Why I had weight loss surgery!

When I was a kid I was never the skinny one.  No one ever told me I was skinny.  I think, for the most part, I was average.  Having a larger frame, there was no way I was ever going to be considered skinny, and I was good with that.  My mother was disappointed by my size, I think if she had her way I would have been skin and bones with perfectly curly hair, but she got neither.

I developed young, well it seemed like I was young.  This didn't help much with the size issue.  No, I was not fat, but there was more than my share on my chest so I looked more on the heavy side than not.  This wasn't helped by my refusal to wear a bra when I should have been.  I wasn't that girl who was real feminine, and sure didn't want to be the first in my class to have to wear a bra.  I had enough difficulties in grade school, I didn't need one more, so no bra for me.

For those of you who read my blog regularly, I have not kept it a secret that I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse.  I had various abusers, at various times in my childhood.  The thing about being abused is, as I child, you think the reason this is happening to you is because of something you did, or it had something to do with how you looked.  I remember grown ups telling me how pretty I was, and I remember how uncomfortable that made me.  Hearing that was never a good thing as far as I was concerned.  I was always feeling like the abuse had to do with the way I looked, and subconsciously, I guess, I decided to change things to keep people away from me.  This began a life long job of gaining weight and making sure people kept their distance, and it worked.

When I graduated from grade 8 I weighed 150 lbs.  I reached my forever height in the 4th grade, 5"2 1/2.  This was a lot of weight to carry on that frame, but I wouldn't have said I was crazy overweight.  Towards the end of the 9th grade my gym teacher (a very creepy female teacher whom I was very intimidated by) ran into me in the hall and asked me to come to her office for a little chat.  Her office was at a very isolated area, which made me very uncomfortable.  She had me come in, closed the door, and had me sit down.  She stared off with some small talk, asking me how things were going in grade nine, that sort of thing.  Then she told me how pretty I was, and wanted me to think about losing some weight so that I would be more attractive.  This coming from a very overweight, not attractive woman who was not ageing well for a woman her age.  I remember squirming in my chair, looking at the clock on her desk hoping this all ended fast and I could go home.  I never took gym again, and led to more weight gain and image issues.  By the time I entered the 12th grade I had tipped the scale at 205.  At this point my mother insisted that I start seeing our family doctor to get on a weight loss program.   I did start seeing him, and by the time I had graduated high school I had lost 37 lbs.

Off to college I went.  I was scared, and intimidate by the mere size of the city I went to.  I was from a small town, that consisted of about 5000 people, all of the same colour, all of which I either knew or knew of.  Going off to Toronto was as scary as it could get for me.  I was there about 3 months when at the bus stop one morning a guy noticed me and decided he was going to chat with me all the way to school.  He didn't go to my school, but was on the bus the whole trip anyway.  Over the course of the next few weeks he was at the bus stop more than he wasn't, each time staying on for as long as I was, always trying to communicate with me.  On valentines day he was sitting at the bus stop holding a rose, and a card.  This was all I could take, and from that time on I either took the college bus, which picked us up at the residence but much earlier than I would have like to head out, or I missed that class all together in order to avoid seeing him.  By the time I had finished college I had put all of those 37lbs back on, and then some.

As the years went on I stayed at about the same size.  Maybe there was a variance of a few pounds, but for the most part I stayed pretty constant. 

When I conceived my son I was very healthy.  I didn't have any real issues, other than I was very overweight.  I was lucky, I had a uneventful pregnancy, I actually even lost 13 lbs during that 9 months.  I never felt bad, I actually felt great.

After my son was born I just seemed to gain weight faster than one could imagine.  The fact that I put myself in a bit of a cocoon for the first year didn't help.  Life was getting more complicated, and I was beginning to feel less and less healthy.  Finally I decided to diet, and see if I could shake some of this additional weight.  I was able to lose 60 lbs and felt pretty good.  As with any of my attempts of losing weight it never stayed off....somehow it always found me again, and before I knew it I had gained back those 60 lbs and more.

It wasn't long before my Dr told me that I was diabetic.  I was going to have to start taking meds every day for the rest of my life.  I couldn't stand the idea of doing that, I hated taking meds of any sort and knew that I wouldn't be able to sustain that.  I knew that things either had to change or I was going to die.  Somewhere along the way I also found out that I had sleep apnea. Like taking meds daily wasn't enough, but now I had to wear a mask to bed every night so that I wouldn't stop breathing.  My life was getting way to far out of control, so I decided to pursue weight loss surgery.

At the time you had to have medical issues along with being over 100 lbs over weight.  I sent my application in, and 3 months later I started the program.  It took me more than a year and a half to actually get to my surgery day, but nonetheless when that day came I was ready to bid farewell to all of my medical issues and with any luck be able to become more active with my son.

I was lucky, I was able to toss the meds away, along with the cpap machine and for the last year have been able to shed a great deal of weight and am able to be a larger participator in my sons life.  It has been a life saver for me. 

I never did this to become skinny, in fact the idea of being skinny scares the hell out of me.  There are times I run into people who haven't seen me in a while and will say "hey there skinny" and this sends shivers down my spine.  I have not shaken those feeling from childhood, but I am able to handle it differently.  Now that I am all grown up I know that I can keep myself safe, I know that no one will be able to abuse me again, and I know that I am in a much better place.  It doesn't take away the fear, but I am working on it.

The truth of the matter is this, I didn't have this surgery to become skinny or anything near it.  I did this so that I could live a healthier life.  I wanted to be there for my family, to be an active member of it, and to not have all these things that were taking days and years away from me.  This is why I had weight loss surgery, and the only reason.

Now the government has changed the requirements for the surgery.  Now you don't have to have a long list of medical problems, all you need to have is at least 100 lbs to lose, and even that isn't written in stone.  I am not sure how I feel about that.  I know that there are people who have this surgery just simply to take the fast track to getting skinny.  What they look like is the most, if not the only reason, they have this.  This sort of scares me, as I think there should be more that just body imagine involved when it comes to altering your body for life.  To me I think it would be beneficial for some people to be given alternatives.  I think if the government were willing to help people lose the weight without having to resort to surgery.  Sometimes things just get out of control, and sometimes just having the resources to help you daily at losing that weight is all you really need.  Sometimes I wonder who this surgery is going to benefit.  I am afraid that when it comes to doing this simply because of the way you will look, well what happens when it becomes work and you no longer can sustain that weight loss.  I know that this surgery had done exactly what I had hoped it would do.  Most importantly I am healthier, and that makes me happier.  No, I am not skinny, I am not any where near skinny, but as long as I never have to go back on medications I feel this has been a successful surgery for me.

Stop stressing!!

I struggle, with so many things but one big one is how much or how little to do for my child.

I don't work.  From long before we conceived our son we had made the decision that someone should be home with him before he went to school and after he came home.  We really were thinking that one parent would stay home until he started full time school, and then look at both of us working, but then when we discovered that he had ADHD and needed so much more than a kid without ADHD we decided that maybe it would be best to have someone home until he was able to manage better.  That day hasn't come yet, however I struggle with so many things because of it.

I know as parents we want to give our kids so much more than we ever had.  To me that always meant more time, more interest, more attention.  But as time has gone by, and with the invention of facebook I am realizing that I am not giving nearly what others give their children and I struggle with that. 

We don't have a lot of money, it isn't easy surviving on one income these days, the world has built itself on two incomes, but we manage to make ends meet and not depend on anyone else.  Sure, we go with out a great deal.  We don't get the opportunity to go on big family trips, we don't get to buy the car or home of our dreams, and we certainly don't buy all the newest gadgets.  There are times that I feel really bad, he doesn't get all of the "things" that his peers get, but then I remind myself of the sacrifice we have made for him.  I would love to go and work away from the house, it would be a nice change for me, and I would be able to buy him things that we could only dream of buying him now.  I would make friends of my own, and have somewhere to go every day.  I would really like that, and know so many who wouldn't know what to do with themselves if they didn't go out to work everyday.  Then there are those that never see their kids but they can buy them all the ipods, ipads, and iphones that any one 8 yr old can handle.  Yes, they can fill their lives with plenty of "things" that I could never buy, but really is it getting those kids anywhere.

When I am feeling bad about the lack of things and places to visit in my sons life, I remind myself that he will grow up and be able to say that his mom was there for him for all the important things in his life.  I will never miss a dance recital, an event at school, a heartbreaking conversation with the girl who will break his heart for the first time.  I will be there for all of the moments, maybe he won't be able to call me on his iphone, but he will be able to walk into the kitchen and sit down and talk to me.  No, he may never have an ipad, but really, does he really need one?  I grew up without one, and somehow I managed.  

I give working mothers a great deal of credit.  I can't imagine doing all the things I do a day and work a full time job on top of that.  I think good for you if you can do it.  I know that if I tried I would not do a good job at anything...and I want to be good at one thing, raising my child. 

I think we really should sit down and think about what is really important in life, in our child's life.  All the gadgets, all the vacations, all the stuff isn't going to improve their existence, but being there, really being present is what will.  I don't think any mother, or father for that matter should feel bad about working full time.  I think that it's just as important as staying home with your kids.  What I am saying is don't stress about all the stuff.  Don't think that you have to fill their lives with all kinds of things, all they ever really want is you.  Yes, maybe they will ask for all that stuff, but really, if it means you work two jobs and never see them in order to get all that, don't.  They will thank you for it later, believe me!