The Meeting

 So I went to the bariatric meeting tonight.  Dee came with me for support.  Bless her heart, she was one of only like, 5 skinny people in the room.  They didn't really tell me anything I didn't already know as far as procedure was concerned.  The woman doing the lecture was really supportive.  She didn't place blame and talked about how obesity is a disease, yadda yadda.  It made me feel a little better, although I'm glad I took a xanax before I went.  They were showing BMI charts and body type charts, and seeing how bad my weight situation is made me want to bawl.

It got me thinking about my weight throughout my life.  Elementary school, I was overweight, middle school, it got worse.  I was always teased.  I beat a few people up and that made things a bit better, lol.  Kids were afraid to make fun of me.  High school, I was still fat.  I was 180 I think.  My sophomore year I quit eating for 3 months and got myself down to a "normal" weight.  I was around 130.  My junior year I gained it all back.  I got back up to 175.  I had started psych meds at that point and my weight really started to go up.  By my senior year I was 238.  Before I started my freshman year of college, Mom took me to the endocrinologist in Kansas City, MO, the same one I still see.  We found my thyroid was fucking broken, so I started meds for that, and switched from Lithium to Topomax for my psych meds.  Weight started to come off and I started walking every night.  By my sophomore year I was back down to 190.  I held steady there until my first job after college.  I had taken an interest in swimming and would go every morning before work.  Without really doing anything besides that, I dropped to 180 again.  I stayed at that weight for a few months, then moved to PA and got up to 203.  I drifted around that weight until I came home in August 2006.  I was living with Tron and started working at Curves.  I didn't have anything to do at work besides.... duh, workout, so I dropped back down to 190.  I stayed at that weight for a little over a couple of years.  I had been at Iowa Telecom for 2 years when my buddy Charity and I signed up for water aerobics at the YMCA.  Amazingly enough, I started losing weight again.  I got back down to, surprise, 175.  I felt really good at that weight.  I felt sexy and strong, and I thought I looked good in my clothes.  I was wearing a size 16, but it was a sexy 16.  Not long after, I had my laparoscopy and was officially diagnosed with endometriosis.  When I started the hormone therapy, I noticed my weight started to creep back up.  I weighed myself before class one night, and I was 183.  I panicked.  Everyone was like, "oh, I'm sure it's just muscle."  Bullshit.
I started going to the Y early.  I'd spend a half hour to 45 minutes on the arc trainer, then do water aerobics.  I was always exhausted and sore.  Eventually my weight was back up to 190.  Still panicking, I tried to cut carbs.  Tessa helped me out and showed me the ropes of the diabetic diet.  I gave it maybe.... 3 months?  I can't remember.  December of 2009 was my hysterectomy, and I went into it weighing 200.  After my 6 weeks of no strenuous activity, I was back at the gym.  I'd go for a couple hours every other night after work.  I'd switch between the arc trainer, treadmill, stair stepper and stationary bike.  After my incision started to feel better, I added in weights.  I burned myself out pretty quickly and started doing maybe half an hour after work.  I hadn't weighed myself, but a couple months later I had to buy bigger pants.  Again, I panicked.  I applied for a credit card and signed up for Farrell's XTreme Body Shaping.  It was 400 hundred bucks for 10 weeks, but I was positive it was going to work.  My starting weight was 205.  I was humiliated.  I was going 4-5 times a week and loving it.  It was fucking hard, but I felt like I was making progress.  Six weeks into the program I rolled the shit out of my ankle.  I went to the doctor a couple days after it happened and weighed in at 238.  I could have died right there.  The doctor asked me how I hurt my ankle and I told him I was kick boxing.  He said, "well there's your problem."  I just stared at him.  How could he say anything bad about my workout routine when I was so fucking fat?  I couldn't afford to do the maintenance program with Farrell's, so I invested in a punching bag.  I was using it, even wrapped it in foam so I didn't bother the gays upstairs.  I went to Dee's one night to check on the dogs and used Dave's scale upstairs.  I was 255.  I had given up hope, but Dee and Sara and Tessa bought me a bodybugg.  I had hope again.  Losing weight is easy, it's calories in vs. calories out.  I knew how much I was burning, so I should easily be able to make sure there was a deficit.  I kept at it for 11 weeks.  I counted every calorie, every serving size.  I was so good at making sure I had a 500 - 1000 calorie deficit.  If I was bad and wanted junk food, I made sure I at least broke even.  At one point I thought I'd lost 5 pounds, but it must have been water weight.  At week 12 I had gained another 8 pounds.  That's when I gave up.  I've not been working out.  There was a brief time when I was trying to go around Gray's Lake consistently, but it didn't last long.  Walking hurts.  Everything hurts.  I don't watch what I eat.  Now I'm 280.

Now I don't know what to do.  At the meeting they passed out a questionnaire.  I need to get it filled out and send it in.  I think at that point they'll look at my insurance and then tell me what the requirements are for the bypass.
At the end of the meeting one of the nurses said, "if surgery isn't for you, you can try one of our nutrition classes."
There's some intuitive eating thing, an OPTIFAST/OPTITRIM deal where they use prepackaged meals, like on the show Ruby, and some other one, but I can't remember what it was.
Dee wants me to try one of those before I try the surgery.  Of course, insurance doesn't cover it.  Dee offered to pay, but I've let her down in the past when she's bought me stuff for weight loss and I feel like a piece of shit borrowing money for my personal problems.
My other issue is I don't have COBRA for much longer.  I think I have another 6 or 7 months.  I need Tyne to help me decide on what to do after that, since that's her thing, but if I still want the surgery, I'm going to have to have good coverage.  I can always go on DMACC's policy, so I'm not worried about going without insurance altogether, I'm just worried about having a plan that will cover surgery.