Sarah

My name is Sarah, I’m from Kildare and I’m 23 years old. I have had my gastric band for almost 6 months now.

I had been thinking about weight loss surgery since I was 20 and made contact with Auralia about a year ago. At first I had my heart set on a gastric bypass but after speaking with Dave, he explained to me that the risks involved with the bypass were allot higher than the gastric band and he said that my BMI was more suited towards a gastric band. At the time I was 16 stone. My BMI was 42. I went in for a consultation with Dave and my mother came with me. We had a long chat about the gastric band and I was very happy to start planning towards my surgery. Before talking to Dave I didn’t know allot of details on surgery to lose weight and to be honest I assumed that once you had the surgery the weight would just fall off you without doing very much work. I had read on allot of websites that this isn’t the case but I think I was still hoping that it would work like that for me! Dave told us to go home and think about it first before making any plans to move forward. I called the clinic a few days later and spoke to Dave again and asked if I could arrange my surgery. I remember making the call thinking that it was the first step towards the surgery but I was disappointed when Dave advised that I should wait at least 3 months before having the surgery to make sure that I had tried to lose the weight again on my own. He told me that he was advising this because of my age and because he believed that I hadn’t fully accepted that the gastric band won’t do all of the work. He sent me allot of information on how the gastric band works and asked me to look through it and start to understand it.

3 months later, after another meeting with Dave and with Dr. Hewin I finally had my date for surgery sorted. On the day of surgery I was 15 stone 5lb, having lost just over half a stone by following some advice from Dave before the surgery. Over the first month I lost 8lb and got to a little under 15 stone! The second month was a little harder to lose weight and I only lost 3lb. I was really disappointed with this because I thought it would come off allot faster but I was re-assured by Dr. Hewin that I was doing alright and that I would eventually get there. By three months in I was 17lb down! I started to exercise more regularly as I got a bit more confident and for the first time in a few years I actually went out with friends to a party!

It’s now 6 months on from my day of surgery and I am 12 stone 6lb! Altogether I have lost just over 3 and a half stone so far. I have a goal of 10 stone by the end of the year.

Looking back, I think the decision from the clinic to make me wait and do more research on the gastric band was what helped me most. Had I not done that I would have went into this with blinkers on, not believing that the band is a tool for weight loss and you need to work with it. On bad days (everybody will still have bad days) my gastric band is my best friend. It stops me from letting go and eating a mountain of food. I think this is the biggest benefit for me! Before I got it done, a bad day would end up leading to 3 or 4 take-aways over the next couple of days. Now, if I do get a take away I can only eat a very small amount and then have to stop. I do miss eating big meals sometimes but dropping 4 sizes tastes so much better.

The decision to have this done was definitely the right one for me and I know when I am unsure of anything or having a bad day I can pick up the phone or drop into the clinic and get it sorted out. I really am a different person now, I love life and I am looking forward to finally reaching my goal. Once I do this, I want to try doing the mini marathon in under 1 hour!

(Results may differ from person to person)