Rolling In The Deep

I'm now a little more than two years out from my surgery, and my weight has settled around 164. No longer obese!!

It has been really, really getting used to being a "normal" size. To not ease slowly into every chair lest it breaks; eyeing narrow retail stores to see what I'm in danger of knocking over; walking down the street and noticing people staring at me without wondering if they're secretly weighing me in their minds.

I'm even wearing crop tops!

I recently started a new job and, lemme tell you, it is AWESOME not being the fattest person in the building. To walk up the stairs to my office without having to hide for 20 minutes while I catch my breath. To step on the elevator and not have people directly check the weight capacity and do mental arithmetic to see if I'll cause us all to plummet. I've even noticed people speaking to me more as a peer, as though they assume I know what i'm doing and am capable of understanding.

It's pathetic that it took losing almost 200 pounds to realize people didn't take me as seriously when I was fat. Iw was more than capable at my job, but I got the sense that my shallow colleagues assumed that not having my weight under control meant I didn't have anything else under control.

Since losing weight, I did deal with serious depression and ended up committed after a suicide attempt. Then my house burned down. I took two years to find a job. I got very badly addicted after so many pain pills following so many surgeries. I was robbed three times, losing literally everything I own.

But.. I've never been happier. I've found the love of my life, I have a great job now, my house is being rebuilt, and I'm a healthy weight for the first time ever.

I recently got a new tattoo, and the message means a lot to me. It's from the Lord of the Rings: "It's only a passing thing, this shadow. " How right you are, Samwise.

And I Was Not Lost Or Found

Still losing weight...in fact, for a few brief hours, until I ate a doughnut, I had lost HALF of myself. From 317 pounds down to 158.4...literally half of what I used to be. I've fluctuated back up to 162 pounds, which is only 2 pounds away from the fake weight I'd lied about when I was 15 and getting my learner's permit (they let my fat 190 pound ass put down 160 lbs and it's stayed on my license like that for 2 decades now). And despite all the weight lost, my skin isn't even too saggy--in fact, if you don't look at my thighs and stomach, I look like a "normal" 160 pound woman.

BEFORE (317 lbs or so)

NOW (160-180 lbs)

So why do I still want to kill myself so badly?

I always thought that by now, losing weight, getting down to a healthy size, fitting into sexy size medium dresses and strutting in 6 inch stilettos, turning heads, on the arm of my boyfriend, the literal love of my life and best friend and everything I ever hoped for in a man, with me looking exactly how I always wanted to look, I thought by now my life would be perfect. I would be happy. My depression would just...disappear.

Boy, was I wrong.

I spent last weekend trying to find anything in my truck that would get through enough skin to open the veins in my wrist. I only managed to mangle myself with my house keys, leaving a bloody raw mess with me very much alive, just annoyed and in pain. Trying to gnaw my way through with my teeth was even more painful, and it's also probably why now, a week later, that wrist is oozing pus and throbbing with pain. It's a good thing my parents still have all six of my guns (they removed them after my suicide attempt and subsequent mental institution stay back in May) because I just didn't have the courage or energy to find another way to kill myself. So I gave up, came home, and lived another day.

Depression is a funny thing. Not, like, funny "ha-ha" obviously. But people look at you and think, well, you're doing better than XYZ people, you aren't homeless, you have people who love you...if you are considering suicide, you are a selfish, worthless, self-centered piece of shit. And everyone close to you wants to make depression and suicidal thoughts about themselves. Like, "Oh yeah, nothing I do for you is good enough, why do I even try? I gave you XYZ and you weren't magically cured, there's obviously something wrong with you!" Yes. Yes, there is something wrong with me. It's called fucking depression. It doesn't mean I don't love you...it just means I hate myself more.

I have heard several times lately what a pathetic loser I am, and all I can say is, you think I don't know? Trust me, I'm much more disgusted by myself than you could ever be. But thanks for the extra salt in that wound.

Right now, this isn't my usual annual seasonal depression, or even the trauma that comes with making it through September (the anniversary of the deaths of my favorite dog J, my best friend Rob, and my good friend from college Monroe who finally killed herself in 2010 after also suffering decades of depression). No, right now it's very specifically because I can't find a job and I am FUCKING BROKE. Like...BROKE BROKE. No savings, checking account overdrawn, no bills being paid. My unemployment benefits ran out weeks ago. If my boyfriend wasn't paying for the mortgage and utilities, I would absolutely be homeless. My parents lent me $1,000 in May when I got out of the mental ward, and made it clear that's all the help they would give me. I cashed in my 401k, emptied my piggy banks, plucked the quarters out of my cardboard state quarters map. I have sold every book and movie I own that's worth anything. I've sold my high school jewelry supplies for the scrap prices. I'm selling off my prized Funko Pop! Vinyl collection piece by piece on Ebay, along with everything else I own of any value. I donated plasma until it made me so sick and my veins were so bruised and blown I couldn't donate any more.

And yes, I've been looking for work. I submitted more than 750 applications now. SEVEN HUNDRED AND FIFTY JOB APPLICATIONS AND I STILL DON'T HAVE A FUCKING JOB. I've gone on every interview I've been invited to, and taken every phone interview offered. I've updated my resume and cover letter and professional recommendations literally thousands of times. I've updated LinkedIn, Behanced, every career website that exists.

So...I'm just a fucking loser.

No one wants to hire me. For anything. So now I'm desperate. Like, considering nefarious activities desperate. I have never felt like such a loser.

When I was a kid, I was really fucking smart. Like, bizarrely smart. Pulled-out-of-class-for-free-periods-cuz-I-already-knew-everything-they-were-teaching smart. When I took the IQ aptitude test for the gifted and intelligent program, the principal told my parents that my score was higher than any other student they had ever placed. I sailed through high school, got into every college I applied to (with scholarships). After college, I was immediately hired making $45k, way more than almost every one of my friends, and when I moved to another company, I was literally asked to apply for a promotion within, like, six months. From there I rose through the ranks until I was managing a department with 70+ subordinates and a $60 million dollar budget. I bought a truck. Bought a house. Started collecting stupid shit, like 80s toys and antique mantilla combs, investing tens of thousands of dollars feathering my nest, stocking my many closets, accumulating shoes and purses like we used to collect pogs back in the day.

Then my company got bought out, my job was eliminated last November, and my world came crashing down. I had finally found a boyfriend who I can actually see myself being with until the end of time, and suddenly I became not a partner but an albatross. My severance ran out fast, then the 401k (assisted by my much-needed purchase of a Macbook and an amazing Caribbean cruise), then my unemployment. Throughout it all, I was sort of idly eating my way through the days, but thanks to the gastric sleeve surgery last July, I was still losing weight. Not much at first, not nearly what I'd expected: in the first 3 months after surgery, when most people lose the majority of their weight, I only dropped maybe 50 pounds. I was discouraged and just resigned myself to being one of the people who gastric sleeve fails. But I kept losing, slowly but surely, and by the time my cruise rolled around in January, I was  down to 195, under 200 for the first time in the adult life, and rocking two piece swimsuits on the beach and wandering around with a wisp of cloth from a beachwear stand in Cancun. My weight fluctuated, as it does, but when I was admitted to the psych ward in May, I was down to 175. I didn't expect to lose any more after that, but over the past few months, I've slowly gotten down to 165, then briefly under 160. I'm at 162 today, but hoping that my forced starvation diet will get me down to 155. That is solidly under half of what I used to weigh, and it would be a "normal" weight according to the stupid fucking accursed BMI chart that's haunted me since my 5th grade physical exam when the doctor pointed out for the first time that I was considered "overweight" and on my way to "obese". Never in a million years did I think then that I'd eventually sail way past "obese" straight to "morbid obesity" and stay there for an eternity.

But...now I'm almost "normal". I look like a normal person. When I get dressed to leave the house, I check myself out in the mirror and barely even consider if my stomach is "hanging out" like I always obsessed. I even stopped wearing corsets and waist trainers because I'm more comfortable without them. Right now, I'm wearing a medium black camisole, no bra because my boobs are so small now, under an XXL hoodie that just barely fit when I bought it, and it's literally hanging to my knees. I have on Gap jeans, real jeans, no stretch, size 12, and they could definitely go down a size or 4. Plus socks pulled up to my knees, when before they barely fit around my calves, and giant purple Italian Moon Boots keeping my legs warm--when I originally bought them, I had to cut the inside lining to get them to pull up high enough to not look stupid, which left them still bunched awkwardly, but now they don't even touch my calves even with jeans tucked inside. I have a dainty ring, size 6.5, the kind I could never wear before because the thin band would have been lost in a roll of fat, even on my finger. This entire outfit is just plain and comfy, but a year ago would have been too tight and uncomfortable to even wear.

Yet...yeah, I'm still fucking depressed.

I believe I've shared this on here before, but: when I was a little girl, every wish I made, every time a cardinal landed and I got through the alphabet or when I saw the first star in the sky, I made the same wish. I wanted to grow up to be thin and beautiful and to find a knight in shining armor. I didn't even need a prince, just a knight. Now I am, if not thin and beautiful, at least approaching normal and decent to look at. And I certainly found a prince, a man willing to rescue this fucked up damsel in a great deal of distress. It seems my dreams came true.

But yeah. I am STILL depressed.

I am hoping things will be better once I get a job, once I'm pulling my weight and don't feel like such a loser. I'll have insurance again and can get back on my psych meds, which will definitely help. Hopefully I'll keep losing weight, at least enough to say I was "normal" at one point in my life.

Even then, though, there's no guarantee that my depression is gonna go away. I've mentioned before, I first seriously considered suicide at age 9. My mom was diagnosed with lupus, they said she wouldn't live to see me finish 5th grade, and I decided that I wasn't going to live without her. She was lucky and stuck around (she's still sick but also still alive, thank god) and so did I. But the thoughts never left. 25 years of suicidal thoughts don't just disappear because life is going well. And when life is NOT going well, there's not much I can do. So I read. I write. I shoot my bow and arrow. I have as much sex as possible. I try to find reasons to live.

Each job rejection makes it that much harder.

But I'm still here.

And I'm going to try to stay.

As hard as it is.

When I Was Crazy

Well, kids, I finally did it.

I lost my fucking mind.

Honestly I could have gone crazy at any point and it would have surprised no one, but I REALLY went crazy this time. As in, I slit both my wrists open and then stuck a loaded .45mm Glock in my mouth. My mom got there just in time, and I spent a week as a psych patient at the mental institution, total Girl, Interrupted style. But I'm still here, I'm out of the awful relationship I was in, and I'm still losing weight (my weight has actually been on the BACK OF MY MIND a few times lately, which is crazy for me to say, after nearly 30 years of it being front and center of my thoughts every second of every day...but now I'm 174, from 314, so I'm feeling kinda badass).

Anyway, I'm very lucky to be alive. I had already texted my mom asking her to send someone else (they were already arranging to send me to the crisis center) because I didn't want her to be the one to find the body. She got there just in time, for a very stupid reason: my wifi was being wonky and I was trying to Google the best place to shoot to make sure I was gone in one shot (literally).

I mean, the gun was in my mouth. The clip was full, the chamber loaded. My finger was on the trigger, tears pouring down my face, slobber all over the gun.

My Beretta. 22 (not the Glock my mom found me with).

But it's really surprising how much wiggle room there is with a big ass Glock in your mouth. Really. Was I supposed to shoot at a slightly upward angle, intending to sever my brain stem? Or slightly downward, for the spinal column? Certainly not straight back and chance missing both, right? Or would that be best? Anyway, I had questions...so I was trying to Google the best method, with the gun in my mouth and my shaking finger pressed right on the trigger, but the wifi wasn't reaching because I was in the back yard. My sister was a former biohazard remediation/crime scene cleanup technician and I didn't want anyone to have to deal with my body indoors, especially since I have so much stuff. There would be hair and skull fragments and blood and brain bits on everything, and I would have felt terrible. Or I guess I would have felt nothing? But the point is, I wanted to prevent a mess and therefore couldn't Google fast enough before my mom walked into my yard and I just couldn't do that to her. I couldn't let her watch me shoot myself. I took the gun out of my mouth long enough to cry out for her to please turn around and go back inside, but she came and took the gun and held me as I collapsed.

I'm doing much better now. The psych ward really did help. I wanna write later about how fucking crazy it was, but I'm glad I was there. I was still determined to kill myself, I just didn't want my mom to see. But the triage unit at the psych ward made sure there really were not many ways to kill yourself--no plastic bags, nothing. I spent my first night there sobbing but trying desperately to hold my mouth closed and pinch my nose shut and suffocate myself. It's true what they say, though--it's super hard to do that, because your body will let go at the last second and you'll gasp for air. I guess sometimes your body's primal desire to live sometimes overrides your mind's desire to end it all.

Glad I sucked at suicide, and now I can truthfully write about a mental hospital because I've been there, done that. But it does still scare me how quickly and completely I could become crazy. I have been off all of my medications since I lost my job and insurance in November, and that's after a decade and a half of constant anti-depressants and anti-anxiety pill combinations. Then my boyfriend and I had a couple pretty crazy fights a couple weeks ago. He had unexpectedly moved in along with his 18 year old son, which I had not wanted, but he was being sued by his landlord and then waited until the last second to find a place, so he ran out of time. They filled my garage with all of their stuff and then suddenly I was sitting, depressed, on the couch all day with two grumpy dudes instead of just one. They both just sat there getting high, watching television, and letting me cook them every meal. But he would get upset if I made ANY plans at all--I always included him, but he didn't want to leave the house. So then I couldn't leave the house. I was becoming more and more isolated from everyone, I was completely broke but hadn't even looked for a job because he liked me staying home with him, and because he said he'd pay some bills if he moved in, and then he started making me feel ugly and unloved too. I was wearing a cute new size Large black off-the-shoulder skater dress and feeling super super cute. When I got up, I flirtatiously flashed him my lacy underwear. His response: "Red and bumpy, just how I like it."

Wow.

I'm fucking sensitive, and burst into tears. That pissed him off, and so he started to go into why it wasn't a big deal because I have plenty of other flaws anyways, like still being fat and flabby.

Double wow.

He never got to see me at my heaviest, 317, but we did meet when I was still around 220. I lost almost 40 pounds in the time we were together, and he still had the nerve to call me fat and flabby.

He really hated me being happy, but got annoyed when I was depressed. He kept offering to help with money but he never did, even though he's been staying here basically full time since October. He knew I was struggling with money but then he picked up a cocaine habit! So then every single day he "needed" to do a bunch of coke so he could "work". He worked from home (my home) in data, but only did about an hour's worth of work a day. Then he spent the rest of the day stressed about work, but just watching tv and getting high. So yeah, I wasn't getting any money, and his coke use didn't taper off when his kid moved in. So I finally broke down and asked him to please at least get the kid out of my house, because I already wasn't feeling very loved or supported. He was furious and we fought hard and he basically dumped me. That's the first time in this ordeal that I started trying to cut my wrists, because he'd pulled me into this weird half-life existence where he was my entire world, and so if he left my entire world was gone too. Hearing over and over from him that I'll never do better than him eventually made me believe it.

Anyway, then we had a couple more crazy fights, make-ups, fights, make-ups...he went through my iPad and freaked out about an old message to an ex he thought was too flirty. Then he went through my phone while I slept and found a text from six months ago to another friend who happens to be an ex, he thought it was flirty also. So I then woke up to broken glass where he'd shattered the photos I'd had printed of us and framed, and most of his good stuff moved out, along with my weed. At this point, my friend brought me a shit ton of Kolonopin, so I was taking like 5 full mgs at a time and don't have much memory of the next few days. I know he threw all my patio furniture into my pool and broke my photos, I took a hammer to his shitty giant CRT televisions (who even uses those anymore?), and then like a freaking crazy sitcom, the cops showed up, I was trying to just get my weed back from him, which he TOLD the cop (ugh idiot...), then he tried to drive away and ended up hitting me with his car and running me over, I broke his window, he broke my toe and rolled my ankle...and then he was gone, and I was left with glass everywhere, a bloody foot, and more Kolonopin. Nothing happened with the cop, which I guess was good, but then the next two days were spent in stupid Facebook wars between my friends and his gigantic ex-wife of 20 years, and with me cutting my wrists deeper and deeper but I just couldn't push hard enough. He told me because I had an ingrown hair I has pulled: "Your pussy looks like a 14 year old girl with acne." Also, "There's a reason you don't feel attractive and it has nothing to do with your appearance. It's because of the empty hole in your heart where you should have a soul." Ouch. And every other evil thing you can say to a very sad, lonely, broken girl with really low self esteem who's been systematically brought under your psychological spell and will believe anything you say...No one loves me, I don't matter, I'm a fat and flabby and worthless slob, I'm lazy and disgusting and he can see why that one ex once told me he was disgusted by me (so glad I told him that really hurtful story)...

So then, well, it finally ended when my mom took the gun away and had me locked up for a little while. So yeah. That's the story of how I went fucking crazy for a little while.

I am staying strong. I would love to have him here to hold me so it's not easy to say no. But I am. I'm still a little shaky and getting used to my new meds, but things are looking up. Already in the 48 hours I've been out, I've done more work on my resume than I did in the previous six months, so I can start working soon and get out of this house and get out of my head a little.

I always said I wanted to write a book, but that I couldn't write about being fat until I was close enough to normal size that I could talk about being fat without being embarrassed. But I also always felt that my story needed a brief crazy spell. And I got it. Guess I can write my book now too :P

Donation Station

Being poor SUUUUUUUUCKS.

I really took so much for granted over the past decade or so. Life is just very, very different when I can't reach for my credit card to solve any problem. It's been kinda nice that I've been forced to eat at home (and I have truly been eating like a depression-era peasant...I've gotten extremely creative with nothing much more than a potato). But it's crazy not being able to swing into Starbucks for a quick caramel frappachino, or to the bar for a shot when a friend is in town. It's been embarrassing making excuses not to hang out because I can't afford the gas to get there, or dinner or drinks or whatever we were meeting for. Now, I literally find myself questioning if I'm using more toilet paper than necessary, and wondering about the legal hurdles keeping me from shutting off my utilities and living with kerosene lamps and an outhouse.

Seriously, though, I had to be very, very, very desperate to consider plasma donation. Not because it's inherently risky—it's not—but because my personal health history makes me a really terrible candidate, and my immune system is 100% not adequately prepared to keep me alive through this. Their screening process is designed to keep people like me from donating due to the risks to our health, but I have honestly never been this desperate for money. Even during that brief period between semesters in college when Rob and I squatted in an abandoned house and bought cigarettes with pennies, I still felt more financially stable than I do right now. So, yeah, I'm fucking desperate. And it's quite clear that the other donors are also not being entirely truthful for the sake of remaining eligible, but the instant cash for a relatively painless couple of hours is more than enough incentive to lie. I'm just not certain that the money is worth what my body is going through.

I've felt like I've had a cold basically since the first session, and after each donation I crash for the rest of the night and usually the entire following day as well. When I donate on Wednesday, that means I'm a zombie basically until I wake up Friday, but Friday is designated as my second donation day of the week. So I go again, and end up feeling like crap until Sunday. From Sunday until Wednesday I feel "okay", and then the cycle starts again. But I don't really feel totally "okay", ya know? By then, my arm is less sore and the bruising around the injection site has disappeared, but the constant slight head cold has kept my throat sore, my eyes dry, and my nose running. I even have a scab on my nose behind my septum ring from where I've been blowing with cheap toilet paper instead of the Puff's Plus with Lotion that I never fully appreciated before.

The donation itself isn't exactly fun—you're trapped there with the needle in your arm as it sucks out your blood, then spins it in a centrifuge to remove the plasma. While the blood is being sucked out, the blood pressure cuff is constantly as tight as it will go, and you have to keep pumping your fist like you're milking your own udders. Then the centrifuge brakes and the cuff loosens, and you have to sit still while the machine pumps your plasma-less blood back into your body. NOT a great feeling. This cycle happens over and over until they have a full liter bottle of plasma, maybe 5 or more cycles. At the end, your final blood round is mixed with saline, and it's pumped back in while you freeze to death and hourly workers pull out the IVs and put cash on your card.

My next donation is Wednesday, and I'll only get $25 for it. But my boyfriend and I have talked about the idea of me being a camgirl, so hopefully something will come of that before I let the plasma center suck the rest of my life out. Not sure how much of a market there is for pudgy camgirls with stretch marks and low self esteem, but I'd rather find out than risk getting the plague from the plasma center.

OVERWEIGHT and SO happy about it!

I am OVERWEIGHT! For the first time in my LIFE! And I am absolutely fucking ecstatic about.

Lemme explain. Remember those stupid fucking BMI charts from health class or the doctor's office? The charts that look at your age, sex, and height only and assign you to a "healthy" weight range based upon these extremely limited variables? No accounting for muscles, for curves, for ethnicity, for irregular body shapes...just a totally cut-and-dry chart. I know calculating your BMI in front of your entire class is a horror shared across the country by chubby boys and girls, who decades later can feel the peculiar texture of classroom chalk held in clammy hands and who can remember being cruelly but undeniably classified as "obese". Well, with a few years and determination, I made it from Obese all the way to Morbidly Obese (a classification that didn't exist back in the day...a little sad that America needed to Supersize the BMI table).

A size LARGE dress
from the thrift store!
And sexy shoes too!

Now, for the first time in my adult life, I am Overweight! Goodbye, Obese! Hello, Overweight! I never ever thought I'd be so thrilled to be called overweight, but if it means that I'm no longer obese, I'll take it!

The gastric sleeve surgery really did wonders for my body. Surgery was 7/11/16 and I went from a highest weight of 317 (closer to 280 at the time of the surgery) to my current 191 pounds. Yep, I'm UNDER 200 pounds! Nerds People on the gastric sleeve message board call it "One-derland" which sounds ridiculously stupid yet I definitely feel a bit like Alice, shrinking in a body I don't fully recognize. It's awesome and I'm not complaining, but it is a strange feeling.

I also lost my job last November as part of a massive lay-off. I'd been there 9 1/2 years and now I REALLY have no idea what I want to do with my life. I have a great boyfriend who works from home (my home) so I have been actively avoiding returning to the real world. I blew my severance, cashed in my 401k and blew through that too (although I did take an incredible solo cruise to Mexico) and the suddenly realized I was TOTALLY FUCKED. I was just spending money like crazy, buying all kinds of ridiculous stuff on Amazon now that I can wear "normal" sizes, and then it seemed like I blinked and every penny was gone.

Now I'm desperately selling off my collections through eBay and Etsy (check out the shops! Adding more stuff every day!). I also set up a locked display case at a local flea market, hoping to sell some of the stuff that's more expensive to ship. One of my friends actually went in today and bought my vinyl album, "Harmonicats" :D Hey, $20 is $20! I tried filing my taxes but it turns out that I screwed myself even more royally by cashing out my 401k—even though they took taxes out, apparently it wasn't enough. So I can't count on a tax return this year. My roof if leaking, I just got a letter from the city that I need to connect my water to the city main and disconnect my sewer by April 12th, and EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. of my bills if past due.

So I'm hoping eBay/Etsy/my flea market shop will help, plus I filed for unemployment (which I should have done MONTHS ago when I was fired) and am just waiting on that debit card. I cashed in all of my stock from the company I worked for (seriously, fuck them.) and that check should be in the mail. Also, I'm donating plasma. It's kinda horrible actually, and I had to stretch the truth a bit to meet the eligibility requirements, and each time I feel really drained and empty and exhausted and kinda like I want to cry. But the initial payments are so high ($50, then $60, back to $50, then $60, then $75 on your 5th draw of the first month) that it's gotta be worth it. After the introductory rates, they go down to $25 and $45 each week, and although I just had my 5th draw I am very aware that my immune system is crashing hard, so I somehow doubt this will be the Big Hustle that's gonna help me pay my bills. On the other hand, it's better than nothing.

And one other good thing about the plasma center, other than the money: they weigh me each time, and every time it's under 200 pounds I wanna take my shirt off and swing it around my head in victory :P Oooh, and here's something that'll mean something to my pudgy comrades: they actually said the beige blood pressure cuff was too big and used the blue one instead! I still can't believe how strange (but good, definitely good) it feels to be "Overweight". That just seems like such a far cry from "Obese". I mean, I bought size 12 Gap jeans. I wear 6" stilettos everywhere because my feet no longer hurt from putting so much weight on such small heels. I wore a bikini in public on the cruise ship—not a fat girl high-wasted bikini but a sexy-ass "suit" that consisted of long band of black material and small black bottoms. And dammit, I looked GOOD! I went kayaking and didn't have to worry about being too fat to row myself back to the beach. I've been hit on by more strangers lately than I ever have been in my life. I took 4 separate airplane flights and did not get a single panicked or disgusted look from the fellow passengers in my rows. I can sit with my feet tucked under me without losing circulation in my legs. I can rest my chin on my knee! How many of you guys thought that was just a myth? Like just a writing device or something that couldn't be physically possible? It IS possible. I am so much more flexible...and I can bend in ways during sex that I never dreamed of...

So yeah, being overweight has its perks. I have a long way to go before my weight is technically "Normal" according to the BMI calculator but, seriously, fuck the entire BMI system.

TL;DR: I'm totally legit broke but almost a normal sized human for the first time ever!

Pureed Food Heaven

**This post was originally from 7/18/2016 or so...I just totally forgot to publish it, and then my life turned into a freakin tire fire and I didn't publish anything else again until...well, now.**

I have never been so happy to eat mush in my entire life.

I'm finally on Week 2 of my gastric sleeve post-op diet, and so progressed to pureed foods yesterday. Thank goodness, because I was (not so) slowly losing my mind on full liquids only.

My mom took me to the store yesterday (I'm still not supposed to drive until I see the doctor for my first follow-up visit on Thursday--they want to make sure my stomach muscles are healed enough to hit the brakes in an emergency, and I should hopefully be off the painkillers by then). I stocked up on all kinds of awesome food to make the meals I'd planned this week. I was panicking a little bit, though, because I have pretty much made up my mind to go from vegetarian to vegan after my pureed food stage, and I realized how much of my cart was animal-based. I bought eggs, fat free sour cream, low fat ricotta, jello, shredded 2% cheddar, yogurt, greek yogurt pops, whey protein drinks, and 1% milk. That's a lot of dairy. To go from that to nothing is, well, a little intimidating.

The other thing holding me back from becoming a vegan is admittedly kinda dumb but I don't know how to get over it. I'm afraid it'll make me even more undateable. That is, less likely to find someone willing to put up with me. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I've already had issues with people (guys more than girls) commenting during the first date that it would be difficult to be with a vegetarian. My ex-boyfriend actually lists it as one of the main reasons we didn't work out. In fact, I asked him about it while we hung out this evening (to watch the first few episodes of Stranger Things, which is SO GOOD! It's shot really well, the music is AWESOME, the lighting and style is super cool, and of course the plots/characters drew me in too). He said that most of his favorite camping meals, dinners to cook at home, and restaurants he loves are all centered on meat. Like, I don't care about that. I even took him to Fogo De Chao which is basically a meat ballet and I didn't bat an eye. But I guess it was just one more thing stacked against me. So what if I become vegan and then REALLY can't find anyone who wants to be with me? I know you're not actually supposed to say this, and you're supposed to have the 'right reasons' to lose weight and shit, but let's be honest: most of the reason I wanted to have gastric surgery and lose weight is so that I'll be hotter and land a good mate. I want to make myself MORE dateable.

Taken a Turn

Yooooooo. It's been awhile.

LOTS has changed.

I feel a little silly writing, actually. But I don't have many (any?) outlets and I'm going through some stuff and could really use a place to lay out my thoughts, recipes, schedule, etc. so here I am.

Quick recap: Super single. Dated several people (guys and girls) after leaving my girlfriend of 8 1/2 years, but we're still best friends and hang out all the time. I ended up buying the house from her, so I live here alone. Well, alone except my chihuahua, my foster minpin, my Maine Coon, and two bearded dragons. So no quite alone. My relationship with my parents hasn't improved, and has actually gotten worse, particularly since my sister had her second kid (this one with the neighbor she cheated on her husband with). I do still get pilonidal cysts but the ichthammol ointment has kept it from ever getting really bad. I went off of Weight Watchers and pretty quickly gained back nearly every ounce I'd lost. Like, shockingly fast. I had one bad weekend in June of 2014 where I got drunk and didn't track, although I was at like 205 pounds and so close to losing 100 full pounds and being under 200 pounds for the first time in my adult life, and the wheels went off until by March of 2015 I was back up to around 280 pounds, and I've hovered there ever since.

Last October, I went to my favorite amusement park for their Halloween event, and was super excited to ride on my favorite roller coasters. Of course, since I gained back so much of the weight I had lost, I was back to always comparing my size to everyone around me, and amusement parks have always held their own particular horror. I felt pretty safe, however, because not only was I with my ex-boyfriend (the employee one) who is a very sizable guy, but I was also with his current girlfriend, a well-known Instagram model famous for her seriously enormous ass.

I was wrong.

I sat behind them in the first roller coaster we came to, and watched with growing horror as the tiny high-school-aged attendant feebly pushed against the bar and told her the bar was not going to click twice. I watched as she struggled to lift herself from the small ride, and I felt the flush creeping up my neck as I began to frantically push my own lap bar into the fat of my stomach to hear the necessary double click. Didn't work. I had to get out too. And THEN...the guy we were with (her boyfriend, who was my ex) proceeded to ride the coaster himself, as we stood on the other side of the tracks, exposed to the awaiting riders, blinking back tears, waiting for his dumb ass to be done. Of course people were staring. I mean, they're waiting in line, nothing to look at until the loaded cars come back to empty and load again, except what's going on in front of them. And in front of them were two fat assed chicks, crying and waiting for their lame escort. Plus, this girl seriously has the fattest ass of any other person I've met in my life. She's gorgeous--lovely face, great hair, tiny waist, thin arms, decent rack--but her ass is like two seals in a circus. Like, bigger than two hams, for sure. Maybe like two duffel bags full of pudding. Anyway oh my god it's super late and I'm rambling. Anyway, it finally happened, I was too fat to ride a ride.

I pretty much immediately called the local bariatric specialists and looked into weight loss surgery for the first time in my life. My close friend had gone through gastric sleeve surgery and went from 330 pounds, wearing clothes that were too big for me, to 175 pounds and a size 6/8. Even though I had totally hated on her while she was first contemplating surgery, she really talked me into it and has been super supportive. The entire time I was on Weight Watchers, I was HUNGRY. The entire time. I just remained hungry. The idea of having surgery that would remove or reduce my hunger sensors was incredibly appealing. So while I've always dismissed weight loss surgery as 'cheating', I started to really consider it.

I ended up going to a seminar, submitting it through insurance, and meeting with a doctor. She basically told me everything that I guess I knew but loved hearing from someone else: that I DO know how to lose weight, I just don't have the tools to keep it off. And that losing weight would really change my life. The surgeon was extremely optimistic and made me forget all of my protestations. So from there, I had six months of supervised weight loss visits, during which time I needed to lose 10 pounds, and I met with the psychiatrist, nutritionist, and everyone else she suggested. After I had gone through the six months of visits, been cleared by the shrink, and met again with the surgeon, they scheduled surgery and I began the waiting game. My surgery was last Monday. So I am officially six days post-op from gastric sleeve surgery!

When I began going to the monthly visits, I had gotten up to 290 pounds (actually 294 I believe). After the six months, I was around 282. When they checked me in to the hospital on Monday, the scale said 270, which was not terribly surprising since I'd been on a clear liquid diet and was so hungry I honestly would have had trouble not eating even meat if it was put in front of my face. When I got home from the hospital on Tuesday, my home scale said 277. I haven't used that scale for a loooong time, so I don't know how accurate it is. But since Tuesday, I've now gotten down to 274 pounds. Three pounds is not a lot, but at least it's not gaining.

Anyway, I'd like to talk about my recovery, complain about my healing process, vicariously plan out meals I'll be able to eat once I can eat again, share victories, and basically get shit off of my chest since I don't really have anyone I can rely on now. Oh, and I wanna talk about how hungry I am.

Because, unbelievably, but maybe predictably honestly if you know my life, it didn't work. The surgery didn't stop my hunger. It works except in the rarest of cases. Well, hello! I'm a rare case. Now, granted, I am still on the liquid diet (which I am being really really good about) and I know I'm still healing and some of it is gas and some is head hunger. I know these things.

But I am still hungry.

Some things never change.

FML: The Pilonidal Edition

I'm sitting here with a heating pad on my ass, ichthammol ointment smeared in my crack, wishing for the sweet release of death...or bursting. 

Yuuup, I have another motherfucking pilonidal cyst.

I'm starting to wonder if they're stress related, or if it's just some cruel cosmic joke to kick me when I'm down.

This one cropped up 2 days ago, so I know I have several days of agony ahead of me. This also happens to be the week my boyfriend dumped me, I miscarried, I blacked out drunk and slept with my ex, I lost my dog, I had to move back in with my other ex since I got dumped, I am dangerously close to spending the money I need to close on the house I'mtrying to buy so I can have a real place of my own, and I found out I'm getting a "promotion" which essentially just means way more work.

And just in case anyone cares, I've gained back almost 40 of the close to 100 pounds I had lost. So this is a tough time for me. Obviously. The pilonidal cyst is the LAST thing I needed right now. 

So...fuck my life. I'm going to go cry myself to sleep. And anyone else suffering with a pilonidal cyst right now: brother or sister, I feel your pain!

She's Come Undone

I've been a bad, bad girl.

And I'm totally paying for it.

I have not really tracked anything since the beginning of June. I tracked RELIGIOUSLY for almost two entire years, never missing a day, and I lost 97 pounds that way.

Now, in the span of around two months, I've undone the entire last year of effort. I gained slowly at first, still making good choices but taking a 'break' from tracking. Then I drank a lot two weeks in a row and still lost, so I decided that maybe drinking wasn't really so bad...so I drank some more...which led to lots of late-night nachos and ice cream...and lots of greasy morning hangover food...and now I'm back up to 226 pounds.

226 doesn't sound that bad to me, actually, under normal circumstances. It's the weight I stayed for most of high school, and I was really proud to get back to 226 after college. Now, though, after being down to 205 and SO CLOSE to hitting 200 pounds for the first time ever...it feels really shitty.

I've really let myself down.

But it's not just my health that I'm destroying right now. I broke up with my girlfriend of almost 9 years, I started dating one of my employees, I then proceeded to sleep with one of my best guy friends and two other coworkers, plus an amputee, and now I'm going on my second OK Cupid date tonight...and I'm sitting here eating chips and guacamole instead of the 94% fat free popcorn I was supposed to have, because my 'boyfriend' (the employee, who I think may be under the impression that we're dating exclusively...since he just dumped the TWO other girls he was seeing...) wanted to walk downtown to get Mexican. What a terrible idea. Terrible ideas all around.

Now my girlfriend (exgirlfriend I guess) wants me to decide if it's over for good or not. I have to move out if we're not getting back together, but she's really trying to make things work. But my employee/boyfriend is also pressuring me to be exclusive, which means I'll have to move out on my own since he lives with his kid and (oh god) wife (they're separated...have been for a long time).

I have no chemistry with my (ex)girlfriend, but our lives are amazing and perfect and supportive and incredible in every way. I have MAD chemistry with my employee/boyfriend but he is ACTUALLY insane and violent and scary and life would be terrible...sexy but terrible...

So I'm going out on these OK Cupid dates, trying to see if there's someone out there I can have chemistry AND compatibility with.

And in the meantime, I'm stress eating like a fucking idiot, I'm binge drinking, and I'm totally and completely neglecting my house, my finances, my family, my work...

You know, if someone came to me with these issues, I would tell them: "Whoa, bitch! Sounds like you need to be alone for awhile. Work on yourself first, then you can think about dating."

But since it's me...well, I'm going full throttle and just hoping I can get my weight back down and find what I'm looking for.

We'll see.

Runaway Train

I hope at least one person reading the title of this post is now singing "Runaway train never goin' back, wrong way on a one way track"...

Man, whatever happened to Soul Asylum? Awesome fucking song.

It's been a weird few weeks of me basically making a fucking mess of my personal life, and it's also been a weird few weeks weight-wise. I hadn't gone a single day without tracking since I started Weight Watchers in August of 2012--even the days that I said I wasn't going to track, I went back and retroactively tracked everything.

Now...I haven't tracked anything for 4 weeks. FOUR WEEKS. At first it was because I drank a shit ton and didn't want to think about it so I called that week a wash and gave myself a break. It was my 10 year college reunion and I didn't want to deal. Plus I made some really bad personal decisions and it was just easier to check out for a few days.

Then the next week was Pride, so I totally overindulged. And also made more horrible personal decisions. Didn't track that week either.

Then...I went on a work trip. Made the worst decision yet. Accompanied by no tracking, too much drinking, etc. I'd been gaining weight (just a tiny bit) for the two weeks prior, but after the work trip I started losing even though I wasn't tracking.

Honestly, I don't know what else to say--I fell in love. With one of my employees. Who's a guy. Yes, I'm in an almost 9 year relationship with my girlfriend.

See? Bad decisions.

So...I'm head over heels, and I've been floating on a cloud for a week now. I have barely even thought about food. I'm on such a high that he's all I think about, he's totally in love with me too, my boss knows and we're straightening stuff out at work, and I'm planning on leaving my girlfriend when we get back from our trip to Denver in two weeks.

Whoa.

I haven't been in love like this since high school, my first love. Who I actually saw last weekend. She's still awesome. Yeah, my personal life is in FUCKING SHAMBLES and it's all my own doing.

So this is the first boy I've ever been in love with. God, I can't believe I wrote that. Never thought I'd be a cheater. Honestly, though, I think I've written before about my lack of sex life. In the past almost 9 years, my girlfriend got me off a total of 6 times. We're just completely sexually incompatible and I thought I could shut off that part of myself...it worked for awhile, but he awoke something in me and, well, he got me off twice in one night. I needed that. I feel sexy for the first time in...well, to be honest, since my first love in high school. So almost 20 years. I'm smaller than I was back then even, and happier than I've ever been. I'm completely addicted to the way he makes me feel.

Plus, I've lost like 10 pounds in the past two weeks. As of today, I'm down to 205 pounds.

That means I've lost a total of 99 pounds.

And I'm about to lose my girlfriend, my house, my dogs, my family, my friends, half of my stuff...and gain a boyfriend...who has a child and a mortgage and...a wife...they're separated (yes, I know for sure, I've met her and anyway I knew they were separated when I hired him two years ago)...oh my god.

Fuck my life.

Runaway train indeed.