Your Stories

Gary before and a month after surgery

I have always been big - well, certainly since my late teens.

My mum called me "big boned" and said it was "puppy fat", but now that a couple of decades have passed it is all clearly an excuse for eating badly and being too lazy to exercise.

Weight-loss surgery is not something I opted for without serious thought. It was back in 2003 that I first considered the option.

And with my weight ballooning to 120kg (around 19 stone) I clearly had to do something before I was saddled with the likely onset of diabetes, heart disease and goodness knows what else.

I saw a local surgeon in August who gave me three weight-loss surgery options. They were a lapband (basically a big rubber band around my stomach to restrict its size - the advantage is this is reversible, the disadvantage is that it is not that effective in men).

Then there was a gastric bypass (where a pouch is sewn into your stomach and then plumbed into your bowel - the advantage is that it is proven to work, the disadvantage is that any surgery which interferes with your bowel can have complications).

In its most simple terms, three quarters of your stomach is cut away. It is therefore irreversible, but - for me - it has worked. My stomach is now the size of a small mobile phone.

I had the operation at the start of September and, as I write this in mid-October, I have lost 21kg, or just over three stone, in the space of around six weeks.

I feel so much healthier, my asthma and eczema have all but disappeared, I am apparently no longer snoring at night, and I am quite simply happier.

I now only eat very small meals as my stomach is tiny, but my hunger pangs have also subsided so I don't feel like I am missing out.

There may be no more fizzy drinks, chocolate and other fatty snacks in my life, but feeling fitter and getting closer to my ideal weight is now much more important to me.