MBC803
I was petite my whole life. I struggled to stay that way. But I was coxswain all through high school in college; being thin -- thin, thin, 84# thin -- was my hobby (and bossying rowers around with a little light steering). I moved to Pittsburgh for graduate school where I was deeply unhappy and massive portion disortion quickly became a normal serving. I gained 101 pounds in a little over a year and a half. I lost 60, I gained 70. I lost 50, I gained 80. I lost 40, I gained 50. I tried every diet, therapy and long stays are rigorous health spas with where I excercised 6-8 hours a day and ate ~900-1100 calories. I'd lose some and gain more. My mother, who first took me to Weight Watchers meeting at 11 because I reached a shocking 111 lbs at summer camp, has always had a perfectly polite opinion about my weight. She suggested bariatric sugery. I was horrified. I wasn't that overweight.
Not long after that, a very kind doctor who had been treating me for 12 years and watched me expand and deflate a little only to expand more said very gently, "if no one has told you yet, because of where you're carrying the weight, you're at huge risk for type 2 diabetes." My mom had been fussing over my weight (and footing the bill for all the various diets and fitness facilities) for almost 28 years. But that got my attention.
I went home that day and I ran the numbers then I went to the mandatory info session at the NYU practice; I was only about 2 point shy to meet the criteria. When they said, "how many of you have tried every diet, every therapy, every excercise option, stayed at rigorous weight loss facilities? And how many times have you gained and lost the weight?" and almost every hand in the room went up, I saw about 100 people just like me. My family isn't heavy, none of my friends were heavy. But here was a lecture hall full of people who understood me.
I wanted to be a pretty little perfect 00 again and walk down an aisle on day in a ridculous white dress and feel like a pretty, pretty, princess. But mostly, I didn't want a chronic disease. And I really didn't want 2; CVD runs in my family.
But because I wasn't heavy for long, I had not developed any cormodities yet. I want surgery to prevent chronic illnesss, but my insurance company was me to be sick in at least 2 ways first. I wrote a letter to my unconidtionally supportive father (who probably didn't want to walk an obese daughter anywhere, never mind with a photographer and all our friends and familty) but who also dindn't want me to develop a serious life loing health problem.
So he agreed to pay.
At my first visit to the practice at NYU, I was clear: I wanted an RNY. It was 2011 and LAP-BAND were the new darling of clinical research. My surgeon nodded and said, "you're small - I mean for a bariatric patient, you're just below 5'0 and you're still under the big 200 - barely, but you are. I could have you and off the table for an RNY in almost the same amount of time as a LAP-BAND. But you're paying out of pocket and it's a 30,000 difference."
They were just starting to perfrom the gastric sleeve. I didn't want to take advange of my father generosity. And she promised - in writing - if I hadn't lost 45 pounds in a year, she'd do an RNY at cost. And she had published extensively on the sucess of the LAP-BAND. So, that's what I did. Because I didn't have to meet any uinsurance requirements, I scheduled my surgery that day and I was on the table in less than 2 months (have added those 2 points to my BMI so the hospital would agree to do the proceedure).
I don't regret not spending the extra $30,000. And RNY patients have serious life long nutritional challenges. But while my band hasn't eroded and when it slipped it slid right back into place a few weeks later, I have been hospitalized with non-community acquired pneumonia (which is most commonly contracted from aspirating vomit into your lungs) and critcally low potassium.
I'd like to do LAP-BAND revision surgery to get a sleeve and I have enough complications -- the excessive vomiting (documented my vomit-related hospital stints) and pretty nasty dysphasgia. I've keep 100 pounds off for almost 9 years and I'm finally starting to experience the infamous weight-rebound. Not a lot. Just 10 pound so far, but I'm scarefd of the scale again. But my BMI is normal and I don't know if insurance would covered it? Do you? (Because my very generous father is now very dead.)
I'm becoming an RD now. Mostly because I had such terrible counseling. The nutritionist at NYU asked me, "have you heard of Greek yogurt?" Now this was almost 9 years ago. But even then, the diary asile was stockedf with it. And I wanted to be like, "lady, take a good look at me -- I mean really look -- if it's sold in a grocery store, I've eaten it." Another who was supposed to be specialist in bariatric nutrition just keep telling me to eat almonds and sending me soup recipes.
I was underweight for a few years and I don't want to be a professional skinny person asking obese people if they've heard of Halo Top (and I feel like Professional Skinny Person is a good way to describe a lot of RDs - which, by the way, is bananas because if you don't know what it takes to be an RD, it's abourt 3-5 years of school included a year of rotations at a teaching hospital and a whole lot of science. And yet every nuritionist I've ever seen has been a borderline anorexic moron - I do not know how they earned their MSs.
But I also can't be an RD who has to run the bathroom every time I eat solid food without chewing well enough or drink to close to eating and I definately don't want to be an RD who's hospitalized for a nutirtion-related illness or condition.
My doctor's office is inconveient and I don't want to go in for a 2 minute appointment just to tell me if I want LAP BAND revision surgery, I need to really fat again. First, I don't want to buy new clothes. I finally donated sizes 2-20 just last summer when I thought I could trust the weight loss would last. So, not to sound just bonkers petty, but I don't want to buy a whole new wardrobe. I also don't want to be obese again and have to lose the weight all over.
So I'm struggling with my weight again. I thought my story was over. But if feels like I'm starting all over again.
I'm hoping to find some support, some answers and some motivation here.
I've never told my whole story in detail. I rarely tell any of it. It' the one benefit to a LAP-BAND -- the weight loss is so slow you can tell your friends and family it was portion control, cutting out sugar and increasing physical activity. Plus after being a perfect size 00 for almost 3 decades, no one is suprised I'm a smaller person again. (I say smalll because I've measured my wrists and I have a medium frame and even when I'm underweight, I look thin but never super thin).
But I need a community like those 100 people back in that conference room 9 years ago, people who understand my story.
If I can do do anything for you, I am a private chef with a pile of bariatric-friendly recipes and almost a dietician. So please don't hesitate to reach out. I promise to ask if you've heard of greek yogurt or send you soup recipes.
