Totem Racer: From Child to Now

From Child to Now

This tattered pic is of me when I was three. After having children of my own, I truly cannot

fathom how my parents got through the tumultous times that abounded when I was this age.

There was the Siberian Husky bite (50 stitches along the middle of my head)... I remember having to pile into the station wagon with all the other kids and someone held a towel to my head. Then I remember waking up some time later and seeing my parent's friend there and she brought me this pretty doll that had blonde hair and a blue dress. I was at children's and was in a dark brown crib. I can still smell that hospital smell, too... It is truly amazing what the mind can do for us.

Then... or perhaps prior to this, there was the severe infection that led to high fevers that led to seizures. The seizure medication never worked.

To the right you have me and my brother. I was four, he was 12 months (approximately)

Here I am in second grade... It was after this was taken and over the following summer (going into 3rd grade) that something happened in my life that hit me pretty hard emotionally. I was (using safe words...) abused by a neighbor who was/is about two years older than me. (as I remember, this was the second time in my life this type of thing happened to me) and this is when I started to find comfort in food. I started to gain a ton of weight.

Well, of course being large, I soon got picked on RELENTLESSLY by classmates. This didn't help the cause.

I did get back at the one kid for it... I embarrassed him in front of his friends. That bought me over a year of his sneering and snide comments. I just wish I realized that would have worked long ago. I also wish I would have just let go and not been so serious. Oh well... what's in the past is in the past.

There aren't any other pictures of me until I got into highschool that I currently have. As I get those, I will post them.

This is my senior highschool picture with my Rusty pup. Man, do I miss that puppy. :D He was such a funny dog. He had such a dingy personality... much like a blonde... so happy-go-lucky.

I wasn't a real popular person in school. I'm not sure if it was due to my size, everyone thought I was gross, or if it was the peer-pressure of associating with me would bring them down... I don't know. The comments, the threats, all of it hurt of course. How could it not.

However, one person who picked on me in middle school came to me one day and apologized for the way he treated me. I'll never forget that. It meant a lot.

Genetics has a big part in my size. My family are all larger... both sides of the family. (I got me a double whammy there) I'm in no way a petite person by bone structure either... I'm a large boned woman. I was one of the taller girls in school at about 5'7" to 5'7 1/2" tall. When down to my goal weight, I still wouldn't be wearing a "medium" size... I'd still be wearing a Large or XL.

Anyway, in an earlier post, I mentioned an Ex... well, there was another misjudgement on my part that landed me a little more abuse. Although, I do have to thank my grandma for helping me not go back. When the temptation arose, I just thought of what she said and that kept me on the straight and narrow.

My weight that year (1990) was up and down.. just all over the place.

It was a couple weeks later and I was dating Dan.

Below is my picture from Minneapolis Business College. Here I'm about 20 lbs over weight. Not too bad...

Below is a picture my hubby (fiance at the time) took of me. I had colored my hair a dark brown... not one of my better decisions...

Around this time, I was having some undiagnosed Endometriosis and PCOS going on... I was taking birth control to help ease the pain and heavy bleeding... ugh... female problems! So, I started gaining the weight back again... This just keeps going on and on and on...
60 lbs here, 100lbs there... very frustrating.

Here I am at my wedding. I am marrying my soul-mate. Dan and I had been through so much even by this point it seemed we were already married. Kinda drove the family and friends around us nuts. We were always together. I'll never forget that Halloween Storm of 1991. We got dumped on... I mean just pummelled with snow. People were stuck in their homes for three days .... In MINNESOTA... land of 10,000,000 4x4's and SUV's... My grandma is so funny... she says to me one morning... "what's wrong, Deb?... suffering from withdrawl?" Dan and I probably were. Both of us were bored out of our minds. Later that year we lost Dan's best friend, Mark. He never made it out of surgery. While this was a possibility, it seemed so unlikely because Mark was soooo full of life. Later that year, we lost one of Dan's uncles, my great grandmother, and in 1994 (2 weeks before wedding ) we lost Dan's father. Wow... was that a rough time. We got through it though.

Well, even after the wedding the weight slowly crept on and on and on. Here is Dan and me in the living room of his mom's house. We were living with her for a little while until Dan fninished his courses.

Then we started to have our babies. Below is a picture of me holding baby Tiffany with Dr. Atluru beside me.

Then I became pregnant again in 1999. This time it was a surprise. Each pregnancy I knew where the egg attached as I could feel it. (I suppose b/c of the Endometriosis) and I had two of them with this one. By the time I made it to the doctor for the 8wk ultrasound, there was some spotting and then the ultrasound revealed one baby. One healthy heart-beat of a healthy baby. Well, all was well and good until I was about 16 weeks along. I had some more spotting and was sent in for an emergency ultrasound. This time, there was no baby. The doctor called it "vanishing twin syndrome" I did some research on it (I had access to the bio-medical library b/c I worked for a professor/vice-chairman of neurology for the University of Minnesota) so I did some reading. There wasn't a lot of information on it at the time. What I did find out is it is extremely rare for a "singleton" pregnancy to abort due to VTS, but it can happen. When there are multiples in a pregnancy, one of the other fetuses "resorbs" the other one. In some cases, the mother's body will resorb the fetus; which is what happened in my case. I ended up having to do a D&C.

The following January 17, 2000, I found out I was pregnant again. This was after I bought pregnancy test after pregnancy test after pregnancy test. All of them coming back negative and sinking deeper and deeper into post-partem depression from the miscarriage.

Then our prayers were answered, he was there... just not registering on tests until I was well past 8 weeks pregnant. I went in and had a serum test done.

I remember telling Tiffany I had a baby in my belly. She was sooo cute... 17 months old... she threw her hands out at me and made that noise as if to say... "get outta here... no way". Later on, I thought I'd try again... she lifts up my shirt and is looking for the baby. hahahaha

Well, September 12, Danny was born. Below is the family portrait that was taken in January of 2001. Don't let my facial expression fool ya... I was happy with my family. I was just suffering from untreated post-partem depression from the miscarriage and the fact that this last pregnancy was excruciatingly painful and delivery was 8 hours of back labor; I was exhausted.

Well, after I had Danny I had a tubal sterilization done. I couldn't endure another pregnancy like I just had and my womb had tipped so far it would have made getting pregnant very difficult. After a while, I started to have very, very painful cycles again with way, way heavy bleeding so I was put on Lupron Injections that puts a woman into "temporary Menopause". I gained another 100 lbs.

Below is a picture of me post-hysterectomy. That helped with a lot of the pain, but now I started having other trouble and was not sure what was happening. The weight continues to creep on...

and on, and I continue to go undiagnosed... (in the below picture of Annette and me, I was going to LA Weightloss... it didn't help. :( )

AND ON...

AND ON

AND ON...

Finally, I'm at my heaviest (below). I have been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia and have been put onto a ton of medication. Pain pills, muscle relaxers, diuretics, arthiritis medication... I could barely walk from the parking lot down to my desk without excruciating pain. Finally, in December 2005, I was granted my wish to work from home. Now I have more time with my kids and I can be here for when they get home from school and I can see them off in the AM.

Oh... and Ihave an additional role... I get to play moderator during their fights. haha

Brace yourself... the picture you are about to see isn't pretty!

Later, we got a puppy... Chester. He was such a sweetie... We had to give him up though. :( we're all allergic to dogs. All four of us. Well, I'm still pretty big here and am still driving to Edina every day in this pic. This was taken in August of 05. OOF!!! I'm not diggin' this pic either. :P

In May of 06 I started working with my doctor. I refuse to alter my body to lose weight (surgery) so we came up with a plan...

(You are going to start seeing pictures of me on my journey back down...)

In June of 06, I was finally positively diagnosed with PCOS and put on meds for insulin resistance. Had they had more information back when I hit puberty, I likely wouldn't be where I'm at today... as said by the doc.

This picture was taken in June of 07... as you can see, I'm on my way down. I also have two very wonderful children. They are gorgeous! (Dan and I always knew we'd make adorable babies... we just didn't realize how cute!!)

The pictures below were just taken about Mid July. While I'm still fairly big... I am on the down-swing.

(the pictures you see below were taken July 28, 2007)

This picture was taken by my beautiful and talented little 8 year-old. Still trying to like it... but ye know... I never did like how I looked in pictures. I've only ever liked a couple.