1/5/03

I take this big step in about 5 weeks.  For the most part, I am very comfortable with my decision.  I have gotten to the point in life where everything is hard.  I took a recent business trip and was miserable throughout the whole flight.  I wake up all night long feeling like I need to pee, then get to the bathroom and just have to go a little.  The pressure on my bladder is tremendous.  My joints ache constantly and I wake up in the middle of the night. 

Although I have had a pretty healthy body image, lately I am more aware of how big I am and how much the media focuses on skinny women.  I can't imagine what it would be like.

Well, I am tired, so calling it a night. 

1/6/03 11:37 PM
I should be asleep right now.  I am tired enough, I sure didn't get enough sleep last night and I have an early morning tomorrow.  But something is weighing (no pun intended) heavy on my mind and I can't sleep.   It's about a conversation I had today with a co-worker regarding some help I am going to need when I am out on LOA.  I wanted her to watch over a project for me while I am gone.  She, jokingly, stated, "I can't, I have too much to do..."   I said, "Well, I helped you out when you were on LOA."  She replied back "Yes, but yours in voluntary".  Hmm... that bothered me..  how could she think this was totally voluntary.   She knows I struggled with the decision.  She is not only a co-worker but a close friend.  Does she not remember any of our conversations about how hard life is, how much pain I am in all the time, how I have struggled, what a struggle life is, just to move from one place to another, choose an outfit, fit in a seat.  I feel that this is my last option, I am out of choices and without this surgery, my obesity will someday kill me.   Unfortunately, I said back to her that her surgery was optional too, and it really wasn't and it (a hysterectomy on a 33 year old) was very hard for her to deal with and caused her a lot of pain.  I hurt her feelings.  I don't know why I lashed out that way.  Or at least I didn't know why until I was lying here in bed trying to sleep.  I am so uptight about teasing, I don't take it well, even from good friends.  Guess this comes from a childhood of teasing about weight..  ya think the two could be related?  No one gets that, they think I should have tougher skin.  Well, I don't, I just don't.  Things hurt me that shouldn't hurt, that don't hurt other people.   Only someone who has walked in my, our, shoes could understand.  Maybe I have vented enough to sleep.

1/13/03
I feel like a train wreck.   Emotions coming out of nowhere, lots of carnage and destruction, leaving no survivors in its wake.   I am raw and hurt at every little thing.  I just had to take a little trip out to my car in the middle of my work day so I could have a little cry.   I am not only very sensitive, but I have also become insensitive of other people.  I think I have lost a friend, and that hurts.   She does not want to talk to me about it, told me that the issue is dead.   So what can I do.  I have already apologized.

Seems like everything is going wrong today.  I dont know if its just that I am taking everything too seriously so that even small things bother me, or if its just a bad day.   Who knows, I just want it to be over.

I wonder when the emotions are going to settle down.

I was always a chubby child.  Seems like every little subdivision of our family has a chubby one.  Not fat per se, but definitely bigger than other children.   My sister was always a skinny little thing, had to work to gain weight.  Whats up with that?  It wasnt until I hit puberty that I really put on the weight, I think I wore a size 18 in 7th grade and was already shopping in specialty stores.  And let me tell you, the selection for plus size women was just not that great back then.  

As for my diet history, I think all I need to say is that as a child my mom was a weight watchers counselor.  Yep, that's right, those wonderful people who help you restrict your calories and focus on food.  I know my mom loved me, but I know she couldnt deal with being a counselor for Weight Watchers and having a chubby child.   So the whole family was almost always on a diet.  We never had anything enjoyable to eat.  My sister and I resorted to stealing money and going to the grocery store on the way to school to buy snacks.  I remember one of my friends asking me, why it was that I always had the junk food all on the same day.  Then other days it was just my apple and tuna sandwich.  She mentioned that if I just took a little each day it would last longer.  No kidding.  But that wasnt an option for me.   There was no where to store it.  I even broke the freezer once by hiding ice cream behind the ice bin.   I was desperate for sweets, mixing sugar and butter and eating that, sometimes just eating spoonfuls of miracle whip.   One of my treats was taking a corn tortilla, spreading it with miracle whip and heating it up for a few seconds in the microwave.   It sounds disgusting now.  I cant imagine enjoying it.

I was the one who had to sign up for sports teams.  My sister wanted to play soccer.  She couldn't.  I had to.   What kind of crazy logic is that.   I was forced to join a swim team.   I was a fast swimmer, but it didn't matter.  I hated it.

I know I came out of the shoot with poor self-esteem, and all the years didn't add anything being last to be picked for a team, never being selected for class president, not wearing the fashionable clothes, the list goes on and on. 

1/25/03

Today I experienced a disappointment, not the first one of this kind.   I had plans with a friend to go out to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants.  One of those, last meal restaurants.  We talked about it on Friday and I was supposed to be at her house at 4:30.   Well this morning, I was at a stamping party, then came home.  Ive been really tired because I am getting over a sinus infection and not sleeping well.   I had a little time to relax, then get ready to go to her house.  She lives about 20-25 minutes away.   I get to her house and shes not there.   No one is there except one of her brothers and he said that no one has been there for a while and he doesnt know where they are, that no one is answering the cell phones or anything.  So I drive around her town for a bit, thinking maybe shell be home soon.   Call to her house a few times, but shes not there.   Then give up and come home.   I wasted 2 hours.   2 hours of my life.  Plus the time I spent getting ready.   I would rather have stayed home and rested.  I wish she had just called me to cancel.   Its 10 PM now, we were supposed to meet at 4:30.  And she hasnt even called.

So heres what really strikes me.  This is not the first time this friend has done something like this.  Not to this extreme but similar, forgetting plans, etc.   And shes not the only friend I have like this.   I have this famine perspective when it comes to friends.  I let them treat me like sh** sometimes.  I should have more respect for myself.  But I am afraid of losing friends, that one day, I might be without any friends in my life.  Thats a horrible feeling, to be alone.  I know, I have been there before.  

When I started high school, I went from public education to catholic high school.  I had a really hard time adjusting and it took several years to find friends.  Even then, they werent the friends that I had deep relationships with.   When I went away to college, I made friends with my roommates but my third year I again found myself alone, trying to make friends and find my way.  This happened several more times throughout the course of my life as I moved to new places, etc.  Plus, I had bipolar disorder and wasnt diagnosed and treated until 1993 when I was 25, so during the years prior, if I was going through a depression, I could get a little overwhelming.  But I know I am not that person anymore.  People describe me as dynamic, magnetic, personable, loyal, caring.   Why do I let people treat me this way.  The whole things sucks and has put me in a foul mood.  

My surgery date has changed, it's now February 10th, one day sooner.  My Pre-op is scheduled for the 4th of February and I see my PCP on the 6th for the final clearing that my surgeon requires.   I was a bit worried because I caught a cold and it then turned into a sinus infection, but I am on antibiotics now and getting better.   Also, I read something about the H Pylori and got all stressed about that.   I was tested for that in 1998 because my doctor thought I had an ulcer.  I tested positive and he put me on antibiotics, Flagyl and Biaxin and some pepto bismol too.  Well, I had a horrible reaction within 20 minutes of taking my first dose of antibiotics.  Turned out I was allergic to both of them.   My whole face swelled up and hives were quickly moving down my neck and chest.   My heart rate was up, my hands were clammy.   Ugh.   Every treatment available uses one of the 6 antibiotic families that I am allergic too, so no treatment for me.  He sent me to a Gastro who scoped me and pronounced me fine.  But I worry that they'll test and find it and cancel.  I am over it now, nothing I can do about it if they do.  I called and they said they only do a CBC on the blood test, so hopefully everything will go well. 

1/26/03

I have had a day of hibernation, just taking it easy and I have enjoyed every minute of it.   I have a ton of emotions and feelings surrounding my boyfriend right now, but I just dont have the energy to get into it.  What I did want to write about is this funny story that happened last week at work.  I was on my way out to my car at the end of the day, I was sick so going home from work early to rest.  This woman that I know in passing (she works in another department where I have some friends..  she has fingernails about 6 inches long and they just totally freak me out, they are so gross to me, that when I see her in the hall I do my best not to run into her) cornered me in the parking lot.  She said that she heard (probably overheard) that I was having the surgery and I said yes I am.  I havent been keeping a secret of it so it wasnt that big of a deal but really who wants stories about themselves floating around the office.  Oh well.   So then she said, I am surprised you got it approved.   I asked her what she meant.  She said, you dont look big enough.  Hello!  I am 5' 5" and I weigh 360 pounds.  How big does she think someone has to be to qualify.   Made me laugh as I walked to my car.  Was she just saying it to be nice?  Who knows, who cares.