kimpossible
I am 37 years old, 5' 7 and started about 290 pounds. I didn't have any problems at all physically except my weight. I was a really skinny kid. I wore "slim" pants and was a normal weight for my age-until about age 11. Then my body just went kind of wacko. I gained weigth really fast and by the time I was about 12 I already had stretch marks! By age 12 I was wearing size 14 adult clothes. YIKES! From then on I just continued to by larger and larger every year. I would try one program or another but whatever I lost would always come back with extra. Over the years I just kind of adapted and began to think it was "normal" to buy new clothes for every season in the next size up. This is my journey to weight loss surgery.
About 4 years ago my husband started mentioning to me that he wanted to have a gastric bypass. He was about 6 foot tall and over 425 lbs. He had foot problems and could barely stand long enough to go grocery shopping. He also had sleep apnea and a c-pap machine at age 32.
At first I was opposed to him doing the surgery. (My father had a gastric bypass in 1986 or so and lost quite a bit of weight, but gained it all back within about 5 years. He passed away of heart attack due aggravated by obesity in 1998-age 42) So I was not really supportive of my husband having the surgery because I was thinking "What's the point? You gain all the weight back and die anyway." or something like that I guess.
But my husband was very unhappy with his weight and the c-pap and all the rest so I started going to the education meetings with him and we decided to both have gastric bypasses together in March of 2003. (thankfully weight loss surgery is covered by my insurance!) We went to all the classes, doctors and got full approval. When went for one last Dr. appointment before the surgery was scheduled and I found out I was pregnant. I was very happy, because we had wanted a baby for awhile but of course I could no longer do the bypass.
My husband went ahead and had the gastric bypass in March 2003. He quickly lost a bunch of weight. By December 2004 he was down to 275. He decided that is good enough for him and has maintain about 300lbs weight for the last 3 years or so. He had very few side effects, although he still gets "dumping syndrome" if he eats too much sugar at one time. He learned quickly that eating too much would make him throw up- (just like with lap band) He still has to eat slower than normally and can not eat huge amounts of food, but this really helps him maintain his weight. He also takes Vitamin B-12. He is like a new man! He never whines about walking anywhere and even took a manual labor job over the summer. He got rid of the c-pap machine right away and has never needed it again. He is not skinny but what a difference 150 pounds made!
So, I went on to have the baby. A healthy and much spoiled boy...but I never lost the pregnancy weight and was up about 30 more pounds from when I wanted to have the bypass in March 2003. It seemed like there was no end in sight and I would just watch the scale go up and up every time I stepped on it. Very discouraging. Once I felt like my "baby" was a little more independent, I decided to have weight loss surgery.
I picked the lap band because I liked that it was adjustable (we still would like at least one more kid) and I liked that it didn't seem as drastic as a step as rerouting all of your insides. (also to be honest, I didn't read a lot of the scarier stats until after it was done.) Also, I think it is really hard to know what is true and what is hype from the stats. I am hoping that the lapband will work for me until they invent the magical pill or something that will actually work on my brain to eliminate head hunger!
I am happy with my choice. I feel healthy and like I had a very quick recovery. This is the first time in a very long time I have even seen the scale going down at all! It is a little frustrating though if you have 100+ pounds to lose and it is projected that you will lose 1-2 pounds a week. I really wish it could be like 10 lbs a week. Wouldn't that be great??!! Well that is my very long story. Thanks for listening :)
