And all the extra tons of fat layered around my body is mostly to blame.
In February I had my first full physical in years. I can remember that Dr. manipulating my fat rolls, especially my stomach area, and commenting on how hard it is to feel anything with all that fat. I have had my gyno say the same thing many times while trying to find my ovaries. Didn't really matter much to me though because I was confident that if something was wrong there would be other symptoms. Add to that the wonderful taste of food, especially those laden with fat and/or chocolate, that was my main focus.
Losing weight was just always way too difficult.
Anyways, I had just spent the last year eating correctly, for the first time in my life, and exercising, which I really fallen in love with, and wondering why the weight was coming off so easy this time. I mean I had done this many times in my life and hadn't lost this amount of weight, this easily. I guess I just thought maybe it was the age difference, although I knew that the older you get the harder it is to lose weight. I am so good at burying my head in the sand.
By April I was starting to spike fevers in the afternoon, and even though I would work out every morning, walking several miles and lifting plenty of weights, I found myself out of breath going up stairs and needing, for the first time ever in my life, an afternoon nap.
Then finally the back pain and stomach pain kicked in. I was living on Advil, waiting for this fluish stuff to pass, like it had always before. When it got to the point that I couldn't get out of bed I finally went to see the Dr. Now just to clarify, it is not that I waited till I couldn't stand it anymore, it was that all my life I have pushed through feeling ill, and the pain wasn't really that bad.
Long story short, turns out that I have Marginal Zone Lymphoma. The pain was caused by my spleen, that is a pretty small lymph node, had been growing for years and when removed it weighed around 12 pounds. The Dr. said it was the biggest spleen he had seen and I guess I was the rock star of O.R. because of it, with staff coming in from all over to view this thing. It had grown up to my chest bone and down to my pelvic bone, fussing to and surrounding other organs. Ouch.
I almost died. If my Sister had not insisted that I come to Boston to the Dana Farber Center I would surely be dead now.
Now it is 8 weeks after surgery and I am still pretty sick. I may not get better than this and this cancer is not curable. Although they tell me that it is very slow growing and not aggressive. But I may never feel better than this. I may have been sick for so long with this, that I may be at the end of my window.
I don't tell you all this to feel sorry for me. I tell you this to give you another reason to eat right and lose weight. They couldn't find my cancer because I was to fat. There was too much fat in the way to feel it and this type doesn't have other symptoms until it gets to a critical point. There are many things that can go wrong with your health that can't be detected with fat in the way, or even more scary, having to have surgery being extremely overweight. I cringe to think what my recovery would have been like if I hadn't already lost that 100 pounds. I probably really would of died no matter how prepared the Dr.s were.
I think we stay fat because it is comfortable. I know now that I am way past 100 lbs. lighter and I look in the mirror and don't recognize myself, and I smooth on lotion and feel the actual bones in my body, that I feel like I am not me. Like my fat defined my whole life, and kept me safe at same time. I had a fleeting thought the other day, I have to be more aware of my surroundings, because now that I am almost skinny, men will start to notice me and I need to start worrying about the dangers that are out there for skinny chicks. How messed up is that?
I think we stay fat because we don't like ourselves. You really need to think, do I really hate myself so much that I want to die? Because being fat is what will kill you, one way or another. I know that I am not ready to die, and now that decision is not in my control anymore. Well not that that decision is ever really in our control, but now I know no matter how healthy I choose to live my life, this cancer will kill me. I can't do anything about it.
But I can tell you my story, so hopefully it will change your path in life.
Just change one thing today. Walk around the block, change from sugar to stevia, stop eating red meat. Please just change one thing. And call your Dr. for a full physical.
