Skip to main content

#SurgeryFAIL? (yes, that was a twitter reference, and yes I am ashamed)

The recap: I had Gastric Bypass seven years ago. I started out at 290, never got down below 185 (size 16 jeans), and have fluctuated somewhere around 200 for the past couple years. I exercise regularly and eat well. I've also had a tummy tuck and arm/thigh lifts. I'm currently around 207, and eating 1770 calories a day in a drastic attempt to drop back below the 200 mark.

The current problem: Every now and then I watch a documentary or read an article about someone who has had weight loss surgery, and I feel like they're always so thin. I don't really understand why I never got all that thin in the first place, and why it's such a struggle just to maintain the loss, much less lose more.

The conclusion: I guess I'm disappointed. I don't regret the surgery, because it's had a huge impact on my life and my confidence, but I am frustrated that after three surgeries and seven years of struggle, I still feel fat. At what point is a weight-loss surgery considered a failure? I live in fear of gaining back all the weight and having to have another surgery, or just live with my body...

Comments

Anne said…
PS Sorry that was so short and disjointed. I had a sort of outline in the text box, and then I accidentally published it, and I couldn't figure out how to unpublish it, so I just cleaned it up a little and sent it back out into the world...

Popular posts from this blog

Nothing tastes as good as thin feels?

That old Upper East Side adage has been running through my mind all week. Ever since I got my visa to go back to London and started counting down the days I had left of fresh, delicious California cuisine. I recently got to within a couple pounds of my goal (well, not my goal weight, but my goal of getting below a certain hated number), and now I’m struggling with a very difficult decision: to eat or not to eat? I have an opportunity here. I could be below the dreaded number by the time I leave for London, if I’m willing to give up all badness and only eat healthy, low-calorie foods like vegetables sans olive oil and salads with no cheese or nuts. But then I would be sacrificing my last week of yumtastic treats like Trader Joes Mini Peanut Butter Cups and delicious grilled asparagus with olive oil and steak, glorious steak! Maybe the choice would be easier if I had a point of reference, but I’ve never been thin, so I have no idea how it feels. What I do know is that a lot of thing...

I'm telling.

It’s weird. My scars haven’t even faded yet, except in miraculously transparent patches, and I’m already forgetting they exist. Now, when I raise my arms to tie up my hair (something I would never have done in public just a year ago) and the man at the next table looks at me a little too long, I feel an urge to make sure I’ve shaved my armpits. It’s only when I not-so-slyly slide my fingers into my shirt that I feel the abnormally smooth stripe of skin and realize what the man was staring at. And I’m so much less strict about hiding them. Last week at work I wore a sleeveless dress and one of the nurses asked about my scars, and I realized I hadn’t told anyone there about my weight loss and all my surgeries. Even the other receptionist, to whom I feel fairly close. And so I told the nurse, because I’ve always maintained that if I hide my history with surgery then I don’t deserve the benefits of the procedures. I promised myself that I wouldn’t be ashamed of my plastic surgery, a...

This book stuff is harder than it seems...

So as I think I may have mentioned, I have to write a book for my MA in Creative Nonfiction, and I decided to write a memoir about this whole GB experience, including childhood stuff and family dynamics in addition to the process of surgery and the mental and physical results of the change.  I thought it would be so easy.  I mean, I spend 90% of my time thinking about my body anyway, how hard could it be to put those thoughts down in the form of an interesting, structured narrative? NOT, that's how easy.  I haven't written one single word of the book, and I'm having a really hard time starting.  And the longer I put it off, the more afraid I am of failing at my goal to write a funny, frank narrative; I'm terrified it'll end up as a 'poor me' memoir, and I'll have proven my dad right in saying that this project is self-indulgent and useless.  And that's not the only surprise stumbling block... When I tell people what I'm writing about, they al...