KEY POINTS:
Sarah Woodfield has lost more than 100kg since she started on her path to obesity surgery.
"The heaviest I ever weighed was 198kg," says the 32-year-old Auckland financial account manager, who now weighs 88kg.
She was on the way to developing type 2 diabetes and her health was at serious risk. "I would have been dead within 10 years."
She had repeatedly tried to lose weight and did not want surgery. But after managing to shed 12kg in 10 months, she realised she had to consider an operation.
The surgeon immediately booked her for the operation and urged losing as much weight as possible beforehand: she shed a further 22kg, using meal replacements, in 10 weeks, taking her down to 164kg.
Miss Woodfield had state-funded gastric bypass surgery at North Shore Hospital in November 2005, an event that changed her life forever.
Gone are the days of having to have all her clothes made specially and of "constantly feeling I had to apologise for taking up too much space. It gives you the hope and the control."
The operation makes people feel full more quickly because instead of going through the whole stomach, food passes through a small pouch made out of the stomach.
Miss Woodfield exercises regularly and limits her eating to three small meals a day. A typical dinner of stew or dahl with rice and vegetables would
be no more than 1.5 cups in total volume.
Treats still feature, but in small amounts. "I still eat KFC, but a snack box with one piece and a few chips rather than a whole bucket."
A triumph for her was to take part in the annual Round the Bays event, using a mixture of running and walking.
The surgery has disadvantages. Miss Woodfield has to take dietary supplements and she had plastic surgery in Malaysia to remove excess skin, which left her 7kg lighter.
But she can't imagine going back to her old habits of overeating.
"I will never revert. This is just such a good life."
She considers her old ways an addiction, saying she ate food not to satisfy hunger, but "because it was there".
