Today is my last day at the job I had when I had my surgery. When I started there I weighed 288. As I leave I am 195. I've never hidden my surgery. This was a personal decision which is oft debated on this site. As I approach my new job on Monday, I am contemplative of the new relationships I will be building. My new colleagues will not have any awareness of me as the "fat girl". I know I still have a ways to go but the mental fat girl has mostly fallen away. These new folks will see me eat healthy, exercise and lose weight fairly gradually. They won't even require an explanation. I wonder if I will feel compelled to tell them. I am happy with my decision to tell folks about my surgery and I won't debate the choice as its been done here already. But I wonder how long the former fat chick will be my chosen identity? Anyone have any thoughts?

Hah I like you E!

I think it comes from Jealosy that people will debate a decision like the ones that we the over endowed will make. I have know so many "skinny" people to say to me "just dont eat" yea right, just walk a mile in my shoes...they couldnt take the weight...

Im sure your coworkers looked at you sideways when you were only eating a babies portion of stuff LOL

you should be proud of yourself!

Interesting post! I definitely feel like my surgery and weight loss has kind of overcome my identity in the past 1-2 years as it is the focus of a lot of my thoughts a lot of the day. There is kind of a "now what" feeling once you get a little further out from surgery. Now who am I? Now what is the new "normal"? Now how do I keep the "new me"? I also had that thought as we hired a new person at work a couple of weeks ago. I don't know what made me think of it but I realized she will never have known I was obese before, just by looking at me. That is so weird to me because I feel like everyone just "knows" that the real me is fat. I still kind of feel like I'm faking "thin"...... There's a lot to be said of identity issues through this journey for sure.

I have a close friend who has been sober for over 10 years. For the first few years after cleaning up she immediately confessed to being in recovery. She says that she no longer feels the need to announce her sobriety. She lives a sober life but it doesn't define her.

How did they react? Do they treat you differently now? I sure hope not!

The skinny ladies treat me the same. The one who just had a baby and is dealing with the extra weight is kind of annoyed about it. I get it. What woman struggling with her weight wants to hear "nah, I just ate a spoonful of Peanut Butter and couldn't eat another thing"!?