Grammo
I am “Grammo” my grandson’s playful name for me when he is teasing me, otherwise I am Gramma! This is “my story” as submitted to Dr. Husted, along with his new patient info sheet which he has on line on his website. A few details have been deleted for sake of internet safety! June 8, 2009
Dear Dr. Husted, This is my story, to the best of my recollection, which is far from perfect. My memory has never been great, and is not very well supported by my poor record keeping and is even further compromised by former use of the statin drug Lipitor. I am female, 55 years old, born **************, in ********* MI, five years after my twin siblings Guy and Annie, five years before the baby, Susie. Three and one half years before Mary, who drowned at age seventeen. Yes, I am “the MIDDLE child” – I am full of excuses! I grew up in the very small village of **********, MI just north of Toledo, Ohio. I was not an “abused” child, but I would say I was an emotionally “stressed” child. My father was severely injured in WWII, spent the year before his marriage to my mother, his high school sweetheart, in army hospitals having his face reconstructed. Dad had constant, severe headaches and swallowed handfuls of Anacin which eventually destroyed his stomach (more on this later) and he was also a smoker. Dad was further stressed by being the responsible parent for five children. You see it turned out my Mom is bi-polar with multiple other personality disorders. She was once the subject of a study of the University of Michigan (until she was so disruptive that even they kicked her out!) During the course of her stay at U of M there were many family interviews and studies and it was determined that she had probably first presented with this disorder at least by the age of around fourteen – certainly through all of her marriage and child rearing. Dad died at the age of 54, a year younger than I am now, mainly from complications of lung cancer, though he had stopped smoking for about two years before his diagnosis. I will always believe he could have beaten the cancer had his body not already been so compromised, but especially if his will to live had still existed. I don’t think it is mere coincidence that my oldest sister never had children and in fact did not marry until she was fifty years old! She had already helped to “raise” one family! The whole family (including extended family) has a tendency to be overweight, many battle it successfully, others are pleasantly plump, but I am the only one who is morbidly obese. Throughout my childhood I would say that my Dad probably wavered between 30 and 50 pounds over his ideal weight, except during periods following stomach surgeries when his weight would drop dramatically and, of course, when he was wasted by cancer at the end of his life. Mom’s weight was all over the map! She ranged from “normal” to above ideal by 30 to 40 pounds to bouts of anorexia when she weighed 85 to 90 pounds. I do not know if she maintained her “normal” weights naturally. I’m pretty certain that there were times in her life when she took amphetamines. Mom is now almost 84 years old, her (mental) high and low cycles are still not regulated, in spite of constant care and twice daily nurse visits to administer medication, and her weight fluctuates, she tends to have an appetite and gain weight when she is “high” and she stops eating when she is “low.” I, and none of my siblings, have never been diagnosed as bi-polar, though all of us battle mild depression and all of us have prescription meds for depression. Mom can be very vain at times and she has always been greatly offended by my size. She will try to pass it off as concern for my health, and hopefully there is some kernel of concern in there somewhere, but mostly she doesn’t like the way she thinks it reflects on her. I started chubbing up around age five or six and somewhere around the age of eleven or twelve, my Mom took me to one of her doctors (the one I am pretty sure supplied her with amphetamines) instead of our regular family doctor. This female doctor did correctly diagnose me as hypothyroid and put me on a small tablet for that along with a capsule of some kind of amphetamine. Weight dropped dramatically, in fact too much. Meds were stopped and weight was regained with interest. I did not learn until in my thirties (and I was HUGE) that I should have remained on thyroid supplements for my whole life. Throughout junior high and high school I put myself on various fad starvation diets and yo-yoed up and down, always up more with every lapsed attempt. I remember being in high school and eating nothing but boiled eggs and carrot sticks for months on end, fantastic weight loss, but I actually turned YELLOW. As mentioned before, I grew up in a tense household, one where you never invited your friends in for sure, and I left home on the night of my high school graduation. Poverty and lifestyle (sleep all day – work at nightclubs, party at area nightclubs - Toledo, OH to Detroit, MI - when not working) kept my weight down to between sizes 10 to 14 for a while. I eventually moved in with an older co-worker who liked to cook and my weight started creeping up again. Both of us were singing part time with local C & W bands and she decided we should move to Nashville. We were going to make it BIG and I sure did! We were both chunky and we both joined a health club, but now we were living on our “economy” diet of veal cutlets smothered with instant mashed potatoes and canned creamed corn every night except for the nights we splurged on McDonalds’ fish sandwiches on the way home from the health club. It was during this time that I met my husband, I was nineteen, almost twenty, and he actually “courted” me with groceries! That worked out real well. I was probably around a size eighteen when I met him. He introduced me to the infamous Dr. Snap of East Nashville. (Dr. Snap eventually went to jail!) Everyone was seeing him to get pills they called “upjohns” and most people, like my husband, used them as a form of “speed.” They did help me lose weight. I got back down to 10 to 14s again for a while – until he went to jail for prescribing them for everybody like my “Jack Sprat” husband. By this time I was pregnant with my only child, a daughter who has inherited my awful genetics and metabolism. When I could not lose weight post partum, I did Weight Watchers for the first time. Limited success -never got below size 14. I had little money and no car and eventually stopped Weight Watchers and weight started creeping up again. I eventually found a family doctor, long deceased now, Dr. Webster, in Nashville, whom I adored. This man was so kind to me and I think part of my weight loss success with him was my great desire to please him. I was following a low cal diet, on my own with Dr. Webster’s general guidance, and he also prescribed diet pills, I can’t remember if they were phentermine exactly, but some form of it I’m sure. I also had turned into an exercise (at home) nut. I became the smallest ever since I was twelve years old, but still above today’s accepted guidelines for my recommended weight. I look at pictures now from that time and I think I look like Skeletor, but at the time I know I still saw a fat girl in the mirror. Dr. Webster retired and I was devastated, first because I loved him so and second, because the doctor who took over his practice, I think his name was **** ******, refused to prescribe weight loss medication. I quit seeing any doctor and my weight was creeping up again. I did Weight Watchers a second time with such little success for the effort that I gave up on it. From this time to present my memory of actual chronology on all these various diets and diet medications is very bad, for various reasons, including a seriously messed up thyroid, a very bad reaction to Lipitor, and probably by bouts of depression. The only thing I know for sure is I did do all these things! My husband, Jack Sprat, had even started a middle age spread, and we both did the Rotation diet (we bought the book) that was so popular for a while. I had success, close to 50 to 60 pound loss, husband got too skinny. We eventually stopped “rotating” and I started “rotunding” AGAIN. Somewhere in here, and I can’t remember if it was before or after the Rotation diet, I did NutriSystem for the first time, several months. Some success, eventual relapse. In my early thirties, something was SERIOUSLY WRONG. But I was a little messed up in the head, marriage in a bad place, among other things and I failed to take the reins soon enough. I was gaining almost five pounds a day and had severe stretch marks appear all over my body like big angry red welts – way more than when I was pregnant. I lost all my body hair, most of my eyebrows and was fast losing my formerly thick and luxurious hair. Somebody, I think it was Dr. ****** *****, but I’m not sure, finally got me back on thyroid meds and the hair loss stopped, some mental confusion started to clear and the weight gain slowed but did not stop. Somewhere along here, I’m not sure when, I was also seeing a hypnotist and joined another health club. When I was up to about 275 pounds, I began seeing Dr. Richard Feldman in Nashville for the first time and started taking phentermine and water pills and eating low fat diet and I lost about fifty pounds. I was still taking meds and dieting but eventually stopped losing weight and I began to literally starve myself, only allowing myself to eat once or twice on weekends and eating virtually nothing for the rest of the week. I still was not losing much weight, but I eventually lost my mobility. I suffered a severe electrolyte imbalance, became completely paralyzed and ended up in the hospital. Back in balance and mobile again I did not diet again for a long time, you can guess the result of that. Eventually the word was spreading about the Phen-Fen phenomenon and I was anxious to jump on that bandwagon! And it worked!!! Great!!! I was losing and had never felt better in my life. Then you could no longer get it in TN and I was actually flying to OHIO in Dr. Feldman’s crazy little airplane to get the drug combo there. I was down almost a hundred pounds and then phen-fen was no more. You know how that story ends. When I reached my all time high of 294 lbs. around the fall of 1999, I started the Atkins diet. Over the next year, I lost over a hundred pounds and hit a plateau around 180. I could dip below some days, but never broke through to my “next goal” of breaking 175. I was managing to keep it around 180 for a while when my body staged another little rebellion. By this time I was seeing Dr. ****** ***** in Nashville. (He later left his practice to become an administrator.) I was feeling very mentally fuzzy again, unable to think straight, and feeling generally sick and running low grade fevers off and on. Thyroid checked ok, no infections found. Eventually creatinine was checked and I was called back in for a cat scan. Before I made it the few miles home that day, Dr. ***** had called three times ordering me directly back to St. Thomas hospital (where he practiced) and said he already had urologist **** ********* lined up and I was going right in to have the “largest kidney stone he had ever seen” removed. I actually had stones on both sides, blocking tubes on both sides, The GREAT BIG STONE had apparently been there a long time and a portion of that kidney atrophied, I got so sick when the OTHER side was also blocked by lesser, but by no means tiny, stones. Immediate retrieval was the plan – it did not work out that way. Dr. ********** concurred that it was the largest kidney stone HE had ever seen, too and no way could he retrieve it without first breaking it and probably several times. I was sent home with two stints and appointments made for ESWL therapy. First ESWL session was relatively painless (after the first day!), but I was uncommonly listless. Pre-op testing prior to the planned second session revealed I had no blood! More cat scans! Dr. *********’s first ever experience with ESWL induced hematoma! I was bleeding out into the sac around my kidney. Bed rest (and stints) for the rest of the summer. Let’s see, no exercise plus comfort food equals what???? Plus, I became afraid of my Atkins diet, possible cause of stones? Maybe, maybe not, I later (much later) developed another possible theory –“Dr. “Grammo””, here. I was eventually put on blood pressure medicine, initially to aid my kidneys, but was told I had plenty of room for any lowering effect on my actual blood pressure. By this time, Dr. ***** also had me on Lipitor for several years. A myriad of nagging symptoms was gradually developing including general aches and pains, weakness, hearing and vision problems, MEMORY LOSS and these were sort of being dumped into a category called YOU ARE AN AGING MENOPAUSAL FAT WOMAN. Maybe not in so many words. A quick paragraph on my “menopause.” I was never sure I had a true menopause or just had period cessation due to obesity. Periods came early, barely 10 years old, were always HORRIBLE! Always very heavy and clotty and crampy, often irregular. I was eventually diagnosed with endometriosis and later with fibroid tumors. (Dr. ****** ********, Nashville, TN) I was always fighting anemia throughout all the years that I menstruated. For about ten years prior to cessation they were worse than ever, sometimes I thought I might just bleed to death and I wore tampons plus pads plus DIAPERS! Sometimes would bleed every day for months, then a few days off and start over. Eventually days “off” stretched out to eventual end which came in March of 2000. I can remember this date because it coincides with something else significant to me, ************************************************* in March and I had one more period and then never again. Eventually, Dr. ***** was once again making emergency phone calls to me to tell me to stop taking Lipitor immediately! (I had actually stopped taking it the very day before he called, after having done extensive internet research on my ever worsening symptoms.) The worst symptom of all, rhabdomyolysis, had finally shown up in my blood work. I was told I must never take another statin drug, ever. (I later wondered if my kidney problems also arose from Lipitor use.) Dr. ***** left practice not long after that, choosing to be an administrator instead. During my time with Dr. ***** we also tried Meridia with no success and in fact it raised my blood pressure. For a while I also used Xenical, probably with success, but I was also doing Atkins at the same time. I tried every popular OTC that came along, too. I liked Ephedra! I began to see my current PCP *. **** *****. He is my husband’s PCP and he was happy with him and wanted me to see him. Dr. ***** has been hanging in there with me through various attempts to get my weight back in control. I refuse to take prescription cholesterol lowering meds, but seem to have achieved some control with Red Yeast Rice supplements. Weight just keeps creeping. Neither Dr. ***** nor Dr. ***** would prescribe phentermine but I would get it myself from the internet and they were aware I was taking it. I eventually stopped taking it because I knew it elevated my blood pressure a little and I had stopped losing any weight with it. But I gained 20 pounds fast as soon as I quit taking it and every day right up to this very minute I REALLY miss the energy boost. A little over a month ago I decide to try NutriSystem again and ordered from QVC on television. I told Dr. *****. He said he was glad I’m still trying but he did not think Nutri- System would work for me. (He was soooo right – I was actually gaining!) and he encouraged me to actively pursue a weight loss surgery. I gave the NutriSystem one last shot, found I was gaining, and got back on the internet to look at WLS for the umpteenth time in an as many years. I’m ready now. Why DS? I’ve always known it’s the only thing that will work for me. I have “overcome” my own best diet efforts so many times; I know I will also overcome any other diet surgery that does not have the malabsorptive property of DS. Remember when I mentioned my Dad’s stomach problems? Twice his stomach was greatly reduced in size (due to the horrible ulcers that probably resulted from all the OTC pain meds he swallowed – before his death he was scheduled to have an experimental stomach replacement) and twice he had dramatic weight loss, but eventually went back to his normal (and not excessive) eating patterns and regained with interest. I just know any other surgery would be a waste of time and money. Why have I waited (Weighted?) Well, many reasons. I used to think “giving in” to a surgery would label me a “failure.” I know now that some things really are not my fault. I also have a real healthy fear of anesthesia and surgery, but now I’m more afraid of living the rest of my life the way I am now, plus the DS can now be done laparoscopically, reducing some of my fears about recovery. I am so ready now. My daughter will have her second medically necessary C-section delivery in late September and I so hope to be “switched” and recuperated by then because she will really need my help. I am so in love with my 3 year old grandson and can’t wait for this granddaughter and I want to be a fun and active Grandma. I try now, but it is hard just keeping up with one. I don’t think I can keep up with two unless I get this surgery. I am still in love with that ”difficult” Jack Sprat (*** *****) who could vex me so back in the day, and he’s still in love with me. We weathered many storms, but I don’t think anyone who has only known us for the last ten years or so would ever even think that. He’s encouraging me to go ahead with this surgery even though we have no insurance coverage for morbid obesity and will have to self pay from our retirement savings. That’s love. He’s not much for flowers and candlelight, but he comes through where it counts. I am 5’1” tall and weigh 283 pounds. Thank God, I am still ambulatory, though not without considerable pain. I do not rely on outside help for anything – though lots of things don’t get done as well as they used to. I’m relatively active, but I no longer walk for exercise like I used to, due to the pain. I look forward to doing this again because it always gave me a mental boost as well as the physical benefit. My diagnosed co-morbidities are elevated blood pressure and cholesterol, arthritis, mild depression and general metabolic disorder. I wake myself up snoring and my husband says I stop breathing in my sleep. I have never smoked or done recreational drugs. I very rarely drink alcohol. I have no unrealistic illusions about what my body will look like once weight loss is achieved. I had quite a preview of the “saggy baggy bod” after losing over 110 pounds on Atkins and realize it will be even worse now that I am ten years older and will lose even more weight. I rather expect to resemble a Shar Pei! I look forward to meeting you and Ellen, who was so kind; she answered an e-mail on Sunday! Regards, **** (A Goddess in Progress)
These are my size 24 stretch denim long shorts and size 3X tank top. Shorts are fairly new, but shirt is about 25 years old! It’s not worn out because it spends time in the “too small” box and the “too big” box. Unfortunately it recently came out of the “too big” box. Over the years, I once had lipo to reduce my chin and neck because they were choking me and later had a lipo (at one of my lower weights) to remove extreme “saddle bags” that made clothing a very difficult fit.
