Telling your children

[K9chita 14]

I have had no problem telling my wife, sibblings, parents and close friends of my decision to have WLS. I am finding it hard to firgure out a way to tell my kids, who are 8 and 10. Thoughts?

[kwigillingok 177]

My kids are older, 13 and 18 so talking to them about the surgery wasn't difficult at all. The first thing my daughter said was she didn't want me to die (we watch too much Grey's Anatomy lol) but once we actually sat down and talked about what the surgery was and went over the risks and how frequently they occur she was good. Now I just annoy her by telling her which of her clothes I'll be borrowing someday soon! My son is all for it because he knows it will make me happy.

You know your kids and what they can handle, so maybe just start off by saying your going to have a surgery and let them steer the conversation. You answer the questions they ask, as they come up.

[tdutko75 6]

My kids at 9 & 6 so I kept it pretty simple. Mom is going to have a surgery that is going to help her lose weight so that she can do more things with you. When I told them my 9 year old said you just need to exercise more to lose weight... I said that does work for everyone and that I'm doing this to be around for along time. They both seemed nervous about it but ok

[Roo101769 742]

I told my four year old mommy was going to have surgery to get skinny. No use trying to explain health benefits or necessity to her at that age. Actually she had a little bit of a hard time dealing with mommy "getting skinny" because all she has ever known me as has been obese. She even told me I wasn't fat and to stay the way I am. But when I pointed out all the things I can't do with her now, that I will be able to do once I lose weight, she was soon on board. Now she just says "your not skinny yet". LOL

[NiciL 2]

I have a 12 & 10 year old. I was totally honest with them. My 12 year old seemed ok with it. First thing out of my 10 year olds mouth was no you are fine how you are. Then followed up by you could die. It was really hard helping him get an ok attitude about it. But I'm 7 days post op & doing great now. Days 1-5 were no picnic, hospitalized most of the time due to problems. That was hard on both kids. Just glad to be doing good now. Great to see my kids feel like mommy is ok again.

[K9chita 14]

I have a 12 & 10 year old. I was totally honest with them. My 12 year old seemed ok with it. First thing out of my 10 year olds mouth was no you are fine how you are. Then followed up by you could die. It was really hard helping him get an ok attitude about it. But I'm 7 days post op & doing great now. Days 1-5 were no picnic, hospitalized most of the time due to problems. That was hard on both kids. Just glad to be doing good now. Great to see my kids feel like mommy is ok again.

Glad to hear you're doing well...

[Pookeyism 1,143]

8 and 10 year olds are hard to predict. It really varies. What they watch on TV and personality type might help you address this. You know your kids. Last emergency what happened? Do they panic, revert? Want answers, get in the internet? Read? Pull out their art supplies?

http://www.aboutoperations.co.uk/explaining-hospital-stay-to-children.html

I am a little different than most when it comes to children, I think because my Mother started taking seizures when I was 9 years old and I was pretty much a beta mom after that. My philosophy is your kids are tougher than you think, BUT you can still ease a situation and find a medium between protection (to sooth your worries) and buffering it too much (what I call the process of letting them know what is going on).

As a kid, I began to get extremely anxious as I was coddled or talked to in an overy simplstic manner, mostly because I think I linked it back to the way I was treated in regards to my Mom and her care.

One more thing, I would highly suggest you not promise everything will be ok. If you must promise, promise that you are folllowing all the doctors advise and rules, that they will be taken good care of while you are gone, and they will be kept updated. Also spell out what they can do, so they can own the situation. Let them help prepare your food, pack your clothes, and make a list of responsibilities while you are away and recovering, something they can see, that they can see they are contributing.

Good luck. I only had rabbits...

[M2G 1,836]

So it has been about 3 years since I told my kids. I went back to read about it on my blog because it has been so long... (my husband and I are BOTH sleeved about 5 months apart, I went first...)

Basically telling my daughters about my surgery was probably THE hardest part about having surgery. At the time (circa Oct. 2010) my two girls were 8 and 9 (almost 10). I have read about so many children (girls in particular) who start their young lives with body issues, body image distortions, and many young girls develop eating disorders. In telling them about my surgery, I didn't want MY failures to become THEIR failures. We do not call ourselves fat, we emphasize healthy eating, basically trying to model good habits for them. BUT, we also had to explain WHY we NEEDED surgery.

We talked about having this surgery so that we could lose weight, eat less and generally be healthier and live a long enough life to watch them grow up, and watch our future possible grandchildren grow up as well. They didn't have a lot of questions at first, but we told them they could ask anything anytime and that we would talk about it. We also said it wasn't something that we wanted them to broadcast to the entire universe, that it was personal and medical. They were GREAT about that I do have to say. My youngest just a few days before surgery told me "but Mommy, I like you just the way you are." :wub:

Now that it has been almost 3 years later, they know more about it but our eating habits have become "normal" for us. We don't drink when we eat and in fact (bad mom) I don't offer THEM anything to drink. If they want a drink it's up to them to fetch it (they are now 11 and almost 13) and they just know the drill. Sometimes I will emphasis Portion Control to them and my youngest...sometimes she gets a little ticked at me for having her cut back...and will say "well, not EVERYONE has the stomach the size of a squirrel!" True words...lol. So it's times like that when I'm reminded OH they DO get it and understand.

One last piece of advice...not sure where you are at in the process, but I didn't tell my kids until about 3 weeks before surgery. I wanted them to have time to "process" but not enough time to "worry" if that makes any sense...