Sitting comfortably? I am after losing 5½ stone!

On 19 September 2008 I had my gastric bypass surgery as I was approaching 21 stone.

I was apprehensive at first, but was reassured by the Healthier Weight staff that it would be OK and that weight loss surgery would be hugely beneficial for me. At the time I was a diabetic on 3x60 units of insulin each day as well as Metformin – since my weight loss my diabetes has been cured. I was also on four different blood pressure tablets, which I now don’t need.

I have always managed to walk and swim, even at 21 stone, but I now enjoy much better freedom of movement than before, and have joined a walking club. I want to lose another stone or two, but I’m very happy to be 15 stone – a weight I haven’t been since my late teens (I’m now 56). I’ve always been a bubbly and confident person, even when overweight, but now at my health club I get people I don’t even know telling me how good I look!!

There are some things I miss – the boozy nights out with the lads, going to carveries, eat as much as you want restaurants, and always the pies on the way home – but these are all the things that make you overweight in the first place. I now enjoy a glass of red wine occasionally much more than ten pints with the lads! I find that I now leave a lot of food or throw it away, and I rarely feel hungry. I still enjoy the odd chocolate bar though!

I used to buy XXXL size clothes.  I’m now a large and I even lost a shoe size! What’s really fantastic is that I can get into car seats, waiting room chairs and aeroplane seats –no more the dreaded extra seatbelt. My excuse used to be that nothing was made big enough, now I don’t have to be embarrassed anymore.

I do find that weight loss has had a positive mental effect on me, seeing yourself differently in lots of small ways – putting shoes on, kneeling down, climbing ladders etc. Losing weight for me was always something I “would do later” – how different it is now!

David

March 2009