Keeping it a secret?

I chose to tell everyone because i wanted them to know that drastic weight loss is not simply a matter of choosing to be healthy and not being "lazy".  This type of weight loss, and permanent weight loss, is rarely achieved without intervention.  I didn't want to feed that misperception.  I had been overweight all my life. I tried everything to be healthy and lose weight. Surgery was my last option. And no, it's not a magical solution. It requires a lot if work. And I explain that too when I tell people. 

It absolutely is your choice, however. 

DD

You said in one short paragraph what it took me four long ones to say! LOL. :) Exactly!

I considered keeping it a secret, and I didn't tell anyone but my family when I first went on the bariatric registry. But I knew it would get too complicated if some people were in on the secret and others weren't, and I knew people would be guessing and speculating if they saw me dropping a lot of weight suddenly.  I knew people would talk about it no matter what, so I figured, the gossip might as well be factually correct!  So I decided to tell everyone.  I think it was a great decision for me. My experience has been that when you tell people matter-of-factly, the way you might about anything else, they take it matter-of-factly, and they often then feel free to ask you questions if they aren't sure of how it works.

I have almost never had any judgement from anyone - the one and only time I had someone say something negative about it was in a changeroom at a swimming pool, and she was someone I'd only seen a couple of times and never saw again - we struck up a conversation about having both lost a lot of weight (not sure how it came up), and she asked how I did it, and I told her I had WLS. She said she thought WLS was "criminal" (on the part of the health system, not on my part - I guess she thought I was a dupe of "criminal" doctors making money through "unnecessary" surgeries), and that she did it "naturally". I congratulated her and said that we all have our choices to make on how to take care of ourselves, and she agreed, and that was that. 

Everyone else in my life, at work, in my family? All very supportive when I told them. After all, everyone sees me with almost half my body weight gone now, so most people comment on it and many ask how I did it. I always volunteer the information. 

Why do I do it? Because I feel very strongly that WLS is a public health issue and that there should be no shame in getting the help we need to live a healthy life. I think WLS should be as readily available as any other medical intervention like cancer treatments or heart surgery. I think it should be fully publicly funded so that anyone can afford it if they need it.  And I believe that a very effective way of generating public support for WLS is for people to have the personal experience of knowing someone who has been helped by WLS. 

I don't want people to think I simply dieted and salad-ed over 150 lbs off my body. I don't want people to keep holding the mistaken impression that fad diets (or any diets alone, really), work over the long term. I want people to understand that surgery has been the ONLY method of weight loss that has higher success rates than failure rates. I don't want them to believe the bull**** peddled by Dr. Oz and other charlatans claiming that all people really have to do is WANT to lose weight and then they can do it (and of course use this expensive product or that expensive program).  I don't want to be the person people use as an excuse to shame fat people, saying things like, "Hey, if Michelle can do it, then I don't see why so-and-so can't get off their butt and get some willpower and blah blah blah." 

So...that's why I told everyone.

Like Dawn, everyone knows... I too enjoy educating them because many people have bad thoughts about it. Since most people only hear the negatives/side effects of it that aren't in-the-know. My boss knew.... like I said, everyone knew (except my mother who I have a strained relationship with and we hadn't spoke for 2 years  until I was already a year post op then I told her)