If interested, please see my profile page where I detail my experience with RNY.

I had surgery about a year and a half ago.  Even if I never lose another pound.  Even if I gain the weight back.  Even if anything else bad happens, the past year and a half have been the best of my adult life.  I have not felt pain and deprivation, I've felt alive, fulfilled, busy, and happy.  

Are you seeing a therapist?  If you aren't, I highly recommend adding one to your obesity recovery team.  It will really help you figure out these thoughts, these fears of failure and fears that you'll be humiliated.  Mine is super useful for me and, I truly believe, a key part of my longterm success. 

I think Charlie Gordon and Algernon would agree. Well, maybe not Algernon.

That is such a good question and one I asked myself before surgery.  For me, because the weight comes off so quickly & consistantly, it just made all the NSVs stand out all the more.

For the first year I journaled these NSVs and make a point of revisiting them occasionally.  It reminds me of all the health jeopardies you put your body into if the weight creeps back on. This, along with all those other terrific points everyone else who posted to your question, makes it very different from non surgical weight loss.

Can you please tell me what NSV stands for

NSV is non scale victory like no longer having to use a CPAP or being able to comfortably cross your legs...ride on a roller coaster.  You can find a list of acronums if you use the search button.  There are some pretty funny & surprising NSVs that people post.

Surgery isn't a cure it is a tool and you are directed by your doctor what to do if you follow directions you will be successful if you don't you wont you can only eat bad so long before you eventually gain weight how y eat plays a big part in your weightloss journey I wish you the very best and i hope you succeed just remember what you put in is your choice.  

The difference is:

A) It works unlike Jenny Craig, WW, and other fad diets.  Indeed, I just heard a study on the radio that the average adult is unlikely to lose a significant amount of weight over  a year and WLS is pretty much the only route.

B) You are invested. You will have invested a tremendous amount of time and money, pre-op, learning how to eat and nutritional counseling (or at least I did). You will have invested time and money on psychological evaluations.

C) You recognize that it is an extreme procedure and therefore will do anything to protect your good outcome. For the record, your intestines will be cut, rerouted, and sewn. You stomach may be severed or stapled to make it smaller (it will certainly be surgically altered).  You are dong an extreme thing and you arent doing it lightly.

That is why you will succeed.

The great news is that YOU get to decide how much food goes in your mouth. After weight loss surgery the amount you can eat is less (unless you eat every hour or two then it is easy to consume a lot). It is a tool when used correctly helps us to get to goal and stay there. If you eat too much/too often (which is possible after any surgery) you will regain.

I had my RNY in 2008. MANY people who had surgery the same time as me have regained. Some have even regained all their weight. They stopped following the rules. They did not get back on track when they had gained 5 pounds. Losing 5 is much easier than losing 50, 75, 100 (you get the idea).

I made a commitment to myself to fight this battle every day and will continue doing so. It is not magic.

Well, before I had 90% of my stomach removed, I was ALWAYS hungry. Now, I do GET hungry, but I get satisfied with small, frequent meals. And I was a super-absorber with a very thrifty metabolism---I swear I think my body could store 4 out of every 5 calories I ate.

Since my DS, I only absorb about half the protein calories I eat, about 60% of the complex carbs, and only about 20% of the fat. This means I can eat a rich and varied diet, and as long as I leave alone the simple carbs---absorbed at nearly 100% by everybody---maintaining my loss is pretty easy, really. You might say my DS has given me a normal degree of hunger and a normal metabolism, something I didn't have pre-op.