Exercising After Bariatric Surgery

As soon as your bariatric surgery is over, you may be eager to start living a healthier lifestyle. However, exercise will not happen until your doctor and/or surgeon gives you the go-ahead. Once you begin to work out, expect changes in your fitness plan, since your body will change as it loses weight. Just remember, bariatric surgery is not a fix it to your weight loss. You have to be serious about working out post-op to see big results.

After Surgery Exercise

Soon after your surgery, your nurses and surgeon will encourage you to begin working out. These exercises will include getting in and out of bed, walking around the hospital, and other in-bed exercises. Your surgeon will give you suggestions for exercise programs, which you should follow.

The first four weeks after surgery should focus on flexibility exercises, deep breathing, and getting back into the swing of performing daily tasks. As you go along, increase the amount of daily tasks you perform, wash your dishes by hand, clean the house, use the stairs, and try parking further away from home or the grocery store to get in extra steps.  

 Gradually, you should include low-intensity aerobic exercises, such as walking, biking, or swimming. The important thing to remember after surgery is to keep in touch with your body. If you are hurting during exercise, stop immediately.  

Open Procedure Tips

If you had an open procedure, it might take longer for you to recover from weight loss surgery. During your first six weeks post-op, avoid lifting anything heavier than 15 pounds. As much as it might hurt, you should keep performing small exercises to increase your pain threshold. For the first eight to twelve weeks, you need to allow your incision to heal. This means avoiding abdominal exercises. By avoiding these, you are alleviating abdominal hernias around your incision.  

Calories play a big part of your post-op recovery, especially after open surgery. The first few months after surgery, you should consume less than 500 calories a day. Intaking fewer calories might promote fatigue, so avoid high-intensity exercises. As you lose weight and improve at exercise, you will be able to consume more calories. Make sure you follow your surgeon’s nutrition plan.  

Staying Motivated After Bariatric Surgery

Weight loss won’t happen instantaneously after bariatric surgery. The more you exercise, the more your body gets used to it. This means that your exercise regimen will change consistently as you make progress. As your body loses weight, it will become harder to resume losing weight. This can grow frustrating, as new exercise routines might be difficult as you make progress towards your weight loss goal. It is important to remember that pushing through the frustrations and pains that exercise can cause will help you see progress.  

Working out with a group is a great way of staying motivated, as not only will you have group support, but you will have people there with you, suffering through the same, hard exercise. Just remember to embrace the feeling you get after a long, hard exercise session. There’s pain, sure, but there’s also the pride in having finished another round of exercise.  

Interested in Bariatric Surgery?

Are you in northern California and interested in weight loss surgery? BASS Medical Group offers some of the best bariatric care in the area. With our team of skilled surgeons, you will go into weight loss surgery feeling confident and leave with a detailed nutrition and exercise plan. If you are interested in bariatric surgery and want to find out more, get in touch with our expert bariatric surgeons.

The Best Bariatric Care in California

‍BASS Bariatric Surgery Center and Dr. Brian T. Chin offers some of the best bariatric care in northern California. Our team is ready to make you as comfortable as possible during your recovery from your surgery. If you are interested in gastric bypass surgery and want to know more, contact our expert bariatric surgeons to find out if this surgery is right for you.