Protein shake - meal or snack?

For all those who are post-op, do you drink a protein shake as one of your meals or do you drink it in addition to your meals, more like a snack? Thanks!!

When you say "in addition to your meals," do you mean eat a meal and drink a shake together? Because that's out, for sure. But I think you are just asking what you call a shake.

For me, I tried to stop thinking about food in those terms. Most people think of breakfast as certain kinds of food, like cereal or waffles, and the same with lunch or dinner. And snacks become a euphemism for something sweet, or crunchy, usually processed nonfoods. It can be a bit of a trap.

I eat at set times, by the clock. I think of them all as meals, not snacks and meals. And I try to make them fit the WLS lifestyle, rather than try to make them be "breakfast," or whatever.

Thank you Grim, I understand what you are saying. To clarify my original post, many post-op eating plans that I've seen (I have yet to get mine) say to eat three meals per day and one or two snacks if needed. They don't say what constitutes a snack or how it is different from a meal. My thinking is that maybe a snack is a smaller portion with less calories than a meal but I'm not entirely sure. So I was essentially wondering if a protein shake might be considered a snack or if it's a meal? If I go by what you say in your reply though, I should essentially eat at set times each day and not bother to categorize them as a meal or a snack per se but just as all meals. And a protein shake can be one of those meals. Does that sound about right? I guess I should just wait to see what my eating plan calls for but I'm curious and a bit impatient. Plus, I'm always interested in how the vets on this forum plan their meals. Thanks again for your input!

I do exactly what Grim does.  I eat six meals a day.  When I set up My Fitness Pal, I named them Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner and Early Morning Snack, Afternoon Snack and Evening Snack.  Each of those meals is about 200 calories.  So if I wanted a protein shake it would just get logged as one of those meals.

Some meals will be 300 calories and some will be 100 calories.  At the end of the day it is my total calorie count that matters, not the time at which I ate certain amounts.

Please don't try to do this without measuring and weighing food and without tracking your food. 

We have fantastic technology to help us.  My Fitness Pal does the work of tracking food and nutrients.  A fitness tracker will keep track of your exercise and also sync with the food log.  A smart scale can sync your data from the scale to the phone.  I also use a system called Medcenter to organize my vitamins a month at a time and remind me to take them.

I wanted to lose weight but keep my health and vitality.  I use the available tools to make sure I continue to be successful.

Some docs/programs make a big distinction between a "meal" and a "snack" while others don't, but seriously - if your meals are no more than 100-150 calories, what's a snack?

Some docs make a big deal of having no more than three meals a day (and if you have to in order to get in the requisite protein, a protein shake or two as "snacks") under the belief that more than three meals a day leads to a grazing behavior, which can torpedo your weight management. Conversely, some docs prefer that you have 5-6 smaller meals a day to avoid over-eating at a meal, which can also torpedo your weight management. The important factor is still how many calories you consume in a day irrespective how you split them up. Different people will do better with one approach or the other, but overall there is no preference for one over the other.

My plan is big on three meals a day with no snacks.  I have a protein shake for breakfast every day and I count it as a meal.  Then I eat lunch and dinner later on - those are both solid foods.  

I am like grim. I use the terms snack and meal interchangeably to mean food. I often have a shake for breakfast today and later a shake Might be had before beftime. I just know I need to eat six times a day 

I eat about 6 times a day as well, 3 meals and 3 "snacks".  Sometimes my snacks have as many calories as the meals, so I try to stagger the calories out during the day. I just call them snacks because I haven't set My Fitness Pal to call them all meals.

I had a shake for breakfast this morning because I was a little low on protein yesterday.  The protein shake gives me a 30 gram start to my day.  It's actually the first shake I've had in weeks, but it did taste good.

How far into recovery are you? My first 2 weeks when I was on liquids only, the shakes were my meals. Now that I am on solid food, my diet plan states 3 small meals with protein in between. I'm pretty early into recovery (week 5, first day of regular food). I am eating so little at this stage that there is NO WAY I could get all my protein from my meals. I usually eat my small meal as protein packed as I can and drink 2 protein supplements between. I love the Premier Protein chocolate shakes and I also like the Genepro powder supplement (it mixes well and adds very little taste). Good luck!

I'm 11 months post op and I'm having protein shakes only when I'm in a hurry. This rarely happens, but sometimes I'm running out the door on Saturday mornings and I take along a shake. My doctor wants me to eat 3 meals a day and if I need a snack to rely on a protein shake or protein bar. I probably only have 3-4 shakes a month now and rely on meals.