We went on holiday to Tenerife this summer, just over two years after our gastric sleeve surgery in March 2024, and it was a completely different experience to our first post-op holiday. We went to Tenerife in July 2024 too, just three and a half months after surgery, when we were still very much figuring out our new normal. This time felt like we actually got to enjoy it.
That said, it was not without its surprises, its awkward moments, and one or two trips we had not planned for. Here is an honest rundown of what two years post-op looks like on a proper holiday.
The Big Surprise: Food Abroad Digested Better
This was the thing that caught us most off guard, and genuinely puzzled us. At home, James can manage about one slice of pizza before he is done. Kirsten is similar. In Tenerife, we were comfortably eating half a pizza each. Not forcing it, not suffering for it, just eating it, enjoying it, and feeling fine.
We did a bit of research when we got back because it made no sense to us. One theory that kept coming up is the pizza base. Pizza in Tenerife, like much of mainland Europe, is often made on a sourdough base. Sourdough is fermented, which breaks down a lot of the gluten and makes it significantly easier to digest, even for people with sensitive stomachs. For bariatric patients, that could make a real difference to how the stomach handles it.
We are going to put this to the test at some point. We live in a small town in Scotland and there is nowhere nearby that does sourdough pizza, so it is genuinely a planned date night now, a trip to the city to find a proper sourdough pizzeria and see if we get the same result at home. Watch this space.
Ice cream was another one. James usually gets dumping syndrome when he has ice cream. Not every time, but often enough that he is cautious about it. In Tenerife, nothing. He had ice cream several times across the holiday without a single issue. Again, we are not entirely sure why, whether it was the heat, the specific products, the way they are made, or something else entirely.
Overall, across the whole trip we ate pizza, curry, steak, ice cream, and even Haribos, which is not exactly a bariatric staple, and we both came back having lost around five pounds each. James hit his all-time post-surgery low weight when we got home, which felt incredible given what we had eaten all week.
Dehydration Hit Us Hard at the Start
This one caught us completely off guard, and we should have known better.
The first two or three days in Tenerife we just did not drink enough. At home, we have our routines, we know roughly how much we need, and we manage fine. What we did not properly account for was the heat. Tenerife was between 27 and 32 degrees the whole week, and we were sweating far more than we realise in day to day life back in Scotland.
By day three and four we were exhausted. Genuinely beat. We both felt foggy, lethargic, and just flat. It took us a day or so to connect the dots, but once we did and we started drinking properly throughout the day, we picked up quickly.
After bariatric surgery, hydration is already more complicated because we cannot drink large volumes at once. We sip constantly rather than glug a big glass of water. In the heat, that means you have to be even more intentional about it, keeping a bottle to hand at all times and reminding yourself to sip regularly even when you do not feel thirsty. Once we got into that rhythm, the rest of the holiday was much better.
It is one of those things that sounds obvious in hindsight, but if you are planning a sunny holiday post-surgery, factor in the heat as a serious hydration risk. It is not just about how much water you normally need. It is about how much you are losing through sweat in temperatures your body is not used to.
The Awkwardness of Leaving Food
We stayed at the hotel almost the entire week, just relaxing by the pool with books, which was exactly what we needed. The hotel had twelve restaurants, and after trying a few we found one we loved and basically made it our base for every meal.
For the first few days, leaving so much food was genuinely uncomfortable. Not because we felt guilty about wasting it, but because the staff clearly thought something was wrong. One evening they brought the chef out to our table. He stood there looking concerned, asking if everything was alright, was the food okay, was there something they could change. We had to explain, as we have done many times in many settings, that the food was absolutely fine, we just could not eat very much. It is one of those explanations that never quite lands the way you want it to, because to someone who does not know about bariatric surgery, it does not quite make sense.
Thankfully, after a few days we think the staff just got used to us. They got to know our table, we got to know their faces, and nobody blinked an eye at two largely uneaten plates anymore. But those first few evenings were uncomfortable in a way that is hard to fully prepare for.
If you are going somewhere like a hotel restaurant where you will see the same staff repeatedly, it can be worth mentioning your situation early on. It takes a bit of the awkwardness away, and staff in most places are genuinely understanding once they know.
James and the Sunburn Situation
This one was a bit of a disaster, and it came down to something James has been dealing with since surgery: heat regulation.
James sometimes struggles to accurately sense temperature. He will feel cold when it is actually quite warm, which sounds like a minor inconvenience but when you are sitting in 29 degree heat in Tenerife and your brain is telling you that you feel fine, a bit chilly even, you do not think to reapply sun lotion. And you absolutely should.
James got badly burned. His scalp and his feet were the worst of it. The feet were bad enough that the skin started to split and peel around his toes, and we ended up going to the local hospital to get them looked at. They gave us some cream and told him to stay out of the sun for a couple of days, which meant two days indoors watching the pool from the window rather than sitting beside it.
If you have experienced any changes to how you sense heat or cold after bariatric surgery, please treat sun protection as a scheduled task rather than something you do when you remember. Set a phone reminder if you need to. James learned this the hard way.
The Loose Skin and Body Image Piece
Something James found difficult, particularly in the early days of the holiday, was being around the pool without a shirt.
He knows, rationally, that he has done something remarkable. He has lost over 12 stone. He entered a bodybuilding competition. His health is transformed. But knowing all of that does not automatically make you comfortable in your own skin, quite literally. The loose skin, and in James’s case the chest area in particular, is a real and visible reminder of where he has come from, and not always in a way that feels triumphant.
He walked around topless and felt self-conscious about it. He says that people looking at him probably see a man who has lost a lot of weight and look perfectly fine. But that is not what he sees. He sees the loose skin, the areas that do not sit the way he wants them to, the parts of his body that exercise and time cannot fully fix.
This holiday actually helped to solidify something he had already been thinking about. James is booked in for skin removal surgery on 6th January 2027. It has been something he has been building towards for a while, and spending a week in the sun, being more exposed than usual, made it feel not just like a choice but the right next step.
We are building a dedicated section of the website to follow that journey in full, from the decision and preparation right through to recovery. If that is something you are considering yourself, or just curious about, keep an eye out because we will be covering it in a lot of detail.
Two Years On: A Very Different Holiday
Looking back at Tenerife in July 2024, three and a half months post-surgery, we were still figuring out basic things like how much we could eat, what our triggers were, and how to navigate any social situation involving food. It was a good holiday, but it was hard in a way we could not always articulate.
This year felt like we got to actually be on holiday. We relaxed, we ate things we enjoyed, we found a restaurant we loved and sat in it every day like regulars. We came home lighter than when we left. James is at his lowest weight since surgery.
There were bumps. The dehydration was avoidable in hindsight, the sunburn was painful and inconvenient, and the body image stuff is something James is still working through. But none of it overshadowed the bigger picture, which is that two years on, life genuinely feels different. Better. More like the life we were trying to get to when we made this decision.
If you are in the early months after surgery and wondering whether things like holidays ever start to feel normal again, the honest answer is yes. It takes time, and there are still moments that catch you off guard. But they get smaller, and the good moments get bigger.
Sources
NHS – Dehydration: causes, symptoms and treatment
NHS – Sunburn: treatment and prevention
BOMSS – Patient information on life after bariatric surgery
NICE CG189 – Obesity: identification, assessment and management
About this content
This blog is written by James and Kirsten, a couple from the UK who had gastric sleeve surgery together in March 2024.
We started this blog because we couldn't find any sources of content that details before surgery, the surgery and then life post surgery - so we decided to write one ourselves.
Everything on this site is based on our own experience and the research we have done along the way. It is not medical advice. Gastric sleeve surgery is a serious procedure and every patient's journey is different. Please always consult your own bariatric team or GP before making any decisions about your health or treatment.
Some posts on this site may contain featured or sponsored content, or affiliate links. Where this is the case, it will always be clearly stated at the top of the article. Our opinions are always our own.
Publish Date: 27 June 2026 | Last Reviewed: 27 June 2026 | Next Planned Review: 27 December 2027