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  • Name: Katie M.
  • Username: fit4lifeK
  • Location: WA, USA
  • Member Since: 7/25/2012
  • BMI: 51.0
  • Hoping to have surgery
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fit4lifeK's Blog
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My Story

I have battled weight since I was a teen when realized I was bigger than my friends even though I was shorter than most of them. I have yo-yo'd with weight loss for 15 years and I am done puting my body through losses and gains of almost 100 lbs. I have had the idea of WLS playing around in the back of my head for a few years now but after the events that took place after my 4th daughter was born in April 2012 I have made my decision. 

 I was already overweight when I became pregnant with our last child. I was about 230 lbs or so. Towards the end of my pregnancy I started taking on water at an alarming rate. I gained 20 lbs in one week alone. Edema was rocking it.

The day I had my daughter by C section I was almost 330 lbs. She was almost 11lbs at birth! She was swollen too and lost almost two lbs before we even left the hospital. Just a hot mess.

The night after I was discharged I was having a hard time laying down and breathing. I was exhausted, post surgery, hormones plummeting, and struggling to get my milk to come in for my baby. I was so concerned with her that I ignored a lot of signs that looking back I can see were big red flags. It was in the wee morning hours when I found myself now gasping for air not just while trying to lay down but all the time. Game over. My husband took me back to the hospital and everything happened very fast. I was admitted and put in the ICU. Breathing issues got worse and by that night I was almost choking to get air. Early the next morning I started coughing up nothing but blood. Last thing I remember is frantically looking in my husband eyes and feeling like it would be the last time I was going to see them. 

I woke up two days later in a different hospital and I had tubes down my throat and wires in my neck. I only vaguely remember reaching out for my husband's hand at different times while unconcious but nothing else. When I woke/became aware, there were two doctors above me using this plastic covered tube to shove down my throat as they were suctioning out my lungs which gave me so much relief. We did this for two days while I communicated by writing on paper and tried to understand what just happened.

For whatever reason I had respiratory failure. I was given a mercy, recovered, and able to walk out of the hospital with a husband who never left my side. Though I was separated from my newborn for a week, (they don't allow babies in the ICU) I managed to work my supply back up afterward and exclusively nurse her after many tears. This was greatly due to what I later discovered was my husbands dedication to pumping for me every two hours while I was unconcious. He knew how important it was to me. I can't imagine what this experience was like for him. 

The day I left that hospital I promised myself I would do everything I could to make it so I never put him through something like that again. I love this man more than my life, and I love our family. I can still remember the terror of feeling like it was all over.

I don't know why it all happened but I suppose at this point it doesn't matter anymore. Though I'm still wrapping my mind around the idea that I survived something many others haven't, I know for sure that I never want to be there again. I know that my weight was instrumental in my whole mess. Time is precious. Life is precious. I am thankful to be home and have made a full physical recovery and though I don't know if I will ever be the same emotionally, I have faith that time will heal my heart. I'm ready to make a change in my life for good and be the best me I can for the people I love most in the entire world. 

Well that's a big part of my story. Thanks for reading.