At my surgical appointment this week it was suggested that I should lose some weight to increase my chances of my pouch surgery going well.

Since the birth of my kids I gained a lot of weight and then have yo yo-ed since then. I’ll lose weight during flares then gain it back. Last year I had months of steroids which caused me to gain a lot and surgery where I lost weight. Then during my recovery where I couldn’t do much physical exercise and being unable to eat much fruit or veg but encouraged to eat white bread, pasta and rice I then gained more!

I have been looking at my weight since January and I have lost 10 lbs, but I know I’m still probably two and a half stone overweight.  My BMI is currently 28 which puts me near the top end of overweight.  Ill be honest, it doesn’t bother me massively, I like the way I look, I know Im not stick thin but I think I look fucking good! (and Im SO modest!) But I do want to be fitter, healthier and stronger.

The doc was really nice about it and was simply telling me how to increase my chances of a better outcome.  I know a lot of crohnies really struggle with being underweight but for me it’s the other way.

So I need to get on it, it feels very much like when I stopped smoking.  I liked smoking, I know that sounds bad and isn’t the right thing to say these days, but I did like it.  I knew it was bad for me and I knew that Timm and the kids hated me smoking but I never really wanted to stop.  Then my consultant told me that I was five times more likely to have a flare up of ulcerative colitis if I was a smoker.  I quit that day.

Id been a smoker for 15 year and I just stopped. I felt that if I continued smoking after Id been told this and then had a flare up, that it would be my own fault.  Every time I put a cigarette to my lips I thought about how sick I was during a flare up, I thought about being on medication and having to stay in hospital and funnily enough, it made me not want to have that smoke!

I feel the same now, I know that by my BMI I am overweight, I know that my health could be better and I could be fitter if I lost some weight.  I have dieted over the years and never really got on top of it.  Ill lose a stone or two and then slowly gain it back.  Also whilst I was ill, my weight just didn’t seem like a priority. But now I feel that if I don’t lose weight and something goes wrong with the surgery or my recovery, that it will be my own fault.  I feel that I have to do this now to give myself the best chances of an easy recovery.

I know it isn’t as simple as that and that complications can arise whatever your weight, but now I have heard it, I feel its something I must do.  It feels easier to say no to that slice of cake or takeaway because the fear of surgery going wrong is far higher than my desire to eat fatty foods or chocolate and sweets. I have six months to lose the weight, so Im just getting back on the healthy eating, going to the gym and getting more exercise.  Wish me luck!

I think a lot of this has to do with control too, I have little control over what happens with my body at the moment, the surgery isn’t what I planned for my life but I need to have it and so it is out of my hands.  I can’t control the disease or treatment, but I can control how I treat my body, what fuel it gets and how I exercise and so that is what Ill do.

I need to know I am going into the surgery match fit and so if that means cutting out the cake and hitting the gym hard, that is what Im going to do.

Sam xx