Vanessa Feltz has gastric band fitted
By
Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 10:28 AM on 30th June 2010
She has battled with her weight in the glare of the public eye – and has been open about her problems with over-eating.
But TV presenter Vanessa Feltz yesterday revealed that she had undergone a gastric band operation last week after her weight ballooned to 16st 4lb.
Miss Feltz, 48, who lives with her fianc Ben Ofoedu in north London, claimed that she was sick of being labelled the ‘poster girl for fat people’.
The outspoken blonde, who also hosts a BBC London radio show, said that she had wanted to be honest and not fall into the ‘Fern Britton trap’ after her fellow TV host kept her own gastric band operation a secret.
Surgery: After years of struggling with her weight in the public eye, Vanessa Feltz has had a gastric band fitted
A gastric band operation is a type of weight loss surgery where the
size of your stomach is reduced using an adjustable band so that you
can only eat small meals.
Speaking for the first time since her operation in Belgium last
Friday, the mother-of-two admitted that she will now be forced to
live on 1,000 calories a day for the rest of her life.
Last resort for the morbidly obese…
Gastric banding is a surgical procedure that involves fitting a silicone band
around the upper part of your stomach.
This creates a pouch that quickly fills up with food making you feel full. This then passes slowly
through a narrow opening created by the band, into the lower part of
your stomach.
The operation is performed under general anaesthesia. There is usually some bruising, pain and swelling of the skin around the healing wounds.
After the op, patients are on a liquid and pureed diet for a number of days. Eating too much can make you feel sick.
Celebrities who have had gastric bands fitted include TV presenters Fern Britton (pictured below) and Anne Diamond.
Gastric bands are only recommended
on the NHS as a last resort for people who are morbidly obese or who are obese but also have a
serious health condition such as diabetes or heart disease.
The band is designed to remain permanently within your stomach but can be removed if need be.
Complications are rare but there have been cases where the band slips out of place or leaks, requiring a further operation.
Serious infections can sometimes occur as well as damage to other organs in your abdomen.
There have also been cases of patients dying from internal bleeding following gastric band surgery.
She said: ‘I was 16stone 4lb and I want to lose about four or five
stone. Then Cheryl Cole and I would look identical – you wouldn’t be
able to tell us apart. I could be her body double! At the moment I’m a
size 18-20, but I’d like to be nearer to a 12.
‘I’m not unhappy, but I did wonder how fat I was going to get. I’ve
had enough of being defined by it.
‘How many more years do I have to be
the poster girl for fat people? I’d like it not to be an issue any
more. I’ve had my bottom plastered over magazines and it does upset me.’
The star did admit: ‘I feel it’s a shame I’ve had to do it – I wish
I’d had the self-control and willpower to do it on my own.
‘Part of me
thinks I believe I’ve had an operation to do what most people can do
just by saying no to the dessert trolley. I feel like it was the last
resort. I didn’t have it in me to do it all by myself again.’
Miss Feltz said: ‘I have had a real issue with weight and I haven’t been able to conquer it myself.
‘I don’t smoke, I hardly drink, I’m a nice girl, I’m a good mum, I’m
not off having wild sex with strangers so I think that part of me feels
entitled to some trifle!’
Miss Feltz is now on a diet of liquids as she recovers from the
keyhole surgery and was open about her fears of surgery as she said: ‘I
did think I didn’t want to die on the operating table. I’d rather live
and be fat and happy than die trying to get thinner.
‘I’d lost and gained the same four to six stone four times in ten
years – the psychological lesson, just stop eating so much, seems to
only be possible for a certain length of time with me.’
She added ‘I did think when coming around from the anaesthetic – f***
the facelift! Operations are bloody serious and I’m not having another
general anaesthetic for vanity. Let me just be slim and old.’
Miss Feltz said she was looking forward to the ‘luxury’ of buying off the peg clothing.
The presenter is well known for her fluctuating weight and made fun
of her size when she launched her TV career with a stint on the Big
Breakfast and then won her own ITV talkshow Vanessa in the 1990s.
However, after her husband Michael Kurer – the father of her
daughters Allegra, 24, and Saskia, 20 – left her in 1999, Miss Feltz
lost four stone and showed off her new figure in a swimsuit on the
front of a national newspaper.
She then had a six-year relationship with her fitness trainer Dennis Duhaney, before meeting her fianc singer Ben Ofoedu.
But Miss Feltz was reduced to appearing on reality TV show Celebrity Fit Club in 2004 after she put all her weight back on.
She even made a guest spot on BBC comedy Little Britain, playing a
spokeswoman for fictional slimming club Fat Fighters, alongside
atrocious weight watcher Marjorie Dawes, played by Matt Lucas.
Vanessa Feltz with her fiance Ben Ofoedu earlier this month. The radio presenter said she had been determined to go through with the operation despite putting Ben and her girls ‘through it’
Miss Feltz said she had tried to lose the weight by exercise and
diet, saying: ‘I’ve done no carbs, low fat, eating very little – apart
from sushi – all kinds of heavy dieting. As Marjorie Dawes would say I
was eating nothing but dust!
‘And I exercised and I have lost lots of weight in the past, but the
same thing always happens – I lose it. I’m really thrilled, so I
celebrate with a piece of cake and that’s yo-yo dieting.
‘At some point you become your real self again and my real self is
an over eater. Each time you put the weight back on a little bit
quicker and you end up heavier and then you have to do it all again and
it’s much harder as each time I’m older.’
Miss Feltz joked to OK! Magazine her wedding had been postponed to
pay for the operation, and laughed that when she did marry: ‘I’ll be
the skinniest, size zero bride the world has ever seen!
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We LOVE you Vanessa! Good for you and good for your honesty – you put Fern to shame! That’s why we love and support you xxx
- Dredgette, London, 30/6/2010 10:55
If she’s 16 stone in that picture, she’d have to be about 4’11″!
- Krauti, London, 30/6/2010 10:52
Tracy, North Wales – 9.57
I’m 11st 9lbs and a size 18!! So no way is she telling the truth!!
- law-abiding citizen, UK not EU, 30/6/2010 10:47
If she hadn’t lied and said that the most she had been was a size 18 and she got down to a size 10 after her divorce (did anyone notice that?) she would have seen she was overweight, I doubt she has been less that an 18 fore many years and she is at least a 22 now.
- Linda, London, 30/6/2010 10:46
And for years she told us it was no shame to be fat, and how she had to go to chain stores in New York to buy her clothes. Spare me. It isn’t a case of being bigoted, she should tell the truth about why she’s decided on the operation after a public career telling other obese people that it was fine to be so.
- Margaret, Warwickshire, England, 30/6/2010 10:45
Aaww good for her!! Bet she’s going to look lovely once she’s lost all that weight.
What I admire about her is she’s always happy and smiling in photos. She doesn’t let any of the fat jibes get to her and she’s clearly doing this for herself. Who doesn’t want to lose weight for their wedding?
- Jennifer, Leeds, 30/6/2010 10:43
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