Mental and emotional changes

in the process of watching YouTube videos by my surgeon (Dr. Julie Ellner, in San Diego) I caught an excerpt in which she touched on the idea that there are two different groups of patients: those who have been heavy all their lives, and those who became heavy after life events but who had long histories of being "normal". Since my monthly visit was yesterday, I asked her to clarify.

She told me that, for those who have been heavy all their lives, there tends to be a sense of "jumping into the abyss"--we really have no practical experience living in a smaller body, and it can be challenging in surprising/unexpected ways. For those who gained their weight later in life, the transition to a healthier weight isn't as much of a challenge because they have a "remembered self" to go back to.

I started to gain my weight when I was 8 years old. I had always been taller and "bigger boned" (I was 5'9 and wore a size 10 women's shoe by the time I was 13) but I can trace excess weight back to my 5th school when I was in the third grade (my dad was in the Navy). Food became my stability and my security, in a world where I was always the new kid, always had to leave behind friends, had no family ties outside of my brother&sister&parents, and never knew when the dreaded Next Move would happen. We didn't have much, but my parents always made sure there was food on the table. It was our only constant.

That being said, I have a long history of being Big. I have very little history (one year, I was 23) of being "normal sized". I'm practicing the habits I'll need post surgery, food and eating and drinking and gym time and prioritization and planning. What I'm wondering, though, based on what Dr. Ellner told me, is what skills I'm not even aware that I need because I've never really been there.

So I pose the question to you: what emotional/mental skills do you feel are the most important? The most useful? What did you have to learn, as you lost your weight?

I come from a history of not always being SMO... I was maybe 10-20lbs overweight in my twenties... taking myself to Nutrisystems when I was 150lbs and about 25yo because I freaked out over buying a size 10...

That being said, I also never really stopped gaining after that point, and after having my daughter hit the MO and then SMO category not long after my son was born. I did spend a couple of years around 180, and thought I was thin then...

The biggest thing I've noticed now that I'm in a healthy weight range is the attention you get. People smile, they look at you, they hold more doors open for you, and they strike up random conversations with you. Attention. You get lots more of it. You'll need to deal with that, and not get mad when you realize how different people (strangers) treat you because you're no longer SMO/MO. OK, you can get mad about it, but it doesn't help, not really...

Interesting. I remember, the year I was 23, when in the course of two weeks two separate men looked at me and, apropos of nothing, said, "I'd really like to f*** you". Of course I had no idea how to respond, and no idea how to play that game. I got married when I was 25 and am still married, so really I never had a chance to develop those skills.

But I'm also a physical therapist assistant, and I talk to people all day long in a clinic setting. Hmm. I'm used to getting to know people on that level, but not them knowing me. I'm not really shy per se, but I am private.

I think I'm going to have to learn how to comfort and reassure myself. How to find that sense of stability and security, when I need to be reminded that I am safe.

What methods do you use?

I disagree with her assessment. Whether we started large and stayed that way or were moderately-sized and gained, we all have to start over with WLS. We have to learn how to eat, and we have to learn to cope without using food--because really, most of us have a long history of using food to cope, even if it took years to show up on our waistlines.

Whatever the current physical size of my body, I will always be a Fat Person. Fat people are my tribe. My fatness may be in remission, but I will not ever be normal, as in a person who does not have food or weight issues.

Even those who at one time were average sized will find that the world is much different now. Clothing sizes are different, our shape may not go back to what it was pre-obesity, and we will have the years of experience as obese people.

I think the hardest adjustment, for me, was that while I was obese, I could keep people away. It was an external beacon of unworthiness, laziness, stupidity, and every other negative attribute society assigns to obese people. Now, I am an average size, not thin and not fat, and I blend in. However, I have to interact with people much more. The first couple of years that was painful, and my anxiety would be bad, especially in large crowds. I had come to rely on the relative invisibility of being super morbidly obese.

I had to learn how to physically move through the world since I no longer took up as much room, and I had to learn how to adjust to people being friendlier.

I think the biggest help in all of this has been to find a counselor and go. There have been things that came up once I stopped soothing myself with food that I was unaware of. I once stood in the hallway bawling my eyes out. Sainted Husband asked me what was wrong, and I told him since I didn't turn to food anymore I had to feel my feelings.

Very nicely said !! Cannot think of anything else to add...Thank You !!

You hit the nail on the head Kate.

I was overweight from age 5. Smallest I ever remember being was 180 pounds in 8th grade because I cut my calories and started working out more. I think the biggest part I took from this was to not take this opportunity for granted especially the first year out. Losing the weight for me was my JOB. Granted I have a full time job etc, but this was foremost in my mind. I had to get the weight off. I had a specific weight goal in mind and no one told me I could not achieve it. I would not and could not stop until I was below goal.

There are many that lose about 100 pounds then get complacent and stop eating on plan. They are not regimented and they end up not losing more and or gaining. I can't and won't let myself do this. I've invested too much time and money to screw it up.

but that is just my opinion.

I have always been a bigger person. I was normal weight until I hit high school and then gradually started putting on weight... 158 at age 15, on up with my highest weight being the day I had my daughter at 37 when I weighed 306 pounds. I agree completely with Pammieanne who said the attention is irritating. I do not like the newfound friendliness of men. It appalls me, actually. And the things that I have to get used to now... the extra room in the car, extra room on a couch, extra room in the bathroom stall. I am constantly surprised by that. And every single morning when I put my size 14 jeans on I hold them out and think they are never going to fit me. That they will never zip. They zip every morning, though. Actually this morning they are loose and soon the size 12 jeans I bought will fit me. ;)

The biggest change I had to make is planning. I now plan everything food-wise. I enter all my meals into MFP every morning, and then I take all of my food with me, and that has been so helpful. When I have the food with me I am not likely to deviate. A trip in the car for me used to be an excuse to stop for fast food. At almost 7 months post-op I am still in my honeymoon phase but changing the habit of stopping *anywhere* for food has been the most critical change I have made.

I never heard that concept before and believe you have a very smart surgeon.

It makes sense that we will try to stay where we have usually been comfortable.

It made sense to me, too. It does feel, too me, like I'm headed off into a life I don't know how to live. I'm not going back to skills I had developed once and then set aside due to cir****tances, I'm moving into something completely new.