On August 1st, as I was sitting on the gurney waiting to be taken in for my surgery, I kept thinking two things. The first thing, as you expect, was how much I didn’t want to die and leave my husband and daughters behind. But the second thing that kept running through my mind was Please, don’t let me fail at this. And as I waited, becoming more and more anxious, I thought about what I would have to accomplish to consider this surgery successful.
Wedding Weight
I was always heavy, but in the months leading up to my wedding, we dieted. I managed to go from about 190 pounds, down to about 160 pounds, and the day I got married, I weighed in at 165 pounds. It was still 20 pounds or so over my “ideal” weight, but I was happy and comfortable at that weight. I didn’t feel overweight.
So on that day of my surgery, sitting on the gurney, I put that wedding weight in my mind as the weight I wanted to be before I considered my weight loss surgery successful.
In the 7 months since surgery, I have gone from a size 26 to a size 12.
I have gone from sweating to death every night, sleeping in t-shirts, in the middle of winter to sleeping in flannel nightgowns with covers on and still taking a little while to get warm and toasty without the excess weight on me.
I have gone from going out to dinner, ordering an appetizer, and entree, a soup or salad, and a dessert to ordering a soup and having a bite of Jim’s dinner.
But today, I am successful 🙂
The scale this morning said 165 pounds. I could have cried.
I have very few clothes that fit me, and I have skin hanging off of body parts I forgot were there. I lost a lot of hair, although that seems to be slowing down and I colored it last night, so it’s not even thin and grey – just thin.
But I’m a success.
Would I recommend this surgery to everyone? No. It’s hard work and it’s a scary thing to not know how you will live out your life. There are no long term studies done to tell me that in 20 years I will be far healthier than I would have been if I stayed fat.
But I am a success.
With dedication, work, love and support, I will keep this weight off. I have never been able to do that before, but now that I can consider myself a success, it would be a shame to mess that up.