Stomach surgery to cure obesity is not as dangerous as it used to be when it was first used, back in the 1950's.

But complications can include huge abscesses, internal hernias (ruptures), bleeding, lung clots, gastric pouch ruptures, and other nasty and dangerous problems.

Still it's considered useful for people who are morbidly obese or who have serious diabetes.

Just curious whether anyone knows anyone who has had it done. Personally I'd rather starve myself skinny.

I did have this done as a matter of fact. I know of several others on this site that have had it done as well.

My surgery was June 2nd last year. I am 9 months into the surgical recovery now.

I did not choose to do this surgery as a short cut or because I thought it would be "easy". I did it as the last resort after many years of attempting other alternatives through diet and exercise.

My father died at 46 from Heart Disease and I was about to turn 40 (my birthday is tomorrow). I have two young sons who are Autistic and special needs and their father needs me and they need me to be part of the family.

The surgeon where I went has done many successful Gastric Bypasses and I felt comfortable with the likelyhood of my success. I am younger, I am healthier and lighter than the average person having this procedure done so my risks were much less.

In fact I had a totally successful and "easy" recovery (if you can call it that) without any complications at all.

I can eat almost anything I want, but the quanitity is severely limited. I need to be careful about my fluid intake (I need to drink more), I can't drink fluids and eat food at the same time (they compete for stomach space).

I found I lost weight no faster this way than doing a healthy strict diet. About 10-12 pounds a month was my loss. I am now down 112 pounds. I was a size 28 and I am now a size 14.

I am in the last 25 (22 pounds really) pound stretch to reach my goal weight. I feel better than I have in years, I have more energy, flexibility and a general sense of well being that is amazing to feel.

I will need to be careful the rest of my life, but hey, we should all be monitoring what we eat and how we eat anyway.

I had my procedure done laparoscopically which made my recovery much faster. I do not regret doing the procedure at all. It is NOT the easy way out. I still have problems eating many foods and likely will never be able to tolerate certain ones at all.

I am an RN and I went into this with totally open eyes and I was aware of the risks I was taking. But it was that, or be dead at an early age from obesity and heart disease.

I know of 5 people (excluding those here) who have had this done. One had it done when it was a relatively new procedure. She was left with horribly hanging flesh and now is in her 70s and looks terrible and disfigured because she never had an corrective surgery to remove the excess flesh. The other 4 are co-workers. One became emaciated looking, the second is still large - both have the sagging flesh which looks really bad. The 4th person had extreme complications resulting from the surgery and almost died. Tho I don't know for sure, I believe she had to have the procedure reversed. And finally, the last person who had it done also had severe complications ending in her having to leave work. But she did lose weight.

Personally, this is not for me. I've heard of more horror stories than positive ones. But for those who do have this procedure I would imagine they don't take the decision to do this lightly and discuss all possibilities and outcomes with doctors.

I know of three people (Outside of this site) who have had the "Last Resort" Stapling.

It's always a last resort, after trying everything else or "We have reached morbid obesity" stage - or when there is medical need to reduce the weight quickly, such as in a case where the obese person is at high risk for heart attack in near future.

The people I know personally had decades long battles with weight, diet and exercise programs, tried every drug, herbal remedy on the market, one even turned to methamphtamines which worked rather well, she lost 100+ pounds, but also got a nasty drug addiction and jail time and when she cleaned up swelled up to 150+ excess weight. That resulting "quick" weight gain along with meth use resulted in a weakened heart, the doctors had to do something rather extreme in her case to save her life.

Starving oneself skinny is only possible if you live someplace where food is not available always. Hunger is a strong motivator, very strong. The human body is designed to survive, in the case of starvation diets the body turns to methods that result in serious chages which once one ends the diet their body packs on the bounds to survive the next famine.

a much safer and less expensive alternative to gastric bypass is laparascopic adjustable gastric band. It can be done as an outpatient procedure in many instances. The mortality for the operation is close to zero. The weightloss is slower (and less nutritionally adverse) but in the long term, it's equal to that of bypass. In fact there's a certain percentage of bypass patients who, for various reasons, begin to regain weight. The adjustable band has less of that problem

I also know a few who have had it done and most seem happy with the results, the only one who is not happy is a lady down the street...I think her doctor didn't go over things with het like he should have, she is unhappy with the small amount of food (she just wanted to eat NORMALLY and still doesn't) also she has loads of hanging skin and said she looked better fat when nude...but the others I know didn't even have to have skin removed...they were younger though and probably had more elasticity in the skin....I think you have to really think of the pros and cons and figure out what is best for you.

If I had diabetes I might do it. From what friends tell me diabetes is terrible. I won't even read up on it. Too depressing.