Morbid Obesity!!! ME???

   When I was first told I was morbidly obese, I felt like someone had just dropped a few tons of bricks on me and I was forever doomed as a human on this earth. No way am I morbidly obese. Morbidly obese people are the ones you read about in the tabloids that are living in their cars because they can't get out or require a front end loader to get them out of their house and into an ambulance. Well guess what, I am morbidly obese. I get told a lot, you aren't that big to require gastric bypass. That is for extremely large people that are 100 lbs or more overweight. Well guess what, I am 100lbs overweight. Most people that know me do not realize that fact. I carry most of my weight in my abdominal region and with some loose fitting clothing I cover it up pretty well. It doesn't hurt either that I am 6'3" tall and carry my extra weight without looking like I am carrying that extra weight. But, according to the weight charts, I should weigh 195. I currently weigh around 285, but when I started this whole process, I weighed 295.
   I have found out though that morbid obesity is not a determination of how I look, although, I am not that happy with how I look. It has more to do with a combination of how a person looks combined with the health risk factors that come with carrying way too much weight. My adventure with severe weight gain began back in 2002 when I quit smoking. I was so intent on staying away from all forms of tobacco that I really did not pay any attention at all to what my weight was doing. I replaced smoking with eating and didn't even give a thought to the circumstances of what I was doing. I was just intent on quitting and thought that was the answer to being healthy. That was in December of 2002 and by April of 2003, I had gained a whopping 55lbs. Melody and I went out to a nice dinner at the now defunct Stevenson's Apple Orchard in Kansas City where one of there well known features was the keg of fresh made apple cider from their orchards and you could help yourself to it while you waited to be seated. I drank 3 or 4 cups of the cider and by the time they brought us our meal I was very sick. I could not even touch my food. The next day I was headed out to Chicago for a service call and I still felt terrible. I had a glucometer from past experiences with my blood sugar taking an occasional dive and so I check my blood and almost went into shock by the reading. Somewhere around 395. I was like yeah right, no way that can be accurate so I stopped on my way to Chicago and bought a new meter. Same thing. So I laid off food and sweets for a couple of days and still had very high readings. I called my doctor and told him what my readings were. He called in a prescription for me for Metformin and within a couple of days, my readings came back down to near normal. A follow-up visit the next week confirmed, I have Type II Diabetes. What a blow. This can't happen to me. I am active, seem healthy, quit smoking for 5 months, how could this happen? Well, several books later and quite a bit of online research and I found out how it happened. I was eating way too much and mostly all the wrong things. My weight gain was out of control and I was literally in the early stages of eating myself to death.
   Wake-up call. I started excersizing more, eating better, started dieting and was able to lose 50lbs with the help of a popular weight lose program and was able to manage my diabetes pretty well. I actually got to a point where I did not need any medications and was controlling it strictly by diet and excersize. I was riding my bicycle a lot and was trimming down nicely. Then a bit of laziness started to set in and I wasn't riding the way I was and started to slip on my diet and slowly started to regain the weight. Then the unthinkable happened. I was in a motorcycle wreck and while nothing got broke but my bike, I was beat up pretty bad and could not excersize for almost a year. I gained back the 50 I had lost plus added another 40 to boot. Blood sugar went back out of control, high blood pressure started to creap into the picture, I was becoming a wreck after the wreck and finally I had to start insulin injections to try and keep my blood sugar levels under control. That worked for awhile and then even the injections of insulin 4 to 6 times a day aren't keeping my blood sugar under control. I still have average readings around 250. And that is what brings me to where I am today. Getting ready to have gastric bypass to give me a tool to help me get back to being a me that I can be happy with, a healthier person who can do more and live more without the everyday burden of obesity, diabetes, joint pain, arthritis, high blood pressure, sleep apnea, and just plain old feeling like crap a lot of the time.
   So why am I sharing this experience here?  I hope that someone comes along and reads this and realizes that they are in the same boat as I am or very nearly there and can start taking charge of their situation and do the things they need to do to get back to a healthier lifestyle where food and diabetes and all the other fun things associated with it aren't destroying their lives. It seems like a weekly or even sometimes daily experience of hearing of someone dying from the effects of morbid obesity. If you are out there and thinking okay, so I have put on a few pounds, but I am not obese, perhaps you might want to take a closer examination of the facts. Especially you guys. It was really hard for me to finally admit that I am morbidly obese. It's like the joke says "What's the difference between a 50 year old man and 50 year old woman? A 50 year old man can walk down the street with a bald head and beer gut and still think "this looks good".. Men like me just don't pay the kind of attention to what is going on with their body, like most women do. Not to say that all men are that way, just the ones that have more going on in their lives than paying attention to a little weight gain, or a few extra trips to the restroom, or a few extra glasses of tea or water with a meal because you just seem a little more thirsty. Pay attention to these things guys and gals. They mean something. Don't do like I did for so long and just chaulk it up to getting older. If you are going thru some of these things, get to your doctor and have a checkup. Be aware out there and all my best wishes to my friends and loved ones that are following me along and wishing me well. I love you all.