I've decided to blog today on a growing concern I'm having about the glamorization of Weight Loss Surgery. The message coming across by those who perform this life changing (although not necessarily changed for the better) procedure is "You'll get your life back!" It will cure diabetes, Sleep apnea, High BP, and even do your dishes (okay that last one isn't true). It doesn't help that pressure comes from everywhere to lose weight or else you will die a horrible painful death.
In the end WLS is nothing but enforced anorexia and bulimia if you eat too much. You are forced to eat a lesser volume of food. Unlike other starvation diets, bingeing can't happen because it will probably result in vomiting (and that's not bulimia how?)
It's toted as a cure all but what you get in exchange for the possible remission of certain diseases (the surgery has no guarantees regarding permanent remission) are higher incidences of new diseases such as malnutrition, vitamin deficiency, supplements for life, gallstones, repeat surgeries, and a new one: a double risk of fracture (although this study needs to be repeated with a larger group). Oh and weight regain and death.
MSNBC reports that risks of getting this hack-and-slash gut reduction are often underreported.
Yet many people get the surgery knowing that it could kill them. Is it the new lease on life they are looking for or is it freedom from a fat hating world? Is it really health or just the appearance of it? There is so much pressure to be thin. And I will be honest with you. For my entire 17 years dietitng, I said I wanted to be healthy, but really I wanted to be "pretty".
I can't stop anyone from getting it, but please at least ignore celebrity endorsements, pushy doctors and medical companies. Read everything about the side effects before you do it. Please remember that your stomach and intestines are major organs, the side effects may be worse than whatever medical issues you have now.
How is WLS different from this: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1299501.ece ??? Why is one acceptable but not the other?
Posted by: CTJen | June 15, 2009 at 10:27 PM
I hear you. I try to tell others, too, but they are still so bound up in the whole thin=healthy thing. How many misconceptions can one attack at a time? There are only a gazillion when it comes to what "everyone knows" about health and/or fat. They don't even hear you half the time. I belong to a grief support group where two people were widowed as the result of complications from WSL. Another has a daughter who is suffering mightily from WLS even now. And still people talk about how it's the road to health. I guess they don't do any independent research.
Posted by: Kristie | June 16, 2009 at 12:01 AM
My mom and great aunt are getting it. She's so excited--I'm just praying to God she's a success story as much as I hate the whole concept. I don't know what I would do if this took my mother from me.
Posted by: J | June 16, 2009 at 12:46 AM
A good friend of mine had weight loss surgery a couple years ago. Here is her medication regiment as posted on her blog:
Morning
Synthroid 175mcg
Strattera - 60mg [for ADD]
Folic Acid - 800mcg
Zinc - 100mg
A - 50K iu
B12 - 2500mcg
Super B Complex
D3-50 - 50K iu
Magnesium - 250mg
At 2 Hr. Intervals Afterwards:
Calcium Citrate - 1600mg
Zinc - 100mg (at lunch)
Before Bed:
MultiVitamin - 1 Centrum Performance (before bed)
Iron - 150mg (6qty Tender Iron before bed)
Probiotic - 2qty 3billion cfu Acidophilus
She's taking at least 15 pills a day because she is unable to digest these vital nutrients from the foods she eats. But, hey, at least she's thin, right?
Posted by: Rachel | June 16, 2009 at 04:53 PM
Having read just a little bit about how the gut works, looking at diagrams of roux-en-y gastric bypass really makes me feel sick. It is monstrous, it is a disgusting mutilation and I don't know how anyone gets away with promoting it as something that benefits your health.
But what am I saying? I should remember all the vehement defenses of the corset for women's health in the 19th century. Evidence doesn't hold a candle to the demands of popular culture.
Posted by: librarychair | June 16, 2009 at 07:49 PM
I still blame WLS for killing my best friend in college. Yes, she was overweight and was having health problems because of it. However, a few months after having her surgery she contracted Guillain Barre Syndrome. She died within a week of being admitted to the hospital. The cause? No clue. It's thought maybe the surgery had something to do with it, but no one officially made a statement as to what caused it.
Obviously I blame the surgery. And I'm still bitter over the lost not only of my friend, but all the people she touched and the folks whose lives she would have come into contact with had she not died.
Posted by: Dayna | July 14, 2009 at 01:12 AM