NEW LENOX – Phil Martinez had success with weight loss in the past, but found it very difficult to stay on track.
Over time, he reached 360 pounds; a far cry from the 179 pounds he weighed when he married his wife in 1989. The 55-year-old Joliet psychotherapist decided he needed to take more drastic action in order to be there for his wife, Sarah, and two daughters, Rachel and Marin.
At that point he decided to try dieting, and lost nearly 100 pounds through the Atkins diet. He kept the weight off for over a year, however, he found sustaining it was difficult. Phil didn’t take weight loss surgery lightly.
At first, the thought of laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy gastric sleeve surgery was a little scary to him because it is irreversible. In fact, he researched several practices that specialized in weight loss surgery, including BMI surgery.