Duodenal Switch: Stories

The beginning of my journey was in 2007 and I started at 398lb. Last week I weighed in at 219.2lb and this morning I weighed in at 215.2lb. So I am down over 180lb since I started.

I originally had lap band in April 2007 and it did help me. I was productive on it, I did follow all the rules -- eat small portions, protein first, blah blah blah -- but it stopped working. I managed to lose at the most 130lb and that was great but it came back (not all of it. I think I'm down 90).

My revision surgery was scheduled for May 11, 2010. I was getting a duodenal switch. They knocked me out, opened me up, found massive mess and could not complete my surgery. I wound up with just a vertical sleeve gastrectomy and I could go back for the second half of the duodenal switch in six months.

I had surgery on May 3, 2011. They kept me in the hospital from Tuesday to Friday. Everything went okay and I had no complications.

The duodenal switch is not done by many doctors at all. Biggest reason for that is that it takes a very long time to learn, you have to be mentored and it is not a lucrative operation because it takes so long to do that you could probably only get two done a day. But if you do other surgeries like gastric bypass where you're only under the knife for like an hour, or the lap band where mine was I think 45 minutes, or the VSG which is like an hour, you can bang out eight of those a day! But the duodenal switch you're talking 4-5 hours under the knife. So not many doctors do it.

I don't have a goal weight yet because I have never been this small in my life and I don't know what 150lb is going to look like on me. So I am just going to keep on going until I realistically look happy with myself in clothes.