I go to the docs every other month now, we’ve got the level of liquid correct so it’s just a quick chat really.  I average about 3kg lost each time.  Which isn’t much but it’s something.  I refuse to feel like I’m doing badly, because I’m not.  I’m losing weight. For the first time in my adult life.  There’s nothing bad about that.

For the first two weeks post-weigh-in, I feel great and strong.  Like a champion.  Then for the rest of the next 5 weeks I feel like a failure.  The fact that I’m actually losing weight disproves my self-doubt, but that doesn’t erase 37 years of habitual self-doubt.  I’m getting there though.  My husband and friends are freaking fantastic.  My best friend, god bless her, said to me the other day (I mentioned that I was feeling ok about my progress), “it’s not my place to comment on what someone else looks like good or bad which is why I don’t ever say anything. but you do look different. dramatically different. you aren’t a failure at all”.  I love that attitude, that other people’s bodies have nothing to do with me, that it belongs to them and them alone. She never looks at me with that look people get, where they are assessing you, watching you, judging you.  Never.  I love it.

I won’t suggest it’s easy.  Contrary to what the doctors and booklets say, the vomiting and clear mucus is pretty normal.  Not all the time, but certainly a couple of times a week.  It can be so unpredictable too.  The fact is, contrary to instructions, I don’t eat with a goddam teaspoon.  Whatever the doctor says, it’s retarded and I’m not a child.  I need to maintain some self respect and dignity.  Even if it means I don’t lose weight as quickly and that I do vomit from time to time, it’s not a sacrifice that’s worth it for me. But the real culprit is not drinking.  If I leave it for more than a few hours between meals and forget to have a big, long and sloooow drink around 5-10 minutes before eating… I WILL be visiting my friend the toilet bowl.  Getting better at remembering but not quite there yet!

So yes, it’s been a year and I’m doing ok.

Prior to that, well, it’s not been smooth sailing. For the first month, it was so easy. Not eating much was a breeze. Didn’t have to think about it, didn’t have to put in any effort, it all just happened. What I didn’t notice was as time went on, I started eating a little more and a little more. Not as much as before surgery but certainly not far off. I became aware of it and good ol’ guilt and feeling crap about myself kicked in. Then I clicked. I just clicked. I realised that if I ate less I was still satisfied. I was eating more, not out of hunger or even out of self-medication but because I wasn’t paying attention. I wasn’t “present”. I wasn’t aware.

So I started paying attention and found I could eat less straight away and I didn’t feel hungry. I wondered how long I’ve been doing that. Eating more than I actually needed, or wanted.

I thought when I had my next weigh-in at the doctor’s that I would have gone backwards. I expected a lecture. Amazingly, no! I still managed to lose a good chunk of weight. Freakin’ awesome! Lesson learnt and not to be repeated. Goes to show you that even when you screw up, that safety net is still there. Obviously I can’t just let things go or I’ll get stuck sooner or later, but it’s good to know that the surgery wasn’t a wasted effort. It is helping me.

I still haven’t got my exercise quotient up. It’s hard. I’m trying to transition to a new career so I’m working a full time job and then I come home and work on the other career. I don’t know if I’m making excuses. Probably. But I’ll get there. I am making changes. I walk wherever I can, I’m more active than I used to be. Rather than sitting around on weekends, I’m trying to constantly do thing; get up early and get out of the house. Go do stuff. I’m a bit too embarrassed to do exercise in public. And frankly, even more embarrassingly, I’ve broken some home exercise equipment in the past so I can live without that mortification again. I’ve been contemplating buying a yoga DVD so I can do exercise at home… maybe I should just bite the bullet…

It’s all a learning experience!

It’s Day 9 post-surgery and feeling pretty good. Drove the car today for the first time since and frankly I’m glad I waited this long. Started to reverse park but after that queasy pressure thing kicked in I decided against it and found myself a nice easy straight-in park. Can’t be too careful! Still can’t twist too much or pick-up flat stuff off the ground but that’s the only time there’s any discomfort. Oh yeah, and driving in tight-waisted pants. Not a pleasant experience. Do-able but not pleasant.

Took the last of my bandages off today. First one came off on Day 5 and all but the last were off by Day 7. The last one, the biggie, didn’t look very ready for exposure the world so I left it on a bit longer. Rightfully so. It’s still not looking spectacular and it’s 3 times the size of all the other cuts. It’s pretty damn ugly compared to the others too – it’s crooked and puckered compared the neat straight lines of the rest and has a teeny bit of hard not-yet-dissolved stitch poking out. Sorry for the extreme detail – but I’m hoping that others who go through the same thing get to read this and maybe feel a bit less like a freak knowing it’s normal. Or perhaps it’s not normal and I truly am a freak. Either way, sorry!

I feel I’m gonna be hating that scar for the rest of my life. Smack in the middle of my middle, staring back at me ugly-ly. Oh well, small price to pay really.

My first post-surgery appointment with dietician and surgeon is next week. Looking forward to it.

Starting to get my appetite back slowly. Started out with barely eating a mouthful or two then go to about half a cup and now at about a cup. Still living on soup and branching out as far as scrambled eggs with the odd KickStart thrown in. Not feeling deprived or hungry – from time to time I wish for anything more substantial – actually it’s not really a substance thing, it’s more a flavour thing. There’s not massive differentiation in flavours of soup. I mean I try to keep it as wide as possible, asian to italian to eastern european to english and it works pretty well but still… soup is soup you know.

I am missing salad though. My husband thinks I’m a freak because my last meal before surgery was salad. Normal people, he claimed would want a hamburger or fabulous steak, but that’s not me. I love salad. Always have, always will. And I knew it was going to be a long time before I could digest a bunch of leaves and raw veges so that’s what I wanted. Call me crazy. Whatever. Salad is good! I’d love a bowl of leaves, mozzarella, fresh fig, basil and pinenuts but whaddya gonna do?

Oh yeah, and shoulder pain has gone finalmente! Glad to be rid of that sucker…

You know when someone asks “Are you hungry?” and you respond “I could eat.”?  Not anymore dear friends.  Now, I find myself entirely disinterested in food.  I now realise that I used to feel hungry constantly.  Like 24 hours a day.  And I thought about eating or not eating ALL the time.  I mean, I didn’t eat all the time, I often wouldn’t eat a thing till dinnertime but I was thinking about it, that’s for sure.  Now, it barely crosses my mind and I have to be reminded.  It’s very liberating. Don’t know if it will continue but that’s today and today is all I’m focussing on.

Changed in other ways too… not quite so amiable.  Have had a propensity towards lactose intolerance for years.  If you don’t know what that means, well, imagine  steadily building gut pain followed by explosive diarrhoea.  Too much information?  But wait, there’s more!  Now I’m the opposite.  Goddam surgery has got me backed up like a pair of testicles in a snow storm.  They ain’t coming out for nothing.  Yes, I’ve swallowed a bucketload of laxative but still nothing damn it!  Tonight I’m cracking out the prune juice.  Desperate times, people!

And in other physical news, the requisite shoulder pain seems to come and go.  I presume as the post-surgical gas builds up the pain increases because as soon as I burp or fart (my husband is loving me right now!), the pain goes away again.  Till next time of course.

All things considered, it’s Day 5 post-knife-shenanigans and I feel damn good.  Was going massively stir crazy I must say.  I’m really not one for staying in the house for any sort of extended period so the lying in bed (only place I could get comfortable) just about killed me.  Woke up yesterday morning and told my husband he’s taking me for a walk.  Not far, just up to the park behind our house and back again (with a little reading stop in between).  But oh, to have the sunlight on my face and to get my legs moving!  Heaven!!!!

And, for the first time since surgery, I wanted to read.  This is so foreign to me.  I am a voracious reader.  I read for about an hour a day, every day, no matter what.  Since surgery I just can’t engage my brain properly so for the past 4 days I couldn’t bring myself to pick up a book.  Or watch an intellectual movie.  It was all “Confessions of a Shopaholic” and “He’s Just Not that Into You”.  That was as much as I could get a handle on.  But to pick up a book again and read, in the sun, was so restorative.  I feel a thousand times better.

Last night, we even went to the movies.  Thank god, for the oh-so-comfy, stretch-out-able armchairs in Gold Class.  Inglourious Basterds, you were ok but the cushy chair was even better.  The only thing missing was popcorn and a blanket.  Can’t have everything I guess!

I got to the hospital at 10am as requested. After being shuffled from room to room and nurse to nurse for various uninteresting questions (much the same ones I might add – ie whats your name and what are you allergic too… MSG and lactose intolerant, for christs sake), I disappear on a trolley and husband goes to find himself a spot of lunch (what a prick.  talk about rubbing it in).  Finally at 1pm they wheel me into the theatre.

After flirting oddly with the anaesthetists assistant (I don’t know why, boredom mostly) I apparently became unconscious and some bastard stuck a band around my stomach.  Ha!  I jest of course.

I’m woken up at quarter to 3 in recovery by some annoying bint who wouldn’t let me sleep another minute even though I really wanted to get some more kip.  I feel like there’s a vice around my sternum.  A massive burp would be brillo just about now thanks.  I mean a big old, Barney Gumble rip-snorter.  Ward clerk asks the nurse where to take me, I respond Rio and give him a thumbs up.  Clearly, anaesthetic has left sense of humour well intact.  Thank god.  Where would I be without gold like that?   (Yeah, I’m not just writing that for the sake of an amusing story.  That’s actually what I did.  I really am that kind of tool).

I arrive in room to find husband missing.  Hell hath no fury like a post-anaesthetic woman in a hospital with an absentee husband.  Half an hour later he rushes into the room apologetic and flustered because he’s been waiting outside for an hour and reception can’t work out what room I’m in. Pricks.

Contrary to popular reports and well-meaning advice from anaesthetists and surgeons, I have none of the promised powerful nausea or agonising pain. I am in fact, nausea and pain free.  What a gip!  I do however have an aching shoulder (I’m told they pump a blimp-ful of gas into the abdomen during surgery and something about nerve endings) and a small elephant seems to have taken up residence on my chest.  Lazy bastard!

Brain function is essentially zero.  I watch Confessions of a Shopaholic and He’s Just Not that Into You while husband snoozes on chair beside me.  That’s about the sum total of action in my cerebral cortex right now.  Can’t even manage reading.  Or talking.

Dinner arrives at some point and husband attempts to feed me lukewarm dishwater but it doesn’t appeal.  A quarter of one of those mini-hospital apple juices will do me fine and dandy thanks!

Visiting hours end at 8pm though husband is rampantly starving and can’t wait to get outta there and get food.  God knows why, I’m such sparkling company right now.

Night is spent being woken at odd hours for blood pressure, temperature and blood oxygen checks (good, ok-ish, fair-to-middling) and wandering backwards and forwards to bathroom.  Seemingly never-ending IV drip filled with sugar, salt and water has left my bladder somewhat overworked.  I do wonder why on earth they’re filling the fat chick with sugar and salt but hey, who am I to question?  I have a band.

And it rocks.

See funny on multiple levels cos the band is called “The Band” and the song is called “The Weight”.  Geddit?

As it happened our health fund had just asked my husband to participate in a trial of some sort for a new one called Kickstart.  So I got it for free!  It ain’t cheap so this was a big win.  3 synthetic-fruit flavoured shakes 3 times a day.  Plus 2 cups of vegetables a day – to keep you regular. Right on!  I feel like an old woman already.

Kickstart wasn’t so bad.  Tasted ok.  Was pretty filling and each hit was only 139 calories.  I won’t suggest that I was by any means perfect in my adherence to the Kickstart diet.  I had family birthdays and work lunches that were unavoidable.  And I had more salad than I was supposed to most days.  But I still lost about 8kg in that two weeks so can’t complain about that!

Next I got a phone call was from the anaesthetist office.  We sent you an invoice that said you needed to pay the fee of $1200 a week before surgery.  The bill arrived a week before surgery.  Thanks for the notice guys.  The call came 3 days later.  So there’s another $1200 I’ve gotta pony up this week.  Hadn’t really planned on that sucker.  Oh well, good thing it’s pay day!

Finally I got a call from the hospital.  With a litany of questions and instructions that just did my head in.  Clearly the caller had read this list out a million, trillion, billion times.  For me it was my first time and it was WAAAAAY too quick and WAAAAAY too much.  An email follow-up would be have been a worth while exercise cos I forgot stuff I was supposed to do (like showering with anti-bacterial wash for 2 days beforehand – oops).  Fortunately noone seemed to give a toss on the day.

The day before surgery the hospital called again.  This time to tell me I have to pay $475 dollars on check-in.  I mean, admission.  Well, there’s another few buckaroos I hadn’t budgeted for.

All of these calls were so brain numbing. Not in a boring sense… in a I can’t compute sense… too much.

But none of that came close to what was going on in my head.

Second thoughts?  Lordy yes!  None of it seemed real to be honest, until the call came asking for my money.  Then it became so real.  Hyper-real.  In living colour.  Hyper-colour, in fact.  Or not.  (I’ll let the joke go now, I’m not one to cling.  Or am I?).

I didn’t know if it was the right thing to do.  Fear of the unknown was paralysing in many ways.  My ignorance and stupidity was profoundly daft.  For example, I mistakenly believed I would have a hole in my side for the rest of my life.  There is no hole.  I am just an idiot.  Thank god my husband is not.  Many shed tears will attest to my unbounded relief.  Really though, I just questioned everything I was doing.  Then I ignored it and put my head in the sand.  Then I got excited and philosophical.  It changed from day to day.

In the end I stuck with it.  I chose NOT to let my fear paralyse me any more.  God, now I sound like Tony Robbins.  Or the father from Little Miss Sunshine.  Or Tom Cruise in Magnolia.  (let the joke go, loser!).  I just kept on keeping on.  I took faith from those around me who never faltered.  Who believed in me and what I had decided to do.  And so I went under the knife.

And that was that.

He has supported, advised and comforted me through this LONG process (and I mean back as far as my whinging and not doing anything years).

But sometimes, a girl needs her friends too.  It’s hard to know who to tell.  Not everyone will understand.  And you don’t feel that level of trust and safety with everyone.  Much as you might like sharing a bevy or two on Saturday night with them, that doesn’t mean you’re ready to share your deepest, ugliest scars about which you are most embarrassed.

So I told my two bestest bestest bestest friends in the world.  Smalex and CJ.  Smalex would know exactly how I felt and understand my hesitations and humiliation and craving hopelessness for a different self.   And she did.  She was on board without hesitation.   As I knew she would be.

And CJ. Well, CJ is a vault.  The most trustworthy human being on the planet.  I didn’t know if she would get it though, cos, well she’s gorgeous.  She’s slim but she’s got girl curves in just the right places so I was nervous that she couldn’t understand because it’s not an area of dire mortification for her (pish!  who are these crazy normal freaks?).  So frankly, I did it on the spur of the moment.  I burst into tears and blurted everything. In the middle of a public place.  It changed us forever.  She got teary too and we, in that moment, connected so completely.  She understood that it was terrifying and brave immediately.  She understood why, without me having to explain.  I can’t even begin to describe how earth-shatteringly amazing it is for someone to just get you.

I decided not to tell my family.  Mostly because my mum has her own issues so her reaction might be hard to take. I love her dearly and she loves me.  But this is an area which is sensitive and I just don’t think she could be supportive and helpful without first being patronising and judgemental and telling me what to do.  And I can’t bear going through the hurtful judgement phase just now.  I know that once she got past it, she’d be fabulous and supportive and thoughtful but the journey to get there is arduous and I’ve got enough on my plate.  My Dad, well… god love him but he’s a man who is a bit superficial when it comes to beauty.  I haven’t heard him tell me that I looked nice since I was young.  And yeah he’d be happy but not for me, for himself.  So this is not a topic for paternal conversation. My other sisters… well, maybe.  Sooner or later. I just don’t want in being brought up and inadvertently mum finds out you know?

So Husband, SMalex and CJ.  You have been amazing.  I would have chickened out if it weren’t for the three of you.  All of you.  You’re are the best people anyone ever could know.  I love you dearly.  And I am so grateful for you, like you wouldn’t believe, mother fuckers!

(Apologies to anyone offended by such appalling language.  But that’s me.  When I get too sincere or too heartfelt, I gotta do somethin’ to break the mood and make my peeps laugh.  Cause that’s what I do.  And so it will always be.)

So to my 3 amigos, I leave you with a song… the best song ever.

Personable and proficient.  That’s Dr Talbot.   He’s a surgeon so whaddya expect really?  Most people he meets are unconscious.  Appointment done in like 10 minutes (after my hour long wait – grrrr!) and another $120-odd bucks.  Oh yeah, and you can pick your surgery date with Jenny the receptionist outside.

Seriously.  What the fuck?  That’s it?

I go outside and Jenny says how about June 18th.  It’s the end of May for gods sake.  (a) I don’t have $4150 just bouncing around my back pocket and (b) I’m not ready.  At all. Too soon.  Do not pass go, do not collect $200.  How about July?  Sorry no, my husband will be away. No, I will be away.  No, that’s my birthday.  So we settle on August 19th.  That’s the day.

Dietician will call me to make an appointment cos you have to eat some special diet for 2 weeks.  Ok sure, no problem.

Wam bam, thank you maam.

August 19.

Right.  ok. Done.

So at this stage, I’ve done all the research and I know I have to get a referral from my doctor to go see the specialist.  Sitting there in my GPs uncomfortable chair admitting failure was… humbling… and powerful.  At the same time.  It felt like the beginning of change.

She didn’t blink.  Or harass or frown.  She just understood and gave me a hand.  Thanks Dr Roslyn Doyle for being so right on target.  She gave me a referral to a guy out at Castle Hill because she’d heard he does a good program.

Home I went and appointment I booked.

Then I realised.   I was going to be visiting this dude for the rest of my natural life from time to time.  Do I really wanna travel out to the burbs?  No, not so much.  So I found Dr Michael Talbot who works out of St George Private Hospital in Sydney.  Much closer to my inner west home.  Lazy? Sure.   Convenient?  Yes!

Previous dude canned.  New dude in!

My first appointment was not with the surgeon himself.  It was with the physician.  That’s who the ongoing relationship will be with after all. Lucky for me, Phil (Dr Phil – ha!  No, not that one.), was a chatty smart-alecky  dude that I just liked.  The first appointment was information overload.  That’s why I brought my husband along.  He’s good at taking in the technical stuff that I kinda gloss over.  Essentially the first meeting was discussing the three options:

• gastric band
• gastric sleeve
• gastric bypass

I went with door number 1 because it’s not a permanent change to my physiology and for me, that was somehow appealing.  It’s also the lowest risk by a country mile.

So $120 bucks (less some-odd dollars in medicare rebate later) and about an hour and  half of chatting later, I was booked in to meet the surgeon.  Egads!

I eat ok.  Too much from time to time but I’m not particularly different to anyone else.  As a younger gal I did eat pretty badly – all pastas and takeaway and snacks but again, no worse than anyone else really.  As an adult, I’m not a huge fan of fast food or convenience foods.  I will always choose water over coke and an apple over a block of chocolate.  Not for health reasons particularly, just my taste-buds seem to like it that way.   I was born athletic and I stayed that way until I left high school and stopped running around.   I do however eat a bit too much sometimes and I do have a tendency towards guzzling quickly!  So make of all that what you will.

Everyone has an opinion.  I’ve been through all the emotional arguments, the quality and quantity arguments, the lifestyle arguments… whatever you can think of, I’ve analysed it.  Fact is, I still don’t really know and nor do you.  I guess it’s all of them and none of them at the same time.  So throw whatever media coverage, advertising bans, education, oprah aha moments etc around that you want but I just don’t think it’s ever gonna be uncomplicated, easily explainable situation.

From the age of about 20 to now (36), I’ve been overweight.  Now I’m horrendously overweight.  Everyone expects me to have a million health problems but I don’t really.  Pretty healthy all things considered.  However,  I’ve hated myself almost perpetually from the age of 20, and that ain’t so good.  Sometimes for the obvious reasons (boys) but I’ve always been pretty lucky in that department (personality goes a long way as they say) but mostly because I just wanted to wear clothes I like (as opposed to boring fat people clothes) and I wanted to do stuff that I couldn’t (like jumping out of planes and surfing).

Losing the amount of weight I need to lose would take about 2-3 years of strict adherence to a starvation diet.  And I’m not kidding about starvation diet.  Consuming say 800 calories a day for a normal human being is pretty impossible for more than a few weeks.   Try doing it for 2 years.  Yeah, right.

I’ve tried every diet or drug but never really stuck with anything.  I’m just not a consistent sort of person.  In any part of my life.  I’m never gonna be the employee who sits there from 9 to 5 every day and plugs away.  However I will be the employee who gets all excited and involved and works for 12 hours a day for six weeks and then fart-arses around for a few hours each day for the next two.

So…

I  accept that the task of losing this weight is insurmountable.  I accept that I can’t do it alone.   I accept that I need help.

That’s why I decided to get a gastric band.

Took me about 30 words to say and about 2 years to actually do.  It’s an emotionally complicated and heart rending decision to make.  Accepting failure and accepting help does not come easily to anyone, particularly me.

I think many people see gastric banding as an easy way out. They say “can’t you just eat less?”.  Sure I can.  But I will feel starving all the time and I will have to do it for YEARS.  Not days or weeks or months.  Years.  It’s just not realistic.  Those accusers couldn’t do it and nor can I.

Gastric banding is not an easy way out.  It doesn’t make good food choices for you.  You still have to choose the apple over the chocolate most of the time, like everyone else.  The difference is, my body which has been primed for storing weight no longer allows me to intake quite so much quantity.  If I eat too often and eat the wrong things, the band won’t make a difference.

The band is just a helping hand, that’s all.  Not a solution or a quick fix.  It will help me get started and help me stay on track but it won’t do the hard work for me.  That’s up to me.

So I made this decision because I need help.  It’s as simple as that.

This is my journey.