Tuesday, March 27, 2012

My 600 LB Life

Have you seen this series? It is absolutely phenomenal.
The documentary follows 4 people, all 600+ pounds, who underwent gastric bypass surgery. It follows them for a total of seven years. It follows their ups and downs, both the successes and failures. While I won’t go into the specifics (you should really watch it), I have to admit it did scare me in a lot of ways.
1.)    Skin issues. – I already have excess skin. I’ve thought a lot about skin removal surgery, but after this documentary I’m not so sure I want to. Even after losing all the weight they wanted, they still had places where skin could not be removed. They had lots of scars. And the surgery itself looked more painful than the gastric bypass.

So I’m not sure what to do about my skin. I’m hoping over time a lot of it will recess – along with strength training it will go away on its own – but what if it doesn’t? What if I’ve permanently damaged my body and will always be afraid to go out in a bathing suit, or sleeveless shirt?

2.)    In a way this next point is comforting (that others fear this too), but it also hits home that I will forever be scared of being a fat woman again. By no means am I saying I’m not fat now, I’m just less fat than I was at 340 pounds. I don’t worry all the time that I’m being stared at. And one of my biggest fears is being fat again. I have nightmares about it.

3.)    Facing the demons that got me 340 pounds. This is really scary because I don’t know why I got to 340 pounds. When you watch shows like this they always seem to have a reason:  daddy issues, mommy issues, molestation. I don’t. I had a great childhood, I’m relatively normal; I have a caring family, job, friends… I have incredibly low self-esteem, but maybe that’s just from the weight itself? I’m not sure.

7 comments:

  1. I loved the series, and recorded the "Where Are They Now" special to watch later. I know exactly what you mean about fearing excess skin. I was JUST talking about that with JC this morning. I'm doing my best to try and ward it off with lots of water for hydration and exercise, but what will be will be I guess. I think that we will not have the extent of issues that they've had because we were not as obese as them, plus we exercise more. Girl, all we can do is the best we can and worry about the rest later! I'd rather be at goal with a little excess skin, then my highest weight any day. I don't know if I'll ever be bikini ready (after baby, yeah probably NOT! LOL), but I will feel better in my skin.

    I also fear going back to my old ways. I think that fear will actually help us to keep on the right track. If we become too comfortable and complacent, we just may forget about how it felt to be before.

    You know, you are like my bloggy soulmate. You always blog about things that I can totally relate to! :)

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    1. (I recorded the Where are They Now last night, too! :) Haha. We are total blog soulmates.)

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  2. I haven't see that show. Sounds compelling.

    The excess skin, that worries me too. My mommy pouch seems to hang less, but it is still a mommy pouch.

    I think many of us can relate to the fear of getting fat again. Cognitive behaviour therapy worked well for me, I would suggest it for anyone who wants to know what actually triggers eating and retrain your brain on how you think about food and eating.

    From what I've learned from my journey with CBT, I think the world is set up in such a way to make gaining weight easy. And anxiety from the stress and pressures of dieting promotes cycles of restricting and overeating.

    Wow - all little dramatic - sorry about that!

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  3. I haven't seen the show...but I'll have to look it up. Maybe it's on hulu.

    Anyway, I know lots of dieters are scared of the loose skin. Here's the deal...there are consequences to every bad choice. Getting up to over 300lbs is a bad choice and in reality your skin wasn't meant to stretch that far. Maybe you have good genetics and over time it will minimalize. Toning will help develop muscles that will make you look a bit better, but really, you'll probably still have some lose skin. You probably will not look good in a bikini without surgery. I don't know of anyone who has gone from 300+ to a healthy weight and not had lose skin (someone speak of if you have...I'd love to hear your story). But don't compare yourself to the 600lb folks. They are going to have far more skin, and I'm sure the procedure is harder on them. If I can afford it, I'll probably get the surgery. But I'm no where near a healthy weight so I don't know what it will look like. Until then...shape wear if needed, and probably no sleeveless shirts. It's a consequence to my bad choices from childhood until now...I'll just have to deal.

    As for fear of being fat again...I fear it all the time. Every time I slip I fear I'm on my way back up. But as one blogger says (Norma), constant vigilance is what it takes. Even when you get to goal, you can never forget you were once a fat woman, and you can't slip back into her bad habits. This is a good fear in my opinion...one that will keep you on track for life.

    Sorry for the long reply!! No matter what the fears are, stay your course because you are heading in the right direction!

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    2. Dang! Loose and lose are not the same word Rebecca! Sorry for the typos!

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  4. I've never seen it, but I've heard about it on the news websites, so will try and download to watch.

    I think everyone who's been really overweight at one point worries about loose skin and while I think my arms, legs and face will be ok, I get really worried about my stomach. It's going ok and I've lost the slight "pouch", but with 100 pounds still to go, I have no idea what it's gonna look like. There's a lot online about losing body fat as you get to goal and building muscle to give yourself as toned a look as possible, so I try and believe that'll work, because the alternative depresses me. :(

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