T-minus 29 Days and Counting...

On Monday, November 4, I will have gastric bypass surgery.  I'm really not all that big, when you compare me to the majority of people who have this surgery, but I'm having it anyway.

This is a process that started way back in April of this year.  One of my dearest friends, Tiffany, and I work with a woman who had the surgery back in August, 2012, and we were so amazed with the difference that it made in her life, that we started looking into it.  For Tiff, it was much more of a serious matter than it was for me.  She is larger and I barely - and I mean, BARELY - made it into the BMI range for being eligible for the surgery.  We went to a seminar put on by Denver Bariatric Surgery and it was amazing.  And our insurance covers it!  How cool is that? 

Anyway, like I was saying, for Tiff, it's more a big deal that it is for me.  Yeah, I know that I weigh about 65 pounds more than I did when Kenin and I got married, but I also know that he loves me no matter what.  As a matter of fact, his prime concern with me having the surgery is that I will get too skinny and he DOES NOT like skinny women.  (Do I have the best husband in the world, or what?)  I guess you could say that I "followed" Tiff into all of this.  I've been heavier than I would like for the majority of my life.  I was made fun of by my brothers for many years as I grew up, and it helped to shape the way that I looked at myself, and that caused a lot of issues for me.  I certainly don't blame them; we were all in bad places at that point in our lives.  But I felt like I wasn't good enough and all I wanted was to feel loved.  I did lots of inappropriate things to get that "love" that I wanted, and as I said, that caused some issues.  Eventually, I grew a backbone and some self esteem, and at that point, I didn't really care what anyone thought of me, because I was (and still am) happy with the me on the inside.  Unfortunately, I'm not as happy with the me on the outside.

Food has always been a big part of my life.  My favorite memories are of me as a small child, and the family gathered around a table, chowing down on a holiday, or just visiting each other.  A lot of my memories of my biological mother involve food - her cooking our favorite things, her dieting and weighing her food on one of those tiny scales.  And I've always had a sweet tooth.  If it had sugar in it, I made a beeline to it.  I can still remember the bake sale that we had at school when I was 6 or 7 years old... there was the most incredible, ooey, gooey, marshallowy Rice Krispy treats that I think I've ever (even to this day) put in my mouth.  So, yeah, I started out young.

To be continued...