A Tale of Two Dads

I thought about starting this out as “One was the best of Dads, one was the worst of Dads”, but I thought that might be rude. And verging on plagiarism since I have absolutely zero desire to site my source on a blog. So, Mr. Dickens you get to keep your verbiage, and I will move on. I wanted to update everyone today one some pretty big news in my world. But first, there’s some background info to catch everyone up on:

If you’ve read my previous posts, you know that last year I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes, and my oh my how I have hated it ever since. I spent a few months working out with a personal trainer and eating a Paleo diet, only to lose about eight pounds. The food was great! The workouts were so awesome, but my body just wouldn’t let go of the fat. It had been holding on for dear life for a while. Losing weight had become harder and harder over the years as my pancreas was apparently slowly sinking away into oblivion and this wretched disease took over. I could do everything “perfectly” and the scale just giggled at me when I stepped on it.

In September of last year all of my fitness efforts were put to the test in the Addison Oktoberfest 5k. I had trained hard, I had eaten clean, my body shape had changed dramatically, I had lost all eight of those pounds, and I was ready. I strapped the number to my shirt, lined up with my friends, and power walked the heck out of that thing. In the end, I had taken 17 minutes off of my last 5k time. SEVENTEEN MINUTES! Some people run an entire 5k in that amount of time. It was spectacular. I collapsed on a bench and grinned from ear to ear (in my heart at least, I’m sure on the outside all I was doing was wheezing and gasping for breath) at what had just happened. I was so hoping to just match my previous performance, but then I beat it by seventeen minutes. Maybe I hadn’t lost a lot of weight, but that sure as heck showed that I had gotten a TON healthier.

That night I received a phone call.

Yep, it was one of those.

My step-father (who from this point on in this blog will be referred to as my Dad, because I don’t like referring to him as my step-dad, but I didn’t want to confuse anyone) had suffered a heart attack and passed away.

He was 53 years old.

He was only 53 years old.

My world crumbled. Mark was the guy, after all, that had taught me how to drive, that took me shopping for my prom dress. He was the man that laughed with me and cried with me through so many different times in the 17 years he had been my dad. He was my Dad. And now he was gone. At 53 years old.

It’s the craziest thing to lose someone. There’s so much emotion, and yet so much that’s just numb. There are a thousand little tasks, and yet nothing you want to do. It’s just a time of insanity. I was desperate to help my mother, and took on a couple of small errands for her. One was to cancel his gym membership. I called up 24 Hour Fitness and explained that Mark Snyder was my Dad, and that he had suddenly passed away last night from a heart attack, so we needed to cancel his membership. The manager was extremely kind, but also in shock when he pulled up his records. He said, “Are you sure this was Mr. Snyder at _______ address?” I confirmed the information, and he said,

“But he comes in here every single day”.  

I burst into tears, so proud of his fight to be healthier, and the manager quickly said he’d take care of everything.

The next weeks and months came and went with very little to show for them. In the midst of my grief I had stopped eating all of my grass fed, organic, grain free, pure health in a box, and had drifted back to old habits of fast food and restaurants for nearly every meal. My work outs ceased all together as the thought of getting out of bed and making it through the day seemed accomplishment enough thankyouverymuch. The eight pounds quickly re-appeared right where I had left them, and brought along their friends, four more pounds, as the scale when from giggling to groaning under my weight once again.

Before I knew it, it was December again. We had already made it through all of the October birthdays, and Thanksgiving as a family, now it was time to face Christmas. I sat alone in my living room one night wrapping presents, and I glanced up at a family portrait I have there. I’ve lost so many friends and family, and every year as the holidays grow closer, the ache in my heart grows a little more tender. All I could think though was how young Mark had been, and how active. He had been working out every single day.

Like me.

Young. Active. Working out and watching my diet. But unable to shed the fat my heart is incased in.

That day I looked at my family photo and thought, “I’m next”. It was clear. It wasn’t something I questioned. I just knew it.

I’m next.

I made a doctor’s appointment that day.  

When I went to the doctor we discussed my options. First, I was put on some oral medication to help control my diabetes, and I was given a referral to a bariatric surgeon to consult on my options. I wasn’t sure if we were going to talk pills, or fasts, or what, but I went to the surgeon’s office the next week and told him all of the issues I had with the gastric bypass surgery and lap band. We talked through them and he put my mind at ease some, but I still wasn’t sold. I didn’t think I could handle the malabsorption issues that the full bypass gives you, and I really didn’t think I was going to handle a band and all of the potential vomiting that goes hand in hand with that one. I felt like there was never going to be an option for me. But then the doctor mentioned the gastric sleeve surgery. I had thought this was nothing more than the band’s big brother, but I was entirely wrong.

With the sleeve surgery (Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy), there isn’t any kind of foreign object put into your body. No worries about a band slipping, or waiting for your fills to be enough, or hopefully not too much. It also doesn’t re-route anything. All of your connections between the stomach and the intestines are exactly as God put them together. What does happen though, is that approximately 80% of your stomach is cut out, stapled off, and removed from your body. Oh, and as an added bonus, the hunger hormone, ghrelin, is mainly produced in the part of the stomach that is removed, so post operatively most patients report not even feeling hungry. Absorption issues? No, because the intestines aren’t bypassed. Malnourishment issues? Well, Kell, that’s really up to you. This surgery controls the quantity of food you can eat, but you control the quality. No hunger? Right. Oh, and because you’re restricted by the size of your tiny baby belly now, some ridiculous percentage of our patients (like 90 something percent) see full reversal in their Type 2 Diabetes.

Wait, what?

Full Reversal.

No insulin. No shots. No blood sugar crashes. No blood sugar spikes. No stabbing my fingers every couple of hours to check my levels. No more diabetes.

And I get to lose weight? Most patients lose between 50-60% of their excess body weight in the first six months.

Sold.

During the month of March, I started back up with the exercise. I bought myself  treadmill and started walking 30 minutes per day. Thanks to my good friend insulin, I gained 12 pounds. So my blood sugar isn’t at a level that will put me in a coma or stroke, but I continue to gain weight and struggle physically, emotionally, spiritually, etc. So for the past several months I have been actively pursuing a vertical sleeve gastrectomy. I knew I was ready for it when I came to the very real point of not caring what everyone else thought about my decision, or being ruled by some kind of people pleasing co-dependency, but rather decided that this was my next step in trying to save my life. I was amazed by the amount of support I’ve received from every single person I’ve opened up to about this.

I was afraid of being shamed. I was afraid of being seen as a failure. I was afraid of looking like a hypocrite. And yet, I was met with family telling me how brave I was, friends cheering with joy, and more than one set of tears in gratitude for God’s common grace in 21^st century USA and medical miracles.

So, blog / Facebook world, I’m opening up about this new phase of my weight loss journey. And I’m thrilled. My surgery is scheduled for April 19^th (next Friday), and I am planning on documenting every single step along the way. I haven’t decided if I’m going to document in blog form, or just good old fashioned journal and pen, but one way or the other, I’m about to lose a LOT of weight, which means gaining a lot of….well….I don’t know. I’ve always been overweight.

But I’m looking forward to find out.