• Name: Tatiana Benet-Riley
• Age: 45
• Surgery: Gastric Sleeve
• Surgery date: May 29th, 2014
• Testimonial date: June 4th, 2014
• Surgeon: Dr. Almanza

I heard about this from my brother. I knew he'd undergone the procedure about three years before I asked him about it and wanted to see what his experience would be like. By the time I actually asked him was after I'd seen that he lost weight seemingly effortlessly, looked great with lots of energy, and didn't have any of the signs I'd expected to see after weight loss surgery from other people I've known (dumping syndrome, frequent nausea, reliance on pills, gaunt weak appearance, etc.).

So he told me about this. And he was at a point where he never even thought about it any more. He just ate, whenever he wanted. Whatever he wanted. As much as he wanted. And just wouldn't want any more.

Well.

So I signed up. And it has been huge already. I'm fairly Buddha shaped (but rapidly losing). I didn't do this for cosmetic reasons but random people are already commenting that I look great. I didn't have diabetes or hypertension, but before the surgery I had bad knee days and worse knee days. There were nights I'd sleep on the couch because the thought of going up the stairs to my room was too much. My stairs are now effortless. Yesterday I caught myself squatting to pick up something I'd dropped. It had been at least most of a year since I could squat at all, never mind without thinking about it. I'm noticing I already have better flexibility and my feet aren't hurting. I'm hoping the weight loss will also clear up my sleep apnea. I can't tell yet but I do seem to be sleeping better.

Day of surgery (and surgery itself only takes less than 45 minutes) I was hurting (surprise!) but I was up and mobile in no time. (In fact you really should get moving soon to remove gas bubbles that are otherwise painful. And yes, afterwards that was actually the most painful part I'd run into. Eating carefully still and avoiding swallowing air means no pain for me.) Before flying home I was given medication including pain pills and anti-nausea syrup but I've needed none of that. I was worried flying would be painful but I was fine, and that was three days after surgery for seven hours, not counting airport time.

I'm still blown away from seeing how things were day after surgery. I walked along a couple of streets in Tijuana with my brother (he'd lost enough weight that he wanted to have some skin tightened and we planned our surgeries so our stay would overlap) and we did a little touristy shopping. There were all these food carts and bakeries and such that smelled amazing and he got hungry and kept apologizing that it wasn't fair to eat in front of me since I couldn't eat. I told him it was fine...and meant it. I could smell all this stuff that was so tempting but it had no hold on me at all. I could appreciate it and it did smell awesome but I just didn't want any.

Astounding.

(By the way, we ended up stopping at this butcher shop that sold cooked meat of various kinds and he got about a dollar's worth, and couldn't quite finish it.)

When I do eat, the things I eat taste wonderful. There will be the recommendation to keep your diet afterward to low sugar things to make weight loss even faster but I'm freely going to ignore that. As it is I'll have pudding and such and be very happy with a spoonful...for a "meal". Presumably that will settle to something more "normal" in time but in the meantime I feel content and have loads of energy and none of it is wasted making food my enemy.

* This is an actual testimonial, however, your results may vary. For more information, please read our Testimonial Disclaimer and Risks of Surgery.