Describe your behavioral and emotional battle with weight control before learning about bariatric surgery.
I have struggled with my weight for as long as I can remember. The doctor put me on diet pills when I was in the second grade. This was the beginning of a battle that has been ongoing. I was always either on a diet or eating everything in sight in preparation for the next diet. I have always been able to lose weight as long as I am on a diet, but I have never been able to maintain that weight loss long term. I realize that I am an emotional eater. I could deal with the physical hunger but could not seem to overcome the desire to eat even when I wasn't physically hungry.
What was (is) the worst thing about being overweight?
I think that the worst thing about being overweight is the way that other people treat you and the sense of shame that you feel because you are not able to lose the weight and keep it off permanently. It also limits what you are able to do and makes it harder to do things you are able to do. Of course, as you get older the physical ailments caused by a lifetime of being overweight begin to multiply. It basically robs you of the ability to live your life in the way that you want to live.
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 think the thing I enjoy most is being able to go places and do things with my family and not be exhausted and in pain before we get started. It feels wonderful to just get up from a chair and be able to move freely and not have to hold on to the wall to walk down the hall. It is great to just feel like a normal person and not know that I am the fattest person in the room. Even though I am not where I want to be yet, I am very thankful for the progress I have made and I feel like this surgery has given me my life back. I turned fifty last year, but felt younger than I did at forty with so much of the excess weight gone.
bettys62
