would recommend investing in a good one. A blender is really helpful during the liquid phase when you are drinking protein shakes, but it is even more helpful to have it during the puree stage. It is critical that you blend your food as good as possible as you are transitioning to the puree stage and it can be tricky to do this without some sort of blender.
4. Meal Prep Containers. After surgery, you will be eating the tiniest servings of food once you get to the solid stage. To ensure food does not go to waste, I encourage you to get good containers to store your leftovers in. It is also helpful to have containers for meal prepping. You should measure your food and put it in individual containers to help ensure you are not eating more than you should be eating.
5. Tighter Clothes. I learned this the hard way. Being on a weight loss surgery journey, you will be losing weight fast, which means you will be dropping sizes fast. I was shopping all the time because my clothes were getting so big. One of the best things I finally figured out after surgery was to buy clothes a little tight, sometimes even almost too tight. This helped make sure that the clothes lasted as long as possible. It was very frustrating shopping for new clothes every few weeks. By buying clothes a little tighter, they will last longer.
6. It is extremely dangerous to get deficient after surgery. As a weight loss surgery patient, you must start a good vitamin routine prior to surgery. We can get deficient if we don’t stay on top of it and this is something you don’t want to mess with. Take your vitamins every day!
7. Shampoo/Conditioner. You have heard it before, but one thing we struggle with as bariatric patients is hair loss. I found that investing in a good shampoo and conditioner helped me have healthier hair. Hair loss is going to happen no matter what, but finding a good shampoo and conditioner helped my hair feel better and not so tangled as it fell out.
8. If you have been overweight for some time, you might struggle with stretch marks and excess skin after surgery. There are creams out there that can really help with stretch marks and keep your skin moisturized as you go through your weight loss surgery journey. Your skin changes a lot with surgery, so it is important that you focus on keeping it healthy.
9. After surgery, you might struggle with acid reflux and/or diarrhea. I found that keeping medications to help these issues is critical. You never know when you are going to have the issues, so you might as well keep them on you at all times.
10. Investing in a good scale will go a long way for you. You don’t want an inaccurate scale as this will throw you off and make it a really stressful situation when you are weighing in. Take the time to find a good scale for your journey. There are some out there that can measure your BMI, water, muscle mass, etc. These numbers are really important with tracking your weight loss. However, make sure you don’t get too focused on the numbers that you forget about your non-scale victories as well!

Having these items helped me tremendously on my journey. I encourage you to sit back and reflect on what items you might need to keep yourself accountable and track with your weight loss.

Continue reading: Life After Weight Loss Surgery