I met up with my mate in Stratford today with the view of finding a venue for the support group her and I are setting up. My mate introduced me to the world of Peacocks and they had a mammoth sale and I managed to get 4 shirts and a t-shirt for £20! Bargain! We mooched around Stratford for a few hours buying a few bits until we went to Morrisons to take the weight off my feet and chilled with my little lunch and my mate with a sarnie.
I had a text from another mate to say I was in the Guardian today so ran over to quickly buy it! OMG, what a hideous photo they used of me! Argggggghhhhhhhhhhh!! But I think my point was made without too many mis-quotes:
Three years ago Ricardo Lobo-Morell, who lives in east London, weighed himself for the first time. He had to go into Boots to use one of their weighing machines - he was 30st.
"I thought, 'Bloody hell, I've got to do something about it.' I felt like I was on display in the shop and I knew everyone was thinking, 'Oh, look at the fatty on the scales.' A few weeks later, on the tube, I was sitting on one of those pull-down seats and it broke underneath me. I was so embarrassed but I just made a joke to cope with it. That was it - I knew I had to do something."
Lobo-Morell's weight has brought him the kind of chronic health problems that experts fear will become more common with the so-called obesity epidemic. "I developed type 2 diabetes so I have to inject myself with four different types of insulin four times a day," he says. "I've got high blood pressure, high cholesterol, problems with my knees." He can never remember a time when he was a healthy weight. "As a kid, I was referred from dietician to dietician. Most of them were not particularly sympathetic. I would be given diet sheets, but I would nick money from my mum's purse and buy chocolate on the way to school. My mum would try her best, but even now, when my parents visit me, my mum always comes with food; I think it's her way of showing how much she loves me."
For Lobo-Morell, eating seems to be more of a habit than an emotional crutch. "I don't think there was a specific event that happened that made me pile the weight on. It's always been there and a part of me. I've never been a binge eater but I graze in the evenings. Cheese is the big thing I love. I just love my food, the wrong food, and for me the big thing is portion size. My stomach is so huge now that a little portion is not going to fill me up. I've never felt full. The only reason I know when I've felt full is if I think I'm going to be sick." Why can't he stop? "I don't know. [Eating healthy food and doing exercise] is easier said than done. I know what I need to do, but when you're as overweight as I am - nearly 24st - the light at the end of the tunnel is so far away and I have zero will power." One of the worst things, he says, is thinking about how other people might see him. "This might sound weird, but when I see other fat people it disgusts me. I'd hate people to think that about me, but I know they probably do."
Lobo-Morell, who is a psychiatric community nurse, has tried many diets and has been on anti-obesity drugs. He knows he should be cooking healthy meals from scratch and eating lots of vegetables, but "I just didn't like them". He has been trying to eat healthily and lose weight because after more than two years of convincing surgeons he is a good candidate for gastric bypass surgery, his appointment has finally been booked. "People think it's a quick fix, but it isn't. It's major surgery. I have lost friends over it who think it's the easy way out and aren't supporting me. I want to get my life back and start afresh."
What might have stopped him putting all that weight on? "Perhaps if I was targeted at a young age, and more sympathetically," he says. He thinks "fat camps" would have worked for him. "Food is only part of why someone is obese. There's the psychological stuff, and if you can target that it would help. I was never offered anything like that. I have only seen a psychologist now I'm having surgery. I'm a mental health professional so I know the importance of that."
I call Lobo-Morell a couple of weeks after he had the operation. He sounds tired. "I had mixed emotions on the day," he says. "It was strange walking into the operating theatre and getting up on the table. When I woke up I was in quite a lot of pain, and I immediately regretted having it done because I was attached to lots of drips and I felt quite claustrophobic. But that didn't last." He lost one and a half stone in the three days he was in hospital and the weight has been gradually coming off since then. "I've got no regrets," he says, though admits it is hard to follow the special diet of pureed food for six weeks before he can introduce solid food. "But I don't feel hungry. I don't miss the food I used to eat. My diabetes has got much better, my blood pressure is OK. It is early days, but I do feel positive".
I got home and managed to drink a nice cuppa (decaff of course) and tried on the clothes I bought - apart from the t-shirt the other shirts were too small but after losing a little more weight they will fit nicely.
I am not a label freak and only buy which I like - I am glad I have discovered Peacocks and can buy shedloads of clothes for little money! Roll on weight-loss and pay day!
You really don't know how it felt to be able to walk into a regular shop (albeit Peacocks) and buy "normal" clothes - I have not been able to do that for at least 20 odd years!
So I have had a wicked day out and look forward to more weight-loss and this bizarre and crazy weight-loss journey!
Rick :-)
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