PattiD13
I have been overweight all my life. I can't ever remember being "normal" sized. As I got older, I slowly gained more and more weight, not really thinking over what it was doing to my health. I know I used to say "oh, I'm healthy for a big person", because I did not have high blood pressure or high cholersterol. Well, now I do have high blood pressure and high cholesterol, along with diabetes, sleep apnea, joint problems and a host of other things.
For a few years I had thought about weight loss surgery, but at first I didn't think about it a lot. I was scared of it, so that was that, not going to happen. A few doctors asked me what I thought about it, and I told them that, and they didn't ask again. Then I started thinking about it more and more, and started not being as nervous about the idea, but at that point, I had found out that my insurance would not cover any weight loss surgery.
Then I moved to another state. And I started with a new doctor. He was large himself, which made me even more upset when the first thing he said to me was "you have got to lose weight, or you will die" and "you might have 5 years left". That scared me really badly. I knew I weighed a LOT, and needed to do something. I was becoming trapped in my own home. I couldn't get around in a store without one of those motorized carts they have for disabled people. If I went to WalMart, and they were out of carts at that time (which they ususally were), I had to sit at the front of the store until my husband was done shopping, so I quit going because I didn't want to have to sit there alone if there were no carts. I couldn't get around, and I felt horrible about it.
It was then that I decided I was going to find out as much as I could about WLS and try to get it myself. Two other doctors had mentioned it in passing to me, and I told them my insurance wouldn't pay for it before, and I didn't know if it was covered now. My new PCP said she thought it was, and I was off! I went online and learned everything I could about the one surgery my insurance would cover, Gastric Bypass. I had heard that it was the one that helped you lose the most weight (at the time), but for me, that's what I wanted. I wanted the extra help of having a limit on how much I could eat. It wasn't the change in diet that bothered me, because I had eaten healthy diets without a problem before, it was the amount I ate. And this would help out with that. So it was a case of wanting what I have, I guess. :)
I started looking for doctors that would take me in Dec. '08, and it's now July '09. I have a good team now, and I am almost there I think.
I'm really looking forward to starting the rest of my life!
Updated: October 19, 2012.
I had my surgery in January of 2010, and I do not for one moment regret it. It is one of the best things I could have done for myself. However, I didn't lose as much as I'd hoped before I hit a very long term plateau. (4 or 5 months). I didn't want to not lose more weight, so I went and joined my local Weight Watchers in June of 2011, and have been going ever since. I have lost 83.4 lbs since I started WW last year, for a grand total of 208.6 lbs lost since I reached my highest weight of 444 lbs in 2009.
I have 100 lbs more to go, but having come this far, I know I can do it. GO ME! lol
Update May 13, 2014:
I have now lost 242 lbs, with 114 of that being since I joined WW. I am now working on the process of getting some of my loose skin removed. YAY!
Update January 5, 2016:
I had my skin removal surgery where 13 lbs of skin was taken off. Yay!! I have had several complications, I think partly due to the fact that I am not totally strict when "watching myself" be active. (I think I was being a bit too active). Also, I have diabetes, and even though it is well-controlled, I tend to heal more slowly than someone without.
Problem: I'm eating like crazy. I fully admit it. Emotional eating is causing me lots of problems, and I'm trying to get a hold on it. I'm going back and reading the books that helped me get through and learn how to deal with the changes from the surgery. I am working to get back to the lowest I had gotten so far, and hopefully go past that to my goal weight. I am currently at 237, and I had actually gotten down to 202 at my lowest, down from 444lbs. I'd love to even get to 199. My goal is lower than that, but to be under 200 again, after most of my life being much more, that would just be AWESOME!! I'm taking a year off from school to get myself together and focus on my and my health-mentally, emotionally, and physically.
