I had a gastric sleeve in March 2021. If I’m being 100% honest, losing the weight so quickly is almost euphoric— especially if you’re someone who has struggled with being overweight their whole life like I was. It is easy to get obsessed with continuing to lose the weight and stepping on the scale, so I would limit my weigh-ins to every other day. I was 250 pounds at my heaviest- one week before I went in for surgery. After 1 year, I was down to my lowest weight since high school, 160 pounds!!! This was 10 pounds less than my initial goal!

Unfortunately, because of how quickly I lost the 90lbs, my body had a hard time keeping up and I ended up having debilitating episodes of low blood sugar. I was diagnosed with reactive hypoglycemia and my blood sugars were down in the 40s on a daily basis after I ate (a normal person with no blood sugar regulation problems has a fasting blood sugar of 80 to 100)! I struggled for almost a year to get a hold on my blood sugars and I experimented with what I could eat and what I couldn’t.

I have a terrible sweet tooth, and that was the hardest thing for me. I knew this going into surgery, and I swore I was going to have the willpower to change my ways. I was dead wrong and eating the sweets was literally making me borderline disabled. Through trial and error, I figured out a process that works for me and I can still occasionally indulge.

Today, I’m almost 2 years out, and I’m at 170 pounds (my original goal!) and eat just about anything that I want. My weight typically stays within 5 pounds. Because they restricted the size of your stomach, it’s nearly impossible to over eat because it’s physically painful. I can remember taking just ONE bite too much, and I would have to lay on the couch for at least 30 minutes after the meal in agony.

Anyone who says that getting bariatric surgery is the “easy way out” obviously never had bariatric surgery. It really is such a long and painful process to apply those changes to your life and stick to it. But, I will say it’s worth it— because at the end of the day, I like what I see in the mirror, and that’s some thing that I never thought I would feel. I have a lot more confidence, and I go out and experience more in life than I did when I was overweight and self-conscious. This has helped me in every aspect of my life.

I wish you the best of luck with your surgery and your process. It’s a long road, but an exciting one!!