From Stress Eating to Bariatric Surgery: Angela Taylor’s New Lease on Life
Atkins. Weight Watchers. Jenny Craig. The Military Diet.
“You name it, I probably tried it,” says Angela Taylor. A self-described “typical young professional living in Charlottesville,” Taylor could not list all of her weight loss efforts without breaking into laughter. It’s a perspective she has gained in her struggles with weight loss on her journey to bariatric surgery.
Stress Eating Through the Turmoil
For Taylor, managing her weight had been a lifelong struggle, compounded by tragic events. While in college, her parents got divorced and her mother suffered a heart attack. This led Taylor to an early bout with stress eating and weight gain.
In 2013, she lost her niece, Alexis Murphy, in a highly publicized abduction and murder case in Nelson County, VA. The stress of this loss and the resulting media frenzy reignited her extreme eating habits.
Then, in 2017, Taylor tragically lost her boyfriend of three years.
“I just started eating away all of my feelings.”
An Unexpected Candidate for Bariatric Surgery
Jennifer Kirby, MD, Taylor’s endocrinologist at UVA, encouraged her to consider bariatric surgery. Initially, Taylor was hesitant because she didn’t consider herself an ideal candidate.
But after meeting with bariatric & general surgeon Peter Hallowell, MD, she understood how her medical history, including high blood pressure and prediabetes, qualified her as an eligible candidate for gastric bypass.
“After an extensive evaluation and discussion with Angela, both she and I felt that a gastric bypass would be the best procedure for her,” Hallowell says.
Considering weight loss surgery?
Learn more about weight loss procedure options at UVA.
There are a number of minimally-invasive weight loss procedures to choose from, including sleeve gastrectomy and gastric bypass. The gastric bypass procedure reduces the stomach, from roughly the size of two and a half fists to the size of a thumb. This procedure requires a life-long commitment to a change in lifestyle, nutrition and exercise habits.
“I said, ‘OK, I want to do this!’, and everyone in my family thought I’d literally lost my mind!” laughs Taylor.
But her consultation with Hallowell gave her hope. “The way I saw it, it was giving me a new lease on life.”
Watch her story below.
Angela Taylor's Bariatric Surgery Story
Life before I decided to have bariatric surgery was just your typical young professional living in Charlottesville.
I always struggled with weight throughout my entire life going on various different diets: Atkins, Weight Watchers several times, Jenny Craig, the military diet... You name it I probably tried it.
I would get the weight off but gain it back. Plus some. Lots of life things that just led me into a place of unhealthy eating.
It just really left no time for me to really care for myself so I just started eating all of my feelings and gained a significant amount of weight.
I think the most I weighed was like 280.
Another reason that led me to having gastric bypass surgery... In January of 2017, I tragically lost my boyfriend of 3 years. His mother Terry has just been a huge support system.
(Terry) She happened into the life of my son. And she was just so good for him and it was so wonderful to be with her. She quickly became one of us.
I can understand her issues because we had the same thing. She was a foodie and good food means a lot.
(Angela) If I do this, I could get rid of my high blood pressure medicine. I won't be prediabetic anymore.
(Peter Hallowell, MD) So Angela's like other patients and the majority of our patients who are fighting with the disease of obesity. Obesity as a disease is, I think, the hurdle for health care going into the 21st century.
(Angela) I'm no longer on high blood pressure medicine or being monitored for prediabetes. I just have a lot more energy. I mean, I've lost 60 pounds. I have another 40 that I want to lose before I hit goal and I just feel like a complete like a completely different person.
(Hallowell) It's super rewarding to be able to do something in surgery where we literally change people's lives.
(Terry Tigner) And then seeing how well Angela did with it and how much better she was in every way was my inspiration to say, "I want that."
(Angela) People often ask if I regret having my surgery. I tell them, "No." It's the best decision that I've ever made in my life.
I wish I actually had done it sooner and I felt all the confidence in the world with Dr. Hallowell and his staff. Everyone in that clinic over there are just so great.
(Terry) There's a spark, there's happiness there's a contentment.
(Angela ) I'm still working to like lose the last 40 pounds. I'm getting married in October so I have a wedding dress to fit into. So that's really is my motivation.
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