The difference between my son and me...
amazin post i went back n fourth starting in january surgery or not surgery then i asked for opinions i have a very old skool southern thinking family and they were all against it so i decided to do the hcg diet it worked for a min but i was scared i would get immune to the drops so i quit taking them then i went to walking cooking healthier etc 20 lbs is no where near the 80 i need to lose so the hell with what everyone thinks its about me so here i go surgery aug 29th and i will use my tool to help me eat right and along with walking i will lose the 80-100 i want to lose and be healthier and happier...by the way none of them know..
For me this question was a bit of a reverse. I grew up in a house with two obese parents. My father was actually the bigger of the two and then in his early 40s he got a severely high cholesterol scare from his doctor. He went on a diet. It was basically one of those diets in the 80s that was extreme low fat. He wrote down everything he ate, he didn't put any dressing on salad and loved it anyway. He had always loved all food, and so now he was able to fill up on tons of vegtables. He began walking every morning at 5am. He lost the weight and he kept it off. (He also had a midlife crisis when he was in his 50s that led to his death, so he did not solve all of his emotional issues).
So here I was an obese teenager from two overweight parents and a father who had done it all on his own. He tried to push my mother and myself to do it exactly as he did and bemoaned our failures.
For years, and years and years I thought why can't I just do that. If he could do it, I should be able to. When I made the decision for this WLS, I went in to the Psych eval and of course she asked questions about my parents. I said something about feeling all these years like I should be able to do this without surgical intervention, like my father had. The Psych said to me, "you are not your father." Simple as that.
More than that though, the statistics do not show many folks who are able to do what my father did. Sugery has real long term success rates. It is a tool that offers much better odds. In the end, I think we have to let go of the idea of comparing ourselves to someone else as the ideal and focus on what will work best for ourselves.
So here I was an obese teenager from two overweight parents and a father who had done it all on his own. He tried to push my mother and myself to do it exactly as he did and bemoaned our failures.
For years, and years and years I thought why can't I just do that. If he could do it, I should be able to. When I made the decision for this WLS, I went in to the Psych eval and of course she asked questions about my parents. I said something about feeling all these years like I should be able to do this without surgical intervention, like my father had. The Psych said to me, "you are not your father." Simple as that.
More than that though, the statistics do not show many folks who are able to do what my father did. Sugery has real long term success rates. It is a tool that offers much better odds. In the end, I think we have to let go of the idea of comparing ourselves to someone else as the ideal and focus on what will work best for ourselves.
Cari 
Thank you everyone for the replies!
Sometimes we do need to the reminder that we are ourselves and to stop comparing who we are and how we respond to things with other people, even close family members.
Cari, thank you for sharing your story. It truly is much the same... and for sharing about your dad and how his weight loss didn't necessarily solve his issues. It almost sounds like his weight loss became a way of gaining a 'control' in his life. For myself, some of the best success I've had with losing have been when I didn't feel in control of anything in my life except food.
There is a lot of food for thought here from you all. Thanks for the input.
Best of luck to everyone!
Sometimes we do need to the reminder that we are ourselves and to stop comparing who we are and how we respond to things with other people, even close family members.
Cari, thank you for sharing your story. It truly is much the same... and for sharing about your dad and how his weight loss didn't necessarily solve his issues. It almost sounds like his weight loss became a way of gaining a 'control' in his life. For myself, some of the best success I've had with losing have been when I didn't feel in control of anything in my life except food.
There is a lot of food for thought here from you all. Thanks for the input.
Best of luck to everyone!
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