Hi Pam, Jeff, physically its straightforward, they use the reaidual stomach from the sleeve and do a normal bypass.
Pam, the reasons were mainly that the sleeve just never quite worked for me as it should have. Partly the sleeve itself was on the large size. Of course it was smaller than my original stomach but each surgeon does it differently and my first one made sleeves a bit on the larger side. But it wasn't all the surgeon's fault. By any means. A lot of the failure was down to me. I hadn't taken seriously the need to change my habits and learn new ones. I thought the sleeve would do it all for me. And it did for the first month or two but then I started eating in my old ways. Too much sugar and fat. Mmmm donuts and chocolate! And so I went from 17 stone 7 down to 13 Stone 8 and then back up to 15. Donuts and chocolate! My decisions to go with the bypass we're little different to the reasons going for the sleeve - better health, longer life, looking more like the me I feel inside. The difference is that I know this time that I have a limited window in which to lose the weight AND change my relationship with food. I know also that the bypass gives me both restriction and malabsorption so should give me a better weight loss result anyway. And so far it really has! I'm losing weight more consistently and more rapidly than I did with the sleeve even though I'm starting from a lower weight. I'm now at 13 stone 3 just five weeks out. My taste buds seem to have changed (I want good food) which didn't happen with the sleeve. Everyone is different but for me the bypass was the right way to go. It might have been better to have a bypass in the first place but I was scared to go with it as it seemed too extreme to me then. It doesn't now. And there's no point having regrets. Better to go forward positively. The one downside with the rapid weight loss is that it is causing some gallbladder issues. But I can deal with those. A bit of a long post but I hope it's helpful. What were you problems with the sleeve?
