Today I shifted into a new phase of my life and it made me want to make this post so I could possibly help some of you to your own weight loss goals. I won't go too in depth here on my story but please do ask if you want a better understanding and more detail over certain areas. I am determined to be as open a book as possible for any serious questions.
So, my name is Jakob. I am 38 years old and I started my weight loss journey 2 weeks before my 37th birthday. I mean, technically it started before then but that date, September 14th 2016 is when my life irrevocably changed. I had gastric sleeve surgery that day where they also removed my Gall Bladder. I started this at 390 pounds and am currently 238. Today I have shifted my focus. I am still doing my best to promote weight loss but today I feel I can finally start doing a much more strenuous weight lifting routine. So I have gone from a total cardio and fat loss outlook now to a body recomposition one. I have already started to slowly add muscle from my toning exercises and I hope it explodes when I get serious about it.
So yeah, I had gastric sleeve surgery. For those who don't know what this is they cut out three quarters of your stomach and they suture it together in the shape of a sleeve. Basically, you lose the entire kidney bean shape of the stomach. I did it as a tool to win my battle over food addiction which I have. It was a life changing decision and despite all the complications it has been very much worth it. I have actually had 4 surgical procedures in the last year all told. I had an endoscopy before the gastric sleeve and gall bladder removal where they put you in a twilight state and snake a camera through your mouth and down into your stomach. It actually wasn't bad, just a sore throat later. Yes, I know, HA! Anyways, a week after I had the gastric sleeve surgery I developed Diverticulitis. Ya know, that thing Brock Lesnar had that really ****ed him up for his MMA fighting. Never experienced it before in my life but it was horrible. I had horrible shooting stabbing pains in the lower left pelvic area. So, I'm a week out from a brutal surgery, I can't eat anything. I'm living on protein shakes and water and these ****ing pills. Like seriously, **** these pills. They gave me two antibiotics that I'm having to take on an empty stomach which is painful itself but then one of the pills makes everything I consume taste like bitter metal. At this point I can barely tolerate water and just thinking back on it I just felt waves of nausea so powerful I almost threw up even though I'm in the fasting portion of my day.
Anyways, so eventually I am starting to recover and it is the night before Thanksgiving. My weight loss has been going pretty well and I'm upbeat and I've got a giant turkey brining that I will bring over to my moms and cook using Alton Brown's method. It's about midnight as I am getting ready for bed and I feel a horrible stabbing pain in my back. I take some Tylenol but it does absolutely nothing. At this point I am pacing back and forth in the apartment between the bedroom and my living room just hoping the walking will reduce the pain but it is still excruciating. Long story short, after an hour I broke down and went to the ER which I really hate. They took care of me though, shot me up with dilaudid, had me pee in a cup and then go through a CT scan. So what they found was a 6 cm kidney stone sitting right next to a tumor that had taken up half of my right kidney right through the middle of it. So, in December I went through surgery for kidney stone removal. Since it was sitting right next to my new found tumor friend they couldn't blast it with soundwaves and break it up. They had to insert a laser through my penis and through one of my tubes, remove the stone pieces, and then left a stent in that tube for a couple weeks before removing it with a cytoscope. It is not an experience I would recommend because you are awake when they lower that cytoscope down into your urethra and then pull a giant tube out of you that way.
Anyways, so yeah, the tumor. It was classed as a Bosniak 3 complex cyst which is about a 50/50 flip on whether it is malignant or not and they can't test it because it would risk rupturing the cysts. So this thing is taking up residence in a horrible place too. Right in the middle of the kidney and spread out all over taking up half the damn thing. My urologist says he would have to do a radical nephrectomy but he also referred me to UT Southwestern and Dr. Cadeddu. He said it was borderline inoperable but he would try to do a partial instead of a radical nephrectomy as long as I realized my chance for complications was going to be higher than average because of all the factors. So I did that at the beginning of July just before the 4th and I've been recovering from that surgery ever since. It went smashingly well by the way and tests came back benign! So I have one and a half kidneys and I am very thankful I escaped a cancer diagnoses.
Since then I've really just been healing, mostly walking and some light cardio. Some light weights mostly for tone. So earlier I talked about my food addiction right? So, even though I had had the surgery and all that I still had my food addiction. I was eating much more healthy things in much smaller amounts but I was still kinda grazing all day and drinking flattened out diet sodas and all that. That changed about a month or so ago. I tried on my old clothes and saw how they now were so massive. I went out and bought my first new outfit in over six months. That's when it became real what was happening with me and it was like a switch had been thrown in my brain. My depression eased, my craving for food all the time went away, and my entire relationship with food changed. It's been amazing to feel truly confident in everything and not have your physical appearance be what drags you down. That being said I still have bad times. Hell, last night I went on a self doubt and abuse rampage. I guess the difference is I feel hopeful about the future rather than dreading it. I've also been sticking with intermittent fasting for the last couple of weeks and am really liking how I feel when doing it.
So here below you can see my weight progress charts with all my measurements and some before and progress pictures. I'm still working to get the official before and after pictures that my doctor took. I still have a ways to go but if I can help anyone here I would like to. Just remember this is only based on my own experiences. Also apologies for the big pictures. I suck at figuring out how to size them.
Before:
Progress:
And yes, I know I dressed terribly.
Current:
So, my name is Jakob. I am 38 years old and I started my weight loss journey 2 weeks before my 37th birthday. I mean, technically it started before then but that date, September 14th 2016 is when my life irrevocably changed. I had gastric sleeve surgery that day where they also removed my Gall Bladder. I started this at 390 pounds and am currently 238. Today I have shifted my focus. I am still doing my best to promote weight loss but today I feel I can finally start doing a much more strenuous weight lifting routine. So I have gone from a total cardio and fat loss outlook now to a body recomposition one. I have already started to slowly add muscle from my toning exercises and I hope it explodes when I get serious about it.
So yeah, I had gastric sleeve surgery. For those who don't know what this is they cut out three quarters of your stomach and they suture it together in the shape of a sleeve. Basically, you lose the entire kidney bean shape of the stomach. I did it as a tool to win my battle over food addiction which I have. It was a life changing decision and despite all the complications it has been very much worth it. I have actually had 4 surgical procedures in the last year all told. I had an endoscopy before the gastric sleeve and gall bladder removal where they put you in a twilight state and snake a camera through your mouth and down into your stomach. It actually wasn't bad, just a sore throat later. Yes, I know, HA! Anyways, a week after I had the gastric sleeve surgery I developed Diverticulitis. Ya know, that thing Brock Lesnar had that really ****ed him up for his MMA fighting. Never experienced it before in my life but it was horrible. I had horrible shooting stabbing pains in the lower left pelvic area. So, I'm a week out from a brutal surgery, I can't eat anything. I'm living on protein shakes and water and these ****ing pills. Like seriously, **** these pills. They gave me two antibiotics that I'm having to take on an empty stomach which is painful itself but then one of the pills makes everything I consume taste like bitter metal. At this point I can barely tolerate water and just thinking back on it I just felt waves of nausea so powerful I almost threw up even though I'm in the fasting portion of my day.
Anyways, so eventually I am starting to recover and it is the night before Thanksgiving. My weight loss has been going pretty well and I'm upbeat and I've got a giant turkey brining that I will bring over to my moms and cook using Alton Brown's method. It's about midnight as I am getting ready for bed and I feel a horrible stabbing pain in my back. I take some Tylenol but it does absolutely nothing. At this point I am pacing back and forth in the apartment between the bedroom and my living room just hoping the walking will reduce the pain but it is still excruciating. Long story short, after an hour I broke down and went to the ER which I really hate. They took care of me though, shot me up with dilaudid, had me pee in a cup and then go through a CT scan. So what they found was a 6 cm kidney stone sitting right next to a tumor that had taken up half of my right kidney right through the middle of it. So, in December I went through surgery for kidney stone removal. Since it was sitting right next to my new found tumor friend they couldn't blast it with soundwaves and break it up. They had to insert a laser through my penis and through one of my tubes, remove the stone pieces, and then left a stent in that tube for a couple weeks before removing it with a cytoscope. It is not an experience I would recommend because you are awake when they lower that cytoscope down into your urethra and then pull a giant tube out of you that way.
Anyways, so yeah, the tumor. It was classed as a Bosniak 3 complex cyst which is about a 50/50 flip on whether it is malignant or not and they can't test it because it would risk rupturing the cysts. So this thing is taking up residence in a horrible place too. Right in the middle of the kidney and spread out all over taking up half the damn thing. My urologist says he would have to do a radical nephrectomy but he also referred me to UT Southwestern and Dr. Cadeddu. He said it was borderline inoperable but he would try to do a partial instead of a radical nephrectomy as long as I realized my chance for complications was going to be higher than average because of all the factors. So I did that at the beginning of July just before the 4th and I've been recovering from that surgery ever since. It went smashingly well by the way and tests came back benign! So I have one and a half kidneys and I am very thankful I escaped a cancer diagnoses.
Since then I've really just been healing, mostly walking and some light cardio. Some light weights mostly for tone. So earlier I talked about my food addiction right? So, even though I had had the surgery and all that I still had my food addiction. I was eating much more healthy things in much smaller amounts but I was still kinda grazing all day and drinking flattened out diet sodas and all that. That changed about a month or so ago. I tried on my old clothes and saw how they now were so massive. I went out and bought my first new outfit in over six months. That's when it became real what was happening with me and it was like a switch had been thrown in my brain. My depression eased, my craving for food all the time went away, and my entire relationship with food changed. It's been amazing to feel truly confident in everything and not have your physical appearance be what drags you down. That being said I still have bad times. Hell, last night I went on a self doubt and abuse rampage. I guess the difference is I feel hopeful about the future rather than dreading it. I've also been sticking with intermittent fasting for the last couple of weeks and am really liking how I feel when doing it.
So here below you can see my weight progress charts with all my measurements and some before and progress pictures. I'm still working to get the official before and after pictures that my doctor took. I still have a ways to go but if I can help anyone here I would like to. Just remember this is only based on my own experiences. Also apologies for the big pictures. I suck at figuring out how to size them.
Before:
Progress:
And yes, I know I dressed terribly.
Current:
