3 Legged Stool Analogy

Dr Georgia Rigas, our senior Bariatric Medical Practitioner has insights into weight management gleaned from being involved in the care of thousands of patients during their weight loss journey. She has a has a useful analogy for the role that bariatric surgery plays in achieving a healthy life. The analogy is that of a three-legged stool.

She uses this analogy when she is seeking to help people achieve their best weight loss and health gains with the minimum effort. She knows that Bariatric surgery is a Journey, not a destination. Most people want signposts that will help point them in the direction most likely to lead them to their destination.

The legs of the stool consist of:

1. Intervention (bariatric metabolic surgery, or medication, or both).
2. Healthy food.
3. Physical activity (whatever your body allows).

The wooden seat securing all three legs is your “headspace”. Some tips towards a healthy headspace:

• Meal prepping/planning – If we spend as much time in the morning planning our eating for the day as we spend planning what we wear, what time we need to be at work, or what our daily schedule is we have won half the battle. People who plan when they eat give themselves the chance to not have that drink (milky coffee, fruit juice, soda, alcohol) or snacks that “pop up” during the day.
• Try to understand your addictions, cravings and impulses. Everyone has “go to” food and drink that they have when they are bored, stressed or unhappy. These are different for different people and are either consumed in-between meals, instead of meals or in the evening. Typical culprits are alcohol, sweets and sweet drinks, milky drinks, cheese and carbohydrate-based foods.
• A healthy home begins with healthy shopping. If you buy snack foods, you are committing yourself to eating them all. We usually tell ourselves that we purchase these things for our kids or for when guests come over but in reality, most will be consumed by us, not our guests and our children certainly do not need to learn to eat addictive foods at an early age. Once the commitment is made to have a healthy home we must learn to go shopping when we are not hungry, to avoid the snack food isle and to buy the food we need for the meals that we are planning.
• Being mindful – before you eat or drink anything try to pause for a second and ask yourself how you are feeling. When you do have something, try to enjoy it but also consider if this is part of your mealtime. Each time you feel that desire to eat question yourself, “do I really need or want this?”. Being mindful about your food decisions goes a long way to help distinguish between hunger and cravings.
• Recognising hunger & equally the feeling of “enough”. Being “full’ means that you can’t eat anymore, which usually means you have over eaten. Having enough means that if you cleared away the food in front of you, you could return to other activities without being hungry. Sticking to home cooked foods that are full of nutrition rather than energy is a great way to make this easy for yourself. Generally we will have a second or third serving of pasta, rice, pasta or bread but we won’t often have a second serve of protein, legumes, salad or vegetables.

If you are considering bariatric surgery and would like to speak to one of our team about your options then please call us on 02 9553 1120 or contact us online to make an appointment.