Can you tell me a little bit more about the, the gastric band surgery, how the psychologist prepare you because you said he or she said that, Things were going to change

My social life will change. I don’t think I were actually prepared for the operation when, that’s a different thing anyway. When, we talked about social changes. We talked about what I could put in place of the going out for meals. I think that were the biggest issue really, about family, about friends and the sad thing is we’ve lost some of our friends because of this. Not that we fell out. We’ve just kind of gone our separate ways because they’re still going to have the meals and we don’t.

So, we don’t see them, which is quite sad but having said we lost that group of friends by doing what we took over and did, I’ve made a huge social circle of friends. So, it’s like kind of swings and roundabouts so the impact has not been great because we’ve replaced one thing with another but I had something to replace it with didn’t I?

And luckily my husband’s amazing, he’s supported me throughout this. The kids have been a complete support. Everybody all my friends have been wonderful, which is, you’ve got to have that, and my husband has adapted to everything that I wanted to do. So, he comes dancing with me. We go out every night. He’s, he’s done all of that. So, he’s quite happy for us to go dancing. So, the dancing took over, took over from the meals but I were lucky in that respect that I had something.

And then when I went to have this process of the gastric band my diabetic nurse were such a support to me and she and the dietician at the diabetes centre helped me through that process of finding the right thing. So, through that process they asked me would I go and see a psychologist to talk to me about a complete lifestyle change. So, I had that advantage that I did go and see him for about six times and he were brilliant. So, I knew before I went to have the gastric band that everything was going to change.

Do you have any messages for health professionals who want to help people with weight control?

I seriously think they should be, especially the health teams, I think they should be more supportive. There’s support out there if you’re drug abusers. There’s support out there if you’re alcoholics. There’s support out there if you’re smokers. The support for people that are fat is not there. I don’t care what anybody says, it’s kind of You’re eating too much, go home and diet it’s, that’s no always the cause. We’re not all alike. Everybody’s different and I think they should take that on board, health care workers.

Okay. So, do you think there was a kind of judgement there?

I, oh, definitely. Definitely and something I’ve never thought, I’ve always been a confident lady and when I were big, I’ve always had loads of friends and, you know, I’ve always been the life and soul. Never bothered me. But somebody once said to me, If you’re slimmer, people treat you differently and I said, Rubbish it’s very true that.

You have found that out?

it’s absolutely. Especially on the health teams, yeah. Doctors like to sit and look me in the face now. I cannot tell you, people will look at you rather than look at you. They’ll look at me, they’ll look at me face and talk to me direct. When I were bigger, and I never thought that could ever possibly be true. So that came as a huge shock to me.

That’s very interesting.

and it’s true. You were just like a blob on the face of the earth, weren’t you? People now talk to me, talk to me, to me face.

So, do you think they were embarrassed or

I don’t know but I, I, but if you’d have asked me when I was as big as I were, would I think I were treated any different, I would say, Truthfully, no because the group of friends I had, nobody ever looked at me like I were big I mean, these friends that have come in now, we’ve been friends since we were babies, they’ve never looked at me any different. Fat or thin, I’ve always just been Janet haven’t I? So, I never thought that strangers would ever treat me in a different way and yes, they do. Absolutely, one hundred per cent.

I decided that at the age of forty-nine that I had to something about this, not to make me look any different just to, you know, as a health precaution, I knew that I needed to do something. I’d got to that stage where this is just ridiculous. So, we decided that I would go and have this gastric band fitted which I did. I hadn’t even heard of this operation at that stage. A friend of mine visited from Australia and apparently it quite common over there so we did that.

When I came to from the operation, the doctor came to me and he said to me, it’s a good job you’ve had this operation done today and I said, Why’s that He said, because you’ve got cirrhosis of the liver which really shocked me to the core and I first reaction was, Well, I don’t drink Because I thought you just got that with drinking and he said, No he said, the cause of this, the biggest cause of this is the weight

So, I asked him, I said, Will that ever repair itself Well luckily the liver is the only organ in the body that does repair itself. So after two years I went back for a liver test and it’s absolutely perfect. So that were that. But he also said to me, Had I not had it done that day I would be dead before I were fifty-five

When I went to see the, the psychiatrist and the first question he asked me, he said, Why are you doing this and I said, Obviously for health reason and he said, If there’s one thing that you want to do while you’re fat, now, that you can’t do but you think you can do when you’re thinner. What is it I said, I want to run And I knew at that point that’s where I needed to be, and I did it. Killed me but I did it [laughs]. Think I were the last one to cross the finishing line but I did it [laughs].

My family life, I can’t say it’s changed. I just run about more with them and play with kids and, you know, like, I’ve had, we’ve had two little granddaughters since then. So, rolling about on the floor being able to get on the floor and get up. Things like that. I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t play with them. I never took my kids swimming because I were too fat to go into the pool, things like that.

So, you felt embarrassed?

I were, yeah, I were too embarrassed, yeah. Yeah, I were and then I kind of got over that stage and it’s really weird I swam from being thirty-eight to being in my fifties and I never bothered putting a swimsuit on when I were twenty-two stone. I didn’t bother because we used to go all ladies, I never used to go mixed, I always used to go on a ladies’ swim and I used to swim every week. I used to swim every day. Every single day I went swimming. Thirty lengths in my twenty-minute dinner break. I used to do it every day and then I lost the weight and obviously I’ve got baggy skin problem now which is, I’m not ever going to do nothing about it because it’s, I look okay while I’ve got clothes on. But when you take the clothes off and it all droops South, I can’t go swimming now. I’m more embarrassed putting a swimsuit on now that I’ve lost the weight than I were when I were massive.

But that, that is obviously self-, that’s being self-conscious of the mess that I am [laughs]. But I can live with that because that doesn’t matter. The, skin and, the baggy skin and the overhang is fine because that’s not impeding on anything. So, I never did it for cosmetic reasons, it was just health wise.

So as long as I’m as fit as I am and as well as I am, and I can go out and do what I did yesterday. We walked for two and a half hours, up hill, down dale. Then I went and danced for four and a half hours last night. I’m quite happy at sixty-two year old to be able to say that I can do that without getting out of breath, without feeling aching, well no, I won’t say that.