Weight Loss Surgery: Is It For You?
Weight loss surgery sounds like an easy way to lose weight. Cut out part of your stomach, and you won’t eat as much and the weight will melt off. Unfortunately, like all too-good-to-be-true solutions, it’s not that easy.
There are two basic kinds of weight loss surgery: making the stomach smaller so that less food is eaten, and bypassing part of the intestine so that less food is absorbed. Sometimes the two procedures are combined. The newest procedure, stomach banding, makes the stomach smaller and can be done laparoscopically, avoiding major surgery.
Advantages of Weight Loss Surgery
Weight loss surgery does work, and most people lose at least some of their excess weight. It is a drastic measure, and is indicated only for people who are severely obese, who have health problems from obesity, or whose lifestyle is restricted by obesity.
Disadvantages of Weight Loss Surgery
One disadvantage of weight loss surgery is that it’s a surgical procedure, and carries the risks of any surgery. Newer procedures make the surgery much less risky than it was.
Bypass surgery, and sometimes stomach surgery, can cause vitamin deficiencies and complications resulting from them. It may cause protein deficiency, food intolerances, and “dumping syndrome,” where you feel faint and sweaty and may have diarrhea after eating too much.
It may not be possible for a pregnant woman who has had weight loss surgery to eat enough protein and calories for both herself and her baby. Newer procedures utilize an adjustable balloon to make the stomach smaller, and the size of the balloon can be adjusted to allow the pregnant mom to eat more.
The biggest disadvantage of weight loss surgery is that it is based on the assumption that we are overweight because we eat too much, and that we eat too much because we are hungry. Which is usually not true. There are a lot of factors that go into obesity, and if the emotional and cognitive factors aren’t dealt with, you won’t be able to lose any more weight after surgery than you were before. You will continue to sabotage yourself. Most weight loss surgeons require you to have a psychological evaluation before surgery to make sure you are ready to do the work necessary for it to succeed.
In order for weight loss surgery to be successful, you must follow a low-calorie, low fat diet after surgery and exercise, just as you would without the surgery. In addition, you may have to follow a strict and complicated regimen of vitamin and mineral supplementation for the rest of your life.
Weight loss surgery is a tool that helps people lose weight. It is not a magic bullet. If you have weight loss surgery, you’ll still have to work hard to lose weight. But you’ll have one more tool to help you do it.