shocking before and after photos you won't see on the news!!!!

on the left, me at my lowest weight. on the right, me at my largest.

hahahahaha! ah...i crack myself up. i just wanted an excuse to post a cute baby pic of me and my dad! (do you think he looks like john mellencamp? back in junior high my friends all thought he did.)

the pic on the right was snapped right when i got out of surgery. it's got to be the worst photo ever. i didn't give this one to monica robins, that's for sure! david and i always laughed and said i looked like larry flynt in the photo....

i have about 5 handwritten pages of journal notes, all the stuff i still want to say about my WLS experience. people have been emailing me with questions and i'm working on answering them all for a long WLS post, hopefully this weekend.

for now, i wanted to answer a question even my own (glitter)mom asked, "how did you end up taping a news story with monica robbins on channel 3?"

it was all my own dumb idea. i emailed her with my story and asked if she was at all interested in talking to me about it. i had no idea if she'd respond. i just knew that she'd done stories about WLS around the time i was considering it, and she always seemed very fair and balanced in her reporting.

you have to remember, in 2000-2001, there was a lot of negative press about the surgery. oprah had done a few shows that were incredibly one-sided, and star jones has been saying horrible things about the surgery. (yeah, i know, it's beyond ironic that she ended up not only having the damn surgery, but then lied about it for 2 years! hypocrite is not a strong enough word for her....)

like i've discussed before, i'd been on my own "healing journey" over the last year. especially since meeting and falling in love with someone who i deeply trusted. someone who had no frame of reference for the surgery. so i found myself explaining to him why i had the surgery, how it went so wrong for me, and were i was now with it.

in telling him my story, i realized how much guilt and embarassment i was still carrying. and i was able to forgive myself for my mistakes, and let go of the embarassment and guilt, and find peace with who i am right now.

i started to go online, to see if anyone else was talking about having similar experiences. i knew that people were having problems. since i'd started talking about my experince i'd heard from friends and coworkers. things like, "yeah, my cousin had that surgery and went through the same thing as you!"

i started to realize that there were others like me, and, like me, they hadn't been talking about it. i mean, who wants to talk about being fat, having surgery, and gaining a lot of the weight back. and no one is in a big rush to tell everyone about their battles with depression and alcohol. or, things i never dealt with like gambling problems, shopping addiction, sexual promiscuity, marital problems, etc....

so i got pissed. not at anyone in particular. not at the surgeon or the program where i had the surgery. not at the surgery itself. i just got pissed at the situation. a situation caused by society's judgement of fat folks, of the surgery, of people with mental health problems.

(i know i've said some of this before... it's just easier for me to let it flow and not go back and try to edit myself.)

so, like i said, i got pissed. i emailed the health reporter. she responded within an hour and sais she was definetly interested in helping me tell my story. but i started to waiver and consider chickening out. why in the hell would i put myself in a position to be on camera talking about how i drank box wine and gained over 1/2 my weight back??? then a few things happened:

a good friend of mine (who battles weight problems) had a doctor recommend WLS. i was floored, because this friend hadn't ever tried an intense, physician assisted diet, weight watchers or anything like that! this was someone who most likely could be very successful with a good old fashioned diet! why would a doctor recommend such dangerous and drastic surgery for someone who a diet could produce substantial weight loss?

a friend of a comedian i've blogged about in the past had the surgery. i followed his story on his blog. i started to notice what a hard time he was having. i saw what i perceived to be a similar slide into depression, and he seemed to be in real, raw pain and vulnerable. i saw myself in my own dark days. and i became obsessed with contacting the guy, if only to say, "hey, i really was there, and it was terrifying and painful. here's what i did wrong. and here's what i did right."

and the final thing that helped me decide to go through with it. i ran into an old friend that i'd lost touch with, who i met while preparing to have the surgery. (she had the surgery maybe a month before i did and we got to know each other in a support group.) i was so excited to run into her, she'd always been someone i really liked. here's the ironic part: we ran into each other in the plus-size section at target!

i saw her and was so excited, but then immediately felt intense embarassment. i felt my face turn hot & red. "oh my god, i'm shopping in the plus size section!!! she's going to see how fat i've gotten!" even after all my recent "awakenings" about my WLS experience, i was bck to feeling shame.

i noticed she was in the plus size section too, and that she'd gained a few pounds, but she looked great!!! much better then i did. we talked for a minute, i got her email, and then ran off. i was so freaked out, i took her email, shoved it in my purse, and went home.

and then it hit me.... she was in the plus-size section too! how ironic (like raaaaiiiiin on your wedding day) is that? i started to think about all the other people i'd met at those support group meetings, and wondered how they were doing. were some of them back to shopping in the plus size sections?

so i decided to go ahead with the interview. i figured if anything, i'd get back in touch with old WLS friends i'd not heard from in ages. and maybe i'd be able to reach the ones like me, who had been beating themselves up over gaining weight back.

ok, that's enough for now.

here's another scan of me as a little kid. this one is with my beloved grandparents, who loved to pretend to spank me! here's my grandma holding me down for my pretend beating. ha ha ha!!! it's a wonder i didn't grow up to be a dominatrix! LOL!!!!!