Healthy You Challenge

When I found out that Felicia from Life Happens had lost 240 pounds, I wanted to shout it from the rooftops because I was just so happy for her. She is now up to the 246 pounds lost mark and will be celebrating her 250 pounds lost very soon! I know you all know who Felicia is, she has left comments on all of your blogs and always has a kind word of support and a *huggles* for all of us.

She has graciously agreed to share her story with all of us here today. You can read it below or head over to Life Happens and check it out for yourself: Thank you Felicia for all of your support and for being a wonderful motivation and for inspiring us all.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I always thought I was a chubby kid. I spent my High School years looking at the popular girls and wishing I was a slim as they were. My weight never really stopped me from doing anything though as I lettered in several sports and showed horses professionally for years. But in my mind I was never as thin as “those girls” therefore I was always “one of the guys”. I look back now and see how stupid that was. I graduated from High School a slim 145lbs. I was no where near chubby or even over weight. I found that as I sit today and try and figure out why I thought that I see that because my Mom was over weight and had issues with HER self about it that they flowed over to me. Don’t get me wrong my Mom never made me feel fat. At least when I was in those younger years of High School. It was more the influence on how she treated herself while being over weight then how she treated me. I really believe our lives are shaped on how our parents behaved towards themselves and not really even towards us that shape how we turn out. I do not “blame” my Mom for my weight gain. But I do hold her responsible for teaching me that food was comfort as that is where I learned it. If stressed, eat, you will feel better… Anyways thats something for another day.

After graduating from High School I went on to college for Equine Studies. I LOVED IT! College was one of the best times of my life. But that of course meant lots of fast food and beer *grin*. By the time I left college I had put on 30-40lbs. Not a huge weight gain but nothing good either. I went from college to living in California with my Grandparents. My Gram is( was) an AWESOME cook! OMG her food was amazing and there was always food to be eaten. Needless to say lol I put on more weight and by the time I headed back to Montana I was 190lbs or so. Mind you this is AFTER spending months before heading back doing diet after diet even signed up for Jenny Craig. After all I was only going home because of a “guy” ( insert STUPID move here). So I did manage to get back down to 190 lbs after I am sure making it well over 200lbs. Get home, guy thing fell apart, luckily landed new awesome guy and began my journey towards weighing 427lbs. Ok so it didn’t happen just that fast there was more collage in there for an automotive course and a few years of life but lol it seemed that fast.

After meeting Dale we started out early with what would be our entertainment. Not the movies, not long walks, nope… eating out. Between meeting Dale in 1995 and having Joshua in 2000 I had put on well over 100lbs. Sad part is I was one of those people that never saw the weight coming on. I had no full length mirror to look in. I had no scale to step on. And with out even knowing it we had slowly replaced furniture and vehicles that were to small with larger versions so there was never much of a moment of “ummm hellooo your getting HUGE”. I had Joshua in 2000. He was not planned but once here an amazing gift. He was born at 30 weeks at 2lbs 6oz. He was amazing. But of course once he was delivered there was no time to cook or start focusing on myself as I had a baby in NICU to think of ( really stupid thinking though as if I had stopped my gaining then I would not have ended up here). I am now 284lbs ( I had gained up to 342lbs while pregnant). I lost MOST of that the week after I delivered as that was how much I was retaining water. Being fat and pregnant does not get you the best of care at most hospitals. LOTS of things get brushed off as “shes just fat”. ALWAYS know when your gut tells you something’s wrong and insist on proper treatment. Anyways Joshua did great, we headed home and I managed to lose in the next 6 months down to 253lbs with the help of a VERY expensive Weight loss Doctor.

Then my Gram moved in with us. Life changed, badly. My Gram had sever Dementia. I still remember taking her to a doctors appointment before she moved in and telling her doctor of our plans. The Doctor begged us not to do this and I remember saying to her.. We know what we were doing. I had always had a special relationship with her and I was just sure I could take care of her. I was wrong and paid a high price for it. She was very violent both physically and emotionally. Over the next 3 years of trying to care for her and a baby, I fell basically apart. I had very little help from family caring for her and could rarely leave my house because you could not leave her alone. We went out basically for Dr. Appointment’s and that was it. Of course I learned later there are entire caregiver group things but I didn’t learn this in time to help us out any. By the time I had found a wonderful place for her to go to spend her remaining days I had gone from 253lbs to 400lbs. I had put on 147lbs in less than 3 years. I was also physically, emotionally and mentally ruined but I didn’t see this till much later.

I am leaving out a LARGE section of life here in regards my parents. Its just not something I can type about right now. Lets just say that years and years of ,not sure of the word that should go here, also attributed to my weight gain. There was a tremendous amount of stress in my life and pressure to say the least.

You can read more about my history here : Weight Loss History

After Gram moved out, Dale (who had put on a tremendous amount of weight also ) and I just knew we could do it now because we didn’t have the stress and pressure of caring for Gram weighing us down anymore. I had several moments after that, that were turning points besides her leaving. You can read more about the moments that turned me by reading here : Turning Points

I just knew I had to lose the weight. I couldn’t live like this anymore and so I went back to dieting. I can do it. Look at the motivation I had now. But alas it was not to be. I was no longer physically able to move well and by February 2006 I was unable to walk. I was crawling from room to room and having my poor little one have to wait on me and care for me instead of the other way around. I was giving it one last “college try” though and has lost down from 427lbs to the 390’s by April of that year. But then as always happens I fell off the wagon once again ( and again and again ) and I just knew I couldn’t lose the weight alone. I had resigned myself to being fat and eventually being one of those people who you see on TV dying of a obesity related problems and having to be cut out of their house. I had no more fight left in me. I had mentally given up and my body had physically had given up.

You can read more about how I looked at my fat : Me and My Fat

Then one day I saw a commercial on TV advertising the Weight Loss Clinic here in town and it was like someone smacked me with a DUH stick. For years I had said I would NEVER have WLS. “Who does that to themselves”. And here I was today looking at that commercial and seeing for the first time in so many years I couldn’t count, a way out of my hell.

The Day ( taken from my journal )
“May 23, 2006
Its official I have completely fallen off my weight loss program once again. Today I decided that I just can not do this alone. I promised myself on the first of the year that if this time failed I would do the weight loss surgery route. I have to much to lose. I put in a call to the Weight Loss Management Clinic to find out how I go about having Gastric Bypass Surgery. Its my last chance at being a healthy functioning Mom and Wife. I am going to die if I do not do something permanent about this weight loss. I can not just keep losing and gaining. Its worse then gaining it in the first place. I knew it was “the right time” for this decision when I was no longer scared of facing the ins and outs of this type of surgery. When I could sit down and compare the pros and cons of having surgery vs. the pros and cons of the life I am living today. Needless to say the surgery stood out loud and clear compared to the slow death I was living with out it. “

I believed when I made the decision to have WLS that I was such a failure. Still today I have issues with that thinking but for the most part I am mainly proud of myself. But it does come with failure issues. Why couldn’t I do it “on my own”. I knew when I made the call that I had to admit that I was never going to “do it myself”. That I had failed myself and this was the price. But the truth was that I realize now is that I DIDN’T fail myself by having WLS. I had finally stopped failing myself and did something FOR myself for the first time ever. That the diet roller coaster WAS the failing part and the decision that enough was enough and to go through with the WLS was the moment that I said “Felicia YOU are worth it”. I had one main reason for having WLS though and you can read more about that here : My Reason Why

There is so much more to this story that would take books worth of typing to write. You can read more about my weight loss surgery journey here : Pre-Surgery Journey but the long and short of it is that…

After that day I never looked back. Its been a whirl wind adventure since.Life After WLS has been wonderful. Many Goals/Milestones have come and gone. Basically over night I went from someone physically and emotionally stuck in her house to a normal every day person. On June 20, 2006 I had my first weight loss surgery appointment. I weighed 382lbs. Today, 20 months later, February 2008, I weigh 200lbs less at 181lbs. Over all my Weight Chart states I have lost 246lbs since my highest weight of 427lbs. (or at least it will once I update it lol) I can buy clothes ANYWHERE. I can fit ANYWHERE. I can go ANYWHERE. I am IN Photos now instead of just taking them. I am not longer the 400lbs elephant in the corner that everyone knows is there but pretends is not. I laugh now. I play now. I live now. My husband ( who has also lost over 70lbs and is still losing!!) has a wife again and my son has a Mom for the first time in his whole life. What I didn’t know then that I do know now is it was the key I needed to help unlock the door to the rest of my whole life. I do not know what is to come in the future. But I do know something. I have a future now and it is so bright “I gotta wear shades” LOLOL

Thank you for reading my story.