How Will You Use Your Weight Loss Surgery?

Posted: Oct 30 in Surgery Experience by Staff

Your bariatric surgeon in Macon gave you a Lap Band, what will you do with it? Your Lap Band can’t get you to your weight loss goals alone. Your Lap Band is a weight loss tool, and like many tools, it needs some additional power to get it to work properly. You are the supplier of your Lap Band’s “power” (metaphorically speaking of course), and it’s up to you to use your Lap Band to reinvent your health both physically and mentally.

“Give us the tools, and we will finish the job.”—Winston Churchill

As the sole operator of your Lap Band, the responsibility of abiding by your bariatric surgeon’s dietary and lifestyle guidelines falls on you. Use your Lap Band as a tool to shape your future for long term weight loss success.

Reinforce the weight loss abilities of your Lap Band with the following strategies:

• Dedicate yourself to a healthy diet. Your bariatric surgeon in Albany has given you a list of dietary requirements for gastric band surgery. For your Lap Band to be successful, you must dedicate yourself to a healthy diet twenty-four-seven. If you’re unable to stick to a healthy diet, your chances of losing weight will decrease and your chances of potentially regaining weight will increase.
• Dedicate yourself to daily exercise. Once your bariatric surgeon has cleared you for exercise, begin to increase your physical activity one day at a time. You don’t need to run a marathon right away – or ever for that matter! Start slow and build into a workout routine you are comfortable with.
• Build a support system. Just as your Lap Band cannot help you lose weight without your help —you, too, need a little bit of extra support to re-charge your batteries. A solid support system is essential for coping with the mental and physical changes required of Lap Band surgery. A support system provides you with the stability you’ll need during times of emotional highs and lows.

Developing healthy strategies to lose weight with your Lap Band aren’t going to happen overnight. You have your Lap Band, now it is up to you to use that tool to your advantage. Every time that you find a new healthy food you enjoy, put on your sneakers and go for a walk or share a struggle with peers in a support group you are another step closer to a healthier lifestyle.