In Our Own Words

My name is K and I live in Penticton, B.C. I am 50 years old and am so very tired of being tired. I was heavy as a child and then in my teens lost a lot of that baby fat. Funny how I still had the low self esteem years of being teased has engrained into my spirit. I had two children and found it difficult to lose all the pregnancy weight. Diet after diet proved to be only a quick fix with a relapse that ended with more weight gain. I would lose 60 pounds and then gain back 80; I then would lose 90 pounds and gain 130. Throughout this I lost my gallbladder. 
 

I suffer from high blood pressure, knees that are wearing out and the beginnings of hip problems where I am halted from walking too far or too fast. I need the use of a shopping cart when I go shopping just so that I have some support to take a load off. Pain is with me constantly. The doctor tells me that almost all of my problems are weight-related and he knows what diets I have tried and failed at.

I do not work out of the home now. Who would hire me? I am so big now that I find excuses not to go out and socialize except for a few people. So yes, I believe there is a depression setting in. I try my best to be positive and always put a smile on my face. It doesn’t always work. I have in the past few years lost two of my siblings, one in a motorcycle accident and one with a brain aneurysm. I, once the middle child, am now the oldest. My fear is that I will be next unless I get this surgery soon. I am too young to die. I have too much to live for. I need help. I need this surgery.

I have changed my eating patterns and am trying to get my exercise in. I have done my research and know that with the surgery there are risks and that the surgery is a tool that I will need to work with it to make it a success. I know I can do this but with the waitlists, every day is one more day that I have to struggle. I see this surgery as a lifeline not as a magic bullet, but a chance to make the rest of my life more rewarding and productive, free of pain and medications. I am waiting my turn. I just wish it would hurry up (it is such a long wait).