I was larger than average throughout childhood, but that was mostly because I was a head taller than my classmates until I entered high school. Even at a weight appropriate for my height, I had difficulty accepting my body as it was because my peers were all still petite. When I started high school, I was 5'8" tall, muscular, and wore a size 14.
I had been ill off and on through childhood, but not to a degree which appreciably affected my weight. During my sophomore year of high school, I became very ill with severe asthma. It escalated to the point that I was in the hospital every several weeks for I.V. steroids and I took a steroid cocktail at home. I started home schooling because my immune system was so repressed that I couldn't be exposed to the usual variety of school germs. I stayed in bed most of the time and was so bored that I actively looked forward to the work my tutor gave me. Between the steroids and inactivity, over three years, I gained over 80lbs.
I was fortunate that the asthma problems were mostly resolved (it's amazing what treating severe obstructive sleep apnea can do) in time for me to return to and graduate from high school, and to go away to college. During the year that I was away from home, I was just about the only freshman to not gain 15lbs; I'd sworn off meat and was barely eating. I'd become desperate to lose the extra weight.
I entered the working world and found my sedentary lifestyle and return to my parents' house was a great combination for gaining additional weight. I was living completely on my own by the age of 20 and, for several months, I seemed to be on the right track. I ate minimally (and, I might add, unhealthfully) and did weight and cardio training at the health club six days/week (also unhealthy as it didn't allow my muscles to recover). I was in my best physical condition ever, but my weight did not come down. Later that year, I had surgery and then a rotator cuff injury, which put me back on the sidelines. As my body lost what conditioning it had, a severe case of viral bronchitis brought asthma back to the forefront. I've never been the same.
Four years later, after 10 years of Fen-Phen, Phentermine, Meridia, Weight Watchers, Slim Fast, nutritionists, and good, old-fashioned starvation, I found myself at my highest weight ever. I managed to lose about 35lbs before my wedding in 2001, and maintained half of that loss until March 2003. On August 25, 2003, the day of my laparoscopic gastric bypass procedure, I weighed in at an all-time high of 329lbs. |
