Hello All!

I have been lurking on this board for the past couple months, and now I am finally ready to "tell my story"! I am so excited for my upcoming sleeve surgery NEXT SATURDAY (OMG!!!!!)

This is going to be such an exciting step. I have been overweight since I was about 12 years old and battled with low self-confidence and low self-esteem off and on for the past 25 years or so. My mother was pretty disgusted with my weight- almost to an obsessive degree- and throughout my teen years we fought about my weight all the time. Our relationship is still strained from those years of her dragging me to Weight Watchers, making me stand on the scale so she could see how much I weighed, watching every morsel I placed in my mouth, and even counting the Cookies in the cabinet! The ironic thing is that I WISH I weighed NOW what I weighed back then in high school!!

Fast forward to now- I am happily married to an awesome, funny guy (love him!!!) and we have one biological son (6 yrs old) and we're about to adopt a precious little guy from China sometime end of May or June. Mom (and Dad) love being grandparents and HOORAY- the focus is no longer on the size of my ass! (haha!) I moved 1,000 miles away from my parents, and that's been great for me. I have an awesome job in education and love what I do. I have a few very close girlfriends and they are treasures, I tell you! Love them so much.

I went to a little liberal arts school in the midwest and met my LIFELONG BEST FRIEND!!! After college, we both moved to the ATL and there is hardly a day that goes by that we don't talk. We even used to teach ACROSS THE HALL from eachother! Talk about AMAZING- imagine seeing your best friend all the time! Those were great years. Well, my best bud and I have both been struggling with our weight for the ENTIRE 20 years we've known eachother! We have had the SAME TALKS every few months- let's do Weight Watchers! Let's do BootCamp! Let's Walk our asses off every weekend!! We've tried everything and tried to lose the same 20 pounds every year it seems like. I'm telling you, we've talked AD NAUSEAM about losing weight! God help us!

Then, about 2 years ago, an angel from heaven sat next to me in this class I took and she told me all about her surgery she just had with Dr. Alvarez. She was so excited about her new life. I was in awe of the dainty bites of lunch she had (while I was snarfing whatever I packed that day). I told my BFF about this girl and her surgery. We were both kind of intrigued and worried (Mexico?!?!) at the same time. Over the past two years, I had forgotten this girl's name, but friend and I talked more and more about VSG, Dr. Alvarez, turning 40, tired of being fat, and all that jazz....

Well, friends (thanks for sticking with me so long...) guess what?! BFF and I are going TOGETHER to see Dr. Alvarez NEXT WEEK!!! We have done research out the wazoo and followed this forum like it was our JOB (props to our heroes- Tiffykins and DeeDee!) and we CAN'T WAIT!!! We're even sharing a room (there's a discount!) You'll meet her soon- her screen name is VV2010.

That's it folks! Can't wait to share pictures! We took our "before" pictures last week- and dear god, you DON'T want to see those yet!!!

Thanks to all of you for all you post here- what a great sleeve family we have!

Congrats on your decision! You and your friend will be so happy to have each other there. There were three of us from this board having surgery on the same day at the same clinic and it was a great support.

Hope you two won't be too competitive with each other!! : )

Sounds so terrific and great fun. You have built a great life for yourself. Sounds like you are in a great place to have this surgery.

Hey Slim. Reading your story makes me think of myself in a lot of ways. I too am an educator in the Atlanta area for the last 10+ years. I have one child and a few close girlfriends. But, I'm not married and my mother has never said anything about my weight - although I can tell she probably wonders what's wrong with me and why I can't be a halfway normal size. :sad0:

I've been struggling quite a bit with whether to tell people about my surgery (after - definitely not before). I've pretty much decided to tell just to avoid half-truths, rumors, guessing games, etc. But, I also had decided that I would only tell the bare minimum, not all the gory details or personal issues. I tend to be a pretty private person.

But I've also been wondering if that's the best decision. Reading about how you learned about this exciting surgery really makes me think that I might be an inspriration for someone if I could just step out of my comfort zone and reveal more to someone who has a valid interest or might benefit from the surgery. Thanks for sharing that great moment that changed your life. I'm going to keep that in mind in the future when I get my panties in a wad because someone has asked me about my weight loss.

I've got two months left of my 6 month insurance requirements and I'm about to bust at the seams with anticipation. Were you not able to meet the requirements for insurance approval? I've been tempted to run off to Mexico every day since l learned about this surgery, but decided to be patient since I meet the basic requirements.

I can't wait to go through this whole experience with you SDS! You are the bombdiggity! I know we will be great support systems for each other:) Love ya!

VV2010:lol0:

WOW

I'm so excited for both of you!! I can't wait to follow your journey, it is such an amazing thing to go through this transformation. Good luck to both of you, and happy losing!!