My intro, finally :)

November 25, 2002

My name is . I've just recently turned 30 years old. I've been married

to a wonderful man for the past 11.5 years and we have two amazing children that

we adopted from Ukraine in 1999. I was pregnant in 1998 and lost that baby and,

consequently, my fertility decided to leave for a few months. During that time,

we decided to adopt. The month we came to that decision, my fertility returned

but, we knew that some of our children were in Ukraine, waiting for us to go and

get them and bring them home to be a family. So, we continued our adoption

process and returned home December 5, 1999 with the two most beautiful children

on the planet (ok, I could be a bit biased but you can decide for yourselves by

seeing their adorable pictures on my website Now I am pregnant with our

fourth child, due June 26, 2003.

I've had what I like to term as a very long string of bad luck since 1998. I've

been law unto 's law in nearly every way imaginable. Luckily, even though

MANY TIMES I didn't want to, I kept the faith, knowing that it had to get better

for me/us. I'm glad I stuck through it all and I'm glad I've had the

experiences I have. I'd not a change one single, solitary thing (except I'd

like to not hurt the people I hurt during this period of time) because it's made

me who I am today and I'm a dang good person, if I do say so myself :-)

I looked into WLS when I was 250 lbs at BTC. The guy on the other end of the

line told me I wouldn't be able to eat a cookie for, perhaps, 6 months and then

MAYBE just one bite and, perhaps, not even that. Well, honestly, that was it.

That completely turned me off and I knew there was no way I could go throughout

my life being unable to eat a cookie. (Call me shallow, call me crazy, call me

whatever. I call it realistic. Deprivation never worked for me before, I knew

there was no way it was going to work then -- or now.)

Fast forward to about 8 years and 230 lbs. more later. At my highest weight,

480 lbs., an online friend of mine decided to get WLS. I was a little freaked

for her and discouraged her, somewhat. After I saw her success, however, I

figured " if she can do it, so can I " so, I started the paperwork process and on

September 27, 2000, I had an open RNY in Dayton, OH with Dr. Clarey.

She was fabulous. I had some complications due to the closing of my stoma,

dehydration and malnutrition. My stoma was re-opened a total of 6 times due to

the fact I scar internally very badly (had no idea because I had never had

invasive internal surgery such as that previously). I was hospitalized several

times for dehydration and about 9 months out, I finally got my body re-hydrated.

It was back into the frying pan for me with a panniculectomy.

I won't go into the details of the plastic surgery here-- the full story is on

my website. Suffice it to say, I knocked on death's door far more times than I

care to recall. Due to the major mishaps in surgery, I took copious amounts of

painkillers and became addicted to them. When I could no longer get them

legally (or come up with a believable lie to the doctor to get them!!!), I, once

again, switched my addiction. This time it was alcohol. To say I drank heavily

is putting it mildly. (That complete story is also on my website.) I entered

into detox/rehab in August of this year and I have been sober for 110 days!

My highest weight was 480 lbs. My lowest weight is my current weight, 198 lbs.

During the course of my plastic surgeries, they removed a total of 23 lbs. of

skin and fat. My highest size was as big as I could get it, as much as it would

stretch. My current size is approximately a 14/16 pant and a medium/large top.

If I never lose another pound, that's completely ok with me. I love the

normalcy in my life as it relates to food. I love that I can approach food in

the way a " normal " person does. I love that I no longer obsess about food, the

content of food, when I will eat, what I will eat, etc. Don't get me wrong, I

still love food-- I have a complete love affair with it. I love the way it

looks, the way it smells, the way it tastes, the way it feels in my mouth, etc.

However, I am able to approach it much differently than I did when I was

morbidly obese.

I will NEVER, EVER forget where I came from. In my head, that 480 lbs. girl

forever lurks, certain that she's still the largest person to ever walk the face

of the earth. Ahhh, the head job morbid obesity does on one :-)

Warmly,

www.brandiland.com

highest weight: 480 lbs./73 BMI

weight on day of surgery: 459 lbs/69.8 BMI

current weight: 198 lbs./30.1 BMI

total weight loss: 282 lbs, 25 months post-op

November 25, 2002

My intro, finally

hi brandy, i can totaly relate to your story, if i didn't know better i would

have thought it was me talking.And i to will never forget where i cam from.

sandy

> My name is . I've just recently turned 30 years old. I've been married