Why Are You Fat?

  I was reading a forum about Gastric Bypass and one of the topics was, "Why are you fat?" I thought about it for a long time and I couldn't come up with an easy answer.

I hate the fact that people look at me and just assume that I eat 24/7 and gorge myself all the time on bad foods. That's not the case. Most days I only eat one meal after 8 pm ... and that's part of my problem.

I have aways been a big girl. Growing up I was one of the biggest girls out of all of my friends. My mom tried to keep a watch on my eating habits, but I got pretty good at sneaking and hiding food.

From the ages of 13 - 17, my mother constantly had me on diets. The cabbage diet, Weight Watchers, even a diet group through our church. The highest I ever weighed during that time was 130 lbs, and I thought I was huge. Looking back now I would give anything to be that size again!                                  
This is me at my semi-formal in 1997.. i was 16 and weighed about 130 pounds.

The only thing that got me through those years at home were the weekends I would spend with my sister Jenny at University. We would buy every food that I wasnt aloud to have at home... Pop, chips, Candy, Fast foods... Those were some of my favorite memories.

When I was 17 I was assaulted by a man while I was working as a nanny for the summer. It was one of the worst experiences of my life. Soon after I found out I was pregnant, and I was not sure if it was a result of the assult or if it was from my relationship (It was later proven to be my boyfriends through a paternity test)

I did charge the man for the assult and was then involved in a year long trial. During the time that I was pregnant my parents decided that I was to young to have a child and told me that I would have to give the baby up for adoption. This was a very hard decision for me since I myself was given up for adoption when I was 3, along with my older brother and sister.

Being pregnant gave me the liberty to eat as much as I wanted without feeling guilty.. I was eating for two. That's when I first started to gain weight, going from 130lbs - 180lbs by the end of my pregnancy.
                                                          Pregnant with Paige - May 1999

April 23th, 1999 - My world changed forever. I gave birth to a beautiful 6 pound baby girl. It should have been the happiest day of my life, but my daughter was born stillborn. I still to this day do not know what really happened. So not only did I lose my daughter, but the couple who were trying for years to have a family, lost their daughter too.... and I blamed myself completely.

The next few months were a blur and I did a lot of things that I regret. Fast forward 9 months to January 2000. I found out that I was pregnant again. At that point I still had not dealt with the loss of my first daughter and there was no way I was going to go through that again. So I made the choice to have an abortion. (A decision that I struggle with to this day) That happened on a Monday. On the Wednesday of the same week, my trial ended and the man was let go because there was not enough circumstantial evidence. And to make that week even worse, on the Friday I received a call from my father telling me that he left my mother after over 25 years of marriage for one of her close friends. I can say that was the most trying week of my life.

I was super depressed and started using food for comfort. Quickly my weight went up to over 200lbs.

At least one good thing came out of all of that. Around the same time that I was dealing with all of this, I met my birth mother for the first time in 15 years. It was an amazing experience and a wonderful reunion. She was able to answer a lot of my questions, and after 15 years of wondering, it was nice to be able to have some closure. And now more than 10 years since our reunion I couldn't imagine my life with out her! She has been supportive of me no matter how bad i messed up or how horrible the choices were that I made!

Within the next two years (2001 - 2002) I got married to my high school sweetheart and had two healthy perfect children. So there I was 20 years old with a marriage and a family.
                                             The day after my son was born, August 12, 2002.

I tried to be a good wife and mother, but I was young and my husband and I fought all the time. I was eating more than ever and was over 250lbs. After trying to make it work for over 3 years, we decided to separate. We sold our home, and I went from being a housewife/stay at home mom, to living in a two bedroom basement apartment as a single mom working full time at Wendy's.

I became very overwhelmed with my life between the kids, work, bills.... without help... I had a nervous breakdown. My children went to live with their father for the next four years. I saw them and talked to them as much as possible but it was so hard and I felt so guilty for leaving them. I hated myself.

While the kids were with their father I made a huge career change and became a piercer at Stinger Tattoo... something I have always been interested in but never presued because I was afraid of what people would think of me. But 5 years later and I still love my job as much as I did the first day! In 2008, I stared to date my best friend and my life finally got back on track.

Now we are married and the children have been back with me full time for over a year now!!!

Being with someone who loves you no matter how you look is a wonderful thing, but it does make you become very comfortable in your relationship. Too comfortable. I dont know how I reached 334 pounds so fast... but here I am. And now that I have the love ans support from my family and friends its time to get rid of the weight.
                                    My husband and I at my work Christmas Party - December 2010

I want to be able to play with my children. To be able to sit on the floor and colour or play a board game without worrying about my knees or how I was going to get back up. I want to be able to run and ride a bike, go skating.. or even just to be able to go for a walk without being out of breath from just putting on my shoes.

I'm not having this surgery just for me. I'm doing it for my family. We need a lifestyle overhaul and it has to start with me. Ive been though a lot in my life... but honestly.. who hasn't? I cant blame my weight on my past, I can only blame myself for waiting this long before doing something about it.

I can only take it one day at a time.. and this is the first day of my Gastric Bypass Journey.


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