300 lbs and Dropping

I Risked My Life...To Live a Better One

My journey to this place, where I find myself, has taken all my life, and used up half of it.

In March of 2014 I set on a path to change my life for ever. In about April 2013, I began the conversation concerning this with a person whose input I valued, my mom.  She was always a supporter of this for me, but I was never sure. When she passed away, I believe she left me with courage to face my life, demand better of myself, and I remember she would always say, "Nikki, you got to do somethings that are just for you! You have to take better care of yourself." With this conversation in mind I began my education on this new way of living.

This decision was not easy for me. I honestly use to look at this opportunity as a way of weakness. You may not like, that but it is the honest truth. The other honest truth is that I was suffering. My weight had exploded to over 300 lbs! Comfort had escaped me.  My health was spinning out of control. I did not tell any one person all that was happening in my health, not even my husband. My blood work showed me as borderline diabetic. Along with this, two herniated discs, a pinched nerve, sciatica, severe incontinence, irregular menstrual cycles, iron deficiencies, uncontrolled hypothyroidism (Graves Disease), with symptoms even after having radiation treatment. Most days I STRUGGLED to get out the bed.  Many time after waking up, I had to CRAWL out of the bed over to the stair rail and pull myself up to standing. Most nights were restless, filled with pain, and the loss of sensation in my lower body. Waking my husband in the middle of the night just to roll me over had become the norm. The problems had become so awful that I often wondered how long before I lost the use of my legs all together.

A recent sleep study reveled that I stopped breathing nine times each hour of sleep! To say the least I had escalating health issues. I was on the sidelines of my life, a wall flower. My energy was non-existent and now had the title of morbidly obese.  I could no longer turn my own body over in my bed, sit or stand for longer that twenty minutes, suffering with muscle spasms, and numbness in the lower part of my body.

While on my third round of physical therapy, I thought how physical therapy was not working. The muscle spasms in my legs were increasing. My back pain was growing along with my weight. The drive to even try to loose weight had left me. Looking back, I can say that I had part of me believed that my life would not be much better than this.

It is hard to explain in words how trapped I felt in my body. I had been in that state for so long. I did not dwell on that feeling, but it was with me daily. EVERY MOVEMENT I made cost me something. I paid in pain to roll over in the bed, to stand up, to sit up, to move my feet, to wash my body, to cook, to clean, and then the stairs. I am so glad for the power of prayer. The power of prayer in my most crushing pain pulled me through! The Word of God, comfort in knowing that He was there and that He would not leave me kept me. Knowing that Christ has suffered more than me, and He willing faced His suffering pulled me through.  I must say this, when a person is in chronic pain, it changes them.  People eventually forget about your pain, and some don't believe it because you carry it well. Believing this I decided that I would move in pain, and with pain because otherwise I would be confined to the bed. I recall one day going to the emergency room in unbearable pain. The doctor said, we are going to give you an injection for pain that we give accident victims, it will hurt and burn. As I lay on the bed waiting for the injection to start, it was over, I never felt a thing. That is how much pain I had. Because I carried so much physical pain for so long my tolerance for it had increased.  But, like I said, I would rather be in the game with pain, than be out with it. However, my situation was becoming debilitating. 

My back problems began when I was in a car accident while pregnant with my now eight year old son. A month after he was born I was pregnant with my now seven year old son.  Physical therapy was supposed to be helpful, and strengthen me so that I could move this body to loose weight, that was not happening. The weight was ever increasing and the drive, and motivation to end it was diminishing. The doctor and I discussed the idea of back surgery. I spoke to people who I knew that had back surgery. The tally came out 50/50, some where improve while others were not. What I did notice is that the improved ones, were not over weight. I told my doctor that is seems foolish to have this surgery at such a large weight. He then suggested other weight loss options.

In March of 2014 I began to look into weight loss surgery (wls). I had not deiced concretely that I would have the surgery, however I did want to learn more about it. My doctor warned me that the weight loss surgery at my hospital is very selective, and not everyone is accepted. Also he told me it takes usually six plus months for insurance to approve. I believed that I needed to be educated on the surgery so that I could make a decision . Within thirty days, before I could even have my first class my insurance had given me full approval. However after the first meeting/class I was out. There were so many risk and then there was this caveat stated by the facilitator. She said, " When you loose 100 lbs you loose a person. You will be a different person."  Loosing the me I knew was not a pleasant thought.  I had just gotten to a pace where I loved me. Moreover, I had just buried my mom, and I did want to loose anyone especially me. but, pain has a way of being convincing.  I am generally not a risk taker.  The risk of death and other things if I survived the surgery was also scary.  The thing of it was that I had risk for doing nothing. So with that I decided to have weight loss surgery. Now the task was to determine which surgery was appropriate for me, and the one I chose is called vertical sleeve gastronomy (vsg) commonly called the sleeve.

So there you have it. The beginning of my new life of really dropping down from 300 lbs. I get many questions concerning the surgery. I do not mind answering questions, but can't say I will answer all and definitely will not accept negative or disrespectful ones. If you talk to me I will not try to encourage you or discourage you to have weight loss surgery, I will simply share my journey. One thing I will say, this is not an easy way out. Truly I have and just beginning to learn for sure that it is only a tool that gives aid but alone will not solve  all of my obesity problems. I am 5 months out and still have a way to go before I am out of the danger zone. However, I have HOPE through this process, my entire family will change because I have changed, and for the better.  I put my Faith in God above this sleeve that He will guide me to a healthy balanced lifestyle.  A lifestyle with good nutrition,  exercise, activity, strength and love.

Be4EverBlessed,
Nicole.