Post 1

So it’s the start of a new week for me. Looking forward to it. My plans to try new things is going well, took a first aid course and I passed (yay me). In case you don’t know, I have battled with my weight for 16 years now. It’s very frustrating at the best of times. One thing no one really talks about is food addiction. Yes, it happens. We become addicted to the one thing that sustains our lives. I am a self-confessed sugar addict. I have been for a long while. I know my addiction to sugar is also linked to my emotional state. I know what you are thinking, if I know what my problem is then why haven’t I changed it already and sorted myself out. Well that is the not so easy part. As I said mine is linked to my emotions and being a single mum, well let’s be honest that makes me a tiny bit emotional.
So that is why after diet upon diet and that word has become a swear word in my household, I have decided that I really need to occupy my time better to distract myself from the sugary treats that I love and crave. So after my accident which landed me without a job and a lifelong medical condition I decided to go back to school and retrain for something new. I am just finishing up the first year of university and oh my goodness do I love it. I also get the chance to join in on groups and clubs I would never have had the courage to join before. I am also learning to drive something I never had confidence to do before. Turns out I really like to drive at speed too. I now find that I am reading more books for my course and writing essays galore and it really does take my mind off wanting to eat all the time. I have to get more active though. I have difficulty moving around since my accident as my legs tend to lock and become like marble. This has left me in hospital a couple of times after falls down the stairs and so on. But I really want to see how I can push myself, I know now my problem is keeping myself occupied and knowing I am worth making the effort for.
My self-esteem is growing and hopefully I am changing along with it. Only thing I can do now is carry on and see how far this all takes me. So I start this week with one thing in my mind. Today will not be the day I give in and binge on sweet food.

Post 2

Wow has it been a weird week. I started my week with a visit to the local accident and emergency department. I don’t know about anyone else but I really am not a fan of hospitals, especially when I am the patient. So how did I end up there? Well I am sure there are some of you out there that have gall bladder problems, well I have one too. Unfortunately, it decided to play up a bit and leave me on the floor crippled with pain. This is not the first time this has happened to me but after the first attack last year I tried to cut out fat and sugar from my diet as these are huge triggers for it. So after many, many months with no problems this week has been a painful one. As I said I started the week in hospital on a drip and let me tell you when you are a big woman the hospital can be a humiliating place. I am healthy in comparison to some, especially given that I am overweight. I do not have cholesterol problems, nor do I have diabetes or any illnesses they link to obesity. But that set aside I am still spoken to and treated as if I am a lazy person who just doesn’t care about myself. This saddens me greatly. I am a nice person and I am trying to lose weight but it never seems to be good enough when I am talking to a doctor. We have all been there when the doctor tells us that we just aren’t trying hard enough and to go spend money on slimming classes or expensive gym sessions. I don’t know about anyone else but I really don’t have that kind of money just lying around. I would have joined a gym if I could afford it.
So hooked up to a drip I am given the same speech as last time. Your size stops us from taking your gall bladder out is what I am told. The risks are great when you are overweight they carry on saying, this is usually joined with a head tilt gesture and wave of hands to show me a scale of how big I am. It doesn’t matter that I have been trying to lose weight for over a decade and still can’t achieve the svelte figure that they want me to be. So they tell me I have a choice, I can diet severely or just put up with the pain. Now I have great admiration for doctors and nurses, they do an amazing job, one I know I could not do. I sadly hate coming out from seeing a doctor feeling fat, like my life is not important and that they think of me as less of a human being than others. This does not help me in any shape or form by making me so bad about myself that I think perhaps they are right, perhaps I’m not worth it. But do you know what? I am worth it (yes I know L’oreal owns that saying). I challenged the doctor that it would be nice to just have some help where I wasn’t palmed off to some slimming group like the relative that no one wants to deal with. I am sick of having the same blood tests done each time and they come back with the same results – I AM HEALTHY. I offer the doctor an alternative, perhaps instead of belittling me try and help me with my obvious addiction. This was then met with a steely stare from the doctor who then started writing and didn’t answer me at all. I was then sent home with pain medication and told to return if it happens again. Well what do you know three days later it happens again. I choose not to return to the hospital and deal with it at home.
We have AA meetings and narcotics anonymous why is there not a sugar addiction anonymous? It would be so helpful to have a 12 step programme to help us all lose weight. Sometimes slimming groups are just too intimate to deal with. I am not good with lots of people, an issue I am trying to solve by attending workshops and classes at the university where I know there will be lots of people. But small steps, that’s what it takes, small steps. So here is to hoping I stay out of hospital next week as it’s Easter break and I am looking forward to spending some much needed time with my children ‘cause I just don’t have enough grey hair on my head. Their fighting will certainly fix that.

Post 3

Ok so where do I find myself right? Running around like a headless lunatic. I have end of year projects and exams coming out of my ears, all whilst trying to sort out school trips for my kids and generally try and breathe… you know the other normal day to day stuff. Why does stuff always creep up on us and throw our lives into chaos? My plan to stay healthy has hit a snag. I am an emotional eater so when I get stressed I tend to reach for the first giant sized bar of whatever chocolate yumminess I can find and eat my stress away. I would love to say that I have discovered the secret to not doing this but that would be a massive lie. So I reached for the chocolate and tried to eat the stress away. So as I sat there in the cold light of day with my guilt surrounding me in the form of sweet wrappers and the usual suspects of junk food, I decide to surf the net looking for some inspiration. Now I have stated before that I have a health condition and my mobility is affected by this so my first port of call on google is exactly that. What’s the bet I find a million and one websites offering their magical cure for being fat?
But wait no what’s this I find? Yoga for the overweight!!! Really? How is that gonna work? My questioning mind makes me hit my mouse and send me to the page. I sit there and carefully go through the entire site for well over an hour trying to find the joke. Do you know something, there isn’t one. So I co what any normal sane woman in my situation would do, I click the buy button. Yes, that’s right I will be embarking on a course of yoga that I can do at my size and with my mobility problems. I am excited as today I got an email confirming that my shipment had been made and my disc’s would soon be with me. So what do I do next? Well I call my lovely twin sister and ask her for a yoga mat. She is a fitness instructor (I know the irony is not lost on me) and she can’t wait to hear more about it. I tell her that I have to do the yoga at home and I am going to need her help to make sure I do it every day. So to double my chances of success I am also going to blog my yoga. Yes, I will post a pic of me starting my first day of yoga and everyone can see my progress as I soldier on through this and try to achieve some help with the general state that is me.
So keep tuned and wish me luck I have a feeling I am going to be kissing the ground a lot as I fall over and bang into things whilst trying to bend and stretch myself into some weird and wonderful poses. So hopefully you will enjoy this or at least have a good laugh at my attempts and struggles with this.

Post 4

So my yoga pack has arrived and I’m very excited. I open it will all the glee of a 5-year-old on her birthday expecting the latest Barbie doll. Ok so what is in the pack? Well there are 6, yes 6 DVD’s a wall chart of positions and a book I have to read. I so made the reading part sound like a chore, it’s not. I love to read.
Reading through the book I can see it shows me how to start clean eating and which vegetables and fruits are the best choices to make. That will be tough ‘cause I ain’t known for my fruit and veg consumption. I should be ashamed of that but strangely my sugar addiction has kept be bold about my lack of joy when it comes to fruit and veg. I will have to retrain my brain to enjoy these foods. I am getting towards the end of the book and do you know what? This isn’t some gimmick. There is evidence to back up all claims made in the book such as adult research undertaken to see at what age our bodies start to build intolerances towards certain food groups etc.
Eeek ok it’s time to actually try this out now. Grabbing my not so sexy exercise clothes I decide that now is the moment to try it out. I have spoken with my sister the combat guru and told her I will let her know how I get on with my first attempt it. Oh wow he tells you to use chairs if you are not so stable with standing on one leg and so on. This whole routine is geared to help inept people like me who have hidden away from exercise and treated activities as though they were some sort of disease. Ok seriously I have to get this started…….

OMG I am dying. Yoga is not for the faint hearted. I thought yoga would make me all zen, not the red faced, sweaty mass that is heaving on the floor right now. This is gonna sound slightly sadistic but, I actually feel good. My body feels very alive, also very hot and not in ‘Cameron I just got out of the sea in a slinky bikini Diaz’ kind of way. I do believe my whole body is going to pay me back ten-fold in pain tomorrow but I really do think it will be worth it. Looking down at the chart I have to follow I wince as I see I have to follow the routines every other day. Well at least I will be working one day on and one day off, not a bad pattern really.
Waking up the next day I can see why you get the following day off from the workout. Muscles hurt that I didn’t know I even had. I am also walking like a new born giraffe who sank about 9 Jaeger Bombs. So is it worth it? Let me keep this up for the week and I will let you know.

One week later – Ok I feel really good. My headaches from trying to cut out all the awful food I have eaten for so long, are finally going away. Believe it or not the yoga helps with them and eases them away without having to resort to painkillers. My knees don’t feel so creaky and going upstairs doesn’t make me breathe like a desperate man looking for cheap thrills down a phone line. Ooh and guess what? I am sleeping so much better at night, even after just one week. I am waking up brighter and more alert instead of stumbling out of bed like a zombie in a shot of the Zombie Diaries Films. I am actually excited and happy to be able to continue with this and can’t wait to see how I progress. Watch this space for more news and a before picture of me, oh yes and I will be decked out in my fantastic workout gear. No laughing ok!!! Ok you can laugh a little, heck I do when I see me in it.

Post 5

I have a question for everyone who is reading this. What would you do if you were told when you were going to die? Would you cry? Maybe faint? Hmmm it’s weird isn’t it, you never really think about it. Perhaps you would go through this mysterious bucket list we all assume everyone has and start ticking things off. I don’t have a bucket list, I have never really thought about dying, well not until now.

I had an appointment to see a surgeon. As I have mentioned before I have an umbilical hernia and a gall bladder problem. I walked through those hospital doors expecting the same thing as usual; You’re fat, we can’t help you till you help yourself. Now go away we don’t like looking at fat people. It was strange sitting in that room with my mum. Yes, my mum was with me, I needed the support and she has my back and was not going to let them speak to me that way again. I was weighed etc. and then escorted into the room where the surgeon was. The look on his face told me that I was about to be told no once again and asked to leave. You see I have put up with my hernia for over 11 years. It pops out and I have to punch myself in the stomach to put it back in again. The joys of being pregnant, hernias are kind of a parting gift for the mother. Well it’s getting harder to “pop” it back in so I needed help.

This surgeon was a nice enough fellow, he spoke to me like I was an actual human being which made a nice change. Of course he said to the surgery but, this time he was going to explain to me why. He told me it would be unsuccessful and would be likely to return with greater complications. Yes, he did point out I was fat. He didn’t say it like I should be ashamed though. That knocked me over. I am not use to people looking at me like I am a human being. He said he understood that I have a weight problem and I explained that I am sick and tired of being told to go away and eat healthy and if I get given one more prescription for slimming world I may cry. That’s when he stopped and asked how many times I have been to Slimming World. I have been going back and forth to Slimming World for 14 years. It worked the first time for a while till I had my daughter. After that I couldn’t lose weight, my body didn’t like being force fed food to make sure I was never hungry. I told him that I am addicted to sugar and I need help, real help this time please. We talked about my gall bladder, hernia and my lymph oedema. He was kind, he listened to every word. I was waiting for him to tell me to try something else then see how I get on. HE DIDN’T. He looked me straight in the face and gave me the truth. “You will die in 3 years’ time if we don’t help you”. Yep straight out of the surgeon’s mouth came my expiry date – 2019. I will be 43 in 2019, my children will be 17 & 14 years old. They won’t have been married or had children by then.

His concern for me was that I had been pushed from one person to the next like some disgraced black sheep in the family. Moved along to be someone else’s problem. He dictated a letter to my G.P. while I was there and asked if I agreed to the things he was saying. This surgeon wants me to go to have my surgery. He wants me to have more though. He thinks I should have bariatric surgery and at the same time have my hernia and my gall bladder fixed. He sat there and told me he understood about my sugar addiction. He said that regardless of the amount of exercise I was doing and healthy eating I was not going to be fixed by a simple diet. My body had been taught that it had to be constantly full to be functioning. I have put on 3 stone since my last hospital visit even though I have been doing my yoga etc. What I need to do is not eat. He has asked me to visit my G.P. and tell them to refer me to the obesity clinic in the next county to me.

My mum sat and cried in that room. I couldn’t comfort her, my body wouldn’t move I couldn’t lift my arms to put them around her and crack a joke about the whole thing. I sat there totally numb just staring at the surgeon. I didn’t know what to say or do. I couldn’t think. I had not planned on this. I had walked in there expecting to be scolded by another doctor and left alone. Now I was facing a cold hard reality of my own mortality and it was fast approaching. It wasn’t till later on that I realised I had let those doctors push me around and shuffle me out the door. I should have stayed and told them no they will help me. But I didn’t believe in me so why should they. I looked at my daughter when I got back and she was the most perfect sight to me. I couldn’t imagine life without my children, what would their lives be without me?

I have booked my appointment to see my G.P. so on Monday the 20th June I will be walking down there with my mum (yep I am taking her cause she is my strength) and saving my life for me and for my kids. Come back next time and I will tell you how I got on ok.

Blog 6

Ok first things first. A huge thank you to everyone on Facebook. Your kind words and support were amazing. I am so blessed to have so many wonderful people sharing this journey with me. I promise not to make too many sad entries though. One, they aren’t my style and two, hopefully I won’t be going backwards and reliving a moment like that ever again. I was very scared and upset, I also felt alone. Your comments made me realise I am not alone, so for that I thank you.

Going to see the G.P.
So even with the letter from a surgeon and having previously discussed the issue of my sugar addiction with this doctor, she still wants to tell me that I have to do something other than what the surgeon has asked. I am already annoyed after waiting too long to be seen by her this morning. Don’t get me wrong I have nothing against waiting, hell I am British we love to queue and wait etc., but when I am her second appointment of the day and she is running late already this does not bode well in my mind. So I am sat in her little office being made to feel awful once again only this time my mum is here to witness it. Thankfully my mum helps put a stop to it too.

The tiny, thin doctor asks me if I have tried absolutely everything to lose weight. I explain to her again for the third time with this doctor that I have been dieting for over a decade and I can’t lose the weight and keep it off. I also explain that since the hospital thought Slimming World was an option for me I have since gained 3.5 stone as you have to eat a lot of food on that diet. This doctor always makes me feel like I am running in a circle with her. My mum steps in mentioning the paperwork that I had printed off from the CCG and NICE (these gives G.P’s guidelines to follow in how they treat fat people). As she looks at the papers it’s clear she has never seen this paperwork before. I have highlighted all relevant points for her showing that ANYONE who has a BMI of 50> is to be placed straight into Tier 3 if they ask to be and do not have to go through Tier 1 or 2 first. Well my BMI is 54 so I show her I do not have to go through Tier 1 and 2 again. To my anger she still tries to talk me into having a course of diet pills. I then have to explain to her that as someone who has had cholestasis I cannot take the diet pills as they will harm my liver. By the look on her face she is not happy with this. My mum then points out that I need to eat less food and that my addiction needs to be addressed. I am so glad my mum is here and backing me up.

So the doctor says she needs to weigh me and take my blood pressure. I get on the scales and they are broken. I DID NOT BREAK THEM, sorry but I need to stress that for my self-esteem. They were already broken. So right now I am angry, het up and frustrated. The doctor comes back and weighs me. I haven’t gained any more weight which is good. Much to my dismay it’s time to have my blood pressure taken. I know she is going to use that God awful electric machine that never works with me. On the second attempt she gets a measurement and she is not happy with it and then says she wants me on blood pressure meds. Now I have never needed blood pressure meds ever so I am slightly upset she has even suggested them. Hospital doctors know to avoid these machines with me as they never get a proper reading from them with me (I’m awkward like that). So the doctor now asks me to come back in the morning and get a blood pressure machine to take home for the week. She then informs me that as I have insisted so much she will send the referral to the clinic. I explain to her that I need to have the therapy they offer as I feel it would be very beneficial for me, she looks at me as though I should just stop eating and all will be ok. Ha! If only that were true it would solve all my problems. She sternly looks at me and tells me that I cannot stop trying to lose weight while I wait for my appointment from the clinic. Why do they always think that fat people want to be this way.  But me and my mum leave and go book the appointment for the morning with the nurse.

So it’s the next day I went to see the nurse to get the damn machine that will squeeze the life out of my arms. I sat there as she went through all I needed to do at home. Then said she wanted to take my blood pressure to record this morning and write it on the sheet. O.K. now I have said this before, these machines do not like me at all and sitting here pleading with the nurse to take the cuff off my arm as my hand starts to swell and go purple only proves to me they hate me. The nurse starts to panic as the machine seems hell bent on crushing my arm and the screen now reads 326 on the pressure monitor. Yep that’s way too high if you were wondering they normally shut off at around 160. Finally, the nurse manages to get the cuff off me and we both stare at my arms as we actually watch the blood start to flow again. The top of my arm looks awful with lines of blood under the skin where it was trapped in the cuff. I am not looking forward to this week at all as I will have to do this 3 times in the morning and 3 times in the evening. Guess I will have to do it on the other arm as the other one just looks mangled. The nurse assures me that once I have done this for a week and dropped in back in they will contact me and let me know if I need to come back in. Other than that we now have to play the waiting game to hear from the clinic. 

So really after all this I feel good that thanks to the surgeon I am now being referred to specialist who can actually help me, but I am still very frustrated with the way anyone who is overweight is dealt with in their G.P. surgery. It is time for G.P’s to top treating overweight people as second class citizens, they are people who need help and support. I always thought doctors were supposed to comfort their patients and support them, but in today’s society it seems fat shaming has now become the norm. Please everyone remember that people with weight issues may not be the lazy slob the media has taught you to see. They are most likely to be a person dealing with issues that are out of their control and finding it hard to get the help they need and they support they crave.

Post 8

It’s that time of the year…. Yes, summer is here and its holiday season. Sadly, I won’t be squeezing into a one piece on the beach as I have a fear Greenpeace will try and put me back in the sea like rescuing a whale that banked on the beach. But I am sitting on a lovely beach enjoying the sunshine and having fun with my kids as I write this blog.
A quick update for you all. I have my first hospital appointment on the 19th Sept to have my bloods done and meet the people who are going to be helping me. I can’t eat or drink anything other than sips of water for 14 hours before my appointment. That is going to suck because anyone who knows me, knows I live for coffee. I am nervous but also excited about this appointment, hopefully they give me great guidelines to follow and a good plan for eating.
Ok back to my holiday (I really want to brag about the beach). The beach is great; I always feel very at peace when I am by the sea. I have started to ponder about a few things though. I went to an amusement park with my wonderful sister and my beautiful kids the other day and I couldn’t go on any rides. This was great for my son as he didn’t have to hold my bags but I desperately wanted to go on the rollercoaster and all the other rides. I love any ride that goes fast and swings you around like a pebble in a jar. As I stood there watching the rides I saw there was no way I was fitting in any of those seats. The bars would dig in and that’s if they actually managed to get them down over my abundant size. I couldn’t risk the shame and embarrassment of being told to leave the ride so I just avoided them.  Like I said this has got me thinking, I wanted to tell you about the things I will not miss about being fat.

10 Things I will NOT miss about being fat

1. Not fitting on rides – as I have said above, I love them. I love the feeling of my insides rising when the rollercoaster dips down fast and the thrill as you think you are going to fall but instead you are swept away in a fast movement and thrown in every direction. I went on the waltzers last year and asked the man to make sure he spun me and my friends really fast, he laughed at me and said it was going to be the best workout he’d had in years trying to push our carriage enough for it to spin fast (I haven’t been on them since after that comment).
2. Getting up off the floor – we have all seen us fat people trying to get up off the floor or grass at a picnic. Yep, that’s right we have to do the fat woman roll, grab and stand move. I hate that I have to roll onto my knees then grab the nearest object to pull myself up on before I can get close to standing up.
3. Seatbelts – This is a huge problem if you are overweight. Lots of cars I can’t even get a seatbelt to fit me. I sit in the back of my dad’s car and pretend I have it on by draping it on my arm. When you can fit one around you then it cuts across your body in a way that makes you look like some alien from sci-fi film that we should all be running away from.
4. Seats – These are a big issue for most overweight people. I don’t like sitting in between people. I feel awkward and like I am taking up too much room so I try to make sure I get an end seat. It’s awful when someone does sit next to you and they do the weirdest move so they are virtually leaning across someone so they don’t come anywhere near you. Booths in cafes, which I see are now some form of movement in the decorating world. I can’t fit in them, they are designed for thin people and I know people are watching to see if the fat girl will attempt to try and sit and give them all a laugh.
5. Fat Shaming – This happens A LOT. If you have read my previous blogs you will notice that’s Doctors and Nurses love to fat shame. Not all of them I should point out, but a vast majority of them do love it. It serves no purpose and probably makes the problem so much worse for the person being shamed. It makes me feel worse about myself and brings on a lot of self-loathing etc. I really won’t miss fat shaming at all.
6. Eating in public – I try to avoid it as much as I can. I hate people looking at me when I eat. I don’t like the way people look at what is on my plate and they do look. I don’t think people realise sometimes how hard it is when you are addicted to one thing you need to keep you alive. I avoid eating out at restaurants as much as possible. I had my 40th birthday a few weeks ago, what did I do for it? Nothing, I did nothing to celebrate it. I didn’t want to be seen out for a meal and I didn’t want anyone to look at me at all, so I avoided celebrating it which I know upset my twin sister as she really wanted to go out but I just couldn’t handle people looking at me and the hideous comments of “Oh you can’t possibly be twins, your sister is so thin and healthy and you are, well you know” or my favourite one over the years “you two are like Danny DeVito and Arnold Swarzenegger”.  I don’t like that my bad image of myself stopped me from enjoying my birthday with my sister all because I hate eating in public.
7. Tropical Moments – Yes, I get hot flushes. I am overweight so my body responds with making me feel like I am on fire. I look terrible as I sweat (none of this feminine glistening you see in the movies). I literally look like I just walked through a car wash. My hair frizzes and I look like I am having some form of medical episode. It’s not flattering at all.
8. Pictures – I hate having my photo taken. I always tell people please only take a picture of me from the neck up. I never let people take a picture of me showing my whole body. I don’t like looking at me so why would anyone else want to see me in their photo.
9. Trainers – I hate them. I miss wearing boots and heels. I can’t risk wearing them or even fit my fat swollen feet in them. Granted my Lymph Oedema has a lot to do with why I can only wear trainers, but that should be a lot more manageable once I have lost my weight. I miss heels so much. I am a short girl so I miss the height when wearing heels.
10. Frumpy Fat Girl Clothes – Yes these I will not miss. I only wear t-shirts and jeans. I want to wear dresses and bright colours. They really don’t make very nice clothes for anyone who is fat. Shirts are always too short and show your belly off a little. So I tend to buy clothes that are a size or two bigger than me so they don’t show any lumps, bumps or shapes that are just awful.

Each one of these things in the list is pretty trivial to most, but to me they are important. I don’t want to deal with them any longer. I could list a lot more but I won’t. I want each one of these to be a goal. Each time I don’t have to deal with one of these things I know I will closer to my final goal. Those 10 things are my check off list to my healthier lifestyles and my happier days.

Blog 9

Cloud nine, I am floating on cloud nine. I can’t believe the difference it makes seeing someone in the medical profession who actually wants to help you. Ok so we all know I have been waiting for my referral appointment and I went today. I will confess I was scared, but thankfully I had my mum there with me. Yes, I know I am a grown arse woman but you know what? Sometimes you just need your mum and my mum is right by my side. We left my dad in the car. I promise we cracked a window for him (I’ve seen those video’s on youtube of people breaking windows to let the puppies get fresh air) so my dad was sorted. – I would like to point out in case anyone is offended by that it was a joke. My dad was sat very comfortably waiting for us.
The clinic is very small and very quiet and I am given a ton of forms to fill out when I get there. There are lots of questions about my feelings etc. I am not one to really like being asked all that kind of stuff but I want help so I sit and fill it all out.  After 10 mins I am called in to an office by a very smiley lady. I should point out I have not eaten for 15 hours or had anything other than sips of water in that time. This puts me in an irritable mood as I have not had any coffee. But she puts me at ease straight away by saying she won’t do any tests today as she just wants to talk with me and discuss my needs. As we go through my eating habits I am waiting for a look of disdain or for her to tell me that I need to learn more self-control and so on. This does not happen. I know right we were all expecting a little fat shaming but there was none to be found there. She told me she couldn’t believe the treatment or lack of it that I had received from my G.P. surgery. She was very upset to find out that I was not under clinical care for my legs. Apparently I should attend regular hospital appointments for them. I was never given this from my doctors. They just gave me a prescription for bandages and left me to it. She asked me a lot of questions about my moods and how I approach things. It turns out I am high up on the depression scale. I should point out that I do not feel depressed at all. I get annoyed with things but don’t we all? I have seen people with depression and heard how horrible it is for them, that is not me I don’t feel like that at all. She skated over it and said we would look at it again on the next appointment. We discussed my sleeping habits which are awful. I rarely sleep well and will wake several times in the night. So she has decided I need to go to sleep studies. I am to have a monitor on me when I sleep for week to see why I am so unsettled and how many times I move and wake etc. All the time she is writing down the things I need from them she is keeping me at total ease and cracking jokes and generally having a good time with me and my mum. I have never had this kind of experience in any medical setting. My sense of humour when at appointments has got me thrown out of hospitals before (I kid you not I got kicked off a cancer ward a relative was in). I think I am definitely going to like everyone here if they are half as happy as the nurse today.
So next she asks me very nicely to get on the scales as she must weigh me so I have a starting weight for their records. Happy days it turns out I have lost two stones in two months. That leaves me feeling stunned. I was expecting to have put weight on but I have lost weight. What a bonus. She then sits me down and tells me that she can tell me how long I will be on what they call Tier 3, she tells me that I will have to complete 6 months on this, which in all honesty is much shorter in time than I assumed it was going to be. She also tells me my G.P. will not have any say in whether I get to have surgery as it is out of the G. P’s hands now thankfully to new regulations. She also tells me that I must come back on the 2nd November for my next appointment where they will go through what my eating plan will be and that I will be on the Milk Diet for one month. This will be to see what my reactions to cravings etc will be like and to show me how to control them. Everything is explained very carefully to me and I am left not needing to ask any questions at the end of my appointment. 
I won’t have to give anything up at all like I thought I would with the eating plan. Well apart from when I do the Milk Diet. They want me to learn control and to enjoy what I eat but know my limits. I know it’s going to be hard work and they have warned me of this but I am so ready for this. I want this more than I have ever wanted anything. Ooh and she has applied for me to get funding for gym membership as I am a lowly student.  Yes, really they can do that for you, I was shocked too. So for now I am floating on a cloud having received the best help in a long time. I can’t wait to get started and finally get to be who I want to be.

Post 10

I don’t have to do the milk diet. I am so happy about that as I was not looking forward to drinking milk every day and nothing else. I had it in my head that I would suddenly grow to hate coffee and milkshakes as they are the only thing you can mix in the milk while on that diet.
So after sitting down and talking more about my eating habits and discussing whether I am an actual binge eater or not the nurse has kindly informed me that my eating habits are because they have become a habit over many years. She also explained that with the fright I had from the surgeon and so on I was moving in the right direction. So from now until the 16th December I will be on a 1500 calorie diet. I will have to give up my Dr Pepper or move to sugar free Dr Pepper. I think I will just give it up though because if I do get surgery I will not be allowed to have fizzy drinks in any form. I may as well get started with that now and save a headache down the road.
The nurse also pointed out to me that I like having projects to do and that I should build a reward system for myself. So every time I achieve a goal I should pick a reward from one I have written down and put everything in a folder and monitor what I am doing. I have to admit that as geeky as it sounds this really is the way to get me to do things. I like to learn new things and to organise them etc, so doing things this way will appeal to me. So now I need to sit down and figure out what my rewards are going to be and also what my distractions when cravings start are going to be. I know a trigger for me is boredom and since going back to University I have not been bored and kept nicely distracted, but as the nurse pointed out to me I won’t always be in University. Which by the way is a shame because I could easily and happily take on another degree course once I have done this one.
I met some lovely ladies in clinic today too. Both have been on the pathways longer than me and one is post op. It was nice to sit and chat with people who are going through the same thing as me. It somehow puts you at ease knowing you are not alone and that there are others going through this same ordeal. I still get nervous and shaky when I am about to see a doctor or nurse even though I know at this clinic they are so nice and never judge. The downside to them being nice though is that when I have to see my G.P. They seem to be so brash and harsh in comparison.  Which reminds me I need to book an appointment with my miserable G.P. as they won’t refer me to the sleep clinic until I have sat down with them to discuss it. Not sure what needs to be discussed though – the clinic have told me to get booked in to the sleep clinic and that’s all there is to it. But looks like red tape must still be dealt with. Well I am off to Tesco to treat myself to a shiny new folder to put all my diet stuff in and make my food diary and such and yes I am smiling at the thought of shopping for stationary, sad I know. Let’s see if I can manage keeping up with counting everything out and making sure I get the right portions of each food group on my plate every day. Fingers crossed I can get my head around it quick enough.

Post 11

WARNING: THIS IS GONNA BE A LONG ONE
Wow it feels like so long since I last wrote. What have I been up to? Well I had my sleep clinic appointment this week. I am going to be honest with you, it wasn’t fun. I had to take a machine home and use it for the night. How did it go? Well, erm…  not so great. I couldn’t relax enough to sleep properly with the damn machine tied round my chest and then another thing stuck to my finger and then some contraption shoved up my nose. So, after five useless hours of sleep I woke feeling far from refreshed the contraption that was supposed to be up my nose monitoring my breathing was slung round my neck like a noose. I assume I must have freaked at some point in the night and ripped it out. I should point out it was also stuck to my face with tape. The nurses advised that I do this as I can only presume people must pull at it in their sleep, well not me no siree bob, I ripped the thing clean off. The wonderful monitor that was attached to my finger and then had to be taped to my arm and wrist had also been ripped off. I think it’s clear to say that I do not sleep well when trussed up like a turkey. I send my heartiest wishes to the people trying to make sense of the data they gathered whilst I tried to ‘sleep’.

So how has my 1500 calorie diet been going? Not too shabby if I do say so. I haven’t had a Dr Pepper in 6 weeks, yes that’s right 6 whole weeks. This is a major achievement for me as I am a self-confessed sugar addict and Dr Pepper was my drug of choice. I am off to the hospital in the morning to be weighed to see if it has made a difference. My fingers and toes are crossed hoping it has.
I have had an action packed and dramatic time too. I was looking forward to heading off for a weekend teaching course. Yes, I want to teach young and impressionable minds. My university was letting 18 of students learn TEFL for free. Basically, that meant if I passed the course then I would be able to teach English around the globe in any old room I wanted too. So, on the Friday morning I was getting everything ready for my course and by midday had it all packed when the phone rang. I can’t express just how horrible it all got after that phone call. You all know I have the wonderful twin sister and an awesome brother, right? Well the phone call was sister, she was in pain and she was worried. After telling her to ring an ambulance my father rushed me to her flat where I found her in so much pain. After 90 minutes a first responder showed up and started working on her to relieve the pain. He urged the ambulance to get their arses to her flat as quickly as possible. Finally, they showed up, they took my sister to the hospital where she was dosed up on morphine and they started running tests. By midnight they were talking emergency surgery. My sister was in trouble, she had torn a hole in her stomach. This was becoming life threatening as bile was leaking in to her stomach. My goodness she was so brave, much braver than me. I was a mess, when they took her to x-ray I broke down crying to the point that an entire family hugged a wall as they walked passed me to get as far away from the mad crying woman as they could.  By 1am They had decided what was going to happen and I felt awful as I had to leave her alone in the hospital. Our lovely parents collected me from the hospital and helped me try and get some rest before I went off to start my course. I feel awful I couldn’t cancel it and still had to go. I couldn’t sleep all night and walked into the classroom that Saturday morning looking like night of the living dead. I did explain to them what had happened and that my phone would not be switched off. They were very understanding I must say. I spent the next 12 hours learning and practicing teaching techniques. Finally, by 9pm I was home and could find out how my sister was. She had had the surgery and was on the ward recovering. I had messages galore from her friends asking if they could go see her. I will admit I was being totally selfish and told them no, partly because she had just had major surgery and because I was her sister and I wanted to see her first. Yes, I know very selfish, but I do get selfish about my family. But hey they ignored me anyway and went up to see her. I went to my second day of teaching workshop and spent 8 hours with everyone and finally did my presentation lesson. I am happy to say I passed and have the certificate to prove it.

After a very long 10 days my sister was allowed home. I have never wanted to wrap my sister in cotton wool until now. If I could have moved in to take care of her I would have, but she would have ended up killing me. So now we are at the point where my sister is healing and recovering and I am not missing fizzy drinks and had to sleep with a weird thing up my nose. Ok I will be back once I have been to the hospital in the morning with news as to whether me doing this 1500 calorie diet has helped me shift the smallest amount of weight.

Ok here I am back from my obesity clinic appointment. I am shocked and stunned. I have lost 5 kilos or 11lbs if you prefer it that way. So, the next plan is to survive Christmas without stuffing my face full of chocolate and booze and go back in February with hopefully more weight off and getting closer to my goal. Today is a good day. I hope everyone has an amazing Christmas and a fantastic New Year. 

Blog 12

I stop breathing on average 25 times an hour at night while sleeping. 25 times is a lot, kind of a scary number really. Am I scared? No! I don’t like the sleep clinic much at all. I have to go back tomorrow and sit in a room and watch a video on my condition. I don’t like the idea of this at all. So, what actually, happened in my sleep clinic appointment? Well I took my daughter as I had to because it’s the school holidays and she wanted to out and not at home. I wish I hadn’t taken now, she was sat in the room with me when they said I stop breathing on average 25 times an hour whilst sleeping. I didn’t know this was the result I was going to get. I thought they would tell me I was a fidgety sleeper not that I have to stop my driving lessons till I have undergone treatment for two weeks and they can clear me to drive and that I stop breathing so much when I am sleeping. According to the nurse I have had this all my life as my sleep has always been the same (at least I know it’s not because I am fat).

So, at the treatment appointment I am sat down with two other people who also have OSA. Yes, that’s what it is called, because I can’t have normal sleep apnoea. We all sit and watch a dvd of our condition and then and how it affects us while we sleep (our brains don’t get enough oxygen, yes that explains a lot about me). After watching the dvd I am then lead onto a side ward and there I try on a mask and am shown how it all works. I must lie down for 20 mins wearing the mask to feel how it works. Now, this would be fine but you can’t tell a lot about it in 20 mins really. We are all warned that we won’t feel the benefit of this for a couple of weeks as we need to get use to sleeping with the equipment (I will forever be alone as who on earth wants to share a bed with someone wearing equipment to sleep).

So how did my first night go with the equipment? Bloody awful. I woke up more than I normally do because you cannot open your mouth when you wear the mask, if you do open your mouth then a huge rush of air comes down your nose and out your mouth taking your breath away. It is not fun I can assure you. My throat is raw this morning as I seem to open my mouth a lot while I am trying to sleep. I ripped the damn mask off by 1am because it just got too much in the end. The lovely nurse who was helping me says she will phone on Friday to see how I am coping. I think I am going to ask for a different mask because I fear my sleeping is going to get much worse at this rate. My throat is definitely going to be red raw by Friday.

How is my eating plan going? Well obviously, Christmas was difficult but totally manageable. I still haven’t had a fizzy drink and I do feel better for that but I have let my water intake slide and need to get back on track with that. I want to have lost a good amount by the time I go back on February 4th. I don’t want to have put any on, I want to lose more weight. My hernia has been playing up quite a bit though I have noticed as I am trying more exercise. Granted I am not down the gym etc. but I am making sure I walk more and take stairs whenever I can instead of using the lift. I also noticed where I have dropped a dress size my hernia pokes out a lot more too. I am really starting to look like John Hurt in that scene from Alien. If I ever get thin this will definitely be a talking point for people when they see me in the street.

 I tried some protein bars the other day, these are similar to ones I can eat after surgery to make sure I have enough protein and to be honest they are not great. They are not awful either, just something I will have to train myself to have. I am making sure I tick off each food type as I go each day and still weigh out my cereal in the morning and so on. I have to keep doing this so it all becomes second nature to me. Bananas have become my new friend too but I don’t want to eat too many of those. I need to try and keep my fruit intake varied.

My head is so full of information on this and that from various doctors and clinics that I sometimes wish I had never started this. But I want to live a long and healthy life so drastic action must be taken. If I don’t then I won’t get to see my kids make the huge milestones in their lives like marriage and kids or watch them graduate and work doing something they love. I also don’t want them looking at me and thinking I didn’t try to make it better for me and for them.

Post 13

Damn it… Ok having gall bladder pain is worse than natural child birth (which I have done twice and prefer to this). A whole month of pain and sitting in A&E most nights praying that the morphine will take the pain away. I know they said this journey would be hard and painful and they weren’t joking. I thought when they said it was going to be hard following the advice and methods given to me from the clinic that it would be cravings etc. not actual pain, physical vomit inducing pain. I am tired and in pain and I find myself crying and asking if this is all worth it. I feel sorry for my family having to witness me writhing around in pain and there is nothing they can do to ease it. Every night that my gall bladder has decided to rip pain through my body, my mum has sat with me and held my hand trying to ease the pain and my dad has paced the floor waiting to be able to shuffle me in the car to drive me to the local A&E. It’s not fair on them and I feel selfish.

I have my appointment with clinic today to discuss how I am doing and if I have lost any weight etc. I sit there crying again (seriously what is with all the waterworks lately?) explaining about how I have been in pain every night and I am not sure I can keep going if this carry’s on. Trust me when I say I am on my last nerve and want to quit so badly. My doctor is amazing, I cannot praise her enough, she sits and hands me tissues as she listens to how the last month has been for me. She realises I am scared, hurting and need help and support. She tells me she is worried that my gall bladder is going to provide a lot of complications when it comes to the final section of tier 3 of the weight loss procedure to get my hernia, bypass and gall bladder surgery. Even though I feel like telling her I have had enough and I want to get of this fairground ride I find the words leaving my mouth are ‘I want to finish this and get through it regardless of the pain’. My brain is screaming at me as I say this to stop and just give up it won’t hurt if I give up. However, how can I give up now? I have come so far and I have lost more weight thanks to the support, help and advice from this clinic.

They have never once fat shamed me or told me I am lazy and unable to do this. They have done nothing but encourage me and show me how capable I am and it’s then that I realise that there is no turning back. I can sit around and just roll over and die like the surgeon told me would happen or I can take a couple more months of pain to get to a healthier and longer life. So, my doctor decides to put my name forward to the surgeons earlier so that I will sit down with the surgeon by April and have a psychology session to make sure my head is ok with what will happen as soon as the surgery journey starts.

I have lost over 3 stone in the months I have been writing this blog, which is way more than I normally lose. I am happy that I am being looked after and that these doctors and nurses actually care and my eating habits are so changed. I rarely eat anything with sugar in it now. I consciously look at how much fat and sugar are in things and I choose fruit and veg over most things now. It sounds insane that I have to actually think about this sort of thing but it’s not until you address actual sugar or food addiction that you realise how bad we all need help with this. This is not an easy journey at all, even to the point where I would prefer to give birth without any form of pain relief, but I know it’s going to be worth it once I get there. Ok now I am off to dance around my living room to some truly fantastic music and sing so loud that the neighbours will bang on the wall. Have a great day everyone.

Blog 14

Ok anyone who says this is easy is a liar, a big walloping, pants on fire kind of liar. OMG it’s reading week at university which means I get a whole week to catch up on things for my assignments.

I need this break for sure, so imagine my horror that on Monday I start feeling pain in my back and thought oh no please don’t let me have a kidney infection (they warned me I could get other symptoms while finishing off tier 3). I managed to get an appointment straight away at my G.P. surgery (I know, a miracle). So, I popped down there to chat with the doc and see if I had an infection or if it was this damn gall bladder playing up again. Hmm well he poked, he prodded and I nearly went through the roof in his office. He decided it was not an infection but could be my gall bladder playing up and told me to take some pain meds and if it acts up again to go straight to the hospital. I made it as far as the pharmacy before I felt the wave of nausea hit me right at the same time that pain shot through my body. I swear if I had not been in the middle of Tesco I would have thought some wally had shoved a javelin through my side. With tears in my eyes I begged the pharmacist to hurry with my prescription so I could get some painkillers down my neck before I either passed out or vomited on their counter. I managed to get home thanks to my dad and take the painkillers only to be met with more shuddering pain.

Ten minutes later I am in the car being rushed to Accident and Emergency, now I would have been pondering asking for frequent flier miles or some reward scheme clubcard but I could hardly breathe with the pain. My local A&E department are amazing, I am actually thinking of proposing marriage to the whole department, can you marry a department? They made sure I was given strong painkillers and I saw a doctor in under three hours even though it was very busy. I guess me sitting in the waiting room rocking back and forth whilst moaning and wailing in pain is not enticing to watch. The doctor I saw decided that as I couldn’t have the surgery as I am awaiting two other surgeries that I should have it noted that I am to be kept topped up with strong painkillers all the time and that my G.P. should be made aware of this too. He sat and wrote an email to G.P. right in front of me saying how they were to keep a prescription for high medication until my surgery date comes through. I am so grateful to him for doing this as I genuinely can’t bare anymore pain. I have to admit I was close to attempting ripping the damn thing out myself and be done with it all. Pain makes your head think weird things and in the cold light of a pain free day I feel silly for thinking such things. I’m just so tired from it all. They don’t warn you just how hard the journey is, do they!

On a much lighter note I had the courage to venture out for the evening, I know it’s a miracle. Anyone who knows me well enough knows I love political comedy and Jonathan Pie was live at the Junction, I have been an avid fan of the weekly youtube video’s since they started in 2015 so couldn’t resist booking tickets. I dragged my poor sister along with me who is not a massive live comedy fan but she is very supportive of me, so she came along and oh my did we have a good night. I haven’t laughed so much in a long time. I actually had faceache from all the laughing. The support comedian Andrew Doyle was absolutely amazing too. I was nervous meeting up with my sister at first because as I have said before I have kind of locked myself away from the world. I didn’t want people to stare at the fat woman having to move to let people through and so on but as usual my sister made the evening wonderful. We made the startlingly discovery that I have locked myself away from the world for two and a half years. I can’t believe I have kept away from everyone for so long. It was strange to go out and just wonder around Cambridge as I haven’t been there since I was a student there a very, very long time ago, but the night was fantastic and my sister has said I need to take baby steps and get use to going out again.

I shall be venturing out to see people I haven’t seen for years on Sunday. I am saddened that it will be to drink a toast to a very dear lady whom I will miss greatly who sadly passed away but it will be good to see people and try and start to become a bit outgoing and lively like I use to be before the accident and everything went downhill. I admit to being quite scared even though these are people I have known for years. Hopefully everything will be fine. It’s gonna be a while till I go back to the hospital and see how everything is going and give you an update on that so you will have to put up with some insane rambles from me. Ooh and I have job now as well. I will be working as an outreach ambassador for my university. I can’t wait to start that. Well I shall raise my coffee mug right and drink to hopefully a pain free month and me not doing something embarrassing on Sunday when I stick myself in a room full of people for a change.

Blog 15

Well my goodness if you like reading about the tragedy that has been my gallbladder issue and me wailing like a baby then you will love this post.

Naturally we all know that I am having huge problems with my gallbladder and it was a Sunday night in March when it kicked off again. I went straight to the hospital and after 7 hours of being left in a room not knowing anything two surgeons come in and tell me that they will never operate on me at my local hospital because I am fat and they do not operate on fat people. I would love to say that I have exaggerated this but sadly I am quoting the surgeons word for word. So, as I stare back as these two-young surgeon’s through puffy red eyes streaming with tears, what do they do? They shrug their shoulders at me and ask if I want to spend the night in hospital to calm down and get some rest as I hadn’t slept for days because of the pain. They were willing enough to give me a bed to “have a rest” but the idea of operating on a fat person was abhorrent to them. Still staring blankly at them I thank them and take my prescription for pain meds and go home. I refuse to take up a hospital bed to get some rest, that’s what my bed at home is for.

Monday slips by as I can barely move and feel like a zombie, everything still hurts but it’s just about manageable. Tuesday morning comes and the kids are getting ready for school and I can’t move for the pain and sickness I am feeling. As soon as both my kids have gone with my dad to school I breakdown and cry. The pain is starting to get really intense and I am throwing up like I have had a good night out on the beer. It’s not until I start shaking from the pain and find it hard to talk and breathe that an ambulance is called. Hats off to the paramedics who show up and the first responder they are here within 30 mins of being phoned and start stabbing my arms with needles trying to find a way to get morphine straight into my bloodstream. On the 5th attempt at finding a vein they finally manage to give me 10ml of morphine. I should say it’s not their fault it took 5 attempts, my veins tend to run and hide when I am in pain. They let me lay on my sofa for a few minutes to let the morphine run through my system but it’s not working and the pain is getting worse. So, with the help of the paramedics I am escorted to the gurney and then loaded into the ambulance in my driveway. As this is happening what do I keep doing? I keep apologising to the paramedics for taking up their time and saying how sorry I am that I am in pain. I am still not sure why I turn into the most apologetic fool when I am in pain, but I do. We get to the hospital and I am taken into a curtained area as I fight not scream.

My sister has arrived at the hospital and is by my side and starts explaining what has happened to the doctors as I am finding it hard to even register anything going on around me. I am aware of people asking questions and trying to get pain meds sorted for me. I get rolled in the bed and asked why I missed my scan appointment this morning, well this is news to me. What scan appointment? I don’t know about any scan appointment. Nurses and doctors are now saying that an appointment was booked for me to have a scan at 9am and I missed it. I should point out that by this time it is around 9:15am. My sister points out that none of us were aware I had an appointment to which they reply that it was set up and should be on my discharge notes from Sunday night – I don’t have any discharge notes from Sunday night, they gave me a prescription and that was it. For some bizarre reason, they do not believe me and even if I had had this appointment and was aware of it I would never have made it as I was being assisted by paramedics in my home at 8:30am. Now they are refusing to scan me due to this mix up… Great just what I need. While all the arguing is going on around me about whether or not I get a scan to see if my gallbladder has ripped open or not I am shaking and screaming with tears running down my face begging for more pain killers. A nurse brings me some pain meds and I get a blissful pain free 10 mins where I ask my sister to stand in front of a picture on the wall that is freaking me out because it looks like an orange angry baby. Yes, apparently, I say the stupidest things when high on pain meds. But I do have the best sister in the world as she stands in front of the picture of the offending orange angry baby and tries not to wet herself laughing at me. After a couple of hours of me screaming for more pain meds I am moved to the Surgical Assessment Unit. My sister never leaves my side and holds my hand as each doctor comes in to poke and prod me about causing the pain to sear through me again and again. They come down and say I can have a scan but not till 4pm. Till then I am to be kept on pain meds, I can hear my sister talking with the nurses and doctors but I am not totally registering what’s going on around me cause all I feel is pain followed by more pain. I am now being given morphine every two hours and it’s just not cutting through the pain. I am conscious and unconscious throughout the afternoon and apparently still screaming even when I am out if it. My sister constantly reassures me saying the scan will be soon and then they can get to really helping me. I can’t stop crying and hers is the only voice that is really registering to me.

By the time, it’s time to take me down for my scan I am now begging them to kill me just to make the pain stop, yes, I have reached that point where death is more preferable. My sister is pleading with me to hang on and that it will be ok once I have the scan. I know I am in the middle of a waiting area surrounded by people but I can’t stop pleading with the nurses to kill me and make it stop. I look back now and feel very ashamed for this but to be honest if they had done it I would have been ok with it as I really was in more pain than I have ever been in before and I have given birth naturally twice. Natural labour without pain meds is much easier. I am taken in to a room for the scan and the woman performing the scan seems shocked at the state of me. My whole body is shaking as she informs me that they have to push hard in to my ribs to get a clear picture and I swear it feels like she is trying to reach my spinal cord through my ribs. The woman feels so bad that she actually hugs me and tells me it will be ok and she is sorry to cause me further pain. I am taken back to the assessment unit and I think I must be passing in and out of consciousness as everything after that becomes very patchy and I can barely remember a thing till 4am when they move me to a ward. The next morning I wake up still in pain but nothing like before as a nurse injects my stomach with something that burns. She informs me I have been moved to a ward to await being seen by a surgeon. I think my prayers have been answered and they are going to remove my gallbladder at long last. My sister is there first thing to come and see me and she is there when the surgeon turns up to see me. Its then I am told that the hospital will never take my gallbladder out because they do not operate on overweight people and I should just expect to be here till my pain goes. I am sitting on the bed in shock that after all that I went through they still will not take the damn thing out and my sister is furious with the surgeon. How do I tell my parents that I will not be operated on because my local hospital has a policy of not operating on anyone who is overweight? My sister is ready to start busting heads of anyone who keeps refusing to help me and I keep telling her I am so sorry for putting her through this. My parents come up to see me on the ward and I explain what has happened and my mum starts to cry, she has sat with me till the early hours of the morning holding my hand as I ride the pain at home many times. My dad looks angry and upset and about ready to kill the next doctor who wants to tell me to just deal with it. The one thing that really cheers me up is children coming into visit me, they bring me pictures and hug me, my daughter also becomes very smitten with the hospital bed. I tell them to inform my university that I won’t be in class and need to get extensions on my work as I won’t be able to get back to class till mid-April.  It’s not till Thursday when a young doctor comes round and asks me how I feel and I tell him that my pain feels much more controlled and he says with a smile great you can go home then, now all I need is some clothes to wear. Honestly these hospital robes are not flattering at all.
So I am now at home trying different pain meds out to see what will work best for me. The one thing on the horizon is I have my weigh in at the clinic to see if I have lost the last 6lbs that will bring me to a 5% weight loss so I can move on to tier 4.
YES, YES, YES, I did great. Ok they asked me to lose 5% of my body weight and I only went and lost 9%. I lost a further 18lbs I am so happy. My BMI has gone from 54.3 to 48. The dietician has said I can go on to tier 4 but it will take about 6 to 8 months and they will get me in to see a surgeon for my hernia and bypass surgery. I have also been told they will do my gallbladder surgery first. I will still have to wait a few months before they can operate due to waiting list but the clinic doesn’t want me to carry on suffering just because my local hospital refuse to operate on overweight people. I can’t believe how good this makes me feel, I have lost more weight than I thought I would and I will have the damn gallbladder taken out. I am currently eating a diet of chicken, fish, fruit and veg and a little splash of skimmed milk in coffee but that is it. I no longer crave sweet foods and I make sure I drink plenty of water every day. Whilst all I have gone through with my gallbladder has been completely horrific and my mum has said many times if I were an animal they would have done something before now it has helped me change my eating habits completely. So, in a way it has been a huge learning curve for me. Not one I ever want to repeat that’s for sure. I can’t wait to get my surgical appointment through and finally end this chapter of drama and get on to concentrating on my weight loss properly. I have also seen how wonderful my friends and family are as they all rallied to help me and wish me well after getting out of hospital. Even my tutors were so supportive. I know I am a very lucky person to have so many good people in my life who support me and care for me. This helps me and spurs me on more than I can ever explain and so I would like to say a huge thank you to them all.

Blog 16

Three weeks, that’s it!!!! Just three weeks till I get to have my gallbladder taken out and my hernia fixed. Yes, half my problems will be over in just three weeks then I can focus on getting healthy and fit again. So much has changed since we spoke last month, I was offered two of my surgeries which will mean a pain free existence. You have no idea how excited I am about that. I have met my surgeon after being called into his office for a very brief meeting and an explanation of what will happen in my surgeries. Naturally a hospital appointment can’t go without some blunder or mishap and laying on a bed in a tiny office with a strange man prodding you is not where you want blunder or mishap to happen. So, I am lying there with my now loose jeans pulled down looking like a weirdly drunken date in a parking lot. I know my hernia is nasty and needs sorting but what I don’t expect is for the surgeon with over 20 years’ experience to take one look at my hernia and say’s ‘Oh Jesus’ out loud and then recoil away slightly. This is what he did, yes that’s right folks my hernia is so disgusting that even a professional was freaked out by it. Once he has regained his composure and I am allowed to put my clothes to their normal position on my body and regaining some form of dignity back he informs me that yes, my hernia must be sorted out as soon as possible, oh yeah and he will do the gallbladder too. The thing that causes me daily agonising pain came second on his list and my freak show looking hernia was what he really wanted to slice up. Still once it’s fixed I will be able to stand up straight and not look like John Hurt from Alien which will be nice and he promised my stomach would have a pretty smile shaped scar. He runs through all the complications that can happen and then assures me this is highly unlikely as I am very healthy (I don’t feel reassured). So, I leave the hospital feeling very happy that two of three surgeries are being performed soon.

Ok Monday this week has definitely been my best day in a long time.  Today was my driving test. I love driving, I really do. I have a great driving instructor who has helped me so much with my driving after an awful experience with a previous instructor. Well my driving instructor has been amazing and taught me so well whilst having some excellent discussions and putting the world to rights each lesson. So naturally I was gonna pass the test and I did, FIRST TIME. Yep I passed first time and that’s thanks to my amazing instructor because I really thought I may fail once I found out that my test instructor had the same name as my ex-husband and anyone who knows me well enough, knows that there is something about that name that sends me over the edge of sanity and I tend to freak out and hide. But he was a decent guy and a great test instructor and he didn’t make me nervous at all. When he told me I had passed once we got back to the test centre I didn’t even say a bad swear word just a regular normal one.

Oh, and did I mention that I thought giving up smoking was a good idea the week before my test? Well I have decided all my bad habits should go so smoking was next on the list really. I booked in down at the smoking clinic and they gave me lots of patches and inhalators and so on. Now if I could just remember to put the patches on it might help. I haven’t had a cigarette so really, I don’t think it matters if I wear the damn patches or not as I don’t seem to be wanting to smoke anyway. But hey ho, the docs are pleased with me for giving up and everything seems to be moving along nicely right now.
So really this is my best month so far, I am still losing weight, I am gonna be pain free after my two surgeries on the 16th May, I have given up smoking and I passed my driving test. Yep this month has rocked for sure. Right me and my freak show hernia are end it here for the night. Happy thoughts to you all and mucho love as always.

Blog 17 Part One - pre surgery

It’s the night before I go in for surgery and to say I am nervous is an understatement. I have checked my bag a million and one times, everything is ready all I have left to do is finish writing my letters. I have written letters to my kids, my parents, my brother and sister and also to my ex-husband. It sounds morbid I know, but I had to write everything down so everyone knew what would happen if I wasn’t there anymore and doctors had drummed it in to my head for years that there would be a high probability of death via surgery as I am overweight. Trust me when I say that stuff stays in your head. So once everything is done I try to go and get some sleep as it’s about 5 hours now before I must be at the hospital. Two hours, I got a whole two hours’ sleep. Ah well, it was more than I thought I would get.
My mum and dad are awake when my sister turns up to drive me to the hospital. I should point out here that when I am scared and nervous I am not a nice person, I tend to shout and snap a lot. You know the advert of the dog left in the street and they go to rescue it and it barks and bites because it’s scared? Well that’s what I am like. My sister is trying to talk to my parents but I have run upstairs to kiss my babies while they sleep. I come downstairs and grab my bags shout a goodbye at my parents and walk out the door. As I said I am not great with people when I am nervous or scared. Yes, I know my parents are probably very scared too but sadly I am having a selfish moment and just want to get out of the house.
Another side effect of my nerves is inappropriate humour. Sitting in the hospital with my sister I make some not so nice jokes about toe tags when they put an id band on my ankle and when they ask if I could pregnant I point out that unless sperm can fly through windows there is no chance. I go and speak with a very charming anaesthetist who tries to put me at ease as he tells me my blood pressure is higher than normal and I need to remain calm. He assures me that everything will be ok and I shouldn’t worry. It’s not long at all before I am whisked upstairs and have to say bye to my sister. 5 of us are shuffled in to a lift and taken to the 5th floor where we sit and wait to be called to theatre. I am the first to be called. By now my heart rate is so high and I am ready to run out the door and out the hospital. The anaesthetist I saw 10 minutes before walks in and starts to talk to me and ask me to get on the bed so they can get the arm things put up and basically strap me down to the bed before knocking me out. The heart monitor is going nuts and he asks if it’s ok for the other guy in the room, who by the way is pretty hot, he asks if that guy can put a mask over my face. I nod as I don’t want to talk, my heart is still racing and I am really scared. I have been in surgery once in my life and it was 20 years ago and I was not conscious for any of it. The anaesthetist must be taking pity on me as one puts his arms across my shoulders and holds the mask away from face slightly while the other one strokes my brow, he has very nice cold hands which is a bonus. He also tells me he will be there the whole time and won’t leave my side. I doze off in a drug induced haze to the sound of my anaesthetists telling me everything will be ok and to just relax.
I wake up. As promised the anaesthetist is right there as is a nurse. I am kept down in recovery for a few hours till a bed is open for me on the ward. I sleep through most of my time in recovery but each time I am woken to check my vitals I apologise to them and then thank them. Ok by 5pm I am up on the ward and there are the nicest people here on the ward with me. I am feeling uncomfortable and there is a tube hanging out of my stomach with a bottle attached to it weirdly. I have to be honest I can’t feel any pain right now which I am very grateful for. I am sure this all to do with the anaesthetic from the op. I am not complaining though this is the first time I have been pain free in a very long time. It’s not until 10pm that I realised Houston we have a problem, I need the toilet and I am not sure if I can stand up. Now maybe I am being weird but there is no way in hell I am using a bed pan. I would like to thank the nurses who sweetly helped me stand up and then helped walk me to a toilet. Can I just say that having a heavy bottle attached to your insides but still hanging outside your body is not good when you need to walk and holy damn no one tells you that all your core strength goes after hernia surgery. I have the strength of a new born child. Now I know why babies eat, pee and sleep only. That stuff is tiring.
The next morning my surgeon comes to see me on the ward. He is so pleased with me but then tells me how difficult my surgery was, they found an artery burst while they were taking the gall stones and gall bladder out. This had burst before the surgery and was probably the reason I was feeling unwell a day or two before the surgery. There was a 2.5 cm gall stone blocking the duct making the artery bleed out very slowly thankfully. The surgeon managed to get all this fixed before turning his attention to my umbilical hernia. Now they told me last year it was the size of a large grapefruit, then a baby’s head. By the time I had surgery it was the size of a new-born. That was not what my surgeon was expecting. He told me everything is ok but the incisions are larger than expected and it was a very tough surgery. I assumed at the time he meant tough for him – I was wrong it was tough for me too. He does tell me that as I have been able to get out of bed etc I can go home. I have never been so excited in my life to go home. After he leaves I maybe rushed it on the getting dressed front and my blood pressure plummets and the nurse quickly shoves me on the bed as I pass out. I wake up with hospital bed raised at the foot end and my head down near the floor. I ask a nurse to change the bed back to normal so I can sit in the chair for a bit. It’s not till 5pm that I can go home and my mum and daughter come up to the ward to walk me down and take my bags. Walking is tough, painful and tiring when you have no core muscles working. I have to stop every few minutes and it takes me a grand total of 25 mins to walk a 3-min journey to the car. I can’t wait to get home and get in to my own bed.

Part 2 Post Surgery

Ok I do not make a good patient at all which is probably why I am sitting here totally alone. So, I came home from hospital and well let me tell you something they don’t warn you how annoying post-surgery is. I can barely move without wanting to fall asleep from all the effort it takes. I know I had my stomach muscles cut etc but damn.
For a few days now I haven’t been able to sleep as nothing I can do makes it comfortable. I am not really in pain, I’m sore don’t get me wrong but I am ok. The incisions seem to be healing very well. I have 6 incisions in total, one of them is quite a hefty one too and that is from the hernia surgery. Ok so for one week I had folk around me helping or trying to help I should say. I am really cranky and best left when I am not feeling 100%. The best thing to do with me is to leave me in a room with my stuff and just bring coffee in every hour. I am bored, I can’t walk and I want to bite everyone’s head off.
6 days after surgery I have my check up from the neck up at the clinic. Yes, I get to have a psych evaluation. I am not sure if it’s to do with my next surgery or just to check I am ok or what, have I mentioned how clandestine tier 3 is? Seriously you never get told anything till you are in your appointment. Anyway, I am in my psych appointment, tired, worn out and can barely breath. It seriously took me a lot of effort to walk to the clinic from the car even though I was dropped off about 200 yards from the door. I am using crutches to prop myself up I still can’t stand up straight so therefore become overbalanced at the drop of a hat. I sit and chat with the lovely doctor who waited for me to get my lame hobbling arse in to her office and it turns out I am not mentally unstable – Yay me. She thinks my ex-husband leaving me with a toddler and an 8-week-old baby has a lot to do with how I have been over the decade and that he sold our house and all the other bad crap. She said there are two defining moments in my life that have, well for want of better words, they have knocked me on my arse. She agreed that I am trying my best to regroup and sort my life out now which is good. She wanted to know what I did for fun and where I went socially etc, I had to point out to her that I don’t go out, I go to class and I take care of my kids and I am at home with my family and that is it. So according to her I am a total billy no mates, which is kinda right. After everything went up in smoke a few years back I shut myself off from everyone, all my friends and most of my family. So, my task is to get out there and start being a little more sociable. We shall see what happens with that huh. I did book another treat of seeing Jonathan Pie again.
My parents go away for a break a week after I get out of hospital and I like having the house to myself, but I am getting bored very quickly and I really can’t do anything. My sister comes to visit me and tells me off for getting up and cooking and doing day to day stuff and I tell her it’s fine I need to get some strength back or I may end up hurting someone. After 3 days on my own I realise why they tell you to not do anything at all and just lie down and recover. I have split one of my incisions open, not all the way but enough to worry me. Lying on the sofa I cover it up and hope to hell it starts to clot and dry up. All the others seem to be healing but the big one wants to be a pain in the arse. Every time I get a phone call I tell whoever it is that everything is ok and I am healing nicely. I do get sick of being asked how I am all the time. I have one thing that is my saving grace and will relax and soothe me no matter what. I get to have a relaxing bath. Ok so I can’t have bubbles and so on in it but I get to relax in hot water and feel my muscle stop aching. It’s utter bliss. This is all I need in the world a hot bath and coffee brought to me on tap 😊.
My kids are not huge fans of my recovery and like all good teenagers do not really want to help out with things, it’s not till they see me struggling that they turn in to the most amazing humans I have ever known. My son turns in to my chief coffee making and runs to the shops to fetch whatever is needed and my daughter for the first time ever becomes the best at housework (seriously I have had problems getting her to pick up a cup) she is washing floors, washing clothes, tidying and sweeping. I am so pleased with my babies and how well they are helping.

Ok so I am now 3 and a half weeks post op and have another clinic appointment, this is just a weigh in and check-up. I see the doctor who put me forward for my gall bladder surgery, she can’t believe how different I am. I should point out that I am much happier as I am not as tired or sore now and can move around a lot more than before, although sitting in the car with a seatbelt does cause me pain. I have stayed the same weight she thinks but it’s best not to weigh me as I am still swollen from surgery. She lets me look at my full medical notes and OMG it’s scary reading them. I didn’t realise how bad everything was in my surgery until I read these notes. I would like to say a huge thank you to my surgeon for saving my life because after reading the full notes he did save it. It’s quite scary to find out that I actually was in so much danger whilst in surgery and to see exactly what happened because a hospital ignored me and refused to help me, I would have died if I had been left any longer than I already had been.
On a plus side though after leaving my appointment I am being put forward for what is called tier 4. This means I will be put in for a 3-hour appointment and attend lectures about what happens in the bypass surgery, how it will affect the rest of my life and what to expect with recovery etc. I can then go on the long-awaited milk diet and hopefully if all goes to plan I could be having my surgery by Christmas/new year time. Let’s see what happens huh. Til then I have to keep up with either maintaining or losing weight, they don’t want me to put any on which is great because I don’t want to put any on. So, I now have to carry on as I am until I hear more from them about my next appointment which should take about 3 months. My blog posts until then will probably be me whinging about some craving I will get lol. Take care all and mucho love xx

Blog 18

Ok so where are we right now? Well I am melting in the heat wishing global warming was a figment of my imagination, quite clearly, it’s not as the sun tries to melt my face off while I put the washing on the line. Domestic chores are not fun in the heat for anyone especially when you are fat. Honestly the chub rub on the thighs is enough to figure out how the cavemen discovered fire. I would love to say I am relaxing in this heat and soaking up the sun but the truth is I am festering and wishing I could get away with wearing shorts and a vest top without Greenpeace tracking me down to plonk me in to the ocean like some form of rescued whale.

On a lighter note, I did attend my MDT appointment. Yes, I know it sounds very official doesn’t it. Last month I told you how they said I would have to wait 3 months for that appointment. Turns out I only had to wait two weeks for the appointment to turn up and then a further two weeks till the actual appointment.  There is always a lot of excitement among those of us on tier 3 waiting to head towards surgery about MDT, there is always many saying how they have their appointment and then they go on to speak to the surgeon a month or so afterwards. So naturally I got mine and I was jumping for joy at receiving this strange and mystical MDT appointment.  It’s three hours long this appointment so it must be very involved and in-depth. I head in to my appointment all nervous because I don’t know what to expect other than there will be about 6-8 of us and we must see 3 specialists.  See, it sounds mysterious doesn’t it. I walk in and there are 8 of us in total. I grab a seat and wait for someone to indicate that everything is about to start. A lovely nurse comes in and tells us we will start in 5 mins.

Ok well that was three hours of things I had already researched. I get why they have the MDT and I now get why no one really talks about it. It’s not mysterious at all. We discussed the effects of surgery, this is something I have discussed at length with the surgeon and with the nurses for the last 8 months. We then speak with a psychologist about the fact we will be left with horrid skin, our hair will thin and fall out. Once again these are all things I had fully researched and knew about. There is a dietician there I know and she is taking notes. I am fearful that if we don’t ask questions they will think we are not showing effort. I know everything they are talking about as I am one of those people who must research thoroughly before I make decision on anything (boring I know but that’s me). I quickly ask a question about drinking before and after food to make it seem like I need to find something, hell anything out then go back to just listening.  The 3 hours is up and I haven’t learned anything new other than it will be about end of Sept when I get to see the surgeon and then around mid-Feb at the latest when I get to have surgery. So, the whole journey will have taken around 18 months on the 6-month pathway. Which to be fair after finding out that my hospital is the only one that performs this via NHS service for the whole of the East of England is a very quick journey in my opinion. Granted if I had paid privately it would have been one third of that time but still how marvellous that they can perform so quickly for such a large area.

Now for the time being I must stick to my new eating habits and carry on trying to lose some weight whilst I wait to see the surgeon. I know I make light of this journey and say some flippant things but I chatted with another patient this week about their journey and how it was going. They have received an awful amount of criticism from friends and family about their choice to have surgery. I know that we are judged by everyone for having surgery, but I would like to speak in his defence and well in all our defences for having surgery. Nearly everyone I have spoken to along my journey has been through some major upheaval in their life that has resulted in devastating consequences to them. Now I know we all go through shit in our lives, trust I have been through the mill a few times. But everyone has a way of coping some choose healthy things but there are others who choose a more self-destructive road. Whether they chose drink, drugs or food it was their way of coping with some form of horror in their life. In our society, we have a massive soft spot for the loveable rouge who fell prey to alcohol or drug abuse and we take them in and help them telling them how brave they are etc. We see fat people however and the first thought is OMG they must be lazy; don’t they like themselves? This is so the wrong attitude to have and then when they go seek help they are belittled for it. Even the people who profess to love them question them and accuse them of taking the easy way out. I would urge anyone who thinks this is an easy route to actually research what happens to yourself after surgery hell even the hoops to jump through just to get as far as I have. The journey is long and it’s brutal, it’s painful and humiliating. Anyone having this surgery will never lead the normal life they thought they were going to, they will forever be checking levels of this and that to make sure they have eaten protein to function that day. They will cut all their hair short because the patches of hair coming out after surgery make them look almost bald. It takes about a year for your hair to get back to a decent state. They will spend over £60 every three months on vitamins and minerals as their body no longer absorbs them. If they don’t eat correctly they will suffer something called dumping syndrome which means they gets the chills, nausea, the shakes, headaches, sweating, breathlessness to name but a few symptoms and all because something they ate had a fraction too much sugar or fat in it. Trust me when I say they are not having this surgery to take the easy way out. They are having this surgery because something went seriously wrong in their life and they can’t recover on their own from it.
Ok now if you will excuse me I have a date with a chair in the garden and the kids paddling pool. Enjoy the sunshine everyone and don’t forget the sun cream and stay hydrated.

Blog 19

I have my appointment through to see my surgeon. I have appointments all day on the 27th Oct. I must have an ECG thingy in the morning, I then have to see the anaesthetist and then the surgeon in the afternoon. Rumour has it I should get my surgery date at that appointment. I really hope I do get my date so I can schedule stuff. I don’t want to miss out on anymore university, especially as it’s my final year and I need to get a good grade.  I have a hope that it will be scheduled while I am on Christmas break but the reality is it will probably be during my final semester which is annoying but it will be my final hoop to jump through.
Ok so they say things come in three’s well this last week or so has been a total disaster on that front. I can’t get a new car till I sell mine and everyone seems to be terrified to drive a 1.8, seriously it’s not that powerful. I need to get an automatic because apparently my legs do not like driving and my ankles lock on me which is not great for clutch control on a busy road doctors have said it’s best I drive an automatic. So, I am not driving right now which totally sucks in the summer. I wish I could afford to go get a car and pay it monthly but they won’t give us students that kind of finance. It is very frustrating having to wait to sell my car before I can buy another car. Then as if that wasn’t bad enough my laptop dies. Yep my laptop bit the biscuit, yet another expense I cannot afford and to top it all off my son breaks his phone. Seriously summer is starting to suck on a grand scale. It would seem I have the summer blues and am not sure how to get myself out of it.
I have found myself eating things I shouldn’t be eating and I am scared I am putting on weight. I talk to others on the forum for my hospital group but for some reason it doesn’t seem to be sinking in. Am I self-sabotaging? I have come so far and I know I shouldn’t let these small things get to me hell I have lived without a car for many years so a bit longer won’t hurt, right? The laptop I am sure I can always get one on higher purchase and pay well over the odds for it. It just annoys me that I have to do it this way. I would normally go out for a beer to chill out or have a cigarette in the garden and relax. But I gave all that up for surgery. I feel whiney and annoying which is making me not like myself very much right now. Urgh when will this funk end? I just don’t like feeling like this and this is the first time in a while I have had to deal with this kind of funk and I am not coping as well as I thought I would. But I am not smoking or drinking so that’s good.
I have had to deal with my ex-husband acting like an idiot with my kids, seriously I know he has a whole new family but he doesn’t have to make his first two children feel so out of place when they are with him. It’s just wrong. But I can’t shout at him because he will no doubt take it out on the kids and make them feel bad. So, I just try and soothe my kids and tell them daddy doesn’t mean it he is simply put, just an idiot sometimes. I want to say all the time but I don’t. With all the let downs over the last month or so I have lowered my expectations on things which I really shouldn’t do but I have.
On a plus side though I got my timetable for my final year and if it doesn’t change before the end of September then it’s gonna be awesome. I finally get to study politics in the media. Anyone who knows me knows I am very political so I have this to look forward to. Well I am gonna go downstairs and start the ritual of throwing out all the nice foods that will help me self-sabotage. I really need to get my focus back.

Blog 20

Goodness me where has the time gone? Well life has been busy, busy, busy. I am back at university for my final year and I am so happy to be back there. I have text books everywhere and the chaos is on a grand scale but it’s just so much fun.

I feel a bit out of practice with this, so if I ramble please forgive me. So what else have I been up to? Hmmm well, I had a minor freak out when the hospital cancelled my appointments in October and switched them to January. Yes, I know that is a mental thing to have to sit through. I phoned them and explained they hadn’t actually seen me since July and if I wait till January then who knows what might have happened by then. They agreed it was too long and changed it to November instead of January. I still have to go have the ECG thingy in October but the surgeon and anaesthetist appointment will now be November. I am dreading it as I know I have put on weight and I am scared they will turn me down. I am trying very hard to lose again, but now I can eat normal food again it’s having a huge impact on me so I am trying to get my mind in the game properly and focus on my goal. I can’t fail at this, I just can’t.

Oh, I started selling make up. I thought I would give it a go and turns out I can actually make some cash from it. I earnt enough last month to buy tickets for Harry Potter World. We go at Christmas, I’m so excited about that as I really want to go so much and can’t wait to take the kids and my sister too. I have noticed my confidence is starting to pick up since I started selling make up. I am taking selfie’s which is something I would NEVER do before. I don’t know if you have actually looked at the photo I used for the Big Matters website but I look like cousin IT. If I could have made my fringe longer I would have just so I could hide behind it. Now I don’t do that anymore, I take pictures of me with my full face on display and even without make up. Sounds silly but it’s quite a big step for me to do that. I have never liked the way I looked and right now I am liking myself more and more each day.

With my personal growth happening quite quickly now I have noticed many things about those around me. I have noticed who is supportive in my life and in my choices and who isn’t. I find it wonderful that so many support all the decisions I make and they stand by my stand but I find myself disappointed by quite a few who I thought would support me but decided instead to tell me I was taking an easy route out of my situation. I am going to start doing a little video each week throughout the rest of my journey as well as this blog because I think sometimes people need to see just how hard and humiliating it to be fat shamed by those around you and see that in fact weight loss surgery is no easy fix, in fact if anyone watched Mama June on TLC they would have seen exactly how agonizing it is. The pain you go through after the surgery is immense and should be taken lightly, there is a reason this is not offered unless absolutely necessary, this can KILL you. If you had asked me 6 months ago I would have happily shuffled of this mortal coil with everything I had gone through medically. So anyone thinking that people who receive weight loss surgery or even weight loss therapy are taking the easy route then please feel free to walk a mile in their shoes before you join the very long queue of people who have already made them feel worthless and like they don’t belong.

As always much love and respect to you all and I will be back with news of the ECG thingy. I really do hate them the sticky things are so annoying and for some reason I always forget to take one off and then find it that evening as it tries to rip a layer of skin off because it has been on so long.

Blog 21

Did you miss me??? It’s been so long since I last wrote about my journey.

So, I had my ECG and they did a scan thingy and other technical stuff. It was cool though I got to see my heart pumping and listen to it. The doc said I had a beautiful strong heart, which is always nice to hear even if he meant it in the literal sense. I sat down with my surgeon who is happy to go ahead with the surgery but wants me to try and lose as much weight as I can before they call me back in. The wait time is quite a while and they said that my surgery will be around 23rd March. But now with the all surgeries being cancelled by hospitals I would presume it will be in the summer maybe.

Well the last couple months of the year were hectic I had assignments for university coming out of my ears it was complete madness. But that all got put on hold after my mum suffered a heart attack just before Christmas. It was very shocking, and I am not afraid to say I was scared and felt like a 5-year-old child again. The idea that I could lose my mum was horrifying. Thankfully my mum has made a wonderful recovery and is at home with us now where we can look after her. I have to say the staff of the cardiac wing were utterly amazing, she had the honour of two lots of paramedics attending to her when it happened, and they were also amazing. I am so grateful to them all and not sure how I will ever find a way to show them how much their skill and help meant to all of us.

Oooh I went to Harry Potter World at Warner Bros Studio. I drove me and the kids there which was fun and the first time I have driven them somewhere that far from home. My sister met us there for the tour. All I can say is, if you have never been then you really need to go there. It was utterly amazing. The tour is three hours long and you get to see everything. I was behaving like a kid in a sweetshop. I even gasped out loud and grabbed my sister arm shaking her at the start of the tour because I was so excited at the first reveal they did. I also took like 500 photos, which isn’t even me exaggerating the number, hell ask my sister she will tell you I was snap happy. I didn’t ride a broomstick as I didn’t feel confident getting up on it in front of everyone, I guess my confidence levels still have a way to go.

But once I have lost A LOT more weight I promise I will get up on that broomstick and get my picture taken on it. I have never put a photo on this blog other than the headshot on the website but thought I would share one picture from Harry Potter with you all. You will also get to see me and the work I have ahead. Please be kind as I am trying hard to lose weight and encouragement is a key factor when you have let things get as out of hand as I have. I am proud that I have lost a lot since starting this blog, but I still have quite a way to go. But I have to show you Hogwarts in the Snow. As you can see I still have a very long way to go to getting anywhere near looking like my darling twin sister who is stood beside me in the picture. But I will get there.

Happy New Year everyone mucho love xx

Blog 22

So, it’s been a pretty quiet month so far. I have been focusing on getting my final semester sorted at university. I can’t believe my degree is almost done, it’s gone so fast. I have been trying my best to keep on track with my eating habits and really make sure I don’t snack out of anything that could cause me to gain weight. I think trying to maintain a weight is a lot harder to be honest.
Got home from university tonight after a very long and tiring day to see I had mail.

I look down at the pile thinking urgh more bills when I see a white envelope and my dad tells me the hospital have sent me a letter. Is it bad to say that I was not sure if I was excited or terrified? I sat down to open the letter and nearly screamed out loud. I have my date; my surgery date has finally been sent to me. I really can’t believe this is happening that I now have an actual date and I will be able to start the next part of my journey. I may actually be in a dress for my graduation next September. Damn! I know I will have to do the Liver Reducing Diet a couple of weeks before my surgery as the surgeon explained to me when I saw him in November.

That is gonna be about 4 pints of milk a day oh the fun. Not sure that blog will be a barrel of laugh hehe. I told the ladies and gents in the surgery support group and they have a little saying once you get your date ‘they are keeping your seat warm on the loser’s bench’, It’s really the only time it’s acceptable to be called a loser really. Oh, I didn’t say when the surgery was did I? Well I go for my surgery on 27th February. Literally 4 weeks away.

I have so much to do to prepare for it. I have already asked my sister to take me in on the day and hold my hand because I am a complete child and will need her there as surgery scares the bejesus outta me. I don’t think it would be so bad if you didn’t have to walk down to the theatre and then hop up on the bed while they set everything up around you. That’s a scary thing to witness. But it doesn’t matter cause I got my date. In 4 weeks’ time I will be starting something new. I can’t wait.

Mucho love to you all.

Blog 23

Pre – op
So where did we leave off last time? It feels like such a long time since I wrote to you all, but I know it’s only been a month. Well, I had to start my pre-op diet, was it fun I hear you ask? In a nutshell… No. The delightful nurse put me on a diet of 5 pints of semi skimmed milk, 1 salty drink (oxo, Bovril) and 1 sugar free jelly per day. So, no food at all apart from those three items. Easy huh? Well the first few days were fine as I had nice lattes every day. I did try adding sugar free Crusha to the milk but let’s be honest the stuff is disgusting. I stuck to drinking lattes feeling pretty confident that I have this, and it will be so much easier than everyone says.

Fast forward to the end of the first week of my Liver Reducing Diet (this diet is not to lose weight but to shrink my liver for surgery) and I think I am ready to kill anyone who crosses me. I have no energy my skin feels awful; my breath could kill a dog and I still have to cook dinner for everyone but can’t eat any of it myself and I’m a really good cook so this sucks. Yes, I am feeling very sorry for myself right now. I have two more weeks of drinking all this and I feel like my insides are drowning. I pretty much had a break down after the 2nd week when I cooked my favourite dinner for everyone which is beef stew and dumplings with roast spuds and fresh veg. 6 hours of cooking and I dish it up and hear everyone thoroughly enjoying it and practically licking their plates clean. I am sitting having my millionth latte while they chew the juicy stew and enjoy the soft fluffy dumplings and crispy roast spuds. My stomach is growling, and my taste buds are screaming for food. Everyone has finished eating and brings their plates to the kitchen and tries to tell me how wonderful the food was, and I lose it… BIGTIME. I slam my cup down and start shouting about not cooking again and how it’s completely unfair that I have to cook given that I am not allowed to eat anything and its pure torture. My whole family is staring with stunned faces right at me and I actually stomp off like a 4-year-old being told no and go to the dining room for a big cry. Yes, I know I should know better as I am a fully-fledged adult, but I am tired of drinking milk, I miss food so much and I am so hungry. After an hour I do calm down from my tantrum and go and apologies to everyone but my God I really want food, anything I don’t care just something I can bloody chew.

Let’s skip forward to heading to the hospital after three weeks of nothing but milk everyday and I am off to have my surgery. I am terrified they will cancel it as lots of women have had it cancelled at the minute. Oh, I missed out something that happened the night before surgery. Ok so the night before surgery you have meds you have to take, two pills and an injection. This injection you have to do yourself. I thought great that won’t be a problem I can do this. No, I can’t, and I freak out at the thought of sticking the quite frankly huge needle into my stomach. Like a child I had to get my mum to do it. That was not fun.

So anyway, I am off to the hospital and my sister is driving me. I’m not as nervous as I was last year when I had hernia surgery. I haven’t written any letters to my family this time round I woke the kids up to say bye to them and that I would see them the next day. Me and my sister get to the hospital and I go through the motions of signing in and getting all my checks done etc before my sister walks me round to the room to get changed into a very fetching gown. I sit there dressed to the nines with my sister thinking we have a while to chat and they call my name and tell my sister to go as it is time for me to go up and get ready in theatre.

I go upstairs after having said bye to my sister and my surgeon is waiting for me as he wants to talk to me first. We sit and he says he may have to switch the surgery from a bypass to a sleeve if there are lots of adhesions after my last surgery. I sign that I agree for him to do whichever is best and then I am taken to theatre and it all goes dark after that.

Post - op

I wake up in recovery for all of about two mins before I am out cold again and wake up on the ward. It’s dark why is it dark? I went in for surgery in the morning how can it be dark already? Oh my I need the loo where is the nurse. I can feel tubes and all sorts sticking out of me and I need help. The nurse comes and tries to help me get up but holy s**t it hurts. I try so hard to stand but pain shoots through my entire body and then I feel like I am not sure if I want to throw up or pass out. So, standing up is out of the question today. I ask what time it is and they tell me it’s 10pm. Wow I have slept the day away. I went down for surgery at 8:30am and they said the surgery would only be 90 mins and then I would be on the ward by the afternoon. The nurses shoot me with an injection and that’s me out for the night.

I am woken by my surgeon in the morning and he explains to me what has happened. Turns out the surgery was not as simple as they thought it would be. I ended up having three major surgeries instead of one. My surgeon explains that firstly I won’t be going home for at least another day, which annoys me as I don’t like hospitals, secondly when they went to do the bypass they discovered my stomach was not where it should be. Yep that’s right nothing is ever simple huh? Turns out my stomach is actually in my chest after 12 years of my insides being squashed by a huge umbilical hernia my stomach decided to try and permanently stay in my chest after my last surgery. This of course had to be brought down once they had cut away my stomach and fashioned the new one. They also found that the hernia that was repaired last year was coming back so also fixed that and once they moved my stomach out of my chest they found a huge hiatus hernia. This was also repaired.

My surgeon was completely stunned by the amount of work that had to be done and instead of the easy 90-minute surgery he was expecting he performed 6 hours of surgery on me. What is the first thing I say to him? I tell him I am sorry for being such a pain. That made him laugh out loud. He checks over my wounds and there appears to be two drains as well as two drips he promises me they will come out tomorrow. Thank God for morphine that’s all I can say, everything is starting to hurt, and they give me another drip which takes all the pain away.

Finally, after a couple of days they allow me to go home under the strict instructions not to walk to much, not to lift anything bigger than a mug and to only drink liquids for the next three weeks. My surgeon checks me over one more time before I am allowed home and tells me that he wants to see me the following in clinic. I can’t wait to go home.

Well it took two hours to get home as it was the night of all the snow fall that I was discharged. It was a tense, panic filled journey as the roads were awful, I was in pain and couldn’t wear a seatbelt. I will shorten this bit up so you all don’t fall asleep. My first week at home sees me sleeping upright in a chair cause my bed is way too soft for me to sleep with this many wounds on my torso. I have no energy and I feel like I got into a fight with three trucks and lost. All I can have to eat is liquids and I can only manage about 6 tablespoons of soup a day, yes that’s right per day not per meal.

This is gonna be so tough. I think back now at the many people who said I was taking a coward’s way out and cheating by doing this. Having major surgery is not easy, it’s not a quick fix. I have my pills beside me to prove this. Every day I will have to take pills to make sure I can absorb vitamins and minerals. Did I mention the two weeks of sticking needles in myself? This is without a doubt the toughest thing I have done. I noted down in my diary the day I will be allowed to eat and actually chew food, yep I get I am a weirdo but I move to puree in just over a weeks’ time.

The 8th May will be the earliest I will be allowed to try eating normal food just baby sized portions.  I still have appointments for my first official weigh in at the hospital on the 12th April which is scary for me.

I really want to thank everyone who helped me and thank you for the flowers and cards. It means an awful lot and thanks to those who messaged as well. You all amaze me and I am so lucky to have you all as friends. Mucho love to you all. I will be back with my first weigh in details in a few weeks.

Blog 24
Nope, nope I don’t like this at all. I’m trying to eat puree, and do you know what the puree just isn’t loving me at all. Every time I try to eat I am running to the toilet and throwing it up again. I am not loving this stage at all. I wish I was back on just liquids it was easier. My wounds are healing nicely but I have a weird sensation when I bend over like something pushing against the inside of breastbone. I have an appointment with the surgeon so will ask him when I see him and dietician at the hospital. I am driving now, only small journeys as I get tired so quickly right now but at least I can drive. I still can’t lift anything too heavy till I am 12 weeks post op and right now I am just barely 6 weeks post op. My family have been utterly amazing, and my kids can’t do enough to help. I am genuinely feeling the love from my family right now.

I am a mother and have been for nearly 17 years, it’s only now that I realise just why babies and toddlers cry, complain and whinge A LOT. They can’t move and do what they want and well food is just the weirdest thing on the planet to them. This affectively means that with the way I am right now post-surgery I am roughly about 6 months old. Next time someone says I’m behaving like a baby I can say yep, and I really know how they feel lol. I am having days where I think this just isn’t worth it even if it saves my life. Did I mention my hair is falling out and I am starting to look like Rab C Nesbitt in his hayday? Because I am you know. I have discussed doing a G.I. Jane and shaving my head which my daughter says I should do but my sister says no.

So now it’s time to go see the surgeon and see how I have gotten on. I have no idea why I am nervous waiting to see the surgeon. I know I have lost weight as I am soon to get done for indecent exposure as my jeans are so loose now. It’s not even 5 minutes before I am called in to his office, the nurse asks me to get on the scales and do you know what I have only gone and lost 2 stone 4lbs in 6 weeks. My surgeon is beaming a huge smile at me and asks me to sit down. I am still in shock with my weight loss, but he keeps smiling at me and asks how I am. I explain about all the sickness which he then asks me a ton of questions about. After pressing my stomach so hard I think his hand with suddenly emerge from my back he states that he needs to fully explain what actually happen in full detail during surgery as the notes just give a brief glimpse. He says that I am not healed enough to start puree it would seem, so I should go straight back to drinking liquids. Great I now have another 6 weeks of liquids which takes a lot of pressure off me for a while which I am totally fine with right now. It is better than chucking up each time I try anything resembling baby food texture (see 6-month-old baby, told ya). Now it’s time to hear some news about what actually happened in the surgery. So, with great glee my surgeon explains it was very complicated and he had to call 3 other surgeons to help out otherwise it would have taken easily over 12 hours to perform all that needed to be done. I apologise to him for which he says no it was great we never get to do this kind of work.

Ok let me breakdown what he said to me;
So, it was 3 surgeries as he mentioned before he then goes on to tell me that I have a wall that was constructed to protect my heart from the plastic tube that is now part of my oesophagus, my hernias had hernias of their own, how’s that for weird huh? My stomach was imbedded in my oesophagus and also in my hernia which had to be pulled down before being cut open. So far from what he has said there was tons being done to me. No wonder I felt like I had had a fight with a lot of lorries. He seemed quite shocked to see me coping as well as I was. He went on to confirm I would lose a lot more hair due to the stress my body underwent throughout the surgeries. Then he asked me a question I never thought I would ever hear. ‘Would I like to see photos from the surgery?’ Hmm let me think about that for a moment… erm yes please. Seriously when will I ever get the chance to see this sort of stuff again? 8 pages!!!! Yes 8 pages of pictures of my insides. I have to say my insides are a very pretty colour. My surgeon was like a giddy schoolboy showing me all the gory details and pictures. He showed me all 180 staples he put in my abdomen and I saw the picture of my stomach being pulled down to where it should be. Genuinely it was fascinating. Then he drops the clanger I have to have another surgery in 18 months’ time. I can’t believe it another surgery. Apparently once I have lost the weight I need to lose then my umbilical hernia will come back. To be honest this surgery has knocked me right on to my butt and it’s taking much longer to recover than I thought it would and the prospect of one more surgery is not good. Can I handle another one? He also informs me that I haven’t seen the last of him till then either. I have to see him every 6 months till my next surgery and must come clinic every 2 months too as they want to keep a very close eye on me. So, looks like I still have a very long way to go.

I have to attach a picture though to show you the difference to my face. I was in shock when I took the picture for my job it’s a pic of me 2 months before surgery and then 6 weeks post op.  Apologies for the fact that I am not smiling in it I wasn’t feeling too great when I took it. Adding another cheeky little pic taken two days before surgery when I got to meet my idol Dawn French who asked me if people mentioned how much I looked like her. Now that is a huge compliment because she is awesome.

Blog 25

Damn it’s been crazy here. Who is loving this sunshine we are having but secretly inside screaming that we are melting and will never make through the summer (internally holding my hand up)? Am I coping better with the summer this year? Frankly, no. No, I am not. I am actually melting as I type this with a fan blasting me in the face like I am steering a spaceship into warp speed.

I have had all my hair cut off and still my head is melting lol. Yes, that’s right I cut all my hair off. I had been toying with the idea for a while as I have lost a lot of hair since surgery. I started feeling like Rab C Nesbitt. The side effects of surgery really should be highlighted more. I think it’s funny cause I still get people telling me that I took the easy way out and have cheated by going through all these surgeries. Then I have to point out to them that I haven’t just had weight loss surgery that is just one of the 5 surgeries I had in 10 months. I don’t understand why people insist major surgery is an easy thing. I have the scars to prove it isn’t.

I want to talk about getting my haircut though as this was a huge thing for me. I know it sounds silly but going to posh salons is very uncomfortable for me. I have always wanted to be the person that is completely comfortable with them but to be honest I just feel like the ugly sister in the corner and like the before picture in living embodiment. I felt very brave booking my hair appointment at Greys in Hitchin which has to be said is very posh and very trendy. I was lucky that they needed models with long hair so got the hair cut for free (bonus or what). I walked in there and they were having a staff meeting. For me that’s an awkward moment as everyone is staring at me and I don’t like that. They quickly get me seated and I am introduced to the girl who will do my hair. O.K. that’s it I am officially old, the girl doing my hair looks 12 years old (seriously I think I have shoes older than this girl) and I want to shrink into my seat and let the world swallow me up. In my head I am literally thinking damn she is gonna laugh at me or be totally disgusted by hair and me. Why am I so worried about what someone thinks about me? She asks me what I would like done and I explain about all my surgeries and how it is making my hair fall out at the moment. She then puts her hand on my shoulder and tells me not to worry she will sort it out for me and I won’t have to worry. She asks all about my surgeries and she tells me how hard it must have been and that they will help me with a style that will make the loss show less. Everyone there made me feel so at ease. I left there wondering why I was so afraid about going to somewhere trendy. I know that as women we all find it hard to sit in front of those mirrors and trust someone who is basically coiffed to within an inch of their lives. Like people have judged me on how I look and my size I had been doing this myself with all the trendy places and the people who work in them. I was wrong. Yeah to all who know me well I said it, I was wrong. These trendy places are not scary and we all belong in them.

Ok so what else have I been up to? Well, I have been fighting to make sure I get back in to university to do my last semester and I have the best lecturer who helped me no end. She has fought my corner from day one with all that has been going on with all the surgeries and she has helped me get back to uni to finish a semester, so I can graduate. I will actually get my degree after I finish in January.

I have suffered with what I like to call my funny turns for a few months now. I tend to pass out. I woke up on the carpark floor a few weeks ago. Granted a very nice chap was stood there trying to help me and I wish my inner monologue didn’t shoot out of my mouth at any given moment, but it does. He stood there as I looked around and tried to stand and then he said, “I’m afraid you fainted”. My reply was not ‘thank you or oh dear’. Nope it was ‘no s**t Sherlock’ Then it was followed by a lot of apologising on my part. Thankfully he laughed after I assume thinking I was merely simple in the head. But it tends to happen quite a lot. Not the blurting things out loud, I mean I pass out a lot so am back and forth to hospital a lot more than most. I have to check in with them every month right now. By the way I am 5 stones down now. I have no clothes that fit me but this time it’s because they are too big which is a first for me.
Oh in between all this I am taking up new hobbies, I have learnt to sew. I love it and I can actually do it. Who knew but I have learnt to make pj’s, cardigans, cushion covers, peg bags and bunting. Sounds silly but I am loving learning to use a sewing machine and I got to help my son raise money for his detachment by sewing lots of cushions for them to sell. Deary me I have prattled on a bit. I will leave you all to enjoy your sunshine or hide in the shade if you like.

Mucho love to you all xx

Post 26

Eek!!!!!

I’m sorry, I have been away for months. I would love to say that it was because I was leading some fabulous life but to be honest that is far from close to what it’s been like since we last spoke 6 months ago. How has life been since surgery, AWFUL. Now don’t get me wrong life has not been horrific but mentally I have not been on my best game

.
I sunk back into my old habit of when life is getting a bit hard, HIDE. I wasn’t feeling good and I was feeling rundown so instead of trying to build myself up and find a positive I hid and let it all get on top of me. What has this done to my weight loss I hear you ask? Stalled it completely. I have stopped losing all because I am a numpty and let life bog me down. The worse part is I was doing so well. I went on holiday and got to go on all the rides I hadn’t gone on for years. It was amazing, my kids got so much joy out of me taking part in our holiday fun. Heck, my son who never goes on rides said it was amazing to watch me on one ride as everyone around screamed all he could hear was my laughter over the girly screams. Then real-life sinks in and I let stress work its way into my life again.

I worried about whether the university were going to let me come back and finish my degree and whether I would be able to cope with the work load. I let problems and worries about my family and friends seep through till I had once again lost myself. I am not afraid to admit it I was a bit depressed. Then I got a letter from the hospital telling me I had missed an appointment. I had let myself get so down that I had forgotten to go for my check-up. This is the one thing you don’t get warned about after you have major surgery, you will go into a depression afterwards at some point. Whether it’s straight away or months after it will happen. How can it not? I mean come on you have just had lifesaving surgery it’s going to affect you. So, what am I doing about this depression and downward spiral I went on? I am jumping back on my wagon and getting on with sorting myself out.

I joined a gym. Hah yeah, I know me in a gym who would have thought it. In all fairness I did make my sister go with me to hold my hand. I wish I could say I was brave enough to have gone and signed up by myself, but I wasn’t and thankfully my sister offered to hold my hand through the whole process. I must admit that the gym is lush and so clean. Ooh did I mention it is open 24 hours a day? Cause it is you know! The girl who showed me round was so sweet and was ok with the fact that gym’s scare the living daylights outta me. She is setting me up with a gentle programme to get me use to everything which is perfect for me. Yep I already asked them when the quietest time was to train and as I don’t really sleep a lot, I might end up going at stupid o’clock in the morning. So glad it’s open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week as the idea of working out in front of others actually makes me want to heave even though not one person gave a monkey’s that a fat woman had walked into the gym. So, I have my induction on Thursday and my sister is coming to workout with me on the Friday as she can come along and train there for free on Friday with me (how cool is that!!!). I will let you know how it goes. I was doing Zumba for a bit but found out that I looked like an elephant trying to hopscotch after dropping acid. It wasn’t a pleasant sight so best to forget that little jaunt. I can plug in my headphones and get stuck into a routine at the gym instead.

Ok, I am back now, and I promise not to spiral like that again. Thank you to everyone who messaged or emailed about the blog and why I hadn’t written for so long. All will be back to normal and my monthly rant is back with a flourish.

Mucho love to you all.

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