Hello World! I am so excited to be begining this journey, finally! My name is Michelle, and I am a 25 year old wife and mother of one (which at this time is quite enough, lol) living in New York, about a hour and a half north of NYC. My story is pretty standard for most overweight people in many ways. I have been severely overweight nearly my entire life and have fought like hell to just be normal, while always falling just short of success. Everything that I tried has failed in the long term, and after having my son I can say I jsut truly gave up. I focused everything I had on my family and never saw the pounds piling on until it was way too late.

As a child, I was on my first medically supervised diet at seven years old, but can remember the doctors comments to my mother well before then about my weight. As if being on a diet and in the second grade was not enough, apparently, my teacher, classmates and their parents also need to know to avoid any cupcake temptaions during school birthday celebrations. Being the only fat girl in class allowed for plenty of merciless taunting, trust me I did not need the assistance of this little fact. One thing I can say is that unlike many obese people, the one thing I do not have against me is heredity. I am the only fat one in a family of truly beautiful people. In fifth grade, when a classmate found out I was related to the gorgeous petite blonde with green eyes in the 8th grade, I was asked something I wll never forget. "You are related to her? What happened to you?" By then I had already heard a million comments and nasty remarks but that one cut me deep. I had realized I was the black sheep in the family when I was little and had to hide in the closet to eat anything around my aunts who always expressed concerns over my ever growing waist line. But to have a stranger point that out in that way hurt.

I have been obese for 3/4 of my enitre life and should have realized a million times over that I had lost control. The truth is, it took an innocent comment by my five year old son for me to look in the mirror. I mean, really look.

I was laying across my bed, watching tv like I usually am after work, and my son walks into the room and says "ya know, if ya wanna lose weight, all ya gotta do is exercise!" In that moment, my heart sank. Forgetting his age and innocense, I screamed at him "Who told you to tell me that?" Seeing his big beautiful blue eyes staring back at me with concern and confusion, I realized that noone had put him up to that (well, ok that and I may have harassed a few family members about what they knew regarding that comment). He was only telling me what he believed the solution to be. In that moment, I realized that I was not only not living my life to the fullest, but I was causing my son not too either. We have never had a vacation to the beach, I have never been swimming with him in a pool, and the last time my husband finally got me to give in to taking a family photo, he was one. So this is me. And I am taking back my life.

Good for you!!

How is it going now?

Wow, I totally relate! My son was getting taunted in school that his mother is fat. I felt like garbage after that! Wasn't it enough that I was teased in first grade for being fat - now I'm still being teased by first graders - and my son has to suffer from it???

I wish people would just accept the fact that some people are genetically fat, and stop teasing us as if we chose this. I don't know why - maybe our hunger signal doesn't know how to shut off. Like you, I was the only fat kid in my family - we were fed the same foods at every meal, so why was I the fat one? No, I don't believe I was lazy at four years old when I started gaining weight. I think it was just my body.

A recent study at Harvard which I read in the New York Times proved that obesity is more genetically predetermined than diabetes and heart disease combined. I'd be happy to share the article with you. The lap band works around this by squeezing the upper portion of the stomach, which sends a signal to the brain that you're full. Normally you'd have to eat enough to fill your stomach and stretch that part for the signal to be sent - with teh band, you only have to eat a little and the message is sent, so you get less hungry.

Best wishes to you to get your health and happiness back, and to be the kind of mother you and your son dream about. Me too! I want to be that kind of active mother as well. So best of luck to both of us!