I have not told anyone at work about my WLS. And I mean no-one.

I am a remote worker for a very large company where the office for my team is headquartered on the east coast (I work their hours plus more). Since we have had a travel freeze, I have not visited them since Feb this year (9 months ago). This week I am going to be having a casual lunch with another coworker who works remote like me. She wanted to get together with me because it has been awhile. She will be bringing her husband and I will be bringing my wife.

That is the setup. I don't want everyone in the office on the east coast to know I have had WLS because I guess there is still a lot of negativity around the subject coming from others and I really don't want to tell the same story to 40+ people.. I would rather say at the lunch that I have just been watching my diet and exercising. This is the truth, just not the whole truth. I don't want to lie to them either because everyone really gets along with everyone else ( rare in corp offices today). I am also a fairly honest person so feel uncomfortable about telling even small 1/2 truths.

I am looking for a graceful way to handle this because the person I am meeting last saw me in Feb when I was 360 or so. i dropped to 335 lb by surgery date at beginning of July and am now 215 lb 4 months later post op. She is going to notice! And then I will have some explaining to do and then it will get back to the rest of the team. And then I will have more explaining to do. I don't want it to become gossipy or political as I really like my job and don't want to lose it should things get out of hand. We typically are not gossipy as a team and it is forbidden in the code of ethics. However, you never know. One other thing is that I have known coworker and husband for 6 years and we used to work together at my prior job. I would say we are really good friends when it comes to work activities, but not friends really outside of work. She is also in a higher ranking position then me and has established herself very well with management; she is more valuable then I if there were ever any need to choose.

Do you think 9 months is essentially enough to attribute 25 pre op + 120 post op weight loss to diet and exercise when I meet her in a couple days?

What would you do?

I have only told family and a few close friends... Why not say you have been on a strict medically supervised diet? It is true, and frankly your PHI (personal health information) is none of their business. If you were going through a health crisis - God forbid - would you feel dishonest not sharing everything you had been through? There are a lot of medical conditions - incontinence to impotence that deciding NOT to share with every Tom, d**k and Harry does not make you dishonest... Share only what YOU feel comfortable with. Frankly, too many people overshare personal information, in my opinion... do you share your salary info with these people? Then why share your health information?

Thank you everyone for your kind, thoughtful and practical responses. This forum is really great for support.

Thank you everyone for your kind' date=' thoughtful and practical responses. This forum is really great for support.[/quote']

Well today is the day. T minus 2 hours. My wife is pushing me to be completely transparent about the WLS because " it is not fair to all those who are trying to lose weight without WLS" not sure I agree with her on that one mainly because she may have WLS is the near future herself. I am still on the fence about which direction to go, but m going to error on the side of less transparency mainly because of the issues I pointed out in my ordinal post.

I lost 110 pounds in 10 months on Atkins, Adipex, and psychopathic work-outs at the gym, early am and pm. No one believed that I didn't have surgery either, until they saw how fast I gained it back, then they gossiped even more. You can't win this one, my friend. You're fodder for gossip either way. Good Luck with whatever you decide.

How did it go?

Sent from my iPhone using VST

How did it go?

Sent from my iPhone using VST

It actually went really really well. The topic of weight loss did not even come up it was a total shocker to me

I actually started to have the opposite feelings -- I felt like I had to stop crediting my weight loss surgery for my continued loss/conditioning.

I was always transparent and would answer that I lost weight through weight-loss surgery, but I became unsatisfied with that answer. I have done more than just WLS. I completely changed my diet and began exercising regularly and the WLS answer dismissed all of that hard work.

I still don't hide that I had WLS, but I am more likely to answer Zumba than WLS when asked. I truly believe that I lost all that I am going to because of WLS by about 5 months and everything since then has been me. The WLS makes it easier for me to eat smaller sizes, but I am not losing because of WLS. I am not gaining muscle because of WLS. I am not reducing my fat percentage and living a more active life style because of WLS; those changes are because of my actions and choices that started when I chose to have WLS.

I have lost almost 30lbs and not a single comment from anyone yet, except one coworker said that obviously my vacation did me good because I looked well rested and great. That tells me a few things. Of course I wear clothes that are not very snug to hide as much fat as I can delude myself into thinking I am hiding. Another is that perhaps that initial loss is not as obvious as when you get into bigger weight loss numbers.

Whatever the reason, I'm glad nobody has asked.

I've also worried about the many work lunches I've had to go to where I ordered a cup of Soup or a piece of chicken and could hardly eat but a few bites. But nobody has said a word.