100 Pounds Down: A Retrospective
TW: weight loss, surgery, specific numbers
F/24/5'5" [273 > 173 = 100 lbs]
I had bariatric surgery on 12/20/2024. I had a surgery called the SADI.
The majority of health issues I had as a result of my obesity have reversed. The insulin resistance I've had since I was a preteen - gone. Sleep apnea - gone. My triglycerides went from 280 to 131. My HDL (bad cholesterol) went from 151 (HIGH) to 56.
My ease of movement is so. Much. Easier. I can walk for miles without being phased. No pain in my calves/ankles/etc. I can walk up an inclined sidewalk without even noticing. I went for a run the other day. FOR FUN.
Clothes are of course much easier to find. I love to thrift, but before I almost never found anything worth buying in my size. Now I find stuff almost every time. I love fashion so I'm enjoying this a lot.
The Meh (Not So Bad, Not So Good)
I have a TON of clothes to get rid of. I find clothing selling very tedious and Plato's Closet won't take any of of my stuff
I get more male attention. This would be a plus, but I have a boyfriend, and I've never had to deal with it before, so I just feel awkward. Like I went to the club for my birthday and this man would NOT stop trying to grind on me!!!
I have iron deficiency without anemia. It really sucks. However I did have this before I got surgery. It's just harder to correct since my surgery makes it harder to absorb iron. I'm getting an iron infusion next Wednesday tho!!!
My LDL cholesterol (good cholesterol) is a little low.
Loose skin. It drives me crazy. Makes exercising especially hard.
I no longer absorb enough birth control for it to stop my periods, and instead I get a period like every 2 weeks. This is hard because I have heavy periods which make my iron deficiency worse. I also have PMDD and BC basically stopped it. So now I have to seek out an alternative and it's annoying/scary.
In general, it makes medications harder to deal with because I don't absorb them completely, but there isn't a ton of research into exactly how this works. As someone was disabled before finding the right medication, this is very scary. I feel like this risk was not adequately communicated to me pre-surgery.
I've gotten a little too obsessed with my body lately. I've been weighing myself a LOT, body checking constantly, feeling super insecure... my body occupies my thoughts the majority of the time.
I don't regret getting bariatric surgery, but I do have a lot of work to do still before I can consider myself healthy, both physically and mentally.