Patient Stories: Weight Loss Surgery

Memorial Hermann Memorial City

Bob, Weight Loss Surgery
Master of His Own Destiny

Bob has fought a weight problem almost all his life. "My mother tells me that the first word out of my mouth wasn't mom or dad. It was ‘more.'"

"I hated being overweight," he says now. "Even as a kid, I couldn't buy clothes in the same department as my brothers. We'd have to go to the husky department to find anything that fit."

The older Bob got, the more he hated his weight. "I tried everything I could to drop pounds. So being overweight was a constant reminder of my failures."

Bob grew up one of six children in an Italian family that revolved around the kitchen. "My parents owned a restaurant, so food was always the biggest part of our lives," he says. "My aunts, uncles and cousins would come to visit, and we'd all be there in the kitchen. But I was the only one in the family with a weight problem."
   

Bob had also developed serious obstructive sleep apnea. "I was using a CPAP at night because I stopped breathing so often," he says. "In an eight-hour period I'd sleep only about three hours because I awakened so often struggling for breath."

While his cholesterol and blood pressure were within the normal range, he underwent a total hip replacement in 1997 because of weight damage. "I also had a bad problem with shortness of breath, which made it hard for me to move. I was fortunate in that I didn't have diabetes, but my doctor discovered that my blood sugar was elevated. It wasn't high enough to justify medication, but I knew it was time to do something."

At 460 pounds before his roux-en-y gastric bypass, Bob did not set a post-surgical weight-loss goal for himself. "After so many attempts to lose weight, I was afraid that if I set a goal I wouldn't reach it. But after I'd lost about 130 pounds, I began to think I'd like to see myself at 230 pounds."

Tipping the scales between 280 and 290, Bob has another 60 pounds to lose. "That doesn't sound like much considering that I've already lost 166 pounds, but the further out you are from surgery, the harder it is to lose weight and the more critical it becomes to watch how and what you eat. Even today I have to keep reminding myself that I'm the one who's in charge, that I'm the master of my own destiny. I think I make pretty smart food choices but there are times that, just like everyone else, I can't resist a doughnut."

Bob, who is 50, says he's thankful for the many changes weight-loss surgery has brought to his life. "My relationship with my wife is a thousand times better than it was. She was very supportive of the surgery, even though she was scared. And there are just so many little things I can do now that I couldn't do before – bend over to tie my shoes, sit on the floor with my legs crossed. I can go to the store and buy regular clothes, and I wear a size smaller in shoes. Even my head got smaller."