Gastric By-Pass Surgery: A Cure All?

Gastric By-Pass surgery is looked at as a cure all for overweight people that do not or can not control their own hunger. The common belief is that once the surgery is done the hunger is less and you lose weight quickly, with almost no self control. These however common misconceptions and not correct. There are many negatives to this surgery which need to be assessed before pursuing such a drastic measure.

First after the surgery the recovery time is not small, and you are very sore and cannot work for at least 2-3 weeks if not longer. You usually go home with drains attached to your stomach and then you have to visit the doctor to have them removed a week later.

After you get home they send you with little cups the size of little crystal light serving packages, to put your breakfast, lunch, and dinner in. This is all you can eat every few hours! They literally allow you 2 tablespoons of soup or soft foods for weeks, because if you eat anymore it will come right back up. Your stomach just becomes too small to take anything else.

Also many people with this surgery end up losing their ability to eat red meats, and dairy. Cheese and milk become very hard to process and can come back up because the stomach just does not know what to do with the proteins.

As time passes the amount of food you eat will grow and you will eventually be able to eat a regular meal with your family, however if listening to the doctors this usually takes a year or more. However the red meat and dairy concerns can plague certain people for life.

Another concern after having this surgery that is rarely discussed is that many people will end up with Hypoglycemia or Diabetes afterwards. This is do to the lack of certain food that your body is used to, and now cannot intake as much. These are usually permanent conditions and do not go away once your ability to intake more food increases.

The last concern that many do not realize is that if you are obese and start to lose weight in the fashion, it does tend to be quick. However this then cause severe skin sagging if you do not exercise while losing the weight. Some people even with exercise cannot get rid of the extra skin, and end up having to have it surgically removed which usually is not covered under insurance.

Although this surgery can be good for people who have no other choice, and may die if they do not lose the weight immediately, this is still something that should be looked into and researched before having done. The repercussions can be very severe and may not be worth it in the end.