My wife Karen started Weightwatchers when she was 12 years old and losing was always easier than keeping the weight off. A few years after we got married owing to my bad influence, she had gotten up to 225. She tried several other diets but went back to Weightwatchers. I learned the program(s) and became a pretty good WW cook and her biggest supporter. It was funny though because it seemed that if she religiously wrote down her intake, she'd lose.....but if she didn't, she wouldn't! In any case she lost 100 pounds and kept it off for over a year and got her Lifetime Membership.
She went up to about 145-150 and stayed right there doing the program for the next several years but after we had kids and foster kids and all of that, she started getting off the program and eventually went back up to over 200. She would start and stop WW and then try other diets but as she got older losing became very difficult. Where she had averaged about 2 pounds a week, she now averaged less than a pound and would go for weeks with no loss at all. This becomes very depressing so she'd go off the diet and gain more. Soon she was up to almost 300. We had a lot of testing done and if she could absolutrely stick to a very lo-cal/high protein plan she could lose but it was virtually impossible to do. She needed more help to do it then we could provide so she took the radical step of bariatric surgery.
She had the open surgery, not laproscopic, on January 9 of this year and now 8 weeks out she has lost just over 40 pounds.....a 5 pound a week average which is exactly on target. The Doc is happy, Karen is happy, and we are all happy for her. Sister Connie really could never give Karen her full support on this as she felt that Karen still had other options (she was alone in this belief) but after 6 weeks she changed her mind and is now fully supportive and happy for her. That was very important to Karen.
Bariatric surgery is a radical, forever life changing step and we didn't take this step lightly but it was about the last resort and I haven't seen Karen this happy in years. She is also doing a local support group and is active on a net support group as well. It's pretty weird at times as food has always been such a part of our lives...we celebrated every occasion with food. Now, this woman who used to be able to out eat me, eats meals of less than about a half cup. But like I said, I've never seen her happier.
Never let anyone tell you that Bariactric is an easy way out...it isn't.