Dealing with Anxiety after Bariatric Surgery

Dealing with Anxiety after Bariatric Surgery
Dealing with Anxiety after Bariatric Surgery

You may notice yourself feeling a bit anxious as you approach your date for bariatric surgery in Utah. Here are a few tips that can help you cope.

Dealing with Anxiety after Bariatric Surgery

Anxiety lurks around every corner, but this is especially true in the days and weeks leading up to bariatric surgery in Salt Lake City, Utah. Fears and uncertainties abound as you work hard to prepare for your surgical date. Weight loss surgery is a life-changing experience, so there is no surprise it can cause anxiety—the trouble comes when you find yourself unable to properly cope with those anxieties. If that happens, it can impede your weight loss progress.

What is Anxiety?

Anxiety is a lingering sensation of worry, nervousness or fear associated with a particular stressor. Anxiety most often stems from a feeling of loss of control, and if left unaddressed could grow to impact many aspects of life. When this happens anxiety is no longer easily associated with one stressful situation or trigger, but could be more broadly associated with day to day tasks.

Anxiety often manifests itself physically through symptoms like:

  • Tightness in the chest
  • Trouble breathing
  • Sweating, especially on the palms
  • Upset stomach
  • Overeating
  • Loss of appetite
  • Migraine headaches
  • Muscle pain, especially the back, neck and shoulders

Managing Anxiety after Bariatric Surgery

You can develop strategies to manage anxiety as it develops so that you don’t become overwhelmed with the feelings of fear, despair and unease that anxiety brings.

Here are a few strategies for coping with anxiety:

  • Keep a journal with you at all times so you can work through pestering thoughts and clear your mind.
  • Practice deep breathing whenever you feel a bout of anxiety coming on.
  • Exercise regularly to prevent anxiety from building up over the course of several days or weeks.
  • Combat negative thoughts and emotions with an optimistic attitude.

There are countless reasons you could develop anxiety associated with bariatric surgery. Many people become stressed by upcoming lifestyle changes, such as the exercise requirements or dietary changes that you will be following post-weight loss surgery. Others become nervous about potential changes that weight loss may bring to a career and interpersonal relationships with friends and significant others.

These changes can cause anyone anxiety, but you don’t need to let them overpower you. Remember that you are perpetually in control of your situation. You can’t control how others will react to your weight loss, but you can control your reaction to them, just as you can control how well you keep up with the lifestyle changes you’ve committed to.