Why Do Gastric Bypass Patients Get Sleepy After Eating?
Have you noticed since your WLS and return to regular eating a meal often causes you to become sleepy? Seriously sleepy. Drop your head in your plate sleepy.
This happens to me all the time. And theres a good reason for it. When we eat the body produces a rise in blood sugar and a surge in insulin production. This chemical activity sends tryptophan to the brain where it becomes serotonin that signals the body Take a nap! Here come the nods, the yawns and the blinking eyes. WLS patients are highly susceptible to post meal sleepiness because of the shortened route to the small intestine. From there the tryptophan has a fast ride to the brain shouting almost like Paul Revere The Sleepies are coming! The Sleepies are coming!
Now, I dont want any of you emailing my husband, but quite frequently I dramatically play the Im so sleepy card and go to bed after dinner leaving him with the dishes and evening chores. (Feel free to try this at home!) In fact, he's in the kitchen now doing tonight's dishes!
This is fine for the evening meal, but what about a noonday meal? For example the business lunch. How can we socialize at our mid-day meal and not become a victim of the Tryptophan Express to Sleepytown?
A wise nutritional strategy for maintaining a sharp mental edge after lunch is to eat foods that give a gradual, steady release of food energy throughout the afternoon while placing only a light burden on the digestive system. Consider these strategies:
1. Emphasize healthy protein choices, like cold-water fish, beans and legumes, or a non-cream-based main dish soup or stew. Consume 60% of your volume from this group.
2. Choose a minimal serving of low-glycemic-index carbohydrates, like green salad, root vegetables in their skins, mushrooms, green leafy vegetables, broccoli, asparagus, or artichoke. Consume only 20% of your food volume from this group.
3. Be sure your food choices contain healthy fats, such as cold-water fish, flaxseed oil, olive oil vinaigrette (the vinegar helps slow the release of food energy), nuts, seeds, or avocado
4. Absolutely avoid sugary, starchy, or fatty foods like soft drinks, non-whole-grain pasta, fried foods, and rich or creamy sauces and dressings
5. Skip dessert.
Rest assured, (pun intended) by making wise food choices we can be alert, responsive and LivingAfterWLS! Just say no to the Sleepies by making wholesome healthy food choices.
Kaye Bailey 2005 - All Rights Reserved
Author Bio: Kaye Bailey
Kaye Bailey
An award winning journalist and former newspaper editor Kaye Bailey brings expertise in writing and personal experience with gastric bypass surgery to EzineArticles.com. Ms. Bailey developed a passion for writing at an early age. As a teenager she found writing her feelings about obesity helped her cope in a world that is often cruel to overweight children and adults alike.
Ms. Bailey says she found out she was fat in kindergarten when another child told her she was fat. "I didn't even know what fat was but I could tell it was bad and I didn't want to be fat. Until that day I had been unaware I was different. But there I was, a five-year-old girl sitting cross-legged on the floor learning a new word that would define me."
At age 33 she underwent laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery. For the first time in her life after multiple failed diet attempts she lost weight. She said the decision to have surgery took courage, nerve, and a little bit of plain old faith. But she learned surgery was the easy part. Dealing with newfound emotions, struggling with food choices and fighting to keep from regaining weight were unexpected bumps in the road following massive weight loss with surgery.
Having spent most of her life overweight Ms. Bailey is strongly empathetic toward the obese, particularly overweight children. This compassion compelled her to found the website LivingAfterWLS.com, a fast-growing resource of information, understanding and support for the weight loss surgery community. While weight loss surgery is publicly perceived as an easy fix to obesity Ms. Bailey maintains the struggles after surgery challenge the vigor of even the most dedicated individual. As WLS becomes more readily available patients are finding there is a lack of long-term aftercare and support from bariatric centers.
The LivingAfterWLS.com site is complimented with daily blog. The blog, livingafterwls.blogspot.com offers readers the chance to comment or leave feedback about fresh content added daily. This site contains success stories and recipes as well as general information and WLS inspired topics. Complementing the site is a monthly newsletter titled "You Have Arrived" available exclusively to people who subscribe through the website or the blog. The path forward includes community forums, nutrition and fitness tracking tools.
Ms. Bailey makes her home on a ranch in the Rocky Mountains with her husband of eight years who has been her consort in life after WLS.
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