Life and Lack Thereof at Nearly 700 Pounds
How I Was Losing My Life, and How I Got it Back
“Hello… it’s ready.”
The scale droned its usual greeting after I awkwardly tapped the start button with my foot. It was a specialty scale designed to weigh up to 700 pounds. I stepped painfully on it and stood as still as my body allowed me. My legs were shaking as I shifted back and forth on the extra-wide surface of the heavy-duty scale, my balance impaired by my size. I waited, and waited, for the talking scale to announce my weight, but my involuntary shifting was making it take longer than it normally would. Yet, finally:
“671 point zero pounds.”
It was January of 2019, and I’d like to say I couldn’t believe I’d allowed myself to get to such an enormous weight. I wish I could say it, but I knew I had gained a massive amount in a short time. I wasn’t exercising — hell, I was barely moving more than minimally required — and I had been steadily eating everything in sight. Every muscle ache and creak of my bones, all the times my joints cracked could have told me if my ill-fitting clothes weren’t already screaming it loudly from the strain of my girth. I’d been eating fanatically over the previous few months due to unhappiness and extreme stress from my job, and I hadn’t weighed myself in at least 6 months, feeling defeated by previous unsuccessful weight loss attempts.
In December 2017, my legs suddenly stopped working while I was walking one afternoon at work after I had taken my lunch. I made it to my car that evening, having called a friend to bring it downstairs, and pushed myself on my chair to the office lobby and out to the curb to get in. I pulled myself into my car using my upper body strength holding on to the open door, and awkwardly worked the pedals, as my legs weren’t quite listening to what my brain was telling them.
I drove myself to the hospital and called the ER to bring a wheelchair to pick me up. I was admitted for evaluation. After several hospital stays and transfers, the doctors discovered I had stenosis from the second to fourth vertebrae of my lumbar spine that was so severe it was cutting off the flow of most spinal fluid below that point. The lack of spinal fluid was causing the nerves in my legs to not function correctly, making it so that my muscles couldn’t respond correctly to support me enough to walk. After a hospital diet for several weeks, I underwent a laminectomy to correct the stenosis and had to relearn to walk weeks later through rehab.
The recovery from the surgery was brutal, and every time I tried to exercise I’d hurt myself. I had to sit down to do most things. I tried to diet, and at one point had lost 80 pounds since before my surgery. However, the constant injuries started to weigh heavily on my psyche, and I started eating too much. Too much quickly turned into far too much, and the endless weight gain cycle churned on as severe depression set in.
Walking became more than a chore. I couldn’t walk 20 to 30 feet without being completely out of breath to the point of wheezing. I sat down to cook, to clean; I sat down to shower. I stopped being able to go to the grocery store because I couldn’t walk around and pick out groceries. Everything made me winded, and I could no longer bend to put on socks or shoes. Cleaning myself after toileting became a significant problem, my back no longer able to twist or turn in order for me to thoroughly do so. I had to get various aids to help me pick things up off the floor, pull myself out of bed, items to help me shower more easily. Everywhere in my life, little nods to the fact that I could not easily care for myself any longer.
I’d estimate that in late 2018 and early 2019, every day I ate close to or more than 10,000 calories, over five times the daily recommended amount for the average person. I’d order from restaurants at lunch and sometimes dinner time as well. Each meal, I’d consume an appetizer, two entrees, dessert- sometimes more. And I wasn’t eating and enjoying each bite, I was eating mindlessly. I plowed through the food, finishing each bite as fast as I could in order to shovel more into my mouth. I was completely out of control and knew I was spiraling towards an early death.
It had come to a breaking point, absolutely. I knew intellectually that if I wanted to continue to live, I had to do something about my weight. But I just couldn’t care anymore. My family seemingly stopped caring, as well, too busy with their own lives and nuclear families to even check in with me. My social life was done, my local friends having all started to back away from me as my life turned into a train-wreck.
I had long since stopped taking care of myself, and my fetid breath and unclean odor were as likely culprits for people not wanting to be around me as my increasingly surly attitude. I had one small group of close friends left, people who lived over 600 miles away and who could still bear to listen to me complain about my desperate situation.
From mid 2018 on, my work life was a mess, riddled with the nefarious actions of diabolical coworkers. I discussed reporting actions taken by my boss that I thought were highly unethical, if not criminal, and I was somehow overheard by a coworker with whom he was working in conjunction. A reign of terror ensued which is still wreaking havoc with my life. On top of a previous diagnosis of bipolar disorder, I began developing symptoms of PTSD.
In November 2018, after many dark months, I came to one of the lowest points of my life. I spent an afternoon contemplating suicide. I remember feeling absolutely done that day. I could no longer envision any future for myself, and I had lost all hope. I felt, deeply, that there was nothing I could do to change my life any longer. I called the same friend for help, knowing that I should talk to someone. I explained that the only thing keeping me from harming myself was the fear of what would happen when I died.
I wouldn’t be around to feel the shame, but I imagined what would happen if my body had to be cut out of my house or if I would have to be cut into pieces to be cremated. I asked that she please not let my ashes end up in the trunk of my mother’s car like my aunt and grandmother, the guilt over estrangement causing my mother to distance herself in that way from their remains. I got through the rest of the day and night with the help of my close friend and somehow managed to trudge along through my life, even though nothing really changed intrinsically or extrinsically.
Back to January 2019. I sat down heavily on my bed and contemplated what I had to live for. Not much without friends and family.
I next contemplated what I had to look forward to, and the only thing I could come up with was the next Marvel Cinematic Universe movie. I’m a gigantic geek (pun intended), and grew up reading comics and watching cartoon shows featuring all of my favorite superheroes. From the X-Men to Batman, Superman, The Justice League, and the Avengers- they all made me feel happy and nostalgic for a simpler time in my life. Even as a grown-up, the newly released Marvel and DC Comics movies made me feel actual positive anticipation. I tried to focus on that anticipation and set a goal for my health and well-being. I decided that I was going to set a weight loss goal that I had to meet by that time in order to see the movie, or I would have to wait to see it until I met that goal. I chose 50 pounds as my goal, as I had just under 2 months until the next comic book-based movie, “Captain Marvel” released on March 8, 2019.
I managed to meet it in time to see the movie a week after release. I arrived at the movie theater and waited in the ticket line. After standing in line, I had to stop on the way into the theater and sit on a bench in the hallway of the cineplex, as since the distance was very far to walk in my condition. I got some weird looks from theater employees as I was on my way in, but I’m assuming seeing me breathing heavily with a (very likely) beet-red face might have had something to do with it.
I was surprised to find that they sent a police officer to check on me after the movie, the dismay over which didn’t override the enjoyment I felt having watched the plot and climax unfold. It might have been that they were concerned about why I hadn’t yet left the theater, as I was the only movie-goer waited for the infamous Marvel end credits sequence to finish before I exited. I remember being startled when I heard him murmur into his walkie as I passed, “No, he’s right here — he’s leaving now.”
It is startling how many people will either openly stare at or talk about you when you’re massively overweight. Either the employees who had seen me walking in were concerned, or other movie patrons had mentioned me on their way out of the theater and had the police officer on duty come to check on me. I looked back at him for a moment, and then shook my head and moved on.
That aside, things were looking up, finally. I felt good about the progress I had made, and enjoyed seeing Captain Marvel in the theater. And, for a short time, I managed to keep the weight off and continue to make some more minor progress. However, as always, things became more complicated in my life and I turned to the one thing that always brought me solace, food. But at least at that moment, for the moment, I felt good about myself and hopeful for the future. I had learned that if I set a goal and provided myself with an adequate reward, I could achieve it. Because if I can do it, in the low, dark place I was in, I proved that once you set your mind to something, you, too can achieve your goals.
