Having a band that slipped and had to be removed has made me look for long term results of WLS.  Do you have a "list" of those who are at least 5-10 years post op of VSG - or is there anyone out there willing to tell me how it is going?

Ms Shell is nearly 5 years out, Babs I think is 7 years out.

One thing heavily noted around all forums is that most 'long termers" disappear.

One comforting fact for me is that gastrectomies, be it full or partial, have been performed for decades up on decades like since the late 1880's early 1900s for stomach cancer and ulcers. Reading the gastrectomy forums (not related to weight loss) gave me a lot of comfort in long term prognosis/life changes/struggles etc.

Where can I read gastrectomy forums?
Best wishes to you and Wee Nugget!

Just google gastrectomy forums. The American Cancer society had a really good one back when I was researching my revision from band to VSG.

The one thing to remember is that those patients have a diseased organ. We do not so not all their stories will be relevant.

You can also hit up Springerlink, Pubmed for actual research based findings for sleeve gastrectomy. I used to have paid subscriptions to those sites, paid for articles, but my old laptop crashed and I lost all my bookmarks, all my notes, everything and I never renewed my subscriptions.

THANK YOU for your wisdom and suggestions!  I'll start searching.

Here's another lady further out..

http://www.obesityhelp.com/forums/vsg/4462385/7-years-post-o p-Loving-life/

Hugs

Donna

I'll be 5 years out next week...things are going fine for me!

Lizanne

Did you find a way to deal with the "head hunger" as you were on your journey? Have you had no GERD or leaks? What a great encouragement you are!

Thanks!

I was 53 when I had the surgery. The surgery itself went extremely smoothly, no leaks or complications of any kind. I did have severe GERD pre-VSG and it continued and actually got worse post surgery. GERD is pretty common with the VSG. About a year after my surgery, I developed a hiatal hernia, which my surgeon attempted to repair surgically. But the repair didn't work and my GERD continued unabated. Finally, earlier this year, I went to Dr. Cirangle (who was my doctor's partner at the time of my surgery) to see if he had any suggestions. He found that the hiatal hernia had gotten worse, and I had another surgery to take care of it. It was very large and had to be repaired with mesh, but since then, I have almost no GERD at all. I'm off of my twice daily Protonix PPI! Hiatal hernias are very common among the obese, and Dr. Cirangle is finding that it is also somewhat common to develop them post surgery. That's my experience, but the range is all over the place. Most people have some GERD right after surgery, but many find that it goes away as they lose weight. Others need to stay on an antacid or PPI indefinitely. It's really hard to predict, but make sure your doctor is extremely aggressive about fixing any indication of a hiatal hernia.

As to head hunger, well, let's see. The nice thing about the VSG is that ghrelin production is severely curtailed, so physical hunger is lessened. Right after surgery, I wasn't very hungry and really couldn't eat much at all. Plus I was super motivated to stay on my program and get the weight off, so I don't remember head hunger being a huge issue. Now, 5 years later, head hunger is a much bigger problem, especially in the evenings. I have always been a grazer, and that is something I still need to fight. I try to plan for it...eat some veggies or some protein to fill up. My restriction is still very good, about 4 ounces or so of dense protein, and that helps immensely. But the surgery doesn't cure one's bad habits, so it is really important to form some new good habits to combat them!

Hope that answers your questions, and I'm happy to answer any others you may have!

Lizanne

Thin Lizzy, you have been a great encouragement!  I truly appreciate your advice and will consider it a success if I do even half as well as you!  Congratulations!!!