I think nqb admitted to being a judgy mcjudgerson, but without all the info, what can we know? I doubt the doctors would just do this surgery for fun. Arent there a hundred hoops to jump through? Psych evals? Etc.
Well I did use the title "judgy post." I hope it works out for her. I don't know what hoops they make you jump through other than the lose 10% of your body weight and she's in a support group.
There is a post on ML from a poster that had lap band surgery with before and after pics. The results are amazing. I don't think you can judge someone for this without walking in their shoes.
you have to hope that her doctor is ethical and determining according to sound guidelines that she meets the criteria medically for the procedure (and I'm sure her insurance company will make sure of that before paying for it). additionally, here we have to get psychology consults done before bariatric surgery is done on patients, so there's that too.
even with all that, it's not a magic bullet. she will have to work out to keep making it through those plateaus where your weight loss starts to lag in order to keep dropping the lbs. and yes, she will have to drastically change what she eats and a lot of her old favorites may give her serious GI issues. small amounts of alcohol do affect my family member who's had surgery more than before. and with time, the weight can of course be gained back, but it is a good jump start for people who really, truly need it.
My MIL had gastric bypass and has lost over 100 lbs and kept it off for 3-4 years now. She still has to be extremely consistent with her eating habits. She has to make sure that she gets enough protein and nutrients before she can eat anything else. She also has to wait at least a half an hour after eating before she can drink anything. It is certainly challenging, but she has made it a way of life. Her new eating habits have also helped my FIL lose a significant amount of weight.
The biggest win for her surgery, was not actually the 100 lbs of weight loss, it was the fact that she was able to be taken off over 75% of the medications that she was previously on. This medication was partially the reason she was having such a hard time losing weight to begin with. It has made a significant improvement in her life.
I have always thought the surgery should be a last resort....like your life depended on it. Many people say diets dont work. THey only dont work if you dont follow them.
I knew a medical dr who had the surgery.He died from complications. Scarey!
My MIL had gastric bypass and has lost over 100 lbs and kept it off for 3-4 years now. She still has to be extremely consistent with her eating habits. She has to make sure that she gets enough protein and nutrients before she can eat anything else. She also has to wait at least a half an hour after eating before she can drink anything. It is certainly challenging, but she has made it a way of life. Her new eating habits have also helped my FIL lose a significant amount of weight.
The biggest win for her surgery, was not actually the 100 lbs of weight loss, it was the fact that she was able to be taken off over 75% of the medications that she was previously on. This medication was partially the reason she was having such a hard time losing weight to begin with. It has made a significant improvement in her life.
Having other medical issues is one of the best reasons for the surgery. Before any weight is even lost a lot of conditions can resolve. So it's not just the same as being dedicated to diet and exercise. We don't know if this person has hypertension or type 2 diabetes, but if she does those could really be helped.
I wish her the best of luck. It is a huge risk as it is surgery. My dad was on the list to get it done but he lost 20% of his weight on his own that he just kept doing what he did and lost the weight that way. He did cut out alcohol as a part of his healthier eating.
my mom is still married, so I guess she's the 1%. I'd like to read more about theories behind the divorce rate.
I remember watching a documentary about gastric bypass that touched on the divorce rate. One theory was that morbidly obese people are often in co-dependent or abusive relationships.
Those in abusive relationships take away part of the abuser's power (e.g., he can no longer point out that she is fat and not worthy of love).
Those in co-dependent relationships destroy the balance of dependency. For example: While the obese member of the relationship relied on the non-obese member to protect him/her from cruelty, the non-obese member enjoyed feeling like a protector. Once the weight is lost, the formerly obese person no longer needs protecting, and a major factor in the continuation of the relationship is removed.
I thought it was very interesting and definitely highlighted the importance of ongoing psychological care before and after the surgery.
I have always thought the surgery should be a last resort....like your life depended on it. Many people say diets dont work. THey only dont work if you dont follow them.
I knew a medical dr who had the surgery.He died from complications. Scarey!
But surgery could be this woman's last resort, since we don't know anything about any underlying medical conditions she may have or any medications she may currently be on.
I read a heartbreaking article recently about a young teen girl who needs prednisone to treat a condition. Weight gain is a side effect, and she went from a healthy weight to obese, developing type 2 diabetes along the way. Her doctors were considering bariatric surgery despite her age because she could not come off the medication, yet the obesity caused by the medication was having such a negative effect on other aspects of her health as well as her psyche.
My MIL had gastric bypass and has lost over 100 lbs and kept it off for 3-4 years now. She still has to be extremely consistent with her eating habits. She has to make sure that she gets enough protein and nutrients before she can eat anything else. She also has to wait at least a half an hour after eating before she can drink anything. It is certainly challenging, but she has made it a way of life. Her new eating habits have also helped my FIL lose a significant amount of weight.
The biggest win for her surgery, was not actually the 100 lbs of weight loss, it was the fact that she was able to be taken off over 75% of the medications that she was previously on. This medication was partially the reason she was having such a hard time losing weight to begin with. It has made a significant improvement in her life.
Having other medical issues is one of the best reasons for the surgery. Before any weight is even lost a lot of conditions can resolve. So it's not just the same as being dedicated to diet and exercise. We don't know if this person has hypertension or type 2 diabetes, but if she does those could really be helped.
I'm so surprised that there are so many posters that know so much about the risks and benefits of the different types of bariatric surgery that they are able to decide whether this woman needs it or not. I didn't realize how much good medical knowledge you all had about this very specialized area. (sarcasm)
You can't tell whether a patient needs surgery just by their size. Their comorbidities play a huge amount in this. As well, the studies that are available suggest that outcomes are better for pregnancies in women after surgery than before, especially with respect to diabetes and hypertension.
::slow clap for Kimi::
Many of you need to get off your high horses.
Exactly.
I didn't realize today was hate on the fatties day again.
And to secretly delight in someone gaining back the weight? That is one of the most disgusting things I have heard in a while on this board.
DH's aunt just had it done and I was surprised, because I didn't think she was that overweight. Granted, I haven't seen her in a while, so maybe she was heavier than i thought.
MIL (who is morbidly obese) started talking about how her sister had to "jump through all these hoops" to get the surgery done. And all I could think was what a lot of people have mentioned, a complete lifestyle change and how you will have to rethink one of the basic parts of your life. Not to mention the surgery can kill or incapacitate you. So heck yeah, she better have to jump through some hoops.
My bigger judgement was cost, because this aunt is one of the poor-mouths in the family, and from what I understand it's not covered by insurance (if she even has any). So I'm irrationally curious where the $ came from to pay for it.
Yeah my MIL had gastric bypass a few years ago. She still indulges in huge steak dinners and drinks A LOT. So the restrictions can be ignored.
Two of my coworkers had bypass surgery 6 years ago (our insurance used to cover it). They both lost over 100lbs, but now are obese again. They say they wish they'd gotten lap band, since they were able to stretch out their stomachs and gain the weight back again.
Yeah my MIL had gastric bypass a few years ago. She still indulges in huge steak dinners and drinks A LOT. So the restrictions can be ignored.
Two of my coworkers had bypass surgery 6 years ago (our insurance used to cover it). They both lost over 100lbs, but now are obese again. They say they wish they'd gotten lap band, since they were able to stretch out their stomachs and gain the weight back again.
With so many stories like this, I don't understand why more people (not accusing you, RB) refuse to acknowledge that perhaps obesity isn't simply a matter of willpower. Weight loss has an abysmally high failure rate. A lot of body processes are hormonally driven, including the compulsion to eat. Hormones affect people differently. We aren't all wired the same, and genetics has a lot to do with it. I can't use willpower to make myself shorter, or my hair blonde instead of brown. It's really fucking hard to ignore the hormones that send signals to my brain. Fat people are not lazy any more than thin people are. There are tons of lazy skinny people; they're just lucky to have skinny genes.
With so many stories like this, I don't understand why more people (not accusing you, RB) refuse to acknowledge that perhaps obesity isn't simply a matter of willpower. Weight loss has an abysmally high failure rate. A lot of body processes are hormonally driven, including the compulsion to eat. Hormones affect people differently. We aren't all wired the same, and genetics has a lot to do with it. I can't use willpower to make myself shorter, or my hair blonde instead of brown. It's really fucking hard to ignore the hormones that send signals to my brain. Fat people are not lazy any more than thin people are. There are tons of lazy skinny people; they're just lucky to have skinny genes.
Thanks, Kore. It's nice to hear someone point this out after the repeated comments in the thread about how simple it is to lose weight. Those comments hit on a personal level, and it's tiresome to hear them repeated again and again.
I can't lose weight. I did, and hit what I thought was a plateau, but _nothing_ can break this plateau. I've tried every damn trick in the book, been tested for every fucking medical thing that they'll test me for, and nothing can explain why I can't lose weight. I just can't, and haven't been able to for the last two years of trying. I'm still obese. And, it seems, there is nothing I can do about it. All I can do is to keep busting my ass to keep my weight from very slowly crawling back up to being an even higher number.
For those who are lucky enough that losing weight is a simple thing, awesome for you, but quit trying to impose your genetic jackpot on others. Because it's just not that simple for everyone.
Two of my coworkers had bypass surgery 6 years ago (our insurance used to cover it). They both lost over 100lbs, but now are obese again. They say they wish they'd gotten lap band, since they were able to stretch out their stomachs and gain the weight back again.
With so many stories like this, I don't understand why more people (not accusing you, RB) refuse to acknowledge that perhaps obesity isn't simply a matter of willpower. Weight loss has an abysmally high failure rate. A lot of body processes are hormonally driven, including the compulsion to eat. Hormones affect people differently. We aren't all wired the same, and genetics has a lot to do with it. I can't use willpower to make myself shorter, or my hair blonde instead of brown. It's really fucking hard to ignore the hormones that send signals to my brain. Fat people are not lazy any more than thin people are. There are tons of lazy skinny people; they're just lucky to have skinny genes.
Kore, I would agree. I worked with a woman who came from generations of overweight people. She told me that, after struggling with it for years, she decided she would do what she could (eat well, exercise, etc.) and if she still was overweight, at least she could say she was taking care of herself.
Suprisingly, I saw a pic of her on FB last year and she was a STICK. I don't know if she had surgery or something, and I don't know her well enough to PM her and say, "What happened?"
Post by mariavictoriax on Dec 5, 2012 15:58:13 GMT -5
DH had gastric bypass surgery in November 2010. For years, DH wanted to have it done, but I was against it. I also thought, "Why can't you just stick to a diet and exercise plan and lose the weight?" Bariatric surgery wasn't something that I learned about when I was in nursing school either.
In spring 2010, DH's physician began to take his weight more seriously. He didn't have any significant health issues - he was just fat. Cholesterol and blood pressure were fine, no diabetes.
After numerous tests and consults with specialists, it was discovered that DH had severe sleep apnea and most likely had it since he was a child. His sleep doctor said that it was the worst he had ever seen and that, due to the poor sleep quality he has had all his life, there was no way he would have been able to effectively lose weight. A Bi-pap machine alone wouldn't cut it. He needed gastric bypass surgery.
All 5 doctors who treated him consulted with each other and told me, "Mrs. X, your husband is okay now, but you'll be a widow in 5 years if you don't agree to gastric bypass surgery."
Another thing DH said to me, "You've never been as fat as I am. You have no idea what it's like to to keep trying and still live life like this." That broke my heart.
Now, DH has lost 130 pounds. He still has sleep apnea, but we knew that, even with the surgery, it would not go away. DH still needs to be mindful of what he eats and still needs to exercise. It's exactly how Lauralynne put it: Bariatric surgery is a tool, not a solution.
You don't know what other people go through when looking in from the outside. It is so easy to judge and think we know how it is - even for me as a wife. Thanks for reading!
Thanks Kore! This article officially encouraged me to not bother even trying to lose weight after I have my baby. I hate knowing that I let myself get over weight, and now I am stuck the rest of my life. It is a mind fuck.
Try not to beat yourself up. Our bodies are stupid! I've spent my entire life hating myself for being fat. That is incredibly exhausting.
My Aunt had surgery - I really cannot remember if it was bypass or lapband.
What I do know is that she needed far more therapy than was offered, pre-surgery. She would often eat an entire box of donuts
while in the grocery store. She literally said the phrase "I have to eat XYZ before my doctors take it away from me" (meaning pre-surgery). And she is IN healthcare. Obviously, this is a disorder.
HOWever. Having the surgery cured her diabetes. She was on a fast track to dying from her weight. It really was a "cure" for her health issues. She is so much happier being thinner.
I'm with you. I secretly (or not so secretly) take pleasure when people gain the weight back. Everyone I've dealt with that's had wls always give advice on eating healthy and what they learned...which is just annoying since what they really learned is that they can't eat anything bigger than a pea or they will throw up.
Yea I am kind of with you (the end part, not the schadenfreude part). I have a lot of people in my life who have had WLS and they all go through the super fun stage of telling others what kind of lifestyle they should be leading to "live healthy" like them. And every one of them has gained the weight back because they out-ate their surgery.
Last resort only for me. I know how to lose weight, but I am not good at keeping it off. I am pretty sure WLS would keep me in the same cycle. I need therapy and exercise, not surgery (at this point).
DH had gastric bypass surgery in November 2010. For years, DH wanted to have it done, but I was against it. I also thought, "Why can't you just stick to a diet and exercise plan and lose the weight?" Bariatric surgery wasn't something that I learned about when I was in nursing school either.
In spring 2010, DH's physician began to take his weight more seriously. He didn't have any significant health issues - he was just fat. Cholesterol and blood pressure were fine, no diabetes.
After numerous tests and consults with specialists, it was discovered that DH had severe sleep apnea and most likely had it since he was a child. His sleep doctor said that it was the worst he had ever seen and that, due to the poor sleep quality he has had all his life, there was no way he would have been able to effectively lose weight. A Bi-pap machine alone wouldn't cut it. He needed gastric bypass surgery.
All 5 doctors who treated him consulted with each other and told me, "Mrs. X, your husband is okay now, but you'll be a widow in 5 years if you don't agree to gastric bypass surgery."
Another thing DH said to me, "You've never been as fat as I am. You have no idea what it's like to to keep trying and still live life like this." That broke my heart.
Now, DH has lost 130 pounds. He still has sleep apnea, but we knew that, even with the surgery, it would not go away. DH still needs to be mindful of what he eats and still needs to exercise. It's exactly how Lauralynne put it: Bariatric surgery is a tool, not a solution.
You don't know what other people go through when looking in from the outside. It is so easy to judge and think we know how it is - even for me as a wife. Thanks for reading!
Thanks for sharing your story. It helps to hear from the other side of the issue.
Post by fortmyersbride on Dec 5, 2012 16:37:29 GMT -5
Bariatric surgery is a big commitment, with the potential for big improvements as well as big risks to health. Obviously each surgery and each person's outcome is so individualized.
DH is convinced that deep brain stimulation is the next frontier in weight loss surgery. I have to agree with him that conceptually it seems much more effective than bariatric:
The concept is controlling hunger and it's levels at their ultimate sources, the satiety centers of the brain. Kinda cool when you think about it.
God, that would be amazing.
One of my coworkers is really slim, and I can't even remember how many times I've heard her say, "I'm not really hungry." I cannot even fathom this. I basically feel hungry all the time. I have actually had times (including today) where I felt hungrier after eating lunch than before. As I sit here typing this, I'm really hungry. And I've basically not been NOT hungry since Tuesday morning. Someone please fucking stimulate my brain so I'm not hungry!
When I had my weight loss surgery (the gastric sleeve), they also reduced the amount of Ghrelin (a 28 amino acid hunger-stimulating peptide and hormone that is produced mainly by P/D1 cells lining the fundus of the human stomach and epsilon cells of the pancreas) so I'm not hungry as often as I used to be. I also had 75% of my stomach removed, but no bypass.
It hasn't been a la-di-da, easy street weight loss. I've had to change major eating habits. I can no longer eat bread. It fills up my stomach and it's not worth eating when I need protein in order to stay healthy and, you know, have hair. I can drink because my stomach is just smaller and the booze isn't entering my intestines faster than normal, but it's also not really worth it. It's more important to find a way to get vegetables into my stomach than it is to drink a glass of wine.
It's not something you just decide to do, and then zip down to the bariatric surgeon's office and poof, you're skinny! For me, it was six months of office visits, psych evaluations, weighing in, nutrition classes, learning to chew food 20 times before swallowing and physical fitness evaluations by the personal trainer. Add to that the two week fast I did over Christmas when there were homemade pierogi and cookies galore, and you have a miserable fatty.
And at the end of that six months? I got to leave my two year old at home and have surgery, not knowing whether or not I would ever see her again, or be one of the small percentage that dies on the table. And then I wasn't allowed to pick her up for two months, even when she sobbed with her hands up to me. The most I was allowed to do was to sit on the couch and hug her. So no, it's not an easy solution for anyone, nor is it a quick decision. I agonized over WLS for years, because ignorant people said it was "taking the easy way out".
I want to first say that I am someone who lost a significant amount of weight (80 lbs) on my own (counting calories and exercising regularly) and gained some back (about 20 lbs) and I know why-stopped going to the gym and eating the way I should. I truly understand weight loss is difficult; it's one of the hardest things I've ever done. It's not simple as just "Well don't eat" or "Go run." I know that just as well as anyone else who has tried to lose weight.
But I can't get totally on board with the Cracked.com article. I can't find out anything about the author of the article's credentials (because his credentials are just silly and tongue-in-cheek) and the whole website overall reminds me of a version of the onion. Some of the articles I see on the top are "Why Gandolf is the Most overrated Wizard Ever" and "4 Ways to Tell if You're Creepy." So not exactly the Onion but kind of satirical/tongue-in-cheek/silly news stories. I have a hard time taking an article on that site completely serious. The author of this article didn't even write it very seriously.
I did take the time to look at what he linked to, the studies and what not. One of his sources was a personal blog of somebody (Wordpress). Their source was a study done on WW followers in the early nineties. WW has changed so much since 1992. I just think if you're going to write something in 2012, find more recent and credible evidence.
The study from (I believe) Ny Times that this author cited stated that "Their still-plump bodies were acting as if they were starving and were working overtime to regain the pounds they lost. For instance, a gastric hormone called ghrelin, often dubbed the “hunger hormone,” was about 20 percent higher than at the start of the study." I just wish we knew the amount of calories these people were being instructed to eat vs. their activity level. It should be different for each person. If you are eating too FEW calories for your weight, activity level, etc. your body will go into starvation mode and hang onto excess fat. Now we don't know if that's what was happening here, but we don't know that it ISN'T either. Just cutting calories does not solve anything. If you eat too little, you're doing just as much damage as eating too much.
The last paragraph in the actual article bugged me too. "As that article explains, the person who is at 175 pounds after a huge weight loss now has a completely different physical makeup from the person who is naturally 175 -- exercise benefits them less, calories are more readily stored as fat, the impulse to eat occurs far, far more often. The formerly fat person can exercise ten times the willpower of the never-fat guy, and still wind up fat again. The impulses are simply more frequent, and stronger, and the physical consequences of giving in are more severe. The people who successfully do it are the ones who become psychologically obsessive about it, like that weird guy who built an Eiffel Tower out of toothpicks."
Yes, once you have reached let's say 175 lbs you need to exercise MORE than you did at say 250 lbs because you are a lesser weight and are cardiovascularly in much better shape. Running one mile won't do much maybe, so you have to run 5. That's just common sense. I don't see how that is a valid argument. Yes, in order to keep weight off, you have to KEEP working out and eating well and workouts will have to get increasingly more challenging. I know this--I stopped working out and surprise! Weight came back. I hate that he says you have to be obsessive to keep it off. Not obsessive, but you DO have to keep exercising regularly. I went from working out 5-6 days a week when I was losing to 3-4 times a week when I was maintaining. I maintained successfully until I stopped working out because I got married, we bought a house, and a lot of other lame excuses.
Sorry this got long. I think this article actually does MORE of an injustice to people who can't lose weight because of psychological reasons, medical reasons, genetic reasons, etc. because his "defense" is sarcastic and not true in many cases. There ARE legitimate barriers that stand in someone's way of successfully losing weight, but saying that it won't work because you'd have to be an obsessed maniac like he alluded to in the last paragraph is insulting and untrue.
I Just feel like, if he had found some studies that discussed eating disorders or the psychological aspect of losing weight, if he discussed genetics specifically, or any number of other things, his article might actually open eyes to the fact that weight loss isn't just "don't eat cookies." Instead it came across as kind of mocking it. That makes me sad. His last paragraph basically states you have to be a weirdo who is obsessed with weight loss to maintain a weight loss, which I think is also insulting to people who HAVE successfully lost and kept it off by just being consistent, not weird, obsessive or a maniac. It also implies, "You'll never succeed at it, so why try?" which I think is a dangerous idea to put out there.
The concept is controlling hunger and it's levels at their ultimate sources, the satiety centers of the brain. Kinda cool when you think about it.
God, that would be amazing.
One of my coworkers is really slim, and I can't even remember how many times I've heard her say, "I'm not really hungry." I cannot even fathom this. I basically feel hungry all the time. I have actually had times (including today) where I felt hungrier after eating lunch than before. As I sit here typing this, I'm really hungry. And I've basically not been NOT hungry since Tuesday morning. Someone please fucking stimulate my brain so I'm not hungry!