On June 3, 2000, I was feeling very depressed and like a complete failure. I had to go see the Dr. about some health issues but I kept stalling because I didn't want my Dr. to know that I had gained back the 58 lb. that I had lost the year prior. I finally made the appointment in hopes that he had a new miracle drug to fix my weight problem. He said that I now had high blood pressure to add to the list of other problems. He told me about one of his patience that had a weight loss procedure where they placed a band around the stomach to partition off a large part of the stomach so you can only hold a small amount of food causing you to loose weight. He said that they were having very good results at a surgery center in Utah and to check with my insurance company to see if this type of procedure would be covered. I left with hope that there was some way of getting rid of this extra weight for good. I went home with a referral to the Dr. in Utah and a load of questions. It was a Friday night so I had to wait until Monday to call. I turned to the Internet and discovered there were a lot of people like me searching for answers. I eventually found the obesity site and started researching. I read many posts about the pro's and con's to weight loss surgery. I found several different kinds of procedures and became very confused. By the end of my research I had decided that the banded surgery was definitely not for me. I had read way to many posts about people trying to get their insurance companies to pay to have the surgery reversed. I read about 300 posts about success stories, what I could expect after the surgery and I emailed several people who had complications from the different surgeries I asked a lot of questions and waited for responses. I received an email from a lady who's son had died during his weight loss surgery. As I read her letter I just cried. She told me his whole story and all the research he had done before deciding on having a procedure called the Duodenal Switch. She said he was over 400# and that his body was so damaged from the excess weight that his heart just gave out during the surgery.  She gave me the web address to the DS site and said that she still felt that the DS procedure was the best tool out there for over with people as you could live a normal life after this kind of surgery.  She said that most of the other surgeries cause you to throw up if you over eat or if you eat too much sugar you break into a sweat and feel instantly sick. I spent 6 hours on the DS site reading everything I could. I emailed one of the surgeons and later that evening I received a call from Dr. Keihishian. We talked for a long time and I felt like I had known him for years.  I set an appointment for a consultation in June and the team from Dr. K's office helped me get insurance approval. One thing that Dr. K insisted on was getting to know my primary care physician as I live in Nevada and he is located in Delano CA. He said that I could have all my pre testing done here as it was important to include my local Dr. as much as possible to educate him on this procedure in case of an emergency. On July 18, 2000, I had the open DS procedure and within one hour of my recovery I was up and walking. I was so pre pared because of the pre op classes and the DS wed site. I was ready to be released after the third day however because I lived 6 hours away we decided it was best I stay a couple more days. My husband stayed in the room with me and the care and treatment was something we had never seen before.  The room was set up with bariatric bed to ease the pain of getting up and down and it even had a trapeze to hold on to for support. There was a large comfy recliner for times you felt like sitting up, a fan in case you felt a little warm, a chair in the shower so you could sit down and foot pumps to keep the blood circulating while you slept to prevent blood clotting. The special attention to details and a great nursing staff made traveling so far worth while. I can do my check ups here at my local Dr. but so far I have wanted to go down for my follow ups so I can attend the on going support meetings that are held monthly. I am now almost 14 months post op and I have dropped110 lbs. I am so grateful for God for opening the doors for me and thankful for the young mans mother who felt it important to tell me about the DS procedure.

Hi, my name is Barbara and I designed this site to share my weight loss story and encourage others.

This page was last updated on: October 20, 2001

I had the  Duodenal Switch on July 18, 2000 and it changed my life!