Oh, and Dietkitty- I searched for an old article in the paper by Anne Diamond who did what your friend is planning to do
'Dear Fern, you look fantastic, but...' Anne Diamond warns of the trials of a gastric band op | Mail Online
an extract from it:-
"By the time my weight reached 15 stone 10lb, I had never felt so bad about my body. I remember going onto my computer and Googling 'jaw-wiring', telling myself that I would simply have my jaws wired to stop me eating. I was that desperate to lose weight.
Then a friend told me about a gastric band operation she'd had in Belgium. She'd been obese as a child, as a teenager and as a young woman and for her it had been a huge success. The weight had dropped off so easily, she told me: 'I wish I'd had it done 20 years ago.'
My mind was made up. Why Belgium? For one thing the operation cost £4,000, compared with £8,000 in Britain, and there was something appealing about having the procedure in a foreign country, where no one knew me and I could keep it secret, because it is shaming to not be able to control your weight.
But the reality is that it is terrifying undergoing a general anaesthetic in a foreign country and being cared for by nurses who cannot speak good English.
It is frightening returning home, wondering how you are going to manage your new life and being hundreds of miles and several hours away from the surgeon should anything go wrong.
And, as we are becoming increasingly aware, things do go wrong and the NHS often has to perform corrective surgery on those unfortunate people for whom it does. My surgery in Belgium, although I went to a respectable surgeon, was an unedifying failure, not a success.
Yes, I lost 10lb in the first four weeks, which delighted me, but that was because I was eating soup and yoghurt as recommended and my appetite was curbed following the surgery, but there was no feeling of restriction in my stomach.
Once I started eating normally again, I put the weight back on in a matter of weeks. In fact the £4,000 I spent would prove to be a complete waste of money because I would later discover that the band had been put in the wrong place, at the base of the oesophagus - instead of round the stomach - where it could not be properly tightened.
Putting all that weight back on made me feel upset and, quite frankly, silly. I'd gone all that way and spent all that money on an operation that hadn't worked.
People have asked me 'Why didn't you go back to have it corrected?' or 'Why didn't you sue?', but it all boils down to a sense of shame again. I felt it was my fault it hadn't worked.
I didn't want people to find out, and for a bright light to be shone onto this one part of my life I felt I couldn't control - I'm sure you felt the same, Fern, which is why you decided not to tell anyone.
Six months after the first failed procedure, I underwent a second gastric band operation in a private
London hospital and immediately noticed a huge difference.
This time, when I ate I felt full quickly and I physically couldn't consume any more. I would sit in a restaurant and happily watch the waiter take away my plate after I'd eaten just a quarter of my meal, knowing I couldn't force down another morsel even if I had wanted to.
The weight dropped off and I was thrilled. I dropped a dress size a month and lost about three stone before my weight reached a plateau, and I'm having to work hard to keep the momentum going.
One of the biggest problems, which I hadn't anticipated, is occasionally how resentful you can feel at not being able to eat 'normally' like other people, and there are times when the calories creep up.
Because I felt full quickly, I would eat only a quarter of what I ate before, but instead of having three meals a day, I would find myself constantly grazing on small amounts through the day - and if you are taking in the same amount of calories then you don't lose weight. "