My name is Butch Hart and I’m originally from Gilmore City, Iowa and I now live in Round Rock Texas with the family. We lived here since the early 80s and I am a vice-president of supply chain management for Lockheed Martin Corporation. I’m a proud father, grandfather and I’m a big gardener. I’m very involved in sports. I’m a part-time sports writer for the Austin American-Statesman newspaper and have been since the early 80s. I cover a lot of high school sports. I am very much active in terms of walking and doing a lot of those kinds of things but and I played – I was a college athlete. I continued to get heavier and I just kind of continued to grow and continue to get bigger and then my daughter started me on this path by saying dad I don’t know any 500 pound 16 year old man and that was really kind of a wake-up call. Really had not a lot of serious health issues previously but that was really a wake-up call that I had to make some significant changes in my life.

The very day – when my sons were younger I coached them in sports into things and by the time my daughter came along who is 28 years old now I was coaching her but I no longer could do a lot of the drills and a lot of the types of thing and so I kind of dismissed that as meanwhile there’s younger fathers that could do that and I realized it wasn’t that it was younger fathers. It was things like not being able to tie your shoes but not realizing that we’re having to make a big effort or to – I travel a great deal at work and to fly on an airplane you always had to look for an aisle seat hopefully nobody’s next to you flip up the arm get a seat belt extension all of those kinds of subtle things that you don’t necessarily realize. So at family we had to go by dining room sets. We had a fat chair steel reinforcement chair that sat at the end that I sat in. You couldn’t sit when you would visit people you couldn’t sit in public chairs I actually sat in a plastic chair in a outside bar in Baltimore and totally destroyed the chair. It totally just and then looking back that chair probably could support 250 pounds and I was 450 pounds that chair never had a chance.

There was a couple of things on getting involved in making the decision on gastric bypass. I cheated a little bit because I had a younger brother who had gotten to be almost 400 pounds and he had this surgery several years before in California. So I started looking around and started realizing I had lost a little bit of weight but I needed to make that step. I did internet research on bypass, sleeve lap-band and then I started talking to a couple other doctors. Dr. Ganta’s name came up a couple of times as being a guy who was highly regarded in the area of bariatric surgery. He had a good reputation and so I took the free seminar here at the hospital with him. He’s a very likable fellow. He’s non-judgmental. Very likeable man and since I’d already heard professionally he was a good doctor I thought well let’s go ahead and start preceding. Absolutely the right decision of a lifetime. It’s – he made – he never was judgmental. He never made me feel bad about being so fat.

I think it’s critical that you have people on staff that have had the procedure because as you come into an office place it is a bit intimidating to see a lot of skinny people that are young, that have never wrestled with a weight problem. You can see it in the eyes of people that have had the procedure. They’re happier and they are exciting for you that you’re going down this step. Having that reinforcement is absolutely critical because you really need that reinforcement early. Even when you’ve made the decision to have it done you’re haunted with some well maybe I could just do better on diet or maybe you’ve given up and you’re just going to be fat. When you go into an office and the people have already had the procedure and you see the effect you see the after and they’re not preaching to you. They’re supportive of you I think having people on staff that have had the procedure is a huge asset.

It’s a little reinforcements everyday and candidly there is nothing better than running into somebody that you haven’t seen in four or five years and when you’re an older person you have that happen former colleague or somebody who you haven’t seen for five years and frequently they don’t recognize you. I waved at a fellow who was a close friend who went to work for company back East. I saw him at the Dallas airport I waved at him and he kind of waved that waved it’s like you actually waving at me 20 later he walked over and he said excuse me you are Butch Hart. So who am I Jim? And he’s like and he gives me a big hug he goes I did not recognize you because I wasn’t even sure you were waving at me. He goes you were this strange guy he goes and then I stared at you as you were working on your laptop because I realize like oh my god he decided to come over because I made the plunge and it’s like I thought you were Butch but I wasn’t exactly sure. The reward to you personally for those kinds of things people are happy for you but it’s like you’re not the same person. You’re a better person. It’s kind of fun. I think the key thing is you need to find a doctor that you connect with that’s where Dr. Ganta in terms of losing weight and being prepared to go through this you need to mentally buy into what’s going to be done. You need to talk to people like myself to other people here. It’s not easy. It’s doable it’s absolutely worth it. The horrible diet that you have to go on to and that Dr. Ganta wants you to lose 10% of your body weight before he will allow it. That’s really a training ground that you need to pay attention to, you need to mentally commit to doing that because if you commit to doing that once you have the procedure you’re going to have these wonderful results. If you don’t commit to doing that then the procedure is not worth it.

So you have to mentally commit to and generally it’s really not hard for anybody that’s actually tried a lot of diets. It’s not hard to mentally commit to doing this but when somebody kind of half-half arms it to say well I’m going to try this as a push them not the right attitude. You want to be in for the dime and for the dollar. You want to be all the way.

It’s the biggest rush in the world. It is absolutely the biggest rush in the world. I went in and I had bought a nice scale that would weigh me up to like 500 pounds. I weigh every single day I keep an eye on that every single day and I chart I’ve got spreadsheets and charts on my way. It is unbelievable to look at a chart that takes you from 450 to 375 I chart it by the day, by the month, by the week is that line is just down and now to the point where I don’t want to be any less but I weigh every day because I want to make sure I can candidly that I don’t lose any more weight. I’m at 225 now that’s below what I thought I would ever get to. I was my target at all this was to get to 250 and I blew through that and I got to do 225. Now I need to make sure that I eat enough and keep that weight right there so you continue. It is the most rewarding rush in the world to step on that scale than to be down. It’s like oh my this is — is this really me. It’s incredible.