Winning the last leg of the fat race

Yesterday's post may have sounded a little triumphant, and to tell you the truth it was.  I feel like I have won some of the battle, or at least this leg of the fat race.

My surgeon is Dr Craig Taylor and I don't think I could have chosen better.  (Check out his website some time.  www.oclinic.com.au)

My first appointment yesterday went really well.  Better than I hoped for.  He listened to me, he didn't openly judge me, he didn't look at me in disgust and most importantly he understood that I wasn't lazy or any less determined to lose weight then the next person.  (Hallelujah!)

I am still processing all that happened yesterday, because it went from zero to light speed pretty quickly.  As soon as he had assessed me as being an "optimal" candidate (his words not mine) and ran me through my options, we agreed on the gastric sleeve in 5 mins of discussion.  Now don't get me wrong, this wasn't an in and out type of appointment, he took his time assessing me, asking me personal and confronting questions (believe me when I say he was thorough) and weighed up my choices.

Now comes the waiting (or should that be weighting) game.  I have approximately 12 weeks until my surgery date.  I know it will fly by, but at this point I feel like I am now waiting for the rest of the race to start...

The begining

To start all the way at the beginning would mean starting at age 6.  Thats a long time and would take WAY too much room on this blog (considering I am now 28). My parents put me on my first diet when I was 10, and my cycle of dieting, losing weight and then putting on more weight  (and repeat!) began in earnest.

I wasn't an unhappy kid, but I was always the chubby girl in class, (which progressed to the fat girl) and there are certain things (as you may know) that come with the label of fat girl.  Namely teasing, bullying and low self esteem.  Not that I let anyone in on my low self esteem, I was always the loudest and the quickest to laugh or joke, but thats what I call good cover up.

I struggled with my weight throughout primary school and high school.  My clearest early memory of my father involves me lying on my bed crying, and him telling me that if I didn't want to be the fat girl in school I should stop eating.  Now I love my Father, but looking back he clearly had no idea as to what to say or do for the little girl crying about being teased.

Obviously my weight struggle didn't end there, and hasn't ended yet.  As I said, I am now 28, and I can officially say that my struggle with weight has been 22 years of hell.  But I can see the light at the end of my dark and dreary tunnel.

Today was my first appointment with a weight loss surgeon.  Now I know what some of you might be thinking, weight loss is just maths energy in - energy out= amount of weight lost.  So it should be simple, eat less, exercise more, lose weight.  So simple in fact that in my 22 years of loosing weight and putting it back on again, I must have it perfected.  The problem is maintaining the loss.  I can loose up to 5kg to 10kg to even 20 kg, but the moment I stop it all comes back (and then some).

So today I took control.

Today I said I don't want to be the fat girl any more.

Today I screamed out that I was changing my life forever.

Today I have a date with a surgeon to to have a Gastric Sleeve.