Weight, Weight, Weight.

I have been giving a lot of thought to this post. Some of you will think my actions are reasonable and some will think that I was looking for the easy way out. I have heard it all. I know why I chose the path I did and it is working out well for ME. I am not advocating anything I have done to be right for anyone else. You have to find what works for you.

I was 65 lbs when I started kindergarten. I have old photos and I wasn't really obese. I was chunky. I was the tallest in my class and don't really look out of place or stand out as the fat kid. My family are large, heavy boned people. I have never had a broken bone (should have probably had a few!) and neither has any of my brothers. My freshman year in high school I was 160 lbs. and my mom was after me to lose weight. I was extremely active but I also ate like a man that put in a 60 hour week finishing concrete! My mom decided it was time that she intervene. She called the family doctor who happened to live across the street and asked him to prescribe some diet pills for me. My mom could be pretty persuasive when she wanted to be and he, without hesitation, called in a script. This is where is all started. I did diet pills for about 4 months the spring and summer of my freshman year. I went back to school as a sophomore at 125 lbs and looking good - if I do say so myself. I had all the curves in all the right places and wasn't really afraid to show them off. I had stopped growing in height in about 5th grade and so now at 5'6" I was of average height among my peers. Where I was above average was in the D-cups I was sporting. Boobs are powerful things when you are 15. I used diet pills on and off all through high school and when I graduated I was at 135 lbs. The 2 years after high school I got up to about 160 which was really a pretty good weight for me.



Then came marriage and kids. And pounds. I took most of the weight off after my first child, then again after my second (with the help of Rx diet pills). I was at 233 when I got pregnant with my son. I was at 230 when he was delivered full term. I vowed that I would not gain another pound during pregnancy with him and I did really well. No diet pills, just eating right and not huge quantities. I got down to 170 that year. That was 18 years ago.



The next 12 years I just didn't give a damn. I didn't have horses in my life then, I was working full time in a job that I hated in a town 25 miles from home, I basically lived and breathed through my kids and husband. I got up to over 300. Can't tell you how much over because the scale only went to 300. I would guess about 320 at my heaviest. I was wearing a size 22 - 24 jeans and a XXX top. Those D-cups were now G cups. Do you know how hard it is to find a G cup and how expensive they are? But I guess since you can use them as a hat - yes they were as big as my head - you have to pay for the dual purpose! Our family doctor had passed away and so I didn't have that direct line to the RX diet pills anymore and my doctor wouldn't give them to me. He said "Just quit eating and get some exercise", so helpful. I finally changed jobs, still working full time, but in a better place. I had 3 kids in 4-H, gymnastics, dance, karate, baseball, and every other sport you can dream of. I didn't really a have a lot of time to exercise. I was looking online and found that you could get Rx diet pills on line by simply filling out a questionnaire. Here we go again! I got the diet pills and in 7 months I was back down to 220. Around this time horses came back into my life and I was feeling really good about where things were heading. Then my mom died. Then my brother died. I gained back 30 lbs. but I maintained that weight for about 4 years. I was heavy but I was coping. I was wearing a size 18 pants, still in the G-cup, 18-20 top. I was riding alot, my kids were growing and getting out on there own more, I was finding a balance in my life.

I had heard our local hospital had an excellent weight loss program that included weight loss surgery. My insurance covered weight loss surgery so I called to make an appointment for a consultation. I was told that since they weren't a "center of excellence" that my insurance wouldn't cover the visit. They offered to put me on a waiting list until they became certified. I agreed to that and then just kind of forgot all about it.

I decided that I was going to lose weight the right way. Exercise and eating right. I joined the gym and started eating right in Oct. I was at 265 lbs. I exercised for at least an hour a day 4 to 5 days a week, rode at least 5 days a week and really ate a very healthy conservative diet. I didn't give up alcohol but I gave up all sweets, breads, fats, and was eating 3 balanced meals a day with no snacking in between. I was feeling better but didn't feel like I had lost any weight or inches. I didn't weigh until March 1st. I wanted to give this new life style a chance. I gained 7 lbs. It was a huge blow and sent me into an absolute tissy fit. I decided to give it a few more months and to give up everything - if it had blank calories, sugar or fat, I wasn't going to eat it (no alcohol) and I started skipping meals again, my diet wasn't healthy. From March to September I lost about 15 pounds. I was miserable. Then my best friend calls me and says "want to be my diet buddy?". Why not? Nothing else seemed to be working. She wanted me to go on the "cookie diet" with her. Smart for Life cookies are meal replacements. I tried that for about 4 months and lost a few pounds. I was now around 250 pounds.

It had been a year since I was put on the waiting list for the weight loss center when I got a call from them asking me if I was still interested. I was a little taken aback. Did I really want weight loss surgery? It was such a huge step and what if they said no. If they said that I wasn't a candidate for weight loss surgery, what options were left for me to get this fat off. It really set a lot of emotions into overdrive. One thing I knew for sure was that if I wanted to become a better rider, show my horses, live the life that I had been dreaming of, I had to get the weight off.