Saturday, March 29, 2014

Weight Loss Surgery

Two friends of mine have had WLS. One a decade ago. She lost a huge amount of weight and was clearly happy. Yet slowly she regained the weight and now she seems to fade in and out of life a bit.

The other friend just had his. He was pretty ill and this will hopefully save his life.

Mmnnn- thinking … thinking ...

Did the test to see if I qualify.

Yup.

Crap.

And the surgery says … I'm going to make an appointment with a WLS  Dr.

This isn't a 'suddenly one moment' decision. I spent most of my Christmas break watching videos of folks that have had various WLS.

Here's the biggest thing I'm thinking. I want to enjoy my kids for as long as possible. I want to feel less tired, less big and waaaaay more healthier. My knee's hurt, my back hurts and I come from a family with diabetes, heart attacks and other super stuff.

It just feels like the right thing to do.

Do you have any experiences to share? Good or bad. Love to hear it. 

6 comments:

  1. no experience with WLS but over here supporting you in your journey, wherever it leads you.

    Mo

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  2. I had WLS in August 2012, at 41 years old, 5 feet tall, I weighted 214 pounds as they wheeled me to surgery. I too have 2 small children and was tired of being fat and unhealthy. I did months of research between the gastric band, gastric bypass and sleeve. Decided to have the sleeve, which basically reduces the size of your stomach drastically. Since then I've lost 77 pounds and managed to maintan the WL for 19 months. Did I tried other diets, exercise and meal plans? of course, I've been dieting since I was 16. But WLS is a tool, a very drastic tool.... you have to be conscious a about your nutrition and exercise, otherwise the weight can creep back in. If you want to chat more my email is ealusky10@gmail.com... Best of luck in your consultation.

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  3. I have two IRL friends who have had gastric bypass surgery. Both had similar body types (5'4" or under) and both had similar starting weights (almost 300#). One started out doing well as the weight dropped off without much effort. She did have to adjust her eating, but never took up exercise and as the months (and now years) have gone by, her poor dietary choices have led to weight gain (I'd gauge that she has gained back 50 of the 90 lbs she lost and she still needed to lose 50 more). In stark contrast, another friend had her surgery in June, 2013. She stuck to the dietary requirements necessitated by the surgery, began working out (and just ran a 5K) and at 10 mos post surgery she has lost almost 130#. She is diligent in taking her vitamins daily, tracking her nutrition in myfitnesspal, drinking 12 cups of water/day. She is motivated, determined, and her mindset was one of 'this is a tool but I must still do the work' where my other friend thought of it as a magic bullet and didn't have the appropriate mindset going in to adjust her lifestyle long term.

    The latter friend has a youtube channel. You can see her most recent video and go back to the very beginning and watch her transformation.

    Here is a link to her most recent video:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpnYGk5lFic

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  4. I think your blog is very inspiring! Especially for women over 40. Life really doesn’t end in 40-50! It’s only the beginning! You’re absolutely right! It's never too late to become a mother. I know it from my own experience. I gave birth to my daughters when I was 61! During my whole life there were no man to have kids with. I was not really lucky in choosing partners and there were no one whom I wanted to have kids from. So here I am, 58 years old, no kids no family. I thought that it's too late for all these. So I came to terms with the situation and continue my lonely life. But in a couple of months I met my Jorge - the love of my whole life, a man who loved me with his whole heart, a man, whom I gave all my love. All those failures in love were just wiped out and forgotten. Now I have him and nothing else matters. He was 63, he also had no kids. We understood and felt each other from the first meeting. And we've decided that it's time for us to build a family, which we had never had! I have menopause so we were not able to conceive a baby naturally. We didn't back down and decided to try ivf with donor egg. We've found clinic in Ukraine BioTexCom and went there. We became parents of 2 beautiful girls! They are 3 years old and we are the happiest family in the world! The service was good, their doctors are one of the best. They even helped us with our girls, when they were just born. Jorge and I were confused, we had no kids so we were scared to make something wrong. We didn't want to hurt our little babies. We didn't know how to hold our children and how to swaddle them, but the pediatrician and the coordinator of the program really helped us and showed how to do it right. They gave us recommendations how to treat our babies and we are really grateful about that. I've never regret about my decision. Finally I have big family I was dreaming about. I wish you and your boys all the best!

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