Going back to a "lighter" time.

• Position: Medicine & Health - Weight loss

Did you ever wish you could go back in time 10, 20, or 30 years and just start over on your weight battle? Before you had to buy a seatbelt extender or take medication for high blood pressure or stay home because you could not climb the bleachers to go to your son's football game? Back when you only had 20 or 30 pounds to lose, not 120 or 130 pounds? If you could just punch a reset button and start over, you know you would have a fighting chance to stay at a healthy weight.

That is what weight loss surgery does. It takes the steering wheel, hits the gas, and accelerates you at warp speed to a weight that always had seemed hopelessly out of reach. It is the ultimate do-over,.

As the pounds come off, however, emotions will break loose that you never even knew were there, not only in yourself, but in your friends, family, and coworkers. If you are not prepared for them, the emotional tide can overwhelm you, sabotaging your weight loss and undoing the physical changes your surgeon made to your body. Most patients never dreamed that the simple loss of weight could create such turmoil.

"The hardest thing for me has been dealing with all the emotional issues. You can bet that whatever has been eating you is going to surface. I didn't realize it then, but I was stuffing things, numbing emotions. I feel everything more intensely now.

I'm glad I [had surgery] even though it was like ripping off a Band-Aid."

"It never occurred to me that other things in my life would change. I just wanted to get healthy, but it affected everything--my marriage, my kids, even my job."

"My husband started out being very supportive. He...