Tuesday night, while Dave was at work, I was playing on the computer. I usually have the TV on, for the noise (and to drown out the noise that Mozart, our parrot, makes), but I’m not usually watching it. It was on TLC – and most of the time, I don’t even bother to change the channel. This particular night, a show came on that caught my attention, and I watched much more closely than I usually do. It was called, “Half Ton Mom.” A very large woman, weighing nearly 900 pounds, put everything she had into finding a doctor and hospital that would perform gastric bypass on her. Finally, she found a surgeon and this show documented her surgery and progress.
Normally, I stay away from this kind of movie or television show. It is extremely emotional for me – because in my very recent past, I was right there. I felt her agony. I admired her courage. I cheered her determination. But in very nearly every way – her story is my story, and it is very difficult to watch.
She went through the surgery. Because she was such a high risk, she spent her recovery time in the hospital. At two weeks post-op, she had lost 60 pounds. The doctors felt her progress was encouraging. Everything seemed to be going fine.
At two and a half weeks post-op, she had a massive cardiac event – and died with no warning. She left two children.
As I have thought about this for the last couple of days, I realized the reason it upset me so badly is that I could have been her. I didn’t weigh as much as she did, but I was well on the way. Everything she admitted to feeling I have felt. I knew her disappointment as doctor after doctor said they wouldn’t operate because the risk was simply too great. I understand her desire to something – ANYTHING – to make things better. I felt her shame when they had to make special accommodations just to perform her surgery and during her recovery. And when she died, I knew how very close I came to being the person in the morgue.
PRAISE GOD – that I was able to find the help I needed to make a change in my life! So many people have encouraged me – cheered for me – prayed for me. My heart still hurts – for this young woman (she was only 29) and for so many people out there who are still looking for an answer. I hope I never lose the ability to sympathize – and to empathize with people on this journey. I hope that I will never forget how much pain I felt at my biggest, and how much pain people around me are feeling, whether it is concerning this issue or anything else. And I really pray that no matter what changes are happening in my body and in my mind, that I will continually become more and more like God.
“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” (2 Corinthians 3:17-18, NIV)
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