So yesterday I touched on my Weightloss surgery journey as well as some health stuff... let me go more into detail.
It all started back when I was a wee bitty little one - all my life I have been overweight. When I tell you now that my ultimate goal is to be a size 8 that is like moving the earth behind the sun! I have NEVER in my life been a size 8 - well maybe when I was 8?
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| from my sister's instagram - I'm the cheeks on the left! |
Anyway - all my life I have been overweight, chubby, fat, etc. - the weird thing, or maybe it's not weird, but I hear about it alot now a days, is that I was never teased about my weight. I remember when I was living in Iowa with my mom/stepdad as a freshman in highschool. It was like the first week of school while in gym class - the teacher was evaluating each student and we had to be weighed. When I got on the scale (you know the kind with the weight you move left or right) - it said 244 and the teacher read it out loud. I dont know why she had to read it out loud - she could have just written it down on my file and be done. It rang in my ears for years to come... but I was never teased.
I moved back to Houston the summer after freshman year and my grandma put me on a diet - you may have heard of it - Quick Weightloss Diet. I did AMAZING and dropped about 60 lbs. It was the best time of life and I went into sophmore year at a great weight (so I thought) and lived life. I was always the funny one, the nice one, the one that had a great personality - and I never had trouble in the "guy" department either.
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| I'm the one in the middle... this is in at the Valentine's dance |
But as years went on, so did my weight. At 23, I weighed 321 and decided to have a lapband put in. I was deteremined to lose the weight. At the time the lapband was really new and did not have as much research to it - but my dr insisted that this was the right move for me and I did it. Looking back, I wish I would have done more research on the different surgeris as I would have picked a surgery with better results. I mean I had to lose more than 120 lbs to even break it to "onderland" (being 199 or below) and at the time it was thought that being the less invasive surgery for me was the way to go. Moral of the story is less invasive does not mean more weightloss. Again- I said this yesterday - there have been many a success with the band (one of my best friends from highschool - who is still a bestie today - has lost over 100 with the band and has managed to keep it off for over 5 years) but for me, it did more damage than good.
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| At my sister's wedding in 2009 - and no I'm not pregnant :-( |
I kept the band for almost 10 years until 2011 when I was at my wits end and had crept back up to 326 (I was probably higher, but this is the largest recorded weight I have). I called up my lapband dr's office only to find that he was retiring and that he was no longer seeing patience. I was transferred to another dr and that's when the choir angels started to sing. My new dr was amazing and wonderful and delightful (and still is, but this is past tense, so stay with me) AND to top it off, he was a colleague of my dad's sister! So that made it much more amazing. I spoke to him about he band and we decided that it needed to come out. It was causing all the symptoms that I had been having and was more bad than good. So we scheduled my revision surgery and ended up doing it on Jan 17th (my birthday!!).
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| At my sister's 30th/mom's 50th - (I'm on the left - 326lbs, then mom, then sister, then bff LConny) |
Prior to my revision surgery we discussed the options - was I gonna have a Gastric Bypass? A Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy? A Duondenal Switch?? which was it? Well in order to determine what was to be done, I had to have tests - blood work, a gastric scope and all of that!! Well doing all these tests, it was discovered that the band had caused me to have an enlarged esophogus as well as large amounts of scar tissue. Because of this I was only eligible for the Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy. At first I was bummed because I wanted the best results in the smallest amount of time - but in the end, this was the right move for me. So two week prior to Jan 17th, I had to start a pre-op liquid diet. It was AWESOME - NOT. I could only have liquids... booo to that.. but after day 3 it was a BREEZE. I was seeing the weight come off and lost 14 lbs in that 2 week period! wooohooo!!!
During this last year, I have had scary times, depressing times, Gallbladder surgery times and it's just an amazing ride. I started working out and actually like being active (not all the time, but sometimes... )
I have lost a total of 94 lbs from my highest weight! It has been quite the coaster, but I am finally figuring out that food is not everything. It is delicious and delightful, but not everything. I have come to terms that water is my friend and flushes out the junk. I realize I do need protein in my life even if I just want to eat cake. It's a lifestyle change and is only getting better.
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| on the left at another wedding in 2011 - 326lbs :-( on the right, this was just a few weeks ago.... at about 85lbs down!!! |
So that's the gist of it - so far!... My ultimate goal is to live my life in a size 8 - will I get there, you bet your whitehouseblackmarket chinos I will! Will it take a lot of work, oh hell, what do you think? But here I am... taking control and taking my life in a direction I never thought it would go.
Check ya!
Adriana
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