*

me

I can't remember ever being less than a size 18 (I would have been when I was at school) but over the years it just kept going up and up.

When I was 19 the doctor gave me these amazing tablets which took me from size 18 to size 12. I'm sure they must have been amphetamines, back in the 70's diet pills had amphetamines in them. Anyway it wasn't long after taking these tablets that I was back to a size 18 and onwards and upwards I went.

Weight watchers, I lost about 15 kilos. Then I had kids and the next thing I knew, I was a size 24. Off to Jenny Craig. This was in the early days of Jenny Craig, I hated the food, so ate nothing. Don't know how I did it, but I lost about 20 kilo's and felt fabulous to get down to a size 18.

Of course as soon as Jenny Craig finished, back came the weight. I was starving myself. I guess my body went into survival mode. When I did eat, my body hung onto it, just incase there was another famine. It was a vicious cycle, starve, eat, get bigger.

All this time I was playing a lot of sport, up to 5 hours a day. Then I had an injury which put a stop to my tennis career! I then started going to Theogenes and swimming 2 hours a day as well as doing three aqua fitness classes a week. At this time I was also trying to live on Lean Cuisine.

Then depression set in and before long I was busting out of the Size 32 clothes I was wearing...

• some 'before' and 'after' pics ....

This is how I looked after I lost 40 kilo's (below)

I may have gained some temporary kilo's back since this pic was taken - but I know, without the surgery, I would be much much bigger now than my 'before' photo

(Below): Here are some current photos - taken in 2011 (after my 17 kilo gain)

The pic of me in the 'high-vis' was taken on an underground mine tour, I was especially thrilled that the belt for the 're-breather' fitted around my waist YAY!

The journey so far

________________________________________________________________________
Nature vs Nurture

My GP told me one day that there was a doctor in Hobart doing great things with lapband surgery. I just dismissed the idea, thinking it was not for me and that I would eventually be able to do it myself.It never happened tho. I noticed that the manufacturers of the lapband were holding free seminars in Launceston regularly and the two surgeons from Hobart would take it in turns to give talks at these seminars. I went along to two of the seminars so as to meet both the surgeons. They told us how regular diets don't work for people once you reach a certain weight. You can lose 20 kgs but that's about the end of it, you gain back another 30. That was definitely me!

They said that this was a chronic disease and not to beat ourselves up about not being able to lose weight successfully. Mostly the disease is genetic.


This I found interesting due to the fact that I was adopted and grew up in a family of skinny people, eating healthily and getting lots of exersize. I was always overweight.
When I was in my 30's I met my biological father, I definitely inherited his genes... It was obvious from the facial features we shared.
He brought out his photo album one day and showed me pictures of his relatives.
ALL the women in his family were massively obese. They were twice the size of me - probably weighing over 30 stone.
They were all still alive so that was one comforting thing about it!


WHICH SURGEON TO CHOOSE
After going to these seminars I gathered as much information as I could possibly find on the surgery. Of the two surgeons I met, I thought Tony was lovely.
On the night that Steve was the guest speaker, it was a wet cold wintry night and they said he was running late getting there from Hobart
Anyway, when he finally arrived at the seminar he got straight into giving information and answering questions. He had a heavy dose of the flu which I thought would have been enough of an excuse to cancel the trip to Launceston on that horrible wet night, but I was impressed that he still made the effort.
He was definitely not as outgoing as Tony, the other surgeon I saw at another seminar, but I could tell that he was passionate about his work. .
I choose Steve for my surgeon and went about joining a private health insurance fund and waiting the twelve months for the operation.


I went back to the gym again and swam for hours every day and became more and more disheartened.
In 2005 I went to my regular GP to get a referral to the surgeon.He said he was not happy with the idea of it because all his patients that have had it have only lost weight because they vomit all the time.I was surprised because it was him that told me some time earlier about how there was a doctor in Hobart doing wonderful things for people with the lapband.Anyway he gave me the referral. I hope I don't vomit all the time.

--- 2006 --- I'd only just taken out health insurance, so once the 12 months was up, I booked in for surgery for the October.

Early in October I had to travel to Hobart for a dental appointment so I made the appointment to see the Anaesthesist on the same day.
We had to leave at 6.30am to be in Hobart in time for a dental appointment. Just as we were about to leave I tripped and fell, hurting my left arm and leg really badly.
I had to travel in the back of the car most of the way to keep my leg elevated.
I was also in shock from the fall nearly all the way to Hobart. When I got to the dentists things did not go so well so I was a bit upset about that too. We went and got a light lunch at Salamanca, in a little Vietnamese place. I'd never drunk sports drinks before but I grabbed one to have with my lunch that day. I didn't realise these drinks would raise my blood pressure.
Then we drove around to find the anaesthesists rooms. They were up two flights of stairs. I staggered up there with my crook leg and guess what.... he took my blood pressure and nearly freaked out.
He wrote out a prescription for blood pressure tablets straight away. I've never had high blood pressure before, Peter has it and takes medication, we also have a blood pressure monitor which I use to keep an eye on my own and its always around 115 over 75.


Well this day in the anaesthesiologists, it was about 160 over 100. We explained to him about what had happened that day but he said that my BP would probably go up on the day of surgery anyway because he could tell that I was scared of it.


I suggested that my problem may be that I don't understand how anaesthetic works, thats why I'm worried. Well his reply was that he doesn't know how it works either.
Oh great, just what I wanted to hear. I was worried I wouldn't wake up after the anaesthetic and he's really put my mind at rest now. Not.
Anyway, if taking BP medication helps in anyway, I'm all for it. Another thing he said was that I'd be ok because my face is not fat! huh? Please explain?


OCTOBER
OFF TO HOSPITAL I GO ::
Monday:
Off to Hobart the day before the big day, booked into a motel and went to Mures for my 'last supper' - 3 vegetable spring rolls!

I didn't sleep too well as I was SOOOO frightened of having the surgery, I'd really really worked myself up into quite a state. I'm normally a fairly down to earth person but I was freaking out in a big way, and would have tried anything to try to calm myself down!!!!!!!


Tuesday. Surgery Day arrives
Arrived at the Hobart Private Hospital at 7am. I was checked into the hospital and then taken upstairs to my ward. Normally surgical patients are on the 4th floor but it must have been full because I was shown to a bed in a two-bed ward on the maternity ward.I was given a glamorous hospital gown to put on and within half an hour I was wheeled up to the theatre floor.
I truly felt that I was on my way to my execution and that I would never see my family again. I was terrified.When we got to the theatre floor I was parked in a waiting area and they asked me if I'd like a warm blanket.
Until now the hospital had felt hot but I did notice a considerable drop in temperature on this floor. I took the warm blanket to keep my hands under. I needed to keep my hands warm to give the anaesthesist the best chance of finding a vein to insert the canula.

As I lay in the bed in the waiting area I could hear people asking if they'd seen the surgeon yet. He must have been running late. By the time they came to get me my feet were getting quite cold literally.
I was so so scared of the operation. I knew I had to try to change my way of thinking or I would be a mess.Because they had taken me to the maternity ward earlier I came up with the idea that since I was having abdominal surgery that I could talk myself into thinking that I was having a cesarean section. People have cesareans all the time and usually its a time of happy anticipation, that soon you will be holding your little baby. I told myself that I was about to have a cesarean and that I would be giving birth soon to the new me .... The new skinny me! This thinking really did help me get thru the next minutes.

A couple of weeks earlier I had read a book by Sonia Choquette and she talked about wrapping oneself in blue light to block out any negativity. She also talked about how Prayer was a very powerful formula for cleansing the aura and balancing the chakras and that it can surround the body with healing energy. I have never prayed so hard in my life as I did in that moment!!!

As I was being pushed down to the operating theatre we passed a room that my surgeon was coming out of. He looked at me and said Hi, how are you? I just smiled and nodded and continued to imagine myself floating in a protective blue light energy. :)
Next we were in the operating room and they got me to wriggle from the bed onto the operating table. They asked me my name and what the operation I was having was, probably to make sure they did the right op on the right patient.
My anaesthesist was there and he introduced his assistant, a female, I don't remember her name or what she looked like. I do remember them having all sorts of trouble trying to find a vein. With each failed attempt my whole body was starting to shake violently and the assistant told me to take deep breaths and try to relax with each breath.
I was totally freaked out, I thought that this was it, end of life as I'd known it.

I thought that they had finally found a vein but there was no suggestion that I count back from 10 or anything.
I remember nothing else until I woke up in another bed. My eyes opened and I saw a clock on the wall opposite me.
The time was 10.15am. And it was very quiet and peaceful. I had gone into the operating room at approx 9.15am. I realised that I had survived the operation and felt a wave of happiness over me that I was still alive.
Then I must have drifted off again. Shortly after some people came to take me back to the ward, it was probably a nurse and an orderly, I don't recall.





On the way back to the ward I remember imagining myself surrounded by a white healing energy. I wanted to force my body to repair itself after the surgery. I had also read a book recently by Bev Brock, written about Peter Brock.

Peter was interested in natural therapies and spiritual healing, in the book Bev tells of a time when Peter had hurt himself badly on the arm or the hands while working on his farm. His injuries were such that he would have required stitches. He had to run from the paddock he was working in to the house with blood streaming from his wounds. The power of his mind helped to heal the cuts as he ran towards the house so that by the time he arrived at the house, the bleeding had all but stopped and the cuts had begun to heal themselves. I wanted this to happen to me.
Although I did have 6 incisions I had been mended beautifully by the surgeon but I wanted my wounds to heal without any infection or complications.As it turned out they improved dramatically right from the word go and the only discomfort I experienced in the days following surgery was from pressure when I tried to bend forward.

BACK IN THE WARDWhen I arrived back to my room in the maternity ward I was a little bit groggy but was aware of my husband sitting there by my bed. As I woke up a little bit more the girl in the other bed was anxious to know how I went as she was about to go to theatre to have the same procedure.As I became more alert I felt my mouth very dry and my throat was not feeling right either. It felt like there was something stuck in there and I kept trying to cough it up, whatever it was.
I finally figured out that they had damaged my tonsils during the op and it took about a week for them to come right! It was also a nusciance having an IV drip in my right hand but on the whole I was comfortable.

Best of all I'd survived and I thought I now had a second chance at life again. I sent everyone on my mobile phone list a text to let them know I was ok. Its funny, you go into hospitals and there are signs all over the place telling you turn your mobile phone off because they interfere with hospital equipment. Well, at the Hobart Private Hospital there are no such signs. In fact the staff told me that phones do not interfere with their equipment and that it was ok to use your own phone. This must also release them from a lot of time spent relaying messages to patients.

My room mate eventually came back from theatre, I think she was surprised to see me sitting up looking so good. It felt good to me too. The other girl was about 8 sizes smaller than me and she was suffering terribly from pain.Everyone warns you about the wind pain from this type of surgery. It gets you in the left shoulder and can be quite excruciating. The wind in your stomach too can make you feel nauseous and bringing it up causes you to feel like you are going to vomit. I had two episodes like this and none of the shoulder pain.
Everyone Including myself was totally amazed by this. By about 3.30pm I felt like getting out of bed. They called an orderly to come and assist. I felt worn out just from walking to the bathroom and back.
A couple of hours later I got out of bed and walked out into the hospital hallway. Its supposed to be good to get up and about as soon as possible to help ward off blood clots. We also had these amazing pressure things around our legs that massaged our legs. Once I'd been up for awhile they didn't bother putting them back on my legs.
It was a pain trying to wander around with the IV trolley, I felt like an old person with my zimmer frame, but I was determined to move about as much as I could. My back was hurting from the way I was laying on it so that was another incentive to get out of bed.

That evening I was sitting in a chair watching TV quite happily. I had pethidene injections to kill any pain and I would have little naps after the injections. Sleeping was difficult whilst being tied to an IV.At some stage my right vein collapsed and they had to remove the canula. Luckily there was a spare canula in my left hand which they hooked the drip into. It wasn't a very good one so I had to be ultra careful how I rested my left arm and what I did with it.
During the night the nurse came around to change the IV bag. As this was a maternity ward and they had a little baby who was unsettled, the nurse was changing my IV and administering pethidene whilst wearing the baby on her chest in a kapoochie. It was so cute hearing his little baby noises.During the night myself and my room-mate were wide awake so we went for a long walk right around the 3rd floor of the hospital, wheeling our IV trolleys as we went.

It didn't take long to get back to sleep and before I knew it, it was morning. Next morning, after much deliberating they decided to see how my Barium swallow went and hopefully they would not have to re-canulate me.Soon my chairot (wheelchair) arrived to take me to XRay. I went into the Xray room and I had to stand in front of the machine and then side on while I had my pic taken. Then I had to drink a big mouthful of this strange stuff, swallow and hold my breath while a pic was taken in front of the machine, Then the same again, swallow and stand side on to the machine. The radiologist seemed happy that pics were good and I was taken back to the ward again to await the results.
NEXT DAY
I think I had a bit of a nap after I came back from Xray and not long after I awoke my surgeon Steven Wilkinson came to see me. He said that the operation went very well and that the xray showed everything was as it should be and that I could go home that day if I felt like it.
The other girl in my ward opted to go home mid afternoon.

Our first meal arrived. There was a little bottle of apple juice, a bowl of sorbet (which went runny before I got a chance to eat it) a lemonade icy pole which was the best thing! Also there was a bowl of jelly which went down very nicely too. My temperature had been fluctuating which they said was a fairly normal thing after having an anaesthetic and it went up shortly after my surgeons visit. I felt quite nauseous. I also had a bit of pain in the abdomen so they gave me some medication to help.
I thought I'd have a bit of a sleep and see how I felt that evening as to whether I was to discharge myself.My room-mate went home and I snuggled down into bed hoping to get a bit of sleep and feel a bit better. Well there was not much chance of that. There were cleaners and other hospital staff coming a going the whole time. The bed was very uncomfortable too. The hospital was hot and noisy. We were going to stay in a motel near the hospital for a couple of days before I left Hobart to make sure everything was ok with me as it was a three hour drive to where we were going when we left Hobart.

At 6.30 pm I left the hospital. Someone had told me to take a small pillow with me in the car to hold over my tummy. This proved to be invaluable advice. It certainly helped reduce any jarring when driving over speed humps and later, pot holed gravel roads.We went to our room at the motel and I spent the evening watching TV and I had a fairly good sleep. Only had to take a couple of panadeines to help ease the pain of the wounds to help me to sleep.

Next day I woke up feeling fantastic. It was show day in Hobart and a public holiday. I needed to get some dental work done before I went home and had an appointment for 9am the following day. (If it hadn't been a public holiday that day I'd have had my teeth fixed and left Hobart). But we had a boring day in Hobart with not much to do.

By the middle of the afternoon I was feeling quite cooped up, so we went for a drive down to Sandy Bay where we just sat in the sun for an hour and watched the world go by. Being a public holiday there were a lot of people out and about with their dogs plus there was a lot of watercraft on the Derwent including some small yacht races. Very pleasent.
We went back to the motel and I had an icy pole. I had been very mindful of keeping myself hydrated, remembering the 7 IV bags that had been pumped into me in the 24hrs since the op. I had a selection of jellies, yoghurt and icy poles in my room along with some juices and plenty of water. I didn't really feel like much but thought it best to keep up the fluid intake as much as possible. Eventually I have worked out that I just need to listen to my body to tell me what I need. At the motel I was really starting to look forward to getting up to St.Helens so that we could make some nutritional soup, plus I had my optifast there which has all the vitamins you need in it.

RECUPERATING I slept well again that night and only needed to take some panadol to help me get off to sleep. Next day we were up and packed and checked out of the motel by 8.30 and straight around to the dentists to get my teeth fixed. That didn't take long and we were finally leaving Hobart. Yay! I was feeling fantastic. The drive up the Midland Highway was easy and it really helped hugging my pillow all the way.I felt great considering it had taken us nearly 4 hours to get to St.Helens.
I had a bit of a walk around before putting my feet up.I took one panadol before I went to bed and I havent taken one painkiller since that night.

Had lots of phone calls the next day from friends to see how I was getting on.All were amazed at how wonderful I was feeling and how positive I sounded.That night I had the broth of the vegie soup that Peter had made while I was out at an aromatherapy party with a friend. So yum!
I slept really well that night and woke up the next day full energy and enthusiasm. We drove over to my daughters place and we went for a long walk around the foreshore and back up past the shopping district. That night we also went for a walk.

Since day one the wounds have cleared up beautifully, theres hardly any pain, only if I bend over to undo my shoes, and thats probably from the largest wound where they had the camera go in. The other wounds just look like little scratches now, and as I write this, its not even 2 weeks since the op. I'm really rapt.

On the Wednesday which was 8 days since the operation, I had to have a phone consultation with my surgeon. He wanted to see how things were going and if they were all ok then I would not have to travel to Hobart for that first check-up (he knew I lived over 3 hours drive away) He seemed happy and told me to stick to fluids for another 3 weeks and that I was to go to Hobart and see him in 7 weeks weeks time for the first adjustment.

SHRINKINGWhen I packed to go to St.Helens I packed 3 pairs of trousers. There was my old favourites and two pairs of black pants. One pair was much looser than the other pair so those are the ones I wore when I got out of hospital. After about a week I tried them on again and they were ridiculously loose. I was saving the other pair of black ones for the day that we left St.Helens as were going to Launceston to catch up with friends and family before heading back home.Well I put that smaller pair of black pants on ..... The waistband normally sat around my waist near the navel, Well, when I put them on the waist band came up to my armpits. I thought I'd made a mistake and put the larger pair on. So I took them off and went searching for the other pair. They were both identical pairs of pants apart from the sizes. Well I found the other pair and I really thought they WERE the bigger pair, so I held both pairs together and it was definately the smaller pair that I had first put on. Amazing... These pants 10 days ago only came up to my waist and now they come up to my armpits.

The next time I wore them, only a couple of days later, the waistband comes up to the top of my shoulders and the bum is all baggy. These pants used to be stretched to their limits at the thigh and across the hips.I'll have to get the sewing machine out and start taking my trousers in. I have a cupboard full of tops that are too small for me so I'll be right for tops for awhile.

The loss has been amazing in under two weeks. I'm not hungry, I'm not constantly obsessing about food. Its like I've been reprogrammed. From what I've read, this is a common thing. Everyone I've met has commented about how happy I look and how positive I am.
Now, as I write this, its exactly 2 weeks to the day since surgery. I go back for my first band adjustment on the 15th December. I won't know exactly how much I've lost until then, my scales are not accurate. But I will be measuring and using the looseness of my clothes as a yard stick. I think I've lost about 8 kilos in the last two weeks but it could be more.

2 months later. And I had lost 20 kilo's.

then, after another 6 months, I had lost another 20 kilo's. So all up 40 kilo's.


__2007_______________________________________________

I was having fills regularly over the next six months,Then soon after one fill I noticed I could eat a large plate of food, for instance a plate of chicken parmigana and chips would go down with no trouble.

So off I went and got another fill.Same result, able to eat a huge amount.

So back to Wilko again. I said to him that I can eat a huge plate of food. He said "No, thats not possible, your band is too tight" By the look on my face he then realised that there must be a problem. I was sent straight to X-ray. He suspected that as I lost weight there was more room inside me and that the tube from the port to the band had developed a kink and then split.I had to have another operation. After the fear I went thru with the last operation,

I was keen to have this op done quickly before I got myself worked up about it!! At the same time I was also in the process of having interviews for a job at the Commonwealth Bank .When the Bank rang and told me my start date, it was 3 days after my surgery.

The day of the surgery came around quickly, thank goodness. I didn't have to meet the anesthesist before admission to the Hobart Private, he came and saw me in the ward before the surgery took place. He worked for the same group as I'd had before but was not the same anesthesist as the other one.

He asked me about pain relief and I said that I had pethidene successfully previously and that I had never had morphine before. He said he would give me Morphine this time, I protested, but he reckoned he knew better.

I don't remember much about going to theatre this time and it felt like it was over pretty quickly. When I went back to the ward my hubby said he was worried about me because I was gone for a long time this time. That was all I was aware of him saying before I slipped back into a very deep sleep. For the rest of the day he had trouble rousing me, and when I was 'awake' my eyelids felt like they weighed 10 tonne, I could not lift them open as much as I tried.

When I eventually woke up fully it was the middle of the night. I just got out of bed and took myself off to the toilet. Then I got into trouble with the nurses for doing that. Later during the night I wanted to get up and walk around. But the staff would not allow me to.

So different to the last time I was in there, they encouraged me to get up and about as soon as possible.

Next day I was awake and ready to go home. Dr Wilkinson came to see me and said he had not put any fill in the band. I was devastated, I was starting a new job and knew I wouldn't get a day off any time soon to come to Hobart to get a fill, so he relented and told me to go to his rooms and he would do it.

So, after I checked out I went and got my fill, and for the first time, I had restriction.

I've never been back for another fill, its still very tight. I started my new job on the Monday, I felt like crap, I'm sure I was still under the influence of the morphine for the first week.

____2008_____________________________________________

In April of 2008 I had to resign from my job and move as hubby had been transferred again After I moved I became very depressed, I was put on anti-depressants but I had shocking side-effects. I just gave up and turned to chocolate to help me thru this time.

Its the worst thing I could have done. The chocolate really helped me thru this time, but I became addicted to it, like a drug addict, I had to go out each day and get my hit.

In the following year or so I had gained back 17 of the kilo's I had lost.

____2011_______________________________________________
It is only in the last two months that I have finally been able to wean myself off the chocolate.

I still love chocolate, but it doesn't have the same effect, eating away at me, until I go out and buy some, and eat away at it !! The scales are finally starting to go down again.

So, I have not gained any weight at all this year, I still have tight restriction but am not doing any exercise

(I sprained my achilles last year and can't walk on it for long at all) So what I am able to eat , is currently 'maintaining' my weight. I'd like to eat a little less and now have chromium which helps to curb my craving for bad foods , my achilles is starting to show signs of improvement at last, so hopefully I can get moving and this temporary speed hump will go away and the scales will go downward again Like I said earlier, if it wasn't for the band, I would probably weigh sooo much more than I did before the band

:)

Found this bit of silliness on the internet and just had to add it here!!! ------------------------------