Southgrim
I thought it would be nice to add a little bit about me on a more personal level. Not sure where to start, but here goes!
I am a 35 year old, happily married, mother of 5 - 3 in my arms and 2 in His! They are my world! (yeah, I know, every mother says that! LOL)
My struggle with weight started as soon as puberty hit. The women in my family are not small. As soon as I started gaining a few pounds, I was constantly reminded to watch what I ate, which of course made me want to eat more. (I was a very defiant adolescent! *grin*) Although I was not fat in high school, I wasn't as skinny as the cheerleaders etc. I did a few beauty pageants, which helped my ego alot - but I won more on my talents. I still always thought I was fat because I wasn't a size 4. Sounding familiar?
My first taste of freedom was college. I can honestly look back and say that one of the most wonderful things about being "on my own" was that I could eat whenever I wanted to, and however much I wanted to. So, as a result, I gained the "freshmen 25-35" or so. Looking back, I still looked good. Ahhhh youth! I steadily gained from that point on. I had no self control. It wasn't so much the portions, but what I was actually eating. I lived off of junk food - and loved it! Still do! I left college weighing about 150 pounds. I did try to control my weight, and was successful sometimes, but never long term. Atkins was always my diet of choice, but my story differs from no other. I always gained it back plus some. Story of my life.
By the time my wedding rolled around in 1992, I was weighing in at about 165 lbs. Compared to now - I looked great! But the comments were made behind my back even then! Nine months into our marriage, we discovered that we were pregnant! Hmmmm let's just say that I had some serious weight gain! And even that is probably an understatement! At five months pregnant I had already added 40 pounds to my 5'4" frame. I was also diagnosed with pre-elampsia. I was in and out of the hospital almost weekly, and was on complete bedrest. I wasn't even allowed to sit up. It was a very trying time. So I ate, not alot of junk because everything I ate had to be made from scratch with no sodium added at all, but I still managed to eat alot. I did carry my first baby to term, but only after gaining a little over 100 pounds. I did manage to lose half of it rather quickly, but the other half had found a new home and was not going anywhere! LOL A few times, after Atkins again, Scardsdale, Grapefruit, Phen-Phen, etc I managed to get under 200 pounds, but not by much. I think I did get to about 175 for a few weeks, but it was not long lived. I quickly gained back up to over 200 again. UGH! In 1996 I got pregnant with my next child. I miscarried that baby at 13 1/2 weeks. I was heartbroken, and took that loss very hard - so what did I do? ATE! Gained a few more pounds, etc... up and down, up and down - get the picture? 1996 - 1999 were some tough times. After the miscarriage, my body just seemed to stop working properly. Seems the weight yo-yo-ing was catching up with me! We could not get pregnant again. My weight continued to go up and down because I was told to lose weight in order to get pregnant. But I firmly believe that I just did even more damage to my body. So, fertility treatments - here we come! Finally, in July of 1999 we were pregnant again. We were doubly blessed with twins!! Amazing - it was a life long dream of mine. I was on cloud nine! We were having a boy and a girl. Perfect! I was 190 pounds when I got pregnant, and felt pretty good. A few months into my pregnancy - about 5 months again, the old Pre-eclampsia monster crept back up. This time it was severe. I was hospitalized until the babies either had to be delivered, or hopefully could be delivered at a safer time. It was a very stressful time. We had made it to 29 weeks when we got the devastating news that our baby girl's heart had stopped beating. I was then told that I had to continue the pregnancy to try to get our baby boy closer to term. So there I lay, in the hosptial, devistated that my twin dreams had ended, devistated that my daughter was dead, that what I thought was my last chance to have a girl was gone, and that I didn't know what would happen to my baby boy either. I can not describe the stress that I felt, the sadness was overwhelming. I only made it 8 more days, and at 30 weeks, delivered both babies. Hannah was born first, very silently into the world, and Nicholas came a moment later in distress. This was December 21st. Nicholas was sent to the NICU to fight for his life. I was discharged from the hospital on Christmas Eve. We left the hospital and went to the funeral home to pick up our daughter's ashes. We chose to cremate her so that if our other baby - God forbid - left this world, they could be placed together. Those days were full of such heartwrenching decisions that no parent is prepared for. The next six weeks I found myself grieving the loss of one child, while trying to be a support to my son in the NICU - not to mention, still trying to mother my 6 year old at home. How do you think I comforted myself? Yep, you guessed it... FOOD! And lot's of it! I managed to eat my way up to 260+ pounds. After a year of being completly miserable, I decided to try something drastic, and went on one of those medically supervised all liquid diets. I managed to lose about 40 pounds, and only gained back half of it - but have never managed to lose another pound. It's like my body is stuck right where it is! UGH!
I realized, after almost 20 years of yo-yo diets, that I need something more permanent. I have considered WLS for years, but never seriously enough to act upon it. I didn't think I was big enough. It wasn't until my cousin had the surgery and was SO successful, that I really started thinking hard about it. I watched her for a year. I gained alot of strength from her. She's been through ALOT, and decided to make a life changing decision for herself, and suddenly I realized - I mean like "lightbulb on" realized - that I needed to do this for ME too!
Another major factor in my decision was the surprise birth of my last child. My daughter. My heart and soul. Her pregnancy and birth was as traumatic as the others, pre-eclampsia, pre-term birth, NICU, etc... but when I looked at her, I could see her future. I could see her following in my footsteps, and I realized that I wanted to do better by her. I don't worry about my sons because no men in my family are overweight, but EVERY woman is, to the extreme! But boy wouldn't it be nice to actually be able to go outside and throw the football, or pitch the baseball for more than 5 minutes at a time? And I want Olivia to have a good roll model. And I want to be alive when she gets married, has babies, etc. My family also has a history of heart disease and diabetes, (I'm borderline) and I could see my future staring me in the face. I didn't want to go there.
And so my WLS journey began. I'm looking forward to my new life, and my 2nd chance. It's not often you get that, but it's one of the pro's to this surgery.
I can't wait!
HUGS!
Kimberly
