suitebliss
I can remember being fat all of my life. I remember when I was in the second grade my Mother brought me a happy meal everyday in the second grade. In the second grade I didn’t care much about weight or what I hate and honestly I think my Mother had good intentions. From what I remember health wasn’t as stressed as an importance then as it is now. The summer before the third grade I was in a horrible car accident causing me to have some facial scarring. This depressed me everyday. I went from always being told how pretty I was to being in the back seat of my Mothers car, with over 300 stitches in my face, which was so disgusting that the lady in the next car had to pull into the next lane instead of looking at me. I do believe that this caused me to have a great deal of low self esteem and it wasn’t until 27 years later that I’m slowly regaining the confidence I once had. Many people tell me that they can hardly see my scars, but that’s hard to believe when they flash on my face like a neon light everyday. To cope with such a traumatic experience, I ate. It was food that comforted me from the pain I felt inside. It soothed those dirty looks and it soothed the confidence I’d lost. In grade school I was a friendly kid, I got the fat jokes every now and then but wasn’t tormented like I read some people have. I think I beat myself up more than others. By being that friendly kid, no one talked about me. This cause me to become a real people pleaser to avoid being talked about because of my weight. Besides the car accident I came from a very dysfunctional household. Drug abuse, alcoholism etc. and I was allowed to “eat in the streets”. I ate the stuffed pizzas from the corner store for dinner, potato chips, pop, candy, cake etc. and all those things which were bad for you. The first diet I went on I remember living with my Aunt, she was on vacation and she took a trip to Target and bought me a whole back of Oreo cookies. I threw them all always and started my first diet, I started drinking Slim Fast. I don’t know how much weight I’d lost, but I do remember my Aunt telling me I’d lost some weight. I fought obesity all through high school and eventually college. I think college is what made me feel like I was less than a person. You see I’ve had the same four best friends for the past 20 years and in college I think the biggest size of them was an 8 and I was a 20/22. I watched them date boys and be the center of attention while I always got overlooked and many times like I just wasn’t there. I didn’t date much in college, but I acted like it didn’t bother me. This alone proves my strength because I sat back being the undesired friend and just smiled and joked. I dated a little more after college, but most times I felt as though some of the guys I dated only dated me because they thought I might be easy. The guys I did decide to date occasionally were those that made me feel as though I was beautiful, but they were just temporary to fill the void missing from a long term relationship. I was in and out of a few meaningless relationships with acquaintances. I been on several plans as an attempt to lower and/or control my weight. I tried a self program, slim fast, low carb, south beach, diet pills and weight watchers. I had several weight loses, but gained the weight back on all the programs. I first looked into Bariatric Surgery in 2009, when a co-worker of mine returned to work after an extended layoff – super skinny. She said that she had gastric bypass, I looked into it only to find out that my employer switched insurance companies and the new insurance didn’t cover any type of Bariatric Surgery. I was a little disappointed, but just felt like it just wasn’t meant to be. Then a month ago my co-workers and I were discussing how our Manager looked good with the weight she had lost. The next day I came in and saw her with a new hair color, cute clothes and make up on. I had asked her what was her secret. She then told me that she had Weight Loss surgery called a Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy and it was only $12,000. I asked her how did she pay for it seeing that our health insurance didn’t cover the surgery, she said that she took a loan out on her 401k. Why didn’t I think of that? I immediately called my 401k to find I how much of a loan I was eligible for and come to find out I WAS ELIGIBLE FOR SLIGHTLY OVER $12,000. Talk about excited. I now await my initial appointment with a surgeon on January 20, 2012.
