Cheryl M.
I have been overweight since puberty. I had a few brief times when I wasn’t overweight. I seem to have gained and gained over the years to the high of 285. This was when I decided to have the Lap Band surgery. I had it for about one and a half years but then I started with stomach pain. It was like a burning sort of pain. The Lap Band Doctor said that the band was in the right place and he took out all of the fluid. I tried to take medicine to help the pain but nothing really helped.
My family doctor sent me for tests on my gall bladder. All the symptoms pointed to this. But all the tests were fine. I had other tests….one showed that the IUD that I had put in 4 years prior was floating around in the abdomen area. I got mixed opinions from the medical doctors about this needing to come out or not. There was question about if this would solve the problem of my pain but general opinion was no it would not help. I tried to find a surgeon that would know about the lap band and would take out the IUD. My Lap Band doctor said that he was too busy. He said to go and get the IUD out and then come back to him. I ended up in the ER because the pain in my stomach was so bad. That was really a blessing because I got a surgeon that said he would do the surgery then. He said that he could handle the lap band being in there. I had the surgery and when I woke up the Band was gone and so was the IUD. The Band had slipped and he took a picture of my stomach and that spoke a thousand words. He said he could not leave it in there because my stomach was in such distress. Since that time (1 year) I gained back all the weight that I had lost with the lap band. That was about 80 pounds.
I am scheduled to have the RNY on Oct 7th 2008. I am generally a very private person but it is only fair that I share my story with you since I did so much research here.
