Wow, everything moves fast fast fast!

Well, I met with the surgeon today...and my psych evaluation is tomorrow morning, my diet class is Thursday night, my mandatory support group meeting is this Tuesday and he thinks I will be in surgery the first week of November...I'm like...wow.  Not exactly sure how to cope with all of this. My surgeon did recommend the banded sleeve gastrectomy(sp) because I do not have any co-morbids, but after talking with him I decided to do the RNY. Here's a question though, the place where I work, the people are terrible.  They really are not very nice and have not been supportive of the other people in the office who have lost significant amounts of weight.  My boss knows about the surgery, but the rest of them have not been filled in as of yet.  I'm wondering how many people you all told and if you told people who were...less than supportive and how you dealt with that. Rebekah

At work I only told a few people,  But word got around now everyone and their mama knows.  Also, Everyone is now the food police.  Its terrible. M ysuggestion as far as work people go, if you dont want people to know dont tell anyone.

well for me now that I have my date I just put the word out there. the reason being is that gossip spreads through my workplace likewildfire so I know everyone will be talking about it anyway. I figure I might as well be the one giving out the info so that it is all correct. Second I will have to take off work for six weeks, will have lost alot of weight by the time I come back, and will continue to lose large amounts of weight. I figure there is not a whole lot I can do to hide the fact I had WLS. And lastly I have alot of close friends at work so i would have told them all anyways. Anyways everyones situation is diffrent, and I would go with your gut instinct on weather to tell or not.

It's a personal decision...For me, I'm outgoing and love to talk, so I tell everybody, even people I have just met. I haven't really encountered much in the way of negativity when I talk to people about it. If I sense that someone might have the wrong impression of what it is about and what it entails, then I do my best to educate them about it as much as possible, they usually get really interested then and come around....I have spoken with alot of people though at support groups and here on OH though that have encountered people who don't support them - even people close to them like parents and spouses - it seems the concensus when it comes to advice on those situations is to remember you are doing this for YOUR health, and that it pays to try to do your best to educate them about the surgery and process because a lot of people have misconstrued perceptions about WLS. For example, a lot of folks only remember what they have heard about it in the media - There are two common WLS stories replayed all the time in the media. The first is celebrity has surgery, six months later their skinny - perception: wow! I can't beleive it! That must be the easy way out! Or, the second commonly replayed story: Patient goes in for routine WLS and it goes horribly wrong, they experience a terrible complication or even die from WLS - perception: WLS is so dangerous, you'd have to be an idiot to take such a risk. We know that neither perception is really indicative of reality. It certainly isn't an easy way out. I can go on and on about why it isn't, but you probably already have an idea of what to expect in regards to the challenges of recovery and then the even greater challenge of adapting to the mandatory post-op lifestyle...And of course the surgery has it's risks but in my opinion it is relatively safe, especially compared to the odds of having to endure obesity related health problems if you chose not to address your weight problem. I guess what I'm saying is that if you get the support you seek, great. If you don't then the best thing you can do is to try to help the people around you who disapprove of your decision, or are not supportive to you in your post-op situation to understand what WLS is all about, becuase often the root of that lack of support just leads back to simple ignorance, which you can do something about!

I totally agree with you that people should be educated and if it were a simple case of education i would be on it.  Unfortunately two the women I work with are...truly hateful.  Another woman in the office had WLS two years ago and when she would have problems they would say horribly malicious things about her behind her back.  They decided her weight was public information and still harass her endlessly especially after she became smaller than them. They have a habit of giving her food as a gift, especially things she has had trouble with in the past, and then speculate in the office in front of her about whether or not she will gain all the weight back. On the one hand I want to be supportive of the woman who already had surgery and on the other hand I have this strong desire to totally keep them out of the loop because they are so incredibly horrible. I know I probably need to suck it up and be honest or else I'll come across as being ashamed and easy pickings for them.  I just am not the most successful at confrontation.

I only told people I cared about and who cared about me.  At work I had 4 close friends... we all did lunch together and socialized outside of work... they all knew. I told my boss.. and that was IT. I didnt want to turn into a zoo exibit at work where people would walk by and stare. I didnt want to hear "are you suppose to be eating that!?!?!" or being questioned about "how much have you lost??".  We had a gym in the building where I worked so before surgery I worked out in the gym with my friends and lost about 40lbs... so after surgery when I kept losing everybody assumed it was from working out and change in diet. If they asked what I was doing I would say "working out and a medically supervised diet" and leave it at that. I was pretty much the biggest person at work so nobody questioned it... there wasnt anybody else who had WLS and not many others who would even qualify. As for family and friends... I told my dad, mom and brother.. my mother has a HUGE mouth and told the rest of her family and my dad (he asked!) told the rest of his family. Besides the friends at work I told 2 others people - my best friend who had surgery 6 years ago and another friend. The last friend I told is pretty overweight and she wasnt very supportive of me. Its something I expected and handeled so be prepared. After I was a few months out and she saw I was still the same ole person she started to be happy for me and get motivated to lose some weight on her own!