madermouse's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 11/13/02 For those of you who are interested, I found these two excerpts positively fascinating. These are accounts of real live people, eating real-live food they purchased from real-live restaurants. No wonder we are overweight. �I recently went on a trip to Scotland with my boyfriend and he introduced me to his local fish and chip shop specialty: A deep-fried pizza supper consisting of one frozen pizza, deep fried, which is then smothered in cheddar cheese and ketchup before adding a whole portion of chips, smothered again in cheese, salt and vinegar. The mix is then folded over and devoured! This delicacy is also available with a battered smoked sausage... just in case you are still feeling hungry.� �I'm sooooooooooooo embarrassed. I am an ovo lacto vegetarian and I consciously tend to allow a few extra sweets in my diet since I'm not eating the meat. (I am well aware that this is wrong.) Well last night while coming home from work I decided to stop in a new gourmet dessert shop for some coffee and pastry. There I discovered the Chocolate Mountain. Ready? It is a wedge of chocolate cheesecake (about 5 inches high), smothered in chocolate fudge and walnuts. It's topped with a scoop of rocky road ice cream and a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream and more fudge on top. Whipped cream and nuts on top of this. I left off the cherry so I didn't overdo it. I'm so guilty I'm drinking water all day today.� Wow. I need a glass of water just from reading that last one!! Whew! Sp. last night I caught the program on 20/20 with Jane Pauley (sp?) which interviewed t.v. weather man Al Roker. The title of the show was, �How I lost 100lbs�. I was intrigued, and found myself glued to the screen. Of course, 10 minutes into it, I found out he lost 100 pounds by having his stomach stapled into the size of an egg, then re-attached at the lower intestine where the calories he does eat won�t get absorbed easily. In other words � he had the famous Carnie-Wilson weight loss surgery. Disappointed, but with nothing else to watch, I couldn�t tear myself away. He documented his experience with a video diary that was filled with various poignant moments. One shot showed him 24 hours post-op. He was totally alert, feeling great, and in good spirits. Another shot showed a close-up of his doctor saying �The surgery was a complete success� and it was completed in record time. There was a scene in which he goes to the clothing store and buys an Armani suit off the rack�something he�s never been able to do before. There was another moment in which he describes his forgetfulness. �I have to remind myself to eat. I�m simply NOT hungry anymore.� And of course this video was peppered with hearty laughs and thankfulness and sighs of relief. It was a fucking fairytale. I watched with a kind of morbid fascination, and by the end of the hour I had a frog in my throat the size of Kermit. I turned off the TV and stormed out of the living room. It wasn�t fair. I�ve been struggling day in and day out with this uphill battle for 2 fucking years. At least the first year my hard work actually paid off. Now I�m stuck in a dream where I can�t run because my legs are wading through marshmallow air�and the bad guy is still coming up behind me~!! And there right in front of me, lies the answer. Literally in a matter of days, this guy � and millions of others � get to be free from this stupid burden FOREVER. It just wasn�t fair. I picked up the phone and dialed my friend. She answered and I immediately burst into tears. �I want to have bariatric surgery!!� I cried! Then I frantically listed all the reasons why I deserved to have surgery. I�ve worked hard and I�m not getting results. I�ve struggled and I�m exhausted and I don�t want to do this anymore. I want it to be easy. No � I wasn�t scared of the consequences. (a lie) No � I didn�t care if I was messing with Mother Nature. (another lie) No � I wasn�t afraid that I might lose all my hair, become malnourished, and eventually drop dead. (third time�s a charm) I talked (well, more like bawled and cried and rambled on and whined a bit)�and she listened. She talked and explained and empathized and comforted�and I listened. She�s a good friend. At the end of it all, I just wanted to go to bed and put an end to my rotten day. Nothing was resolved, nothing had changed, but at least I could put my thoughts to rest and pick it up another day. Today is another day, and I�m left with this odd feeling. Its like watching that program last night made this little impression on my psyche and I can�t shake it. Am I all wrong here? Am I stupid for trying to do this the �old fashioned way� when its been proven that this surgery has the highest success rate of any other form of weight loss? Am I shooting myself in the foot because I�m afraid of the pain or the consequences of surgery? Why am I struggling when I could be done with this whole thing in a year or less? Am I just being stubborn because there is a cure for my obesity right in front of me, and I refuse to accept it? I've always been against that surgery. I think there's something inherently wrong with re-arranging your body parts because you have no self-control. And now, here I am, wondering why the hell I'm not jumping on the surgery band wagon so I can breathe a sigh of relief, and laugh heartily and be ever-so-thankful that I'm finally thin. 2:44 p.m. - 11/13/02 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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