Cheating…

Lately I have been surfing around the website Bariatric Pal  and reading the forums fellow WLS patients have wrote. 

One forum caught my attention again and also my frustration. 

It was all about cheating or the easy way out. 

I am going to start this with a little story…this might be a tad repetitive, just warning you.

Before my surgery I have tossed out use to be friends because they thought that this surgery was an “easy way out” or cheating. It is now mind boggling for me to think that WLS is an easy way out of obesity. As all my readers know, I have been obese for a long time, like since I was a little kid. I have been on SO many diets and watched myself SO many times fail. (Here is something new) Back when I had the lap band but in place, I was told by many that I was too young for this huge step and that this was an easy way out. At 18 I said fuck it, I am going to do this. I knew at the time I was too young, but I wanted to be skinny SO bad. I wanted the hell I lived through to be over. When I mean hell, I mean all the bullying at school and whatever bullying I faced as an adult that waited me. I knew if I showed up skinny at Leslie High School and see old classmates or seen people I graduated with I wanted to show them that I can be skinny and I can be beautiful. I wanted them to eat their words so bad, all those hurtful things they said to me in the halls and in class. Back then I fully believed that this was an easy way out of all the pain I dealt with.

I learned quick that I was SO wrong. It was hard for me to stomach this. I only lost 50 pounds with having the lap band. I was so embarrassed, that I gave up going to follow up visits at Sparrow. I had complications from the band such as vomiting. And the vomiting was everything I ate. I developed acid reflux. I lived with this guilt for five years, till I looked at the scale and I was 397. That guilt surely added up on that scale. It took many angry and tearful conversations with my mom to finally go back to Sparrow. Anyways you know the story from there, but what I was trying to say five years ago at age 18 I thought this was easy. I sure was wrong thinking that then, now my view has changed. I grew up, I know that it takes a hell of a lot of work to loose weight and make this life changing decision.

Hearing a total stranger, family member, or a friend tell me now that this is cheating. I can ask them now this question: How? Yes, I have opted to take 85% of my stomach out and remove a tool I once opted to have to help me loose weight. But it is a far cry from being easy. I had to reevaluate my whole life and the all the choices I make. I had to see what needs to be changed so I can become healthy. I had to prove myself to the weight loss clinic who I went through when I was 18 that I have changed as a person, and that having a revision surgery will be the best for me. Because they saw me fail at 18, and they didn’t want to give me another tool to watch me fail again. And I tell you that was harder than any other test I had to ever take. After surgery the first few months were easy, I had no appetite. But now I slowly have it back, and same with the cravings. So, all this work into making choices are tested every day. Take today as an example. I have been craving an ice coffee for a while. I decided today I am going to treat myself to one. Before the surgery I would get the ice coffee that is loaded with sugar and fat. Now, my order was this sugar free vanilla, skim milk and lots of ice. This tasted to me just like the loaded fat and sugar guilty ice coffee I used to have. I love my sweets, I still enjoy them but in very careful moderation. I tried regular ice cream for the first time this past Friday and it gave me such a horrible stomach ache that I know I cant have that. I have tried frozen yogurt and that goes down better than regular ice cream. But I only had that once. Cooking has changed, I used to go out to eat  a lot. Now I find joys in making healthy food that taste so guilty but its not. Like most mid-westerners I was grown up to eat everything off my plate. Now, I cant. For you people who say this is easy, how would you survive just eating a 1/2 cup of food at a time? I bet you couldn’t. Its hard to hear family members tell me “Kaylee, your wasting food and money when you through so much food away.” Sorry family members, you taught me to eat everything on my plate. So when I can’t don’t bitch at me because I can’t. Don’t tell me to eat more when I tell you I can’t. I watch everything that goes into my mouth, I know if I eat a high fat meals all day I am going to gain at least 3-4 pounds and it will take me a whole week to get rid of it. So tell me stranger, family member, or friend how is this easy? I have said goodbye to many friends because they liked me as the fat friend. I learned this and it hurt so bad to say goodbye but it felt so good after because I found out the truth. This journey is far from easy, is it worth it? Yes, it is! I am tackling everyday battles of life and I am still living and still thriving to become healthy.

Another thing that has bugged me lately is this whole fat acceptance and also the saying “curvy girls are better than skinny girls. At one time in my life I fell for that statement. Now, not so much. Everybody is beautiful on their own. Being curvy doesn’t make you any better than being skinny. God made us all different because if we were all the same, life would be pretty damn boring. I don’t get the whole fat acceptance. I get stop the bullying piece of it. That needs to stop, that old saying “Kids will be kids” needs to end as well. Teach your kids that everybody is different but we are equal. Nobody is better than the next. I just don’t get the acceptance piece. I was comfortable at 397, I didn’t accept that I was going to be like this forever. Everybody can change, just because that road of change is hard doesn’t mean to give up. I watched my grandpa give up, and he could have changed his life but he accepted that he was going to be big for the rest of his life and it was sad.

Anyways, this soap box is done for today. I will end this saying I am down 115 pounds! Just 5 more and I will hit the 120 mark. I have just 32 pounds to go to hit the 250 goal I have. Oh Yeah! The stall is over I think…stay tuned to see more.

Take Care! 

Love Always, 

Kaylee