After weight loss surgery my food cravings have gone!

Last updated on Wed, 14th Sep 2022

Like many overweight people I used to crave high-fat and high-sugar foods before my surgery. But those cravings have now gone!

When I think back to the amount of bad food I used to eat, I’m shocked. My actual meals – breakfast, lunch and dinner – were generally quite healthy, but all the snacks I used to eat in between were full of fat or sugar, and sometimes both.

I was sometimes consuming more calories in snacks during a day than in my combined meals!

However I’ve noticed that since my gastric bypass surgery many of my cravings have now disappeared. I don’t crave chocolate anymore, or jellies or mints. I don’t crave crisps. And I don’t crave chips or fried foods.

The only thing that still appeals to me are savory foods, such as bread or cheese – but I have them now in moderation as part of my normal meals, and so I have no desire to snack on them.

I suppose it helps that I’m not really getting hungry between meals. I’m really lucky that way, because I hear of other bariatric patients that experience a lot more hunger than me, and are a lot more tempted to snack.

The only problem area for me is when I’m doing a food shop. It doesn’t help that the supermarkets are absolutely jam-packed with sweets and rich foods, as it’s on the run up to Christmas. I sometimes look at something on a shelf, and some memory fires in the back of my mind saying that I want it. But when I think about it a bit more, I realise that I don’t actually want it, and that whatever desire that popped in my head doesn’t exist any more.

It happened to me the other day. I was messaged by a friend who had just bought himself some Stollen from the supermarket. Now this time last year I would have been all over that as I used to love marzipan. And initially when I got the message I thought “I should get some of that”. But when I stopped to think about it, I realised that I don’t actually want any. The thought of marzipan just doesn’t appeal any more, and I was fine with that.

I do wonder, however, if this is just a temporary thing. I don’t know whether I’m just in a post-surgery ‘honeymoon’ period, or whether these cravings are gone for good!