I had gastric bypass surgery in 1999. I heard it was a year, not 8 months. And it's a general idea, not a set in stone, concrete rule. And it's not that you can't lose more after, it's just that statistically, most don't. That's a subtle, but huge difference.

The problem with statistics is that sometimes we think they mean there is a cause & effect relationship when there is really only a correlation.

So it's probably not that after 8 months the gastric bypass (or low carb diet) stops working, but it's probably other reasons that co-incidentally generally happen around the eight month mark that cause the weight loss to slow. Like boredom with dieting, or stalls, or decreases in metabolic rates resulting from months of low-calorie eating (starvation mode if you will) or loss of motivation or a failure to continue to cut food or increase exercise to compensate for a lower metabolic rate due to a much lower body weight.

I know for me, I didn't know about or understand the insulin/fat storage/blood sugar/hunger connection (circle) after my surgery. So, while I lost 120 lbs in 10 months, after that I eventually started to have a few more treats, sugar etc, not knowing that I wouldn't be able to control them and that it would trigger the carb monster again. 4 years later, I'd regained 80 of those 120 lbs, just from being addicted to carbs again. I was still not able to eat as much as I could before surgery, but I could eat a normal sized meal and that was all it took. It's not that I couldn't have kept losing after my 10 months, I think I could have if I hadn't had thought I could have a few extra sweets and that triggered my carb addiction again.


Valerie