Autum K.
I was never self concious about my weight until I was in the fourth grade. We were making those auto-biography things for our parents, my teacher was weighing each child and telling them their weight so they could write it on their papers; when she got to me she wispered in my ear, "122 pounds". The closest person was a boy named Paul, he weighed 118. It's pretty sad that I can still remember that 22 years later.
I've always had a hard time with my weight. I crossed over 200 pounds at 14 years old, I remember thinking before I weighed, "If I'm over 200 I'm going to kill myself"; obviously I didn't, instead I went to my room and cried. When I graduated from highschool I weighed about 260 (I'm guessing here because I quit weighing myself when I no longer had to take gym - in the 11th grade). I moved out, went through two jobs, moved away from home and back, and met my husband, Dairl. The next time I remember my weight was when I was full-term pregnant with my first son, I was 20 years old and 302 pounds. I had thought of having bariatric surgery many times, but kept puting if off thinking, "I don't want it if it won't be laproscopic", "I'll try this diet first", or "I don't want surgery!". Two more boys and 10 years later, I decided enough was enough. I wasn't getting any younger and was sick and tired of Weight Watchers, Dr. Atkins, cabage diets, fruit diets, low-cal, low-carb, low-fat, and still being Big Me. I weighed 351 pounds when I finally decided to get bariatric surgery and weighed in at Dr. Ludwigs office (June 2006).
My husband had done a lot of research online about the different types of surgeries and we had planned on the Lap-band until I went to Dr. Ludwigs seminar in June, 2006, and found out that he had never done the Lap-band and it had never been done at Enloe Hospital. What to do? What to do? The decision ended up being made for me when I had to have an emergency hystorectomy and my youngest son started having serious issues in school. When things were calmer at home I checked in with Dr. Ludwigs office again, they still didn't do Lap-bands! I didn't want to wait so I had signed up, instead, for the R-n-Y. My husband was heartbroken! As a self admitted BBW lover, he felt hurt, betrayed and worried. He didn't want me having ANY weightloss surgery, but REALLY didn't want me having one where I had no control of how much of my stomach was removed and my body would never nutrients the same. After a tearfull few weeks and a trip to the marriage counselor I decided to wait for the Lap-band. Dr. Ludwig had to have three to five people signed up for the Lap-band in order for the hospital to review the surgery, I thought it would take forever, but it ended up being only two months until he had enough interest...WOOHOO!! On August 3rd, 2007, at 335 pounds, my surgery was the first Lap-band performed by Dr. Ludwig at Enloe Hospital.
