Jump to content
×
Are you looking for the BariatricPal Store? Go now!
Sign in to follow this  
  • entries
    3
  • comments
    0
  • views
    1,188

November 3rd 2012

Sign in to follow this  
Mrs Havelock

354 views

When I was a baby, my father remarked to my mother: 'She's going to have problems with her weight in the future.' Apparently I was physically very similar to his mother. It turned out he was right but not for the reasons he believed. Ironically, it was his life choices that set me on the road to super morbid obesity. Whenever I want to imagine myself as slim and fit I have to go way back through the photo albums to the age of twelve or so. My thighs were so muscular, tanned and slim then! I ate normally, felt normally, behaved normally. I had friends at school, worked hard, and as the daughter of a vicar, was expected to behave impeccably.

 

At the age of twelve my father abruptly left his children, his job and his wife for another woman and we had to vacate the vicarage quickly. We moved to a small, moldering terraced house in a rough part of Manchester. Our diet changed to extremely poor quality food as my mother struggled to care for her three children without the assistance of Child Support (I don't think it had been invented then).

 

I ate to comfort myself, to choke down my feelings of abandonment and sadness. I stole change from my mother to buy sweets, I sneaked out of school at lunchtimes to go home and eat chips and cry on my own. My weight gain and my obvious differences in life experiences from my new classmates meant I was bullied, not only by the 'in crowd' of girls in their smart clothes, but also by my sadistic PE teacher, who on one occasion brought a tape measure into the girls' changing rooms and measured everyone's vital statistics. The closer to the fabled 36-24-36 they were, the more they were congratulated upon for being 'nearly right'.

 

My home life didn't improve. My mother met a man who was an alcoholic and he moved in after their second date. Years of drink, violence, abuse and other horrors took its toll on my mental health and I began self-harming in secret. How is a fourteen year old schoolgirl, already reeling from changes in her life supposed to react when she comes home from school to find her stepfather passed out in the garden, his trousers to his knees, fully exposed and wet from urinating on himself? Worse still was later on when he had come round, expected to sit around the dinner table as if nothing had happened.

 

My weight climbed and my self-esteem plummeted. At fifteen I went on my first ever diet. A quarter of a glass of grapefruit juice for breakfast, half a slice of dry toast for lunch and a quarter of a tin of mushroom soup for dinner. I lost weight, I obsessed about food constantly and my yo-yo had begun its lifelong twirling.

 

I dieted several times in my life - sure to lose many stones then just as surely putting them back on and some.

 

One does not simply wake up at 27 stone, it is the peak of years of food use, abuse and denial. My last big loss was in 2008 when I lost almost eight stone through strict diet and increased exercise. Four years later ... every stone is back and they, as always, brought a couple of friends back with them.

 

I know this would have been the pattern for my almost certainly truncated life had I not had the incredible good fortune to have a mother about to receive a hefty inheritance along with a deep sense of guilt and regret for some of her life choices. I asked her several months ago if she would consider releasing some of the funds that she intended leaving to her children in the future early, enabling me to have private WLS. She said yes.

 

It has happened very, very quickly. A medical screen by a bariatric nurse yesterday, followed by a consultation with a surgeon booked for next Tuesday. As soon as the funds come through (early December) I will have a date for a sleeve gastrectomy booked.

 

 

The WLS is only ever going to be an aid, not a cure for my weight. I know I have years of poor eating habits and psychological difficulties to work on. But I have never been in a happier place personally than I am now. A husband (blimey!), a sense of direction (future children and employment) and a maturity of self set me in good stead for this undertaking.

 

Bring it on.

Sign in to follow this  


0 Comments


Recommended Comments

There are no comments to display.

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recent Blogs

  • Blog Comments

    • I’ve used my Xbox for exercise games too and it can be pretty motivating, especially on days when I don’t want to leave the house. Kinect games really do make you move, and after a session with kickboxing or dancing, I always feel like I’ve actually gotten a solid workout. The controller-free setup feels way more natural for workouts than anything I tried on the Wii. Zumba is fun but definitely takes a little time to get the moves right. Lately, when I’m not working out, I spend time trading CS2 skins and finding new guides on this link. There’s a lot of interesting tips if you’re into games outside of fitness too.
    • I'm literally almost crying reading this. Mostly because I'mon this pre-op diet and these last two days have been difficult... but also because I needed this! Thank you! Congrats! And a BIG congrats on quitting smoking a second time! It was hard enough to do it once... So - when I say BIG congrats... I mean BIIIIIG congrats! ❤️
    • Congratulations! What a great journey! Thank you so much for sharing. You are inspiring!
    • Was sind last resting-place besten Gewinnchancen in einem Casino? "Einarmige Banditen"
      Einarmige Banditen
      Casinos werden in erster Linie mit Roulette und Poker in Verbindung gebracht, aber Statistiken zeigen, dass 61 % der Besucher von Spielhallen ihre Zeit damit verbringen, einarmige Banditen zu spielen (Daten von 2013 von der American Gaming Association). Perish Regeln der Spielautomaten sind sehr einfach, und der niedrige Mindesteinsatz macht sie auch fur decease armsten Spieler zuganglich.


      https://berliner-vv.de/articles/wie_man_sich_f_r_einen_casino_abend_kleidet.html
      https://sen7.com/typo3/inc/?welches_casino_zahlt_am_schnellsten_aus____bewertung_von_online_casinos_top_10.html
      https://justinekeptcalmandwentvegan.com/wp-content/pages/welches_online_casino_ist_zu_empfehlen___online_casinos_mit_guter_rendite_2022_.html
      http://ff-thyrnau.de/wp-content/pages/was_sind_die_besten_gewinnchancen_in_einem_casino___4.html
      https://buecherplaza.de/wp-content/pages/was_sind_die_besten_gewinnchancen_in_einem_casino___einarmige_banditen_.html
    • Fantastic!! Congratulations on being successful with all your hard work.
  • Together, we have lost...
      lbs

    PatchAid Vitamin Patches

    ×