Revisions, out of town Surgeons and family

[Guest guest]

I'm having a revison next month in Washington with Dr. Oh and I'm so

excited I can hardly stand it. I have a few questions thought and I was

wondering what insights some of you wise ones can share with me.

My sister is freaking out. I just told her last night that I'm going.

I tried to talk to her this summer when I first started looking into a

revision, (my first surgery was a RNY proximal and weighing almost 350

at the time, I only lost 70 pounds and that was in the first few months

following surgery) but the first thing out of her mouth at the time was

something like this:

" You know what your problem is? You didn't exercise like you were

supposed to. "

I was devastated for two years that I failed after my surgery to get to

a normal or even close to normal weight and my family didn't help.

Well, I'm almost 50 years old, what do I want from them anyway? They

have beautiful families, are all successful and appear to be happy. I'm

the one who has the problem.....blah blah blah....I'm sure a lot of you

understand. Although there are big people in my family, no one has the

weight problem I do.

I was surprised at her response to my going away from surgery. She's

upset that I can't have it here and worried about the fact that my

surgeon will be so far away. My question is, how do people cope with

that? What happens down the road when you need a surgeon and no one

locally will talk to you because they don't understand the weight loss

surgery? I recently had trouble finding a doctor who would give me a

scope because they weren't familiar with my surgery.

I know that I'm going to be well looked after when I'm in Washington,

thanks to and a wonderful support network. I also know that I

will be looked after better there than I would be at home. Of course my

mother has offered to let me stay with her but I'd be better off at

home. I'll stay in Washington till I'm able to come home and I've

struggled with that as well. It's hard to think about strangers taking

care of me and yet, my heart is so full of the generousity I've felt

from people I've seen online and never met. I know that I would do the

same for someone else if the opportunity presented itself because I am a

warm giving person but like a lot of us, it's easier to give than receive.

When it comes to my family, I can't win. They don't understand why I

can't lose weight and they don't understand why I want to have

surgery. I sat at dinner with them last night and it took all the

energy I could muster to keep my mouth shut. I listened as they talked

about my neices and nephews, proms and dresses, colleges and social

lives....I listened as my sister talked about buying a new house in a

country club and all the trips they've been taking and all I could think

about was how empty my life is and how my weight has held me back my

whole life. I'm self employed and taking a trip for surgery and not

working will probably push my financial situation over the edge...If is

was this it would be something else, but I know I'm headed for bankruptcy.

I don't know why I'm going on like this but I need to get it out. They

make me feel stupid and inadequate and have for most of my life. I need

to do this for me but I need to show my sister that I'm doing it

wisely. I think what she is feeling right now is guilt, but that isn't

what I need. I need someone to understand or I need them to just leave

me alone. My therapist told me the other day that when I lose weight,

the whole dynamics of my family will change. I don't want to deal with

that now. I don't want to deal with them. I almost didn't tell them I

was going at all. It's not that they don't love me, but they don't know

me and they certainly don't understand me. I've always been the weird

one in their eyes.

All the good feelings I have for myself disintegrate when I'm around

them. They don't see me as the alive, vibrant, funny person my friends

see and I fall right into it because all the old patterns come up when

I'm around them. It sucks.

I love my sister. She is the only one of my siblings that I have any

regular contact with, and it is limited. I do know that she is there

when I really need her. I just have never felt that I had anything to

offer her, other than to listen when she is having a hard time. In

site of the fact that she can be very short sighted, she is a warm,

generous person when she wants to be.

All I know for sure right now is that I need to do this. In spite of my

fears, I need to get myself on a plane at the end of the month and have

the surgery with a surgeon who I can trust to give me the kind of

surgery that will make a difference in my life. I know I can do what it

takes to make it work with the right tools. I need to do this for

myself and I need to do it alone. All my life, I've let my fear hold me

back. I can't do that anymore, and I can't let family, my feelings

about them and theirs about me, stand in my way anymore.

I keep telling myself, I'm not the same person they see. I have to get

past all the things I didn't get from them from my weight. The sweater

my mother never knitted for me because I was " too big " to knit a sweater

for. The bribes to lose weight with promises of presents so far down

the road I could never get there. I don't want my anger and resentment

to stop me anymore. As I was growing up, I think my weight was an

unconscious way of me trying to say, " LOOK AT ME, I " M HERE.....I'M SMART

AND FUNNY AND BEAUTIFUL, STOP IGNORING ME. " It's taken me half a

lifetime to realize that all it did was make me more invisible to them

than I already was.

When I'm with them, all I see is what is missing from my life, all the

missed opportunities. There was no prom dress for me. There were no

parties, no sorrority houses, no one fixing me up with the great guys.

There are no children and a divorce from a man who hated my body as much

as I did. I forget about the fact that I am a writer and a quilter and

a warm, caring, compassionate person. I can't be those things to people

who see me as pathetic and depressing.

Thanks for letting me vent....what started out as a simple question

about surgeons out of town has turned into quite a dump....but I know

many of you have been there and understand.

Cindy