The alleged "easy way out"

**DISCLAIMER!! EVERYONE IS ENTITLED TO THEIR OPINIONS... THIS IS MINE**.

... i mean.. everyone knows I love a good debate ;)

Alright.  This is going to be my response to a blog that was recently brought to my attention.  I am part of a WLS group on Facebook that is filled with amazing girls (and 2 boys!) from all over the country who all have had or are about to have some sort of WLS. (WLS= Weight Loss Surgery).  Recently one of them shared a link to a blog post that you can read here.

So. Okay.  I'm going to Quentin Tarantino this and start at the end and work my way back to the top.   First of all...  I do take personal offense to this because I am one of these "self-indulgent, overweight, spineless jellyfish" because accused of "taking the easy way out".

While I take a lot of pride in my choice of having WLS, it took me FIVE years to really make the decision.  I had been able to lose weight on my own.  Hell, in 2007-2008 I lost 70+ pounds just from exercising and eating right and seeing a nutritionist.   It was hard as hell, but I did it without surgery.  Even before my surgery, I had to lose the 50lbs so my surgeon could do the surgery safely, and I did that in less than 6 months.

Let me preface what I'm about to say with this:
1.  I LOVE my RNY.  It was the best decision I ever made and I am PROUD to say that I took my life into my own hands and I saved my own life.
2. I have ALWAYS been proud of my body and who I was regardless of my weight because I'm just a pretty kickass person. (see... full of myself ;) )

... with that said...  It took me MONTHS to admit to my friends that I want to have this.  I had my decision made for months before I decided to tell my friends.  Why you ask?

IT WAS EMBARRASSING!! I can't believe I had eaten myself to 346 pounds and let my bad terrible habits get that far off course.  I could be as confident as I wanted.  I was like the guy with the tiny penis who overcompensates with the giant house or big truck.   I was ashamed I had let myself get up that high on the scale and it made me sick. 

So telling my friends... and then making it totally public between telling everyone who would stand still long enough, or writing a blog about it... was a big deal for me.  And I have only gotten a handful of negative or not so supportive comments regarding it.  Everyone else was super proud of me and that helped me be proud of me.

So thats first off.

"My weight has yo-yoed during the years. I've been normal weight, thick, chubby, and obese. When I was at my heaviest, 250 pounds, I did the unthinkable. I cut my calories to less than 500 per day and began exercising two hours daily. Guess what? I also lost weight as if I had a pact with "he who must not be named." (Oh, wait, that's Lord Voldemoort; I mean the other guy.)

It was difficult, especially at first. But every day I -- and my will -- grew stronger. And after three months (in which I lost 80 pounds), I was very, very proud of myself."
- Weight Loss Surgery Is the Easy Way Out
By Ily Goyanes

Okay.  Well hats off to you for losing the 80lbs, my fellow yo-yo dieter.  Mazel tov.   However.. you failed to mention if it stayed off once you go back to eating a normal, healthy 1200 calorie diet.  Thats the hardest part... maintaining your weight loss.  Whether it was with WLS or without.

After you diet a certain way for a few months, or even just a few weeks... and you had kickass results with it... your body eventually catches up with you and you will plateau. Or hit a stall. Its frustrating.  It sucks.  And its because you're DIETING.  Not changing your lifestyle.

After years ... YEARS... of being on crash diets, battling eating disorders like anorexia(NOS) and bulimia(NOS), and having such issues with food like I did... I realized that 'diet' (as a verb) is LITERALLY a four letter word.  Diets don't work.  Crash diets don't work.  Not for long term results anyway.

If you want to see changes in your body and on the scale... you need to have a lifestyle change. You have to change the way you live your life in order to have a successful weight loss and maintain that weight loss.  And to me, WLS was just another tool that helped me change my lifestyle.  Like Eggface says... you need to be able to work on your head... The why's of why you got fat... in order to be successful with any type of WLS.  Same thing applies just for changing your lifestyle.

I know I didn't get fat JUST because I could eat an entire sleeve of oreos.  I know it wasn't just because of the 3 bagels I could eat in one sitting.  I got fat because food was a filler for me.  Like I've said before.. food and I were besties. Food was filling a void for me.  That void was happiness.  and sadness.  and boredom.

I grew up an only child.  I was also a latchkey kid.  Now I'm not saying if I had siblings or that if my parents were there to say 'No'... I wouldn't have gotten fat.  I'm not saying that at all.  I'm saying those are the things that caused those emotions for me that propelled me to find a friend in food.

Getting my WLS was saying a permanent good bye to one of my best friends.  I know that sounds pathetic and you might want to commit me to a place that can offer me a nice padded room and a lovey, new fall fashion statement straight jacket... but it was true.  Food was one of the best friends I ever had.  Little did I really know is that we were really frenemies... but isn't that the case with *any* frenemy really?

"How can I be proud of someone who takes the easy route? Someone who decides that having a surgeon cut them open and rearrange or modify their insides is easier than eating less and exercising more? It's just lazy."
-  Weight Loss Surgery Is the Easy Way Out By Ily Goyanes

OKAY.  So this is the statement in the blog in which the author proves he/she knows NOTHING about bariatric surgery.

Like I've mentioned before... my gastric bypass... is a TOOL.  Yeah.. my pouch prevents me from binge eating... but it doesn't prevent me from just filling it with oreos or cheese doodles.

I STILL have to make the right decisions of what I'm going to fill it with.  Its not like when I stand in front of my pantry and stare at the oreos a hand comes out of my stomach and bitch slaps me away from them.  (THAT WOULD BE AWESOME AND TOTALLY AN AWESOME SCI-FI MOVIE THOUGH!) No.  There is no hand.  There is HOWEVER a little voice.. okay, not so little voice, because its my voice, and I have a loud mouth.. inside my head thats like NO STOP WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING YOU'RE GOING TO RUIN EVERYTHING! EVERYTHING WILL BE RUEENED!

I could eat whatever I want.  Is there a possibility things will make me sick? Absolutely. So I don't eat them.  I've also made the choice to just cut out breads, rices, pastas and potatoes for the most part...because carbs and I were awesome friends and thats one of the reasons that got me in trouble in the first place. So thats part of my LIFESTYLE CHANGE.  Its my CHOICE.  I still choose what I put into my pouch.  Now.. I just make better choices. And yes.  I know I could have just done that in the first place or continued to do what I was doing on my pre-op diet... I still would have lost weight.  I'm aware of this.  But after so many failed attempts of not losing the weight I wanted to lose, or gaining it back.  I wanted something a little more permanent.  I needed that tool to help me live my life before I died at age 30 of a heart attack because I had one cheeseburger too many. 

And let me tell you something.  The eating thing... is not easy. At all.  9 times out of 10, if a person is large enough to have had WLS... they have issues with food.  Some sort of issues.  And once again... I'll reiterate myself... I went from one extreme relationship with food... to the other.  For WLS to be successful, we NEED to get our protein.  We NEED to eat.  Do you know what its like to sit down and force yourself to eat when your cell phone alarm goes off REMINDING you to eat because the nerves that sends the hunger hormone signals up to your brain have been severed and might not ever grow back.

IT SUCKS! 

And lazy?  oh bitch please.  before I broke my toe (yeah, I did that) I had just started my Krav Maga classes and I was starting the C25K program.  I was NOT lazy.  Not at all.  So bite me, lazy.

"People applaud their weight loss and congratulate them on how thin they've become and how good they look.

Not I.

I don't like cheating and I don't like short cuts, especially (at least) when it comes to such a big thing (pun totally intended)."- Weight Loss Surgery Is the Easy Way Out By Ily Goyanes

Okay.. Well first of all.. that's just rude.  Don't be hatin'. That's all I'm saying.  Even when people I seriously dislike have lost weight, regardless of how they did it, or how jealous I am, I will always congratulate them... because I know how hard it is. and then yes, maybe I will mutter 'skinny bitch' or something like that because I am a girl, and jealousy will always rear its ugly green head, whatever. I'm human. sue me.  But I will ALWAYS congratulate someone on their weight loss.  Thats my point.  Regardless.  (disclaimer: unless I know they're heading to an eating disorder and then I'll be like.. YOU LOOK GREAT AND STOP LOSING WEIGHT RIGHT NOW... because that has happened).

And about the short cuts or the cheating.  Well.  I'm going to follow suit of the people who have left comments and point out that this person is not taking into consideration of all the shortcuts and cheating ways people take and do everyday without even realizing it.

Sending e-mails.  Or even snail mail.  Remember the pony express we learned about in school?

Yeah... So when you order stuff online -oh, short cut! now you don't have to even leave your house to order clothes or food or anything... and it gets shipped, or UPSed or FEDEXed to your house....

SHORT CUT! Think about all those poor ponies out of work.  And in this economy, sheesh!.

Cars!  Are you walking to work? Doubt it.  You're driving.  Short cut!

And ... Well.. if this author is a professional blogger, they might not even have to leave their house to work.. because of the AWESOME INVENTION OF THE COMPUTER! Another short cut!

Whatever happened to etching things in stone or drawing pictures on the wall to communicate?

Yeah.  Thats what I thought.  I mean... that guy that carved the 10 commandments into the stone didn't have a pen.  Or even a pencil.  HE CARVED THAT SHIT!  what if he made a spelling error? There's no backspace button when its a CARVING IN STONE!


So, Author... my point is... until you're ready to get rid of ALL of your short cuts... kindly shut up.

Don't write about something you clearly know nothing about.

That would be like me writing a blog about ... peeing standing up. or how to balance a check book. Or being awesome ... oh no. wait.  That one I could write about.  ;)


Oh.  One last thing:

"And if you're too lazy to cut calories and exercise, you don't deserve to be skinny."
-- Weight Loss Surgery Is the Easy Way Out By Ily Goyanes

 Really now?  Kiss my ever shrinking ass.