Reddit reviews Eating Well After Weight Loss Surgery: Over 140 Delicious Low-Fat High-Protein Recipes to Enjoy in the Weeks, Months and Years After Surgery

The biggest thing pre-op to realize is that you will still be able to enjoy many of the same foods that you do now, but maybe cooked slightly different and smaller portions. A good example for a pre-op dinner for me was 6 oz of marinated salmon, 100 g of grilled asparagus, 160 g of green beans cooked in low fat butter, and 90 g of roasted red potatoes. It is actually quite alot of food, but a good chunk of the volume comes from the vegetables, which have few calories. Typical breakfast was 169 g of low fat/low sugar greek yogurt, 105 g mixed berries, and 39 g of Kind brand granola. For lunch, I would do a 2 slices of no sugar added bread toasted, ~100 g of turkey with a slathering of spicy mayo, served with 3 veggies of my choice. I would get two snacks as well. One was typically more of the greek yogurt and berries. The other was the granola and ~20 g of cashews...I would mix those snacks together. My fiance and I would eat the same things pre-op, and honestly it wasn't bad and felt like I was still eating alot. As for your husband eating unhealthy things in front of you, it will be hard pre-op, but you don't have to be perfect pre-op either. Some surgeons have weight loss goals before they approve you for surgery; mine did not. After surgery though, you won't feel hungry at all...ever. You will have cravings or so-called "head hunger," but I can at least easily ignore it. I can watch my fiance eat take-out Chinese food in front of me and be fine.

Post-op our diets haven't coordinated quite yet since I am still fairly restricted on what I can eat. We found a great book called "Eating well after weight loss surgery" (http://www.amazon.com/Eating-Well-After-Weight-Surgery/dp/1569244537/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1462453288&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=how+to+eat+well+after+weight+loss+surgery). The recipes are designed so that you can use them at almost any point after surgery and tells you what modifications if any you will need to make. Each recipe is prepared by default for someone who hasn't had the surgery so it would work for your husband.

For going out to eat, you will be able to find things that you can have just a few weeks out of surgery. For example, we went out to a Chinese place less than 2 weeks after surgery. I got the wonton soup and didn't eat the wonton (I also only was able to get down half of it and took the other half home). I was a cheap date at $2.25 + tip. Even longer after surgery, you will be able to go pretty much anywhere and find something to eat, but you probably won't finish it.

The alcohol for me wasn't a dealbreaker, because I rarely drank as it was. It can be especially dangerous in the first year, because you are rapidly losing the weight. I do know several people that have drank after surgery and typically a beer or half a glass of wine is where they feel like it may have been too much. To go by your program's guidelines though, it is one year to make you much healthier to live a longer and more fulfilling life. You will be able to do more than you ever imagined.