LOST: Half of My Mom

Big Italian Overboard and her meatballs

Mini-Overboard

I’ve lost half of my mother, AKA: Overboard, and (thankfully) we can’t find the 110 pound piece because it was not her better half. Hurray! Alas, she is keeping good balance! Overboard had Gastric Bypass surgery because she had two serious health conditions; high blood pressure and type two diabetes. When a person has gastric bypass surgery the stomach is made smaller and causes food to bypass part of the small intestine. You feel full more quickly than when your stomach was its original size. This reduces the amount of food you can eat at one time. Imagine how birds eat, it’s like that. This leads to weight loss and a lot of it. In Overboard’s case, since her surgery in July  2010, she dropped from a 24 dress size to a size 8!

When she decided to have the major surgery I was worried and bummed that she couldn’t maintain a healthy weight the old fashioned way; diet and exercise. Like so many Americans, Overboard leaned out-of-balance with food. She was a yo-yo dieter, emotional eater and battled obesity for decades. Gastric bypass surgery was her solution and although an extreme way to lose weight, it worked! Now she is less likely to die from heart problems, diabetes or cancer compared to obese people who did not have this surgery. That means Overboard will be around to watch her grandsons grow up, fuss over her great-grandchildren (God willing), play Farkle, go bowling and bicker with my Dad. She not only looks and feels better, but it seems she has a new lease on life.  

It hasn’t been easy changing her life song. Overboard’s diet and routine have been forever modified, but she has adjusted wonderfully to her new tune. She will never be able to eat the way or amounts she did and will need to take vitamins for life. Plus, essential nutrients will be monitored for the proper functioning of her body system.

Alas, she has achieved that difficult balance of maintaining healthy weight. Although slimmer and more-beautiful-than-ever on the outside, she is still 100% Overboard on the inside. She still over-cooks, over-shops, over-decorates, over-loves and over-spoils her grandsons. That is why we will always love our new-and-improved-healthy-petite Overboard.

Cheers to you Mom! Clink! I'm so happy you are

 keeping "the balance." Good job!