One of the readers offered this account, and since I am asked so often about the procedure and what to expect, I imagine there are many folks who would be interested in reading it.

To me, it is more an object lesson in belief systems than anything else, but it certainly describes a not-uncommon outcome of this particular surgery.

Dear Heidi,

I know of a middle age person who weighs 200 lbs. and had a gastric bypass 5 weeks ago.

For 2 weeks PTA, this person had daily epigastric pain lasting 1 to 3 hours. They finally went to the E.D. and were treated for dehydration and sent home.

The next day they went to their surgeon's office and was admitted to the hosp. There they subsequently started having bright red blood emesis and stools. They were scoped and an ulcer was visualised and cauterised.

They continued to bleed so they were scoped again and a clot was moved and the splenic artery started spurting out blood. They were taken to the O.R. for emergent surgery and revision of their gastric bypass.

Two other surgeons were called into the O.R.. They ran out of O, RH- blood so this person received O pos. blood for 24 hours. Their SBP was in the 60s and 70s despite massive fluid resuscitation. Their cardiac monitor showed runs of nonsustained SVT and VT.

After 4 days, they were finally able to come off the ventilator and the first words out of their mouth was what a great surgeon they had because this surgeon was able to save their life!!! How thankful and appreciative they are for this great gastric bypass surgeon! I didn't say this but I was thinking they wouldn't need to have their life saved if they never had the gastric bypass surgery in the first place!

This "gastric bypass person" who came in "dehydrated" has now gone 4 days with out any nutrition(only received regular i.v. fluid). I asked the surgeon about giving them some nutrition and the reply was, I'm not feeding them thru a groin line and the gut isn't ready yet.

This person is so weak they can barely breathe and the pain and suffering they have gone thru is UNREAL!!!Other than being over weight this was a healthy person before surgery.

I don't understand how anyone in their right mind could ask to have a gastric bypass surgery. I have followed the BTD diet for several years and have never been healthier!! I eat all I want and never go hungry and my est. body fat is 20%, I'm female. I turned to the BTD because I was over weight and my healh was deteriorating. I can never thank you and Dr.D'Adamo enough for all the help I have received. Please sign this anonymous, for confidential reasons.

Thank you, dear! I know people who've had this surgery -- because they wanted to "eat what they want." The thing that never occurs to them is that eating what they want created the excess weight... and continuing to eat what they want will return them to their former state, except that now they'll have the complications of major surgery to contend with as well.

The BTD changes what you "want to eat!" That, to me, sets it utterly apart from any other diet program. In addition, it solves the weight problems while sneakily working behind the scenes in a multitude of other ways -- so while you're slimming and trimming, you feel marvelous -- and keep discovering little happy "side effects" as time goes on.

Worth mentioning, and passing on to others! :-D