This afternoon I stumbled upon an interesting article in the Las Vegas Sun that got me all fired up as it posed the following question: "If gastric bypass saved you money for morbidly obese people to have weight loss surgery, would you suggest they do it?"
The article clearly skewed toward "the knife," listed a variety of interesting statistics that argued that fat people are costing the taxpayers lots of money.
As the number of obese Americans grows - currently 1/3 of our population, about 72 million people are overweight - and the number of Americans at least 100 pounds overweight multiplies, I need to ask:
Is this the answer to our problem? Sign everyone up for surgery?
In 2007, about 205,000 Americans underwent the surgery. What will the number be this year and next year? What is the long-term success rate? How many people gain the weight back?
As a Weight Loss Coach, I have worked with many who have had surgery and gained it all back. Why? Because people insist upon treating only the food and exercise aspects of weight loss.
Obesity is a complicated issue. It is not solely about how many calories you eat and burn in a day. It is about the food industry feeding us foods that are addictive, it is about our larger-than-life lifestyles, and it is about how we think.
Surgery or no surgery, if you want to lose weight, you need to look at your life as a whole. Who are you and how do you function in all areas of life? It's not about your fat, it's about your life.
It's not that I'm totally against gastric bypass surgery. I just think that people need to think it through and - again - whether you opt for surgery or not, you still have to change your life and in order to do that you have to change your thinking.
Take an honest assessment. Ask yourself, how do I handle the rest of my life? Am I happy? Am I motivated? Where have I been successful? How can I utilize those strategies with my weight? How can I educate myself about healthy eating? What will losing weight give me that I wouldn't otherwise have? How will my life change when I lose 100 pounds? How will I handle these changes?
See the movie: FOOD INC. Learn the truth about the food you eat.
Read Dr. Kessler's book: The end of overeating. Learn the truth about the food you eat.
Read Diets don't work: A kick in the tush does. Think it through!
Spread the word, not the icing!
Janice
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First, I would suggest if you are considering having a gastric bypass. Choose a surgeon who specializes in this surgery not any surgeon especially those who prefer not to do them. Second, Most complications from surgery come from non-compliant patients. If you do what the professional specialist requires there is a great chance that you will have NO PROBLEMS. Blood clots are the greatest problem people have. They tell you to get up and walk. DO IT! The schedule they give you for liquid and food consumption is meant to follow. This being said, I need to say that I had a gastric bypass 6 years ago. I followed the directions. I had no problems. I have kept my weight off. There is a good chance that I would be dead by now if I had not taken this step. My blood pressure was dangerously high and I had a grandmother die from a stroke at age 46. My son has Autism. He is now 23. I told him prior to the surgery that God will decide what is going to happen. We need to trust as he knows best. I told my son if God needs mommy more than you need mommy then he will take her to heaven to be with him. If not by doing this surgery mommy's life will end and start over when she comes back from the surgery. Make you own decision. Be sure when you make the decision that you are committed to your new life. If you are not COMMITTED forget it! You just make the case for all of those who want to talk negative about gastric bypass surgery and those of use who need it.
I myself am due to go under the knife in October 2009. I have found this to be the last resort to help my body and the pain levels I go through everyday carrying around excess weight. I once was 256 I lost 116 pounds felt great looked sexy, broke my back in an atv accident, menapause kicked in 1 year after my hysotrectomy and lo and behold I found myself in a back brace for a year stuck on steriods for both and to top it off put on antispychotic meds for other reasons only to find they to cause RAPID weight gain. Well needless to say I am now a nice fat plump 220 again! Im in pain all the time due to the accident and the extra weight and Lord knows that when it came down to not being able to move my hip to get out of bed one morning to get my daughter dressed for school.....that was the day I knew what the choice had to be. I am very grateful that there are professionals out there that offer this service to those of us who cannot do cardio due to body limitations and other medication restrictions. I did it the hard way and now I guess I will have to rely on science. Giving the power to the Lord now Angela :-)
I've been trying for years to loose weight. Every year I'm a little heavier than the year before. I just over 300lbs now. I watch these shows about these people that have to have a wall removed from their home so they can get to the hospital and it scares me to death. I have nightmares about that stuff. I have avoided gb becaue I was always sure I would get it right eventually. But I'm loosing the battle here. I feel guilty for thinking about "taking the easy way out" but I don't know what else to do.
I have been trying for 20+ yrs to get down to a weight that I can live with. I have diabetes, fibro.,severe arthritis, bulging and herniated discs just to name a few. I have lost weight, 110 lbs. but I have at least 130 more to lose before I am even close to their height and weight charts. I work out, despite severe pain. I have to take narcotics to have even a semblance of normal life, if not, then I am unable to barely function. I KNOW my weight is part of that pain, and I am considering lapband surgery to lose the rest. I do not want to rely on pain meds for the rest of my life, even tho i take them responsibly.I do NOT think gb is the easy way out, in fact it is a change of life that one has to be able to do, and it is not a weak person to undertake that change. I feel wonderful having lost the weight I did, it was hard, I lost, then gained, then lost and it took a long time to lose 110 lbs. If I had lost it all, with no gains, i would have lost over 200 lbs. by now!
How does weight loss surgery work? It limits the amount of food a person can consume, if you eat too much you throw it back up. That tells me that weight loss is based on consuming fewer calories than are expended. There may be some variation between people but it still doesn't change that if you eat too much you gain weight.
I read Dr. Kessler's book and it contained eye-opening information, and now that I am aware of the processes in place the food industry uses to attract and keep consumers, I now have strict limits on the fatty/salty/sugary foods he discussed and, as a result, the pounds have dropped off. I didn't need to carve up my digestive system to do that.
Thank you for your blog post!
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