Being Afraid

Oct 14, 2011

Do you remember being a little kid afraid to put your feet over the edge of the bed for fear that the monster under there would get you?  Were you afraid that a scary man was outside your bedroom window, just waiting to grab you as you were fast asleep?  Do you remember cringing the first time you walked into your high school, thinking everyone knew you were a freshman and that they all had plans to throw you head first in to a trash can the first chance they got?  Do you remember the heart racing dread you felt before your first job interview?  Now.  Do you remember surviving each of those experiences?  Do you remember an end of that dread? 

You're probably wondering where I am going with this.  Well, I am going to warn you now, I am not going to a happy place.  Each of those experiences and emotions ended.  Those fears were overcome, and are things from your past.  Having bypass surgery scared the crap out of me.  Not as much as continuing to gain weight did, but it scared me.  Knowing I almost died after having my second cesarean I went into bypass surgery filled with dread.  But I survived.  My surgeon had sure and steady hands, and I survived. 

Since that day I have been filled with a new dread.  The dread of gaining all the weight I have been losing back.  Every day is a battle, a struggle, a fight.  I thought it would get easier, but in truth, this journey has only gotten harder.  In the beginning your body does all the hard work, it tells you when you've had enough, and you have no choice but to listen, otherwise you end up paying tribute to the porcelain throne.  You drop weight when you blink.  You don't have to do anything.  Now, going on two years later I am up 10 pounds from my lowest weight and I am scared to death.  Scared that I can't do this anymore.  That who I am today isn't the real me, and that the real me is 365 pounds. 

I struggle.  Every day.  I am obsessed with food.  With what I can get my hands on and stuff in my mouth.  All the habits I was forced to learn at the beginning are gone.  I still curb my fluid intake before, during and after meals, but I don't eat slow enough, and I don't eat protein first.  I grab cookies and keep walking, thinking that if no one saw me, I didn't take it and eat it.  I crave things I can't have, and yet I still try to have them and end up paying the price by either throwing the excess up, or by having the runs.  My body is screaming for me to STOP, but I am not listening.  I am not listening to anything.  I eat to eat.  To eat.  To eat.  I am not sure I take joy in eating, I just want to stuff my face at any chance I get.  No rhyme, no reason, I just want food.

I guess today's post came from a place of self loathing.  And yet, it is also coming from a place of wanting to be honest with everyone on here who has been commenting on how great I look, and how well I've done, and how hard I must have worked, and who make it seem like my work is done.  My work is not done, no where near done.  There is still work to be done, and the work will continue till the day I meet my Maker.  Don't think just because you have gastric bypass surgery your life is now complete, perfect, fixed, or ideal.  It won't be.  Your weight is fueled by more than what you put in to your mouth.  I am not saying don't have the surgery, I am thankful every day for having had gastric bypass surgery, but I am saying, this isn't the end all, be all, this is the first step on a LIFE LONG journey.  And every day, every hour, every minute, every second could be a struggle.  It is for me.  But that doesn't mean it will be for you.  This journey is an individual one, it is different for everyone. 

This post isn't meant to scare you.  It wasn't meant to inspire you either.  It is just the cold, hard truth.  Anything in life worth having is worth working for.  A truth I hate, but embrace.  I have accomplished a lot, but I have so much more I want to do. 

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