The Beginning of A Rough Road

I can't really remember a time in my life when I wasn't on a diet. In the 4th grade, my mom, trying to control my weight, took me to Weight Watchers with her. Yes, I lost weight. And gained it back and back and forth and so the cycle continued.

I was in major denial. Soon I found myself in college. I loved college, loved my friends (still am close with many of them today), but even college seemed to center around food. Granted I'm Jewish and went to a Jewish school, so perhaps that had something to do with it, but you'll find, as I finally did, it's not about the food. Anyway, things began to get stressful. I began to eat more and more. Soon, I was living in sweats. Getting on a scale was out of the question. I was who I was and people were going to accept me for that no matter what. Well, I do still agree with that somewhat...

In September of 2005 it was time for family portraits and clearly I could not wear sweats, so I was forced to face the mall and face what size I had become. And face "the fat department". I know it's not P/C to call it that. But, having shopped there for a long time, I've earned the right as have any of you who understand the humiliation of walking in there for the first time, finally walking into a dressing room, and just crying. Once you've had that experience, you get to call it the "fat department".

Anyway, I was a snug, elastic waisted size 18 at the time. Needless to say, this was far from my proudest moment. But, I think I had accepted my size, at the time. I was destined to be fat and that was ok. I thought, or at least had convinced myself that I was receiving equal treatment in society and what I lacked in the physique department, I more than made up for with personality.

But, it was just not so. During those past few years I had had a major illness that had me hospitalized for the better part of a month and gathering my strength back took much longer than I would have wanted. First, I decided that I was invincible and I just made myself sick. But, then I fell into a depression and decided that I was just going to always be the sick person. I was the weak, sick person. That was goign to be me. Well, you guessed it. Emotional times, depression, sadness, lonliness, really feeling any type of emotional at all, and I ate.

It wasn't really one thing in particular that made me realize I had to make a change in my life. It was a few things. First, during a routine check-up, my doctor commented that my blood pressure was awefully high for someone my age. And then, that Thanksgiving, a relative (by marriage only, let me assure you) gave me a hug and loudly proclaimed, "I just love hugging you because you are so soft and squishy!" She meant it as a compliment.

Well, it didn't really click at first. It wasn't until I looked around the room and saw every female in the family scraping their jaws from the floor in utter shock that someone would be so callous as to say that and so tactless as to think it was a compliment.

It wasn't even this experience that sent me to the end of my rope. It was just the accumulation of the everyday mundane things that had started to become nuisances. Sitting in chairs became uncomfortable due to my size; I'd become winded after the slightest amount of exercise; my knees hurt, back hurt; and if I looked around MY world closely enough, I could look into the eyes of those who care about me and see that they were hurting. They were hurting because they were watching me slowly kill myself and I was in a conscious denial about it.

I was too busy being "fine". But, I wasn't fine. I'm not fine. And It's not about the food. It took squeezing myself into many movie theater seats, barely being able to fasten the seatbelt on a plane multiple times, and being exhausted after average daily activities to realize that it was time for me to make a change. But, as Frankie Blue Eyes sung, "I had to do it my way".

Or something like that. I can't eat half. I don't do dressing on the side. I don't do white as opposed to wheat. And I don't do movie theater popcorn without butter. I don't do moderation. I either follow strict rules or I look for every opportunity to break them. That's just me. A bit OCD? Ya maybe. Maybe a little bipolar or borderline tendencies? Maybe. But, that's just me. It's what I've got to work with and what I've had for the past 25 years.

So, what DID I do? Well, I did what I knew to do. You have an ear infection? See an ENT. You have a brain tumor? See a neuro. Too tall? See a shrink. Just kidding on that last one. Anyway, I decided I'd go the medical route. To be clear, I meant medical, not surgical. No lap band, no gastric bypass, none of that. There may be some surgical cleanup of skin in the future, however...

Anyway, I found a wonderful doctor who is an endochronologist and metabolism specialist who happens to be right down the street from my office. I also found out that the studios hire him when an actor needs to lose or gain a lot of weight in a short time. Once I had that bit of knowledge, I knew I found the right guy for the job. It was just a matter of getting in to see him...