I am dismayed to read that spending on gastric bands in Suffolk has soared in the last 3 years and last year was nearly £500,000.   I know that the medical profession is insistent that this is potentially the only ‘life-saving’ solution in certain cases, but in my view an operation which is so expensive and carries grave and disturbing risks, such as deep vein thrombosis, blood clots, blockage of the stomach outlet, infection, bleeding and in a few cases, death, should be performed very rarely.    However, it now seems that, in certain cases, people are deliberately putting on weight in order to reach the BMI needed to have a gastric band fitted.  This is a quite ludicrous, not to say dangerous situation, when there are other alternatives.

I will not deny that the obesity problem needs to be adressed – we are rapidly heading into a crisis situation, with many youngsters now being classed as overweight and obese.  What really concerns me is that some children are now being considered for gastric banding, and so this potentially deadly surgery is being performed on youngsters whose problems have been caused by negligent parents.

When clients come to me with weight issues, I explain that it is really quite simple – being overweight is the result of eating too much and exercising too little, very rarely is obesity caused by a purely medical condition.

Of course the real problem is that, usually, the client has been using food for emotional comfort and not simply as a source of sustenance.

Hypnotherapy and NLP can help the client to get to the root problem as to why they are overeating, and can also develop and reinforce better lifestyle habits, such as regular exercise and eating smaller and healthier food portions.   No food is out of bounds, but there is a natural tendency to be drawn towards healthy, nutritious food, as the client discovers how much better he feels by cutting out the junk.

I am ever hopeful that the NHS and the medical profession will one day start to consider this type of treatment as much safer, more practical, cheaper and in the long-term more successful at helping people to develop better, healthier lifestyles, rather than resorting to this, expensive, dangerous surgery.

If you have a weight issue, and you would like to discuss hypnotherapy treatment for this, please do not hesitate to contact me on 01449 780352 or 0781 7158429 or email me on wendy@wendychalk.co.uk.