Many people think that weight loss surgery is just about losing weight. People who have had the surgery and have experienced dramatic weight loss say it’s physical, but it’s also mental.  

Dora Serna gained weight gradually over the years after having her children. She didn’t realize how heavy she had become until she saw her description on a medical chart after gall bladder surgery that listed her as ‘morbidly obese.’ Shortly after that she read a journal article that said life expectancy for morbidly obese people was seven to ten years shorter. The one-two punch got her attention. “I had tried Atkins, Weight Watchers, Nutrisystem – all of them and many others, but nothing worked,” says Dora.

“At 257 pounds I couldn’t do a lot of things. We never took the kids snow skiing for Christmas because I didn’t think there would be clothes big enough for me, not to mention what I would look like in them. I was always careful to pick a seat at the movies or on airplanes where no one would have to get stuck sitting next to ‘the fat woman’. I didn’t ride the rides at amusement or water parks because, what if the bar didn’t close and I would have to get off? I didn’t want to embarrass my children. When my husband and I went out, I always looked around the room to see if I was the fattest person… and I always was. I guess other fat people just didn’t go out, Dora says with a smile.”

Two of Dora’s friends had lost weight after bariatric surgery, so she went to see Dr. Sonny Cavazos at the Texas Center for Medical and Surgical Weight Loss. Eight months after the procedure Dora had lost 100 pounds. Today she is a tiny and svelte 124 pounds and wears a size four dress. Her biggest “Aha!” moment was when her daughter saw her. “I hadn’t seen my daughter since the surgery and when she saw me at a restaurant, she didn’t recognize me. My husband had to tell her it was me. I didn’t see myself as that different, but everyone else did.”

Dora’s husband George is her rock. They are inseparable after 35 years of marriage, and he has loved her literally through thick and thin. He even helps her shop for clothes. “I joke that it was my husband’s fault that I got so big because he loved me unconditionally,” says Dora. “At first I felt guilty spending money on myself, but if I had known what I know now, I would have done it a lot earlier. We would have mortgaged the house if we had to.”

Dora says she’s much more active now. She exercises every day, takes the stairs instead of the elevator and on a recent vacation even climbed a waterfall. Her blood pressure is down too but the most important thing is the extra time she will have. “The bonus to all of this is that I will be here for my family.”

For more information on weight loss surgery and to see more inspirational stories about men and women who have changed their lives with weight loss surgery, go to bariatricsa.com or call 297-1055.