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Surgeon: Dr. Douglas S. Hess, Bowling Green, OH
Surgery date: April 15, 2003
Pre-op weight/BMI: 363/60
Current weight/BMI: 285/45.5
Personal website: My AMOS Profile page
Most recent update: August 2003
by Becky G.:
Basic Stuff:
Hi, I am Becky – married, mother of 4, 39 years old, 350+ lbs, brown hair and eyes, moody and rebellious, and I NEED A NEW LIFE! And I am going to be getting a new start real soon! My surgery is on April 15th, with Dr. Hess. It will be done live on closed circuit TV to other surgeons across the USA. My guts will be seen by all! I truly hope there will be no complications, and I am prepared to do my best to get my butt up that first night and dangle dangle my feet! And to do my breath exercises so I don’t get pneumonia!
I first researched, was approved, and scheduled for surgery in Fall of 2000. Unfortunately my house burned, AND my father died.. AND many other small things, but I was just not emotionally ready for what the surgery was going to require of me. So I backed out. Now 2 years later I quickly got re-approved, and redid all my testing, and am ready for this surgery. I was initially scheduled with Dr. Oakley, but when Dr. Hess called and offered me a special deal, be his live surgery and I could forgo all my out of pocket expenses, well… I couldn’t pass up that great deal! I truly felt like this was another sign that this time it was RIGHT. Because getting the money was the hardest part for me.
My self image:
All my life my siblings have called me chubby.. and fat. I look at the pictures, and see a very typical healthy child. When I married my HS sweetheart I was overweight by about 20 lbs, and then had 2 children, which pushed me up to about 230 lbs. He was really bad for me.. a constant source of insults about how ugly I was, and how fat. He finally said, lose weight or lose him. I lost him, and never lost the weight. I remarried to my current husband who has always loved me for who I am, and loves larger women. I had 2 more children, and now have found myself yoyo’ing right up to over 350 lbs! He’s not really happy about my choice to have weight loss surgery because he’s afraid of how much I’ll change. But I need to do this for me, so I might lose the weight and possibly lose my husband. Only time can tell.
Food habits:
I learned some lessons early, with 5 older siblings; If I wanted something, I had to grab it fast. If I wanted it, I had to eat it now, because saving it for later, it would not be there. As such, I constantly fight an inner fear that someone is going to eat something before I can, which as an adult I have to push that fear aside realizing it for what it is. Another strange habit from my mother was, that if you bought a ½ gal. Of ice cream, it should be split 3 ways and eaten all at once. Which my sister and I did, when my mom needed comfort food we were given it to eat too. I can still remember the bloated feeling I’d have after eating that much ice cream. Which has led me to many many nightes of hiding and eating food when I was upset. With my first husband I can remember hiding cookies…. And then at night after he’d fall asleep, I would sneak downstairs and eat cookies and milk until all my sad feelings were covered up with the dull comfort of being stuffed full of carbs. Now days my family chuckles as when I get really upset I’ll go to the store an buy some oreos. I need them less as I recognize the need, but it’s scary what our learned behaviors make us do. Time for some new behaviors I think, and I do think I am ready and will be able to handle it.
Why I’m doing this:
I have the most wonderful children! My oldest son is 17 now, and quite the young man. He’s learned to love girls of all sizes, and I know it’s because he’s learned from me to look inside people instead of just their looks. He hugs me and tells me he loves me regularly. My darling daughter, my only daughter, is 15. She is my pride and joy. She dresses like a punker, but is 6th in her class of 350 students. There is a wonderful twist of rebelliousness and brilliant intelligence inside her. My two youngest sons are 6 and 3. Sweet little bundles of energy that just wear me out! I want to do fun things with them all. I want to ride rollar coasters with my older kids. I want to take bike rides with my little ones. So, this is for me. To give me life where my own was dead.
Something I wrote when I got my surgery approval and loan money:
This is for me…. All the reading, researching, testing,.. and the explanations to friends and family… all of this has just been part of making this happen for me. For me. I think the most selfish thing I’ve ever fought so hard for in my whole life. No more using the money for bills.. for car repairs.. no more looking at all the things everyone else needs.. no more pushing myself back to last place because I feel a responsibility to take care of everyone else first. Nope… this time is for me.
This time it’s going to be me… not just the hundreds of people I’ve met in real life and online who have had their “rebirth” day as they call it… the day when their whole life changed from having this surgery. The surgery which changed them from being the scorned of society to being a part of it, without anyone even noticing them… just a normal faceless person in a crowd.. not the one standing out because of their size. This time.. it’s gong to be my new life.. my new start. my chance to be normal. My chance to be the person I was before.. before I had to hide myself away inside myself just to protect me.
It’s my time… to be given a heavy duty tool to break myself out of me.. and damn some people who helped put me there better beware cuz I’m gonna kick their ass if they dare hurt me again. I’m going to tell them to get fucked with their comments.. or even their praise if they give it. This is for me, when my brothers and sisters look at me it wont be with pity.. and for once the baby sister doesn’t need their approval and screw them for thinking I can’t do anything right.
I’m scared.. I’m excited.
This is for me… to liberate me from the life I’ve trapped myself in. The life I’ve given up on so many times.. the life I’ve settle for because I thought it was better then other options..the life I’ve often liked to escape from forever… but I failed that.. so now fate has given me a bulldozer, time to re-terraform my life.
I am scared.. the unknown is always so scary.. but one can try to at least check the probability rates.. and this unknown looks like it will be pretty predictably good. Always a chance that it doesn’t change anything at all.. or even a chance that I could die.. but we all have to at some point eh? Heck…. If I do.. then at least I’ll have succeeded finally in doing SOMETHING right. <sarcasm>
I’m doing this for me…. And as selfish as I feel it is…. I know it will also let me do and give myself to my family.. kids.. friends.. everyone in so many better ways then I can now. Soooo many things I want to do… so many ordinary things.. I was going to start a list.. where is that list? Mmm… gotta get to it…. Gonna be a LONG list.
4/27/03
I'm switched!!! I am through surgery.. and home healing... UGH I hurt soooo bad! I was in the hospital for 11 days. Eating sucks! I'm tired.. and can't hardly sit at my desk at all.
5/23/03
I am now.. 5, almost 6 weeks, post-op. I've lost 39 lbs so far. I've had a lot of nausea, but Dr. Hess gave me some medicine for it, and I feel great now!! I can eat about 3-4 oz of food at a time. It's amazing! My family is getting used to getting my left overs. ehhehe. In the first few weeks I hurt so bad, and it was so hard to eat that I was really regretting my choice. But now, nope.. not at all! I have no gas or Bowel problems, even though I eat anything I want.
7/10/03
I'm almost 3 months out now, and have lost 69 lbs so far! To me it's hard to see.. but I can feel it! I can walk for well over an hour now when out shopping, where before I couldn't last a few minutes without sitting down. I can eat almost everything, except pasta - it seems to make my stomach bloat and hurt. I worry about eating too much now, even though it's still drastically less then ever before! My yearning for sweets has diminished, I find myself mostly eating meat and salads with lots of cheese, boiled eggs, ham and tons of ranch dressing!! I eat 2 eggs and 4 pieces of bacon almost daily. That sounds like soooo much to me! But I find I eat slowly... I may take up to 30-45 min to finish a meal. The urge to just stuff myself has gone away. I'm not dieting, and I keep telling myself that this ISN'T a diet. When I saw my Dr. a week ago I was so afraid he was going to be upset at me and tell me I hadn't lost enough. (talk about mental baggage eh?) But He was pleased, and really happy for me that I was feeling so good and having no problems eating things. Especially salads, which some people have trouble with this early out. I love my daily salad though - I think it's my body wanting the veggies as that's pretty much the only vegetables that I eat anymore. I've so far to go... I can't wait to see where I'll be in a year.. 2 years.. and more!
8/7/03
As of last week I had lost another 8lbs.. putting me at a lost of 78 lbs!! My BMI has dropped to 45.5 now, from 58.1 or something. I want to loose 22 more lbs by Sept 15th, to make it a goal of 100 lbs lost in my first 6 months! Hmm... my average is only about 10 lbs every 2-3 weeks, so I'm not sure if I'll get there.
I feel like I'm eating less and less lately - almost like my stomach has gotten smaller. It's very weird. I've also started drinking protein supplement drinks for breakfast and once before bed. I hate the taste.. but my body seems to appreciate it.
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