Marillyn
Well, I have decided to start telling my story. It's not really different from many of yours.
For one thing I have suddenly realized that I have had chronic conditions since I was in elementary school. Back then it was an appendix that finally was taken out when I was 19.
When I had my final check up before I left for college, my doctor was shorter than I was and he measured me being over an inch shorter than I was. So my 135 pounds was not the perfect weight, it was overweight. Since I had problems when I was a toddler, he gave me a lecture about losing weight and how good it would be for my body.
Of course over the next few years I tried all sort of ways to lose weight, the Cambridge one is one that sticks out. Of course like everyone else, I would lose 5 pounds and gain 7.
After my first son was born in 1971, I worked hard to lose the weight. I was back where I was supposed to be just in time to discover I was pregnant again and my second son was born in 1974.
I had different health problems over the years. Most of them took a long time to find out what they were.
My weight fluctuated over the years and then in 1996 I fell going into the building at work. 2 1/2 years later I was finally have arthrascopic (sp?) surgery repairing the damage in my left knee. That was when they discovered that I had broken off one side of the groove in back of my knee and that I had pieces of bone floating around doing more damage.
Of course I had done less and less walking. Of course the car accident that I had 6 months after the fall and left permanent whip lash injuries didn't help. I still remember the overweight occupational nurse making comments about my weight. Of course I don't think she believed at that time that I was really hurt.
As my knee improved (it hasn't completely yet) I started losing weight again. At that point I was about 240 pounds. I didn't know what was wrong, but I kept losing strength.
Then in 2002, the day after Memorial Day, I had one of those dreaded calls, my husband Dave had been hurt at work and had been airlifted (fastest way across Puget Sound for serious injuries). He had dropped about 8 tons on his left foot and a month later they amputated because it didn't survive.
He was still in a wheelchair that hunting season, but he went like he did every year. And then on Halloween while he was gone I got another dreaded phone call. The results had come back and I had breast cancer. Those 2 phone calls changed everything we knew. When I first went to the surgeon he was still in a wheelchair and then when I had a lumpectomy he was on crutches. He pushed to improve as fast as he could so he would be able to take care of me.
During this time my weight didn't change, they didn't want me to diet, so even though food really didn't taste good I had to maintain my weight.
I retired to help take care of him because he found it hard to be alone all day. He started collecting tractors at that time and ended up with 15 of them. Most of them older collectible ones.
I kept slowly putting weight on. I just didn't seem to be getting my strength back. The doctors thought that it was because of my chemo and radiation.
Suddenly in August 2005 my husband started having problems. We started having many doctor appointments and tests. He was admitted to the hospital with liver failure for an unknown reason. We now know that it was the Tylenol that he took for 3 months after his injury and amputation. He died September 3.
Weight just seemed to be creeping up on me. After he died I didn't care what I weighed. By January I was up to the most I had ever weighed and the largest size, -28 jeans. I decided that I had to start taking care of myself. I joined Curves and started losing weight. But I kept getting sick. Last year I had pneumonia, bronchitis and sinus infections multiple times. I was getting weaker and weaker. I developed asthma, though I didn't realize it for 6 months.
I kept getting sick and getting weaker and weaker. I could hardly walk from one side of the house to the other without sitting down and resting.
Last summer I developed chronic diarrhea. I was very limited with what I could eat. I couldn't have any fruits or vegetables or they were through me in 6 hours. My doctor started tests and then sent me to a specialist. It took 3 months to see the specialist. After the colonoscopy and endoscopy he immediately sent me to get a upper gi test with barium.
At that point he realized that I had a paraesophageal hiatal hernia. this means the bottom of my stomach was up in my chest. It included over half my stomach. When this type of hernia is found it needs to be fixed soon. It was the cause of all my sickness for the last year and before.
I went to the University of Washington Medical Center and met Dr. Oelschlager. I was lucky because of my extra weight I was given a choice between 3 surgeries. There was the traditional surgery where I would have to have it again. The gastric bypass and the verticle sleeve gastrectomy.
I chose the third one because it would make the least change to my life. Dr. Oelschlager made my banana larger than for strictly weight loss because he used a 52 bougie.
My stomach liked being where it was so it took 4 1/2 hours to pull it back down into my abdomen, repair the very, very large hernia and cut the fundus off.
I have started losing wieght since my surgery on My 1st and I am very excited about it. The weight loss is an added bonus. I don't expect to go down to my "perfect" weight, I just want to be able to buy clothes that I like easily.
I am hoping as I am able to be more and more active and able to go to Curves more that I will get in better shape and able to do more.
