The Feeling of Full

Chiara Gravell had a sleeve gastrectomy at Penn Medicine with weight-loss surgeon Noel Williams, MD, in 2011. Since then, she’s lost more than 150 pounds, and has gone from being obese to completing triathlons. In this blog, she talks about feeling full, and learning how to make healthy choices.

I get a lot of questions about my experience with weight-loss surgery. A LOT of questions. I am now in most people’s eyes “thin.” I have, in their opinion, “crossed the finish line” and am a “winner” in the battle of obesity.

When I get the questions: “Why did you have the surgery?” or “Why didn’t you just do what you are doing now, before and lose weight on your own?” My answer is short and sweet and leaves most people scratching their heads. My answer is, because of the miracle of full!
Pre weight-loss surgery, I was hungry all of the time. I thought this was normal. I thought everyone had to control their ravenous hunger all of the time. I thought people were like me, when eating a normal sized meal; they were still hungry at the end.

When people would claim “Oh I am stuffed” or “I can’t possibly eat another bite” I would think secretly that they were over dramatic. Can’t eat another bite - really?

Then I had my sleeve…. And the MIRACLE of FULL happened to me. When I was about three or four months out, I had this feeling in my chest. It was constricting, uncomfortable and made me sleepy and annoyed all at the same time. Ok, I am actually the dramatic one I thought I was dying and having a heart attack.


I called the nurses at Penn Medicine’s Weight Loss Center, to describe the horror I was feeling. The answer came back, “That is the feeling of full Chiara. Take a bite or two less next time you eat.”

Uh??? What did she just say? Full? I must have looked like Scooby Doo with a very confused look on my face.

I started to follow the new instructions of the nurses, when I started to feel that constriction in my stomach or chest and I stopped eating. During the first year or so after surgery this feeling came anywhere from two bites to eating one-cup of food. I stopped waited a few minutes and then proclaimed in reality that “I couldn’t eat another bite.” It was true I couldn’t.

I had NO IDEA other people felt this way. I never did before surgery. I could eat a 16 oz steak without blinking and still eat all of the sides and never feel “full.” When I share this with others they say not even after Thanksgiving dinner did you feel full? The honest answer is NOPE! (as evidenced in my before picture here)

It has been 26 months since I have had surgery. I now have that signal in my head, “Chiara stop eating you are done.” I now have to obey it on my own. The sleeve did it for me for about 18 months. Now I have to stop when I am full. However, I am FULL! I can feel the FULL!

When people said to listen to my body before the surgery, I did. I listened it just wasn’t talking. Today I listen and “obey” the signals. This is the real miracle of weight-loss surgery for me. It has given me a tool that I can use long term, (that most people have naturally – I didn’t) to manage my weight. (as evidenced in this picture taken last week)

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