When researchers and doctors make a discovery they are quick to report that it is safe. Often down the road, after many people have suffered the consequences, it is discovered something is not so safe as once advertised and sold to the public. As a morbidly obese woman of 50 I have witnessed this phenomenon many times. As A Registered Nurse (pysch-retired) I have seen surgeries and some of the out comes that are possible. Surgery is always a risk! I am not going to claim that being obese on any level is healthy.
Some people develop diseases related to obesity sooner than others and some of them have more serious complications from those diseases then others. I take issue with trying to cure obesity by mutilating the human body and preventing that totally awesomely designed system from operating as it should. Just as I take issue with the trend in medicine to treat symptoms rather than finding the cause and effecting a cure…which occurs primarily because it is a huge money making industry.
I believe Gastric bypass surgery is making surgeons and others tons of money… why else would my doctor in an HMO first advise against the surgery and then a little over a year later, totally reverse himself. One might want to believe it is because he had witnessed that the procedure was safe, but a little over a year doesn’t give you long term effects, and we all know that while gastric bypass may reverse some diseases like diabetes it creates others such as the inability to absorb nutrients. I have watched several people undergo the procedure… yes they lost weight, they even looked good (dressed) but they also had hair that was falling out, excessive skin ( the removal of which isn’t always covered by insurance), vomiting when eating certain foods or dumping just to name a few side effects.
My own son claims he is going to under go the surgery. Even though I see him as a poor candidate. He has never seriously dieted, he drinks obsessive amounts of fluid, and he does not restrict his food intake in type or amount. Yet this surgery is suppose to create a miracle change in his behavior… sure it will! This surgery does not address the psychology of the patient, the countless emotional and psychological reasons why an individual is morbidly obese. Yes patients are often required to lose some weight first, required to quit smoking but they are making temporary changes. In hopes of getting a surgery they believe will end their problems, because all their problems are related to that fat they carry. This is far from reality but often is what is believed.
Society teaches us to hate fat and therefore to hate ourselves. Countless obese people do hate themselves and offer themselves up to all kinds of diet scams, ingesting pills to lose weight risking their lives ( please don’t forget the Phen-fen craze) and now it is so abhorrent to be fat they must be mutilated in order to attempt to be normal and acceptable. Also risking their lives and long term health issues. What a lovely choice stay fat and risk your life and health or submit to mutilation and risk your life and health… the carrot, the decision turner is that you might lose weight. You might even keep it off, so you can die thin or at least thinner than you are now.
I can speak only for myself but being an attractive or more attractive corpse isn’t what I seek. I no longer want to be thin, I want to be healthy and in seeking that goal I have lost over a hundred pounds. I haven’t starved myself, I eat as much food as I want I just avoid processed foods… the current buzz phrase is to eat fresh. Foods that allow my body to work as it was designed to do. I have to move more or exercise, I have to be responsible for the condition of my body which is no doubt a foreign concept in a society that provides excuses for everything. There are no quick fixes that are 100% safe and surgery no matter how minor has risks and gastric bypass is by no means a minor surgery.
