My story is pretty much like evryone elses. I have pretty much most of my life been a little bit over weight. As I got older, my parents told me it would be harder to loose, look at your brother ( he is older than me) it is hard for him to loose now. I stayed on a diet from the time I was 20 till now. I weighed around 135 before my 1st pregnancy and 199 at delivery time. Whoooa!  I did not loose all of it and 4 yrs later I was pregnant again. After that pregnancy I did not loose all my weight.  i struggled thru my late twenties and knew at 30 it would be harder to loose. At 31, my Mother, and best friend, fell gravely ill and had to have a liver transplant. I spent 3 months day & night at the hospital. I showered, ate and slept there. Finally the hospital furnished us with an apartment on the hospital campus as Momma was recovering. Over the next 12 years, I  spent many days in and out of the hospital with her. The pounds just kept comming. She went thru Breast Cancer and several surgeries. I always was there with her and never regretted it. During this time, i would gain a lb here and there. Over the next several years, I lost my Grandmother several Aunts & Uncles and a couple of our best friends.  I was in a very serious wreck on the freeway and was layed up for 3 months, just eating and sleeping. That put the lbs on. 2 months later I lost my best buddy, my Daddy. I fell into a depression even further. Momma, helped my all she could to be strong and positive but I had just lost my hero in life. Needless to say 18 months later I lost my Momma and I just felt like an orphan. I burried my Momma and come home and got my friend Jackie out of Hospice and brought her home with me until she died.  I just could not seem to snap out of it, I did not realize how depressed I was until I looked in the mirror one day and seen ths itty-bitty head on this big round body! I had promised my Momma that I would quit smoking and so I decided to pick myself up out of this depression and change my lifestyle starting with the cigarettes! That was a couple of years &  40 lbs ago but I don't miss the cigarettes! After exhausting all my options, my husband & I decided that I had to have the surgery. The other aLlternative is early death.

 Here I am along with everyone else, trying to find my way and make a better and healthier life for me and my family. Today I thank God for bringing me thru all the death and sickness in my life. I trust that he will give me strength when I am weak and guide me in the way I need to go. For without God, I am no one! My life has been blessed with many things but the greatest is my seal of salvation!