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Surgeon Testimonial Michael A. Snyder My first impression of Dr. Snyder is that he passionately wants to help obese people become healthy. That impression never changed. He gives you all the tools you need to be sucessful in his program, right down to employing a registered dietician and a notebook of things to expect, things to do to prepare, a shopping list of things to have on hand for after the surgery, a list of expectations as to what you should be doing after surgery to become healthy, and many more tabs.rnrnThe office staff was very helpful, although I sometimes had trouble getting calls back. I just had to be my own advocate and keep calling and leaving messages, and emailing when the calls didn't work.rnrnI didn't dislike anything at all about him. He is high energy, and sometimes that's a little intimidating to someone who is basically sedentary like me, but I hope that as the weight comes off, my energy levels will go up, too.rnrnHe demands execellence of himself, and he demands it of you, too. Make sure before you have your surgery that you KNOW what you are going into, and the side-effects you could experience because of it. Make sure you follow his eating suggestions BEFORE surgery so that you know how you'll eventually be eating after surgery. LOSE WEIGHT before surgery, it helps him be able to move around in your belly. He does address the risks of the surgery, both physical and emotional, and warns you that there will come a time you'll wonder \"why did I ever do this?\" I told him that time would never come.rnrnHis aftercare program is excellent. There are several different support groups you can attend at the hospital, and he requires visits to his office the week after surgery, then 3 weeks post-op, then 6 weeks post-op, and then again at 3, 6, 9, and 12 months, and thereafter once a year. At the first 3 appointments, you also attend nutritional classes so you know what you can be eating and how to transition to the next steps.rnrnI would rate Dr. Snyder a 10, extremely competent, enthusiastic, personable, helpful (he even gives you his personal pager number in case you panic or have problems). And his bedside manner is great, along with his surgical competence.... both are wonderful! Member Interests
Erica Alikchihoo's Journey Click Here To View Describe your behavioral and emotional battle with weight control before learning about bariatric surgery. I was always "lush" - "curvy" - no skinny-mini for me. I look back at pictures of myself, and I was NOT fat, but I was constantly TOLD I was overweight, and my parents constantly had me on "diets". I was 5'9" and weighed between 140 and 145 most of the time. But my relationship with my parents was not the best, and I ran away from home at age 16. Ended up being kidnapped, raped, beaten and held hostage until I believed that I deserved to be where I was. Took me nearly a year to get out of that situation, and only then because he killed two of my pets. I was so afraid of him that I left the state, made some bad decisions, ended up pregnant, and had to come back home to my Dad and Stepmom's. I had the baby, and then to prove to my... Latest Surgery Support Comments
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I am 57 years old, and have been overweight most of my life. At 5'9" I was always tall, but my family constantly told me I was fat, even when I weighed only 145 pounds. I was "well-built" to be sure. When I married at 20, I weighed 175. I never lost the weight after my second child was born.... but just went up from there. I know now that I was trying to make myself unattractive to a man who was stalking me, and also to my husband, who was much heavier than I was. When I originally wrote this intro, I weighed 307 pounds (my highest weight was probably over 312, but after that, I refused to get on the scale). My knees are bone-on-bone, and I have painful sciatica that had became so bad that I was using the handicapped cart to do my grocery shopping and had to use a walker at night to get from the bedroom to the bathroom or I wouldn't make it. I could hardly move. After 6 years of Weight Watchers, and losing and regaining the same 50 pounds 3 or 4 times, I finally talked to my PCP about bariatriac surgery, only to find out much to my surprise, that she was extremely in favor of it, and would do all she could to help me jump through the hoops my insurance would be sure to make me do. I had my first "Doctor-Supervised Weight Loss" appointment with her on 9/16/08, and had the first appointment with the Dietician on 9/22/08 and thus I began my journey. My surgery was on March 2, 2009. 
My Story It's an interesting story. I was the product of a very broken marriage (I am the oldest of 7 siblings - 2 sisters and a brother on my mother's side, and 2 sisters and a brother on my father's side). I am the only child of my mother and father together.  But, although I didn't have a firm foundation as a start in life, I was lucky.... I had my "Granny"... a woman who wasn't even related to me, but who became my lifelong babysitter when I was just 6 weeks old (after her own grandchild had died of leukemia). As a matter of fact, I never even knew she was a "babysitter" until I was over 10 years old. I spent all my time with her. As a baby and toddler, I was a pretty skinny kid, and to my Granny, food was love. She was constantly fixing mashed potatoes, gravy, biscuits, pies, ice cream, banana bread and other things that we know now are not good for kids. Still, as a child, my activity level pretty much took care of the extra calories.... When I finally went to live with my Dad at age 9, I was MAYBE 8-10 pounds overweight. But to my dad and new step mom, I was FAT.  I will post pictures detailing my journey to fat.... it's pretty amazing. They immediately put me on a diet. Those of you who are my age will remember the graham-cracker type of things that you ate with a whole glass of water, that were supposed to expand in your stomach and make you not hungry. And, those little caramel-type things that were also a "diet aid". Additionally, they made me drink water with apple-cider vinegar to help burn the fat off. Then, we moved far away from my "Granny" to northern California, where my stepmother had complete control over my diet, and got me to what she felt was a healthy weight. And I WAS slender. But, the money wasn't good up there, so we had to move back down to southern California.... and while they prepared to move, they sent me to live with my Granny. Unfortunately for me, although I loved her to death, it was a really bad move. I went from 85 pounds in the 5th grade, to 120# in maybe 3 months. Stretch marks all over the place, the beginning of the "end" for me.  That started a weight problem that I battled for the rest of my life. Although I was tall in high school (5'9"), I still weighed more than any of my friends at 145#. My measurements were like 38-26-38, and everyone else's were like 32-22-34. When I was measured for my drill team uniform and they called out my measurements, the whole room fell silent. But pictures from that time show me as FAR from being FAT. Voluptuous, maybe. I have a picture of me taken on my 12th birthday, and I looked like I was maybe 18 or 19. And.... I was starved for affection. Neither my Dad nor my Stepmom believed in physical warmth, so there were no hugs, no outward signs of love, very little praise, but lots of criticism about my weight. "If you would only exercise more.... if you would only ride your bike.... if you would only go out for sports.... if you would only go to the gym...." My dad, a cop, even got me "Black Beauties" - a really strong amphetamine. When he could no longer get them, I turned to street drugs (whites). I got so that I weighed about 135, but even then, they called me fat. Finally, at the age of 14, I developed a huge crush on the 21 year old brother of one of my schoolmates, and when he found out about it, he arranged to be alone with me in his car, and then took me up into the mountains and savagely raped and sodomized me, and told me that if I ever told anyone, he would say I put out for all of his friends. I was way too ashamed to tell my parents, because their standard belief was that any woman who was raped had in some way asked for it.... so, alone and without anyone to confide in, it wasn't surprising that he came back again and again, and the scene repeated itself for more than six months, until I ran away to get away from him. But, because of my parent's beliefs, I also believed that I had done something to deserve what I'd gotten. I didn't know what, but I must have led him on somehow. Even so, I ended up running right into the arms of a psychopath, who not only kidnapped me, but raped me, beat me, emotionally abused me, and basically held me hostage for months, until I believed that I was where i was supposed to be. But when he finally killed my second pet in as many months, I went back to my Dad and Stepmom and begged to come home. They took me back in, but he continued to stalk me, and I was so afraid of him that I ended up running away again, from southern California to Wyoming. There, I became an adult, and learned to support myself. But, after a couple of years, and a few bad choices, I became pregnant, and had to return home. After the baby was born, I met and married a nice man. I didn't love him, but he represented safety and security, and respectability. I weighed 170 at my wedding.... still nicely shaped, but he was obese. I was okay for a couple of years, but then we moved into an area that was close to where my stalker had lived, and (although I didn't realize it then) I purposely began to put on weight.... to make myself unattractive to my stalker, should he ever find me again, but also to make myself unattractive to my husband, because I didn't love him and didn't want to be intimate with him. After my second baby, I never lost the weight, but instead, just continued to gain until I was over 300 pounds. I think I topped out at 312, but I'm not sure, because there were months at a time when I would not get on a scale. By the time I was 34, I needed to be out of my marriage so badly that I developed a depression so deep that all I could do was work and sleep. I finally met a woman who showed me options I never knew I had, and I found the courage to leave him after 15 years. I became involved with a women's empowerment group. Then, I began to work on myself. I started to see therapists, and changed when they weren't helping. I finally found myself, in desperation, seeing a male Orthodox Rabbi for therapy, and he did the absolute most to help me. I finally made breakthroughs that I thought were impossible..... and once I was able to do that, I was able to address my weight problems. I joined Weight Watchers, lost 50 pounds, regained it, lost it again, regained it again... did Dr. Atkins with great luck until I developed a fat intolerance and thus uncontrollable diarrhea, so had to stop that.... tried South Beach, Richard Simmons, NutriSystem, etc. Nothing working. Now, after many years of research, I've found that my best option for weight loss is gastric bypass. I've read everything I can get my hands on, made arrangements with a world renowned surgeon who has done over 2000 of these procedures, worked with his dietitian to become acquainted with and started on his eating plan, and gone to the support groups and nutrition classes required by the hospital, which is a Bariatric Center of Excellence. I hope to have my surgery in February some time, and can't wait to see the changes this will make in my life. I know it is life altering, and that the changes in diet and nutritional supplementation will be life-long.... but I wasn't going to have much of a life as it was, if I didn't do this. So.... as I will it, so mote it be! |
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