Describe your behavioral and emotional battle with weight control before learning about bariatric surgery.
I am a 43 year old woman, who has battled weight loss since I was a teen. When I graduated high school I was 181 lbs. I had wanted to join the military but could not because I was too fat. After much thought I decided the military was what I wanted so I began to work fast and furious to lose 50+ lbs. It took me a year but I did it, and not the healthy way. I went on a crash diet, (grapefruit), this was very popular in the 70's. I got down to the necessary weight and joined the Air Force. I managed to stay on a physical, as well as a psychological, roller coaster weight control problem my whole career. Constantly being within 5 lbs of the maximum weight allowed for me. The military even went as far as to place me in an in hospital weight loss program. This program consisted of a one month stay at the hospital with constant supervision of my food intact and psychological evaluations for eating disorders. Although, the military considered it to be a success. It was really a failure, as I continued to ride the roller coaster. After nine and one half years and two children, I finally gave up. My weight was in excess of 200. I was finding it too difficult to loss the baby fat gained from pregnancy. After getting out of the service I decided to give Nutri-system a try. It worked (very expensive), as long as I ate their foods and did what they told me to do. As soon as I lost the weight, I quit their program. I chose not to do their maintenance program. Of course, I gained the weight back. It took many years but most of it came back. I again went back to Nutri-system, but this time it didn't work. My heart was not in it. Since that time I have tried fad diets and exercise. All to no avail. I developed Hyper-thyroid/Grave Disease in 1988. The diagnosis was so bad that the doctor said the best course of action was to use radio-active therapy to kill off my thyroid. This succeeded in making me Hypo-thyroid the rest of my life, relying on pills to give me the energy I need. This has been another roller coaster ride of getting the right dosage. Well to make this long story shorter, I had heard about the gastric bypass surgery but could not afford to have it done. After speaking with a co-worker about it, I found out that my insurance would cover such a surgery if the doctor thought it would help me medically. I was so excited, I called the military hospital (my husband is retired) immediately to get an appointment. I was given a surgical consult and found out that due to my thyroid, female, and high blood pressure problems, that I was a good candidate for the surgery. I had the surgery just about a week ago, and am glad to say that I believe the roller coaster ride is coming to a stop.
What was (is) the worst thing about being overweight?
How I felt about myself. I felt I was a failure. Even though losing weight pretty much meant starving myself, I felt I was a failure because I could not take off the weight.
If you have had weight loss surgery already, what things do you most enjoy doing now that you weren't able to do before?
I can walk for long periods of time while carrying on a conversation. I can hike with my husband and friends. I can keep up with my two teenage sons when we walk through a mall. As a matter of fact I almost broke down in tears one day when my youngest son put his arm around me and said "Mom, I can tell you have lost a lot of weight." When I asked him how, he stated, "Because you can keep up with me when we walk togther." It was one of the rare moments that I have allowed myself to be proud of myself.
Linda H.