The risk/benefit ratio

[Guest guest]

Alisa wrote:

What I'm simply trying to say is that I don't think a person should

have to

try " EVERYTHING " first before surgery because nothing else has the

success

rate. The risk of surgery is great, but it's still smaller than the

risk

of long-term obesity. Be informed to make their own decision - to throw

their dice, so to say, yes. But, it's a dice throw - with the odds

greatly

in your favor.

*****

Alisa, I couldn't agree with you more. I had the surgery at the age of

44, after a lifetime of dieting and struggling and trying to learn to

love my body and doing everything humanly possible to come to terms

with my morbid obesity. Like you, I was healthy through my 20s and most

of my 30s -- it was only in the last few years before surgery that my

co-morbidities started coming home to roost. I have lost nearly half my

body weight now (not just half my excess weight -- half my *body*

weight!), and all my co-morbs have disappeared. I feel healthy and

strong, I lift weights, I do cardio classes, I walk everywhere without

getting winded, I dance and play with my daughter and husband...and the

one thing I wish is that I had had this surgery 20 years earlier. I

think back over those years of wasted grief and distress, of hurting my

body by subjecting it to diets and bulimia and drugs and my own

frustration, of hating the way I looked but trying my best to " carry it

off " , of feeling judged and being ridiculed, and I desperately wish

that I could have gone through those years feeling as fit and confident

as I do today.

Alisa, I admire you so much for taking the bull by the horns while

you're still young, and doing something affirmative about your medical

condition, rather than waiting for it to eat away at your life. I don't

think we should be encouraging non-MO people to have the surgery as a

panacea, but I think we need to recognize that some people, for

whatever reason, are not going to be able to control their weight

through " traditional " methods.

Right now, my son, who is 20, is following the Weight Watchers program,

and has lost more than 60 pounds. He is not finding it difficult, nor

is he stressing about the weeks when he doesn't lose, or even gains a

pound -- but as he's learning to eat sensibly, the pounds are just

falling off him. I hope that he's going to be able to maintain this

loss, and I am all for him giving it his best shot, but if it doesn't

work in the long haul, you can bet I'll be talking to him about surgery.

Oh, and yes, I was one whose surgery did not go altogether smoothly. I

nearly bled out, had a very difficult post-op course, and took a long

time to get back on my feet again. But, as has been pointed out, living

entails risk. I drove on a busy highway in the rain today, and my

chances of being totalled in my car were probably far greater than the

chance I took when I climbed up on that operating table. Difference is,

the benefits I've sustained from my decision to " go surgical " have been

phenomenal. All I got from that highway trip in the rain were a couple

of books and a bagel!

Take care, all...

p.s. In writing this, I do not in any way mean to downplay the

experience of anyone with a negative outcome from the surgery. I know

people have suffered greatly, and died, from it. We all have to make

our own choices, and I do think that the morbidity/mortality issues

must be spelled out to anyone who wants to go this route.

--

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RNY September 19, 2001

Dr. Freeman, Ottawa General Hospital

BMI then: 43.5

BMI now: 22.5

-150 lbs

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