annag29

I haven't always been overweight and never really struggled with my weight. The day I had my first baby is the day that changed my life forever. I gained 60+ pounds with my pregnancy and never got used to it. After my first child I had 2 more and every time I gained more and more weight. It was as if my pregnancies triggered something in my body to gain all this weight and after many many diets I still could not lose any of it. Well needless to say after being tired of being overweight I looked into different weight loss surgeries. The lap band being one of them. You would think that with my husband being military and us having this "great" insurance as so many think it would be easy to get approved for any weight loss surgery but it wasn't. I had to jump through hoops let me tell you to get this surgery approved. Any active duty family in the military knows we automatically qualify for TriCare Prime but there was no way they would approve me because I was not "heavy" enough. At 215 and only 5'1" in height my BMI was telling I was morbidly obese but tell that to my insurance people. To them I had to be at a weight of 250 lbs. Are u kidding me?? That would put me at a BMI score of 47, not too healthy for someone who is only 5'1".Either way they said I wasn't heavy enough and since I had no medical conditions they wouldn't even consider me. Well other things then started happening to me. I noticed that when I would sleep for some reason my throat would close and I would literally stop breathing. I started having these little attacks here and there until I said NO MORE! I then had a sleep study and found out I had sleep apnea. I got blood work done and of course my cholesterol was through the roof. I thought to myself nothing good was coming out of me being over weight. So I tried getting approved once again. I tried 4 times total and they still would not approve me. I finally found a little loop hole. If I switched my insurance from Prime to Standard I would automatically be approved but the only drawback would be out of pocket costs. The insurance covers 20% and after you meet their co-pays it covers about 85%. If you ask me this is nothing compared to the lasting effects I would eventually have with me being over weight. So I took the plunge and it worked. I started my pre-op testing back in May and I'm happy to announce I was banded on the 31st of July of this year. I'm happy with my decision of switching my insurance and I can't wait until I start my new life. I'm happy and can't wait to get out there and start exercising so I can get back into shape. I'm most looking forward to the energy I'll have once I lose this weight, so I can enjoy my kiddos a bit more. Another thing is that I can't wait until my husband sees me in December for the first time since he is currently deployed to Iraq. Only good things to look forward to and I can thank all this to this fabulous lap band!!