I grew up in a relatively normal and happy family. I have one sister who's two years older than I am, and she's married and has two wonderful little boys. My sister and I are the exact opposite in looks. She's 5'2 and weighs under 100 lbs. I'm 5'8 (I used to be 5'10...I'm shrinking) and weigh a little over 300 lbs. We come from the same parents, but I inherited most of the traits and features from one side of the family, and she inherited them from the other side. It wasn't as difficult as you'd think growing up with a tiny sister. I would say my parents treated us both pretty equally and I didn't feel like the freak because of my family.
Looking back, I know I've suffered from anxiety since I was small. I remember being in my kindergarten class and having one of the kids ask me why I was so fat. That was a shock to me. Fat, me? That wasn't a word in my vocabulary until then. After that, I heard it on a regular basis from my peers. I was very blessed in that I always had friends. I had good, loyal, fun friends. But there was always some little punk kid ready to call me fat, or call me a whale, or call me ugly.
About the time I hit junior high school, I had watched all the other "fat kids" try and make themselves as small as possible so they wouldn't get noticed. I started to go that way, and did turn really shy around new people, and boys my age especially. I was shy, but I also began rebelling against the idea of trying to hide the rest of my life. Throughout this time, I was a nervous eater, stealing candy, granola bars, anything sweet I could find. I was taller than most girls my age, and usually taller than most of the guys my age, too. I was athletic and was in softball and soccer, but I quit that when they could no longer provide me with uniforms that weren't too tight. I matured faster than most kids my age, too, so those uniforms revealed way more than pre-teen wants to. Compared to an adult, I was just chubby. Compared to other kids my age, I was gi-normous.
In high school, I began to walk with my head up high, not meeting people's gazes, but not ducking my head in shame, either. As a self protection, this gained me some friends because they thought I was cool, and turned other classmates away because they thought I was arrogant.
There's so much story after this, but I'll try and keep it short. (Too late!!) After High School Graduation I had a friend who had bulimia and we would go out to eat fast food everyday. She would throw it up and I didn't know it. I developed a fatty liver at 19 as she became skinnier and skinnier. I became Diabetic at 23 and loss about 30-40 lbs and then slowly gaining it back because I got a social life. If you haven't figured this out yet, it's hard to be at the gym doing 1-2 hour workout 3X a week, you don't have much time for a social life.
I was very happy from 23 - 30, and despite gaining back the 30 lbs I maintained the same weight for about 5-6 years. I was attending a wonderful church, and had more friends than I could keep up with. People accepted me for me and loved me dearly. I was living in a house with two other friends for about three years, we loved and fought like sisters, and then they both got married in 2003. The last two years have been difficult for so many reasons. Loosing my two best friends to marriage, moving three times, having my faith in God severely tested, and my anxiety and depression took over many tiimes. Within the last few years, I've gained between 10-15 lbs. That doesn't seem like a lot, but for someone who'd been teetering within 10-15 lbs of 300lbs, it sucked that I was finally over that hump.
Of course, when I gained weight, my Diabetes, blood pressure, and cholestorol slowly climbed into the danger zones. Despite my depression, I have successfully been working on my eating and walking between 1-2 miles 2-3 times a week. My clothes feel looser, but the scale either doesn't move or it moves up. That's the biggest frustration.
So, I've decided the healthiest choice is to get the Roux-en Y done so that if my anxiety takes over again in my life, I'll only be able to eat as much, I'll be fuller quickly, and I'll dump if I stuff myself with sweets. Anybody got a hobby they think I should try?
I've consulted with a dieticien and an assistant surgeon. We're waiting for everyone to get everything in one place and then, hopefully, they send my records in for approval. I'm hoping to have my procedure done by the end of July of 2005.
This forum has been a great way to really meet people who have gone through the surgery and are flourshing!
NelleBelle's Story
Annelle,
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