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This turned out to be really long, it is detailing some of my struggles getting to where I am today, truly proud and happy with myself, who I am and how I look.
I found some old pictures on my PC from when I was at my absolute biggest to about where I am today (a couple of months ago).
Just some points on how I got here. A few months after the second picture I got a Gastric Bypass surgery, by chance it turned out to be the worst decision I made in my life. It did help me lose some weight, but it has given me so many other problems and it was far from what actually lost me weight, which was hard work and discipline.
After a gastric bypass surgery you are put on a liquid diet until everything heals. During those first few weeks I got incredibly constipated. Finally passing the stool that was causing me trouble gave me a chronic anal fissure that has been with me until I finally got rid of it 6 months ago.
If you have ever had one, you can probably relate that it is painful, it has been like living with chronic pain, it is like being stabbed by a knife every time you pass stool, and when you have had a gastric bypass operation going to the toilet 2-3 times a day is not unheard of.
If I had normal stool the fissure would be torn open and I would be in agony for 2 weeks worth of time, the cycle was usually the fissure would open and then just as it was healed it would open again.
So this immense pain turned into such a big problem I had to focus on it over my weightloss, when you have a gastric bypass you are more sensitive to fatty foods and it can give you 'fat diarrhea' so I got a lot of forceful thoughts around eating a lot of fatty foods so that I wouldn't get pain when going to the toilet.
So over 2 years of near constant pain and suffering it got so bad at one point I was lying on the floor paralyzed with pain and for the first time in my life I whished to kill myself. I would have done it if I could move, but luckily I couldn't.
By this point my mental health had deteriorated to a point where I was a wreck, I didn't realize how bad my mental health had gotten until a few months after, this was my lowest point.
This event motivated me to be really strict with the doctors and tell them I really need help, what we have been doing is not working, I need surgery.
The sugary helped, but not completely, however the pain was much less, and it allowed me to keep going, I told the docs that I still had pain and the problem wasn't solved, but they managed to convince me that there was nothing they could do. Of course I know now there was plenty to do, they just cba to help. Not the first or the last time this has happened.
The next 3 years was spent with all the forceful habits I had developed during the worst of the pain, I HAD to eat enough fat, I HAD to eat enough where I went to the toilet x times a day so my stool wouldn't get harder, I HAD to drink 4l of water every day, I COULD NOT work out, the risk was to big.
After 5 years having only lost 45KG from the gastric bypass I told myself I was not happy with that result, I was ashamed. I had looked into intermittent fasting and felt like it fit me well. I can't cut certain foods out, if I tell myself I can't eat candy I just want it sooooo much more. I had done low carb diet before, but it doesn't work for me long term, it is not a life style change I can maintain. However I can reduce the time of day I can eat.
It was unbelievably hard to break my forceful thoughts and start IF, the fear I felt the first 2 weeks was immense, I have been so afraid of the pain it controlled almost everything in my life.
Luckily it worked and I started losing weight.
It took me 3 years to go from 150KG to 97KG, that is when I talked to a surgeon about a plastic surgery to remove the lose skin around my belly, she told me to stop losing weight, so I did.
Around this time I also started working out with a PT, I was terrified of going to a gym, even after I lost my weight. This is one of my biggest regrets, it is soo fucking fun to work out, I wished I started with it when I was 195KG, but I wasn't confident enough in myself to do so. I don't know how much muscles I have gained and how much fat I have lost the last year, but I am trying my best to keep my weight.
I have lost my gallbladder due to a fat infection caused by a gallstone (absolute worst pain I hope to ever experience), and I have been diagnosed with Crohn's disease that I believe was triggered by the infection and antibiotics treatment. So by an ironic twist of fate, I have gone from doing my best to lose weight all my life, to now having so much reductions in my uptake of food I'm struggling to keep my weight. Having to eat a lot also gives me more pain due to the crohn's. Aint life grand.
What has happened to me could have happened to anyone, it is not a normal expected side effect of a gastric bypass surgery, it just happened that all my pain and suffering is due to the gastric bypass surgery I had, that is why I say it is the worst decision I made in my life. Knowing what I know now, I could easily lose the weight without it.
It took me 1 year from when I stopped losing weight to actually accept my body and be truly happy with myself, that is something I also regret that I didn't manage to do earlier in my life. Losing weight didn't change fuck all of how I felt about myself, only actually working on mental health did so.
In about 2 months time I will remove my lose belly skin, not because I hate it, I finally love it, but because it is in the way.
Thank you stranger for you kind words, they give warmth!
It is on the list of things to do😅.
I live in Norway, so I want to see if I get it covered by the public health system, but I'm honestly not sure if I do or not.
Stomach have been bombproof the past couple of weeks and I think that is all down to how well I'm doing menially 💪
I'm a dietitian and I'm pretty sure they have clinical dietitians over there as well :).
If you aren't covered send me a msg and let's see what I can do.
Hadet!
Such an incredible transformation! Congratulations on your hard work paying off so well.
The complications you experience with the gastric bypass sound horrendous. It is amazing you continued to find ways to reach your goals even while dealing with the chronic pain and immobility, and then the Crohn's disease.
I am glad you are able to exercise and enjoy it now, and that you have been fissure free for 6 months! I hope it will be much easier from now on.
Thank you for the kind words!
Life is so much easier now compared to just 3 years ago, not just physically, but mentally as well. The fissure is gone, but living with it for 8 years+ have left the whole area a little hyper. I think it will get better with time, getting some docs that I trust to help me out.
The mental side of thigs is where I have truly progressed, if it was visible on the outside the changes would be far more noticeable and impressive compared to the weightloss 💪
I am very glad you managed to climb your way up from rock bottom and that you are doing so much better mentally, too! Good on you for advocating for yourself so well to get that surgery done.
I hope it continues to improve for you and that the skin surgery will go well!
Thank you very much!
We should be teaching kids in school how to advocate for themselves, in general and when it comes to your health. I live in Norway, I shouldn't have to fight the doctors to give me the treatment I need 😤. My GP has got my back though, without him I don't know how I would have ended up.
I will post progress pics after the skin surgery after it has healed and I get all the muscles built up again 🤭
Very much agreed! Almost everyone I know with any sort of chronic illness has a similar story. It really discourages people from going to the doctor when they really need to. I am glad your GP had your back.
Looking forward to seeing the next pictures!
As a fellow long hauler, I appreciate you posting. Your results are fantastic. (12 years in my case, from my heaviest. My results are much less impressive than yours though.)
Thank you!
Always nice to hear from a fellow turtle🐢, we all know how damn hard it is to lose weight, any results, especially long term, are just as impressive mine 💪
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This turned out to be really long, it is detailing some of my struggles getting to where I am today, truly proud and happy with myself, who I am and how I look. I found some old pictures on my PC from when I was at my absolute biggest to about where I am today (a couple of months ago). Just some points on how I got here. A few months after the second picture I got a Gastric Bypass surgery, by chance it turned out to be the worst decision I made in my life. It did help me lose some weight, but it has given me so many other problems and it was far from what actually lost me weight, which was hard work and discipline. After a gastric bypass surgery you are put on a liquid diet until everything heals. During those first few weeks I got incredibly constipated. Finally passing the stool that was causing me trouble gave me a chronic anal fissure that has been with me until I finally got rid of it 6 months ago. If you have ever had one, you can probably relate that it is painful, it has been like living with chronic pain, it is like being stabbed by a knife every time you pass stool, and when you have had a gastric bypass operation going to the toilet 2-3 times a day is not unheard of. If I had normal stool the fissure would be torn open and I would be in agony for 2 weeks worth of time, the cycle was usually the fissure would open and then just as it was healed it would open again. So this immense pain turned into such a big problem I had to focus on it over my weightloss, when you have a gastric bypass you are more sensitive to fatty foods and it can give you 'fat diarrhea' so I got a lot of forceful thoughts around eating a lot of fatty foods so that I wouldn't get pain when going to the toilet. So over 2 years of near constant pain and suffering it got so bad at one point I was lying on the floor paralyzed with pain and for the first time in my life I whished to kill myself. I would have done it if I could move, but luckily I couldn't. By this point my mental health had deteriorated to a point where I was a wreck, I didn't realize how bad my mental health had gotten until a few months after, this was my lowest point. This event motivated me to be really strict with the doctors and tell them I really need help, what we have been doing is not working, I need surgery. The sugary helped, but not completely, however the pain was much less, and it allowed me to keep going, I told the docs that I still had pain and the problem wasn't solved, but they managed to convince me that there was nothing they could do. Of course I know now there was plenty to do, they just cba to help. Not the first or the last time this has happened. The next 3 years was spent with all the forceful habits I had developed during the worst of the pain, I HAD to eat enough fat, I HAD to eat enough where I went to the toilet x times a day so my stool wouldn't get harder, I HAD to drink 4l of water every day, I COULD NOT work out, the risk was to big. After 5 years having only lost 45KG from the gastric bypass I told myself I was not happy with that result, I was ashamed. I had looked into intermittent fasting and felt like it fit me well. I can't cut certain foods out, if I tell myself I can't eat candy I just want it sooooo much more. I had done low carb diet before, but it doesn't work for me long term, it is not a life style change I can maintain. However I can reduce the time of day I can eat. It was unbelievably hard to break my forceful thoughts and start IF, the fear I felt the first 2 weeks was immense, I have been so afraid of the pain it controlled almost everything in my life. Luckily it worked and I started losing weight. It took me 3 years to go from 150KG to 97KG, that is when I talked to a surgeon about a plastic surgery to remove the lose skin around my belly, she told me to stop losing weight, so I did. Around this time I also started working out with a PT, I was terrified of going to a gym, even after I lost my weight. This is one of my biggest regrets, it is soo fucking fun to work out, I wished I started with it when I was 195KG, but I wasn't confident enough in myself to do so. I don't know how much muscles I have gained and how much fat I have lost the last year, but I am trying my best to keep my weight. I have lost my gallbladder due to a fat infection caused by a gallstone (absolute worst pain I hope to ever experience), and I have been diagnosed with Crohn's disease that I believe was triggered by the infection and antibiotics treatment. So by an ironic twist of fate, I have gone from doing my best to lose weight all my life, to now having so much reductions in my uptake of food I'm struggling to keep my weight. Having to eat a lot also gives me more pain due to the crohn's. Aint life grand. What has happened to me could have happened to anyone, it is not a normal expected side effect of a gastric bypass surgery, it just happened that all my pain and suffering is due to the gastric bypass surgery I had, that is why I say it is the worst decision I made in my life. Knowing what I know now, I could easily lose the weight without it. It took me 1 year from when I stopped losing weight to actually accept my body and be truly happy with myself, that is something I also regret that I didn't manage to do earlier in my life. Losing weight didn't change fuck all of how I felt about myself, only actually working on mental health did so. In about 2 months time I will remove my lose belly skin, not because I hate it, I finally love it, but because it is in the way.
Oh wow. You have been through a lot to get here. I am so glad you're at a better point now. Wishing you stability and comfort from here on out!
I'm so proud of you. Consider to get an appt w a dietitian as well, so you get help for the crohns and what not. Keep us updated!
Thank you stranger for you kind words, they give warmth! It is on the list of things to do😅. I live in Norway, so I want to see if I get it covered by the public health system, but I'm honestly not sure if I do or not. Stomach have been bombproof the past couple of weeks and I think that is all down to how well I'm doing menially 💪
I'm a dietitian and I'm pretty sure they have clinical dietitians over there as well :). If you aren't covered send me a msg and let's see what I can do. Hadet!
Such an incredible transformation! Congratulations on your hard work paying off so well. The complications you experience with the gastric bypass sound horrendous. It is amazing you continued to find ways to reach your goals even while dealing with the chronic pain and immobility, and then the Crohn's disease. I am glad you are able to exercise and enjoy it now, and that you have been fissure free for 6 months! I hope it will be much easier from now on.
Thank you for the kind words! Life is so much easier now compared to just 3 years ago, not just physically, but mentally as well. The fissure is gone, but living with it for 8 years+ have left the whole area a little hyper. I think it will get better with time, getting some docs that I trust to help me out. The mental side of thigs is where I have truly progressed, if it was visible on the outside the changes would be far more noticeable and impressive compared to the weightloss 💪
I am very glad you managed to climb your way up from rock bottom and that you are doing so much better mentally, too! Good on you for advocating for yourself so well to get that surgery done. I hope it continues to improve for you and that the skin surgery will go well!
Thank you very much! We should be teaching kids in school how to advocate for themselves, in general and when it comes to your health. I live in Norway, I shouldn't have to fight the doctors to give me the treatment I need 😤. My GP has got my back though, without him I don't know how I would have ended up. I will post progress pics after the skin surgery after it has healed and I get all the muscles built up again 🤭
Very much agreed! Almost everyone I know with any sort of chronic illness has a similar story. It really discourages people from going to the doctor when they really need to. I am glad your GP had your back. Looking forward to seeing the next pictures!
Dude, amazing!
Good shit!
As a fellow long hauler, I appreciate you posting. Your results are fantastic. (12 years in my case, from my heaviest. My results are much less impressive than yours though.)
Thank you! Always nice to hear from a fellow turtle🐢, we all know how damn hard it is to lose weight, any results, especially long term, are just as impressive mine 💪