Commitment is the Key to Sustained Weight Loss after Surgery

Jenny Lynn Hatter is proud to say she lost 100 pounds … four times.

It wasn’t until she had weight loss surgery in 2015 that she was able to maintain the weight loss. “I thought the last thing I wanted to do was have weight loss surgery, but I knew it was my last shot,” she said.

Jenny Lynn had been overweight her whole life. She had “very bad joints and very good health.”

But she was aware of so many things that brought her embarrassment – going upstairs, sitting at ballgames, flying on an airplane.

“I loved to fly but I detested getting on an airplane,” she said. “The inevitable look you get from someone, who really is not trying to be ugly …”

She loves the water, but always hated going to swim. “I just hated the looks,” Jenny Lynn said. “Once, I heard a gentleman say, ‘oh my goodness.’ It hurt … it always hurt.”

So she would try the newest thing for weight loss, but inevitably the weight came back.

“One day, I was at my high school and an alarm went off,” said Jenny Lynn, chief academic officer at Harrison County Schools. “As an administrator, you kick into action. I went up the steps and I thought I was going to die.”

Her mind raced to these questions – “What if there is a real emergency? How am I going to help the students?”

She saw a commercial for the weight loss program at Saint Joseph East and signed up for a seminar. She knew she really had to listen and she would have to do her part. She had the surgery on a school vacation in 2015. She was told it would take two years to achieve her goal weight; she did it in a year.

Watch the video below to hear from Jenny Lynn Hatter.

“I wish there was a simulation for people to see what it feels like to lose 150 pounds,” Jenny Lynn said. But she stresses, “there’s no smoke and mirrors, no magic dust.”

She’s careful when she goes to the grocery store, and she takes spin classes. It takes a dedication to fitness and healthy eating, she said.

But it’s worth it. “I have so much energy,” she said. “Life is so much more enjoyable. Doing my job was all I had in me. There was nothing left for my husband, my children, my church.”

And even though she “was that obese person who didn’t struggle with super-serious health issues,” she feels healthier now.

It’s not always easy, but the team at Saint Joseph East has kept her on track with “tough love.” She admits to having “excuses for a million different things” and she had to be honest about that or else she would wind up back where she started. If she didn’t think an appointment was going to go well, she wouldn’t make one

“It is so important to never give up,” she said. “Never, ever give up.”

Jenny Lynn said weight loss surgery may not be for everyone, but individuals have to figure that out for themselves. She said the “highly personal decision” can “change your life in amazing ways. It can be a total game changer for you.”

As it has for her. “I never bought into the lifestyle changes before,” she said. “Nobody signs up for this wanting to change for life. This center (at Saint Joseph East) does change for life. This center does slice a lot of that fear out.”

If you would like to learn more about weight loss surgery, be sure to join us for a free seminar. View a complete list of upcoming seminar dates, and register online.