I suppose just about everyone starts their blog with a “where do I begin” type of question in their mind. If I did that then I would probably write another novel and of course it would be a comedy of life. But I would rather start back 5 years ago to the summer of 2004 when the real honest to god truth struck me with regards to my fatness. I call it fatness rather than weight because weight rhymes with wait and I don’t want to…though I must. I was sitting in my office chair at the computer working on a book when two cats got into a fight under my legs. I got them apart but not before one of them scratched the hell out of my right leg. The wound just wouldn’t heal and it grew bigger and bigger even though the doctor had given me antibiotics and some cream to rub on it. After three months the wound was leaking water and just well gross. Meanwhile I seemed to feel a bit weaker and more tired and I chalked it up to the fact that I would soon be pushing 60 years old though I didn’t feel like it. In September I did nothing but fall asleep and sit. All I did was eat to comfort myself when I was awake. Barbeque, Biscuits with butter, Fried Chicken and lots of V8 juice. September 5th I woke up and my legs would barely move. My arms felt weird when I tried to move them too. I made it to the bathroom and back and thought oh this will go away I can still walk. After sitting on the couch for about 10 hours things got worse. I finally called my doctor and he said to get to the hospital. It took 7 strong firemen to get my fat ass down two flights of stairs to the ambulance. When I got to the hospital I was informed that I was in the throws of Renal Failure. In other words my kidneys had stopped functioning. So after 3 days in the ICU they transferred me to a rehab hospital. I could not walk for the life of me and had to be tugged on and carted on special gurneys. I had to have a special bariatric bed in the hospital. They used a small lift that hurt like hell to get me up and sit me in a chair. Oh my legs and arms moved now and the kidneys were better but I could not walk. I was diagnosed with something they call Venous Stasis. It is a direct result of non-activity and obesity. They weighed me on the special bariatric bed and I weighed a wonderful whopping 425 pounds. Now in the hospital I could not stand the food. I don’t know if it was the antibiotics or what but I just could barely eat. So here I was 425 pounds and suddenly diagnosed also as malnutritioned which I found rather funny. I was in that hospital for 35 days. When I got out I could walk but only with a walker. The rest of the time I had to be in a wheelchair. To this day it’s still the same. I did loose down to 350 pounds by 2005 and stayed that way until February of 2006. Still with the Venous Stasis I still had wounds and wrapped legs and was trying to find a way to help myself along with the doctor. He kept saying loose weight. I just nodded and was like yeah right. Anyway the wounds were a bit better. In January of 2005 my youngest daughter’s fiancé of three years left her and ran away with her best friend up to Michigan. She was devastated. We were all close and this just stunned us. She lives with us so she and I spent a lot of time consoling one another by…you guessed it…eating. Two weeks later in February my skinny Minnie husband of 33 years had a massive heart attack. He underwent a quadruple bypass surgery and it took him 6 months to recover. During this time though he ate correctly and maintained a good healthy weight what did I do…? Eat. Of course it’s what I do best. So I thought oh well I’m 350 pounds and have been this weight for a while. I had no high cholesterol, no high blood pressure, and no diabetes. I thought I was doing ok regardless. Well my legs began to look like a war zone. New wounds and more bandages and lots of pain. I finally bought a Weight Watchers Scale in 2008 and discovered that I now weighed 374 pounds. I was on my way up again. I thought damn how am I to loose weight and exercise in a wheelchair with a walker? I tried to join several gyms and they just blew me off. Too old..too heavy..we don’t deal with the disabled…and on and on. Sooo I bought a treadmill. Not for me but for my now overweight daughter and my skinny health conscious husband. I could not walk on it regardless. Sooo I began to research. I found one of the greatest DVD’s called “Chair Dancing” by Jodi Stolove. So I found a way to exercise. Now I just did this a week ago and before that I joined Weight Watchers online to track my food intake. I’m doing something wrong because I haven’t lost a pound. Oh wait I lost 4 pounds but Christmas and New Years came and I’m back to 374.2 pounds. So thus this blog to help me keep on track and also to help me know there are others out there who are having much of the same issues regardless of how much they have to loose. I can’t afford a motorized scooter but someday. I want to be able to go to a mall again just to look in the windows and go to the top of Stone Mountain to look out upon the horizon or to the Zoo even or many places I can’t go right now because my wheelchair is too cumbersome plus it’s not easy to push about a 374 pound woman nor can I manage to get myself far as my arms want to fall off. So here I am. Determined and ready with the right tools and a positive attitude. Here’s to 2009 and the coming weight loss that I know will be a long road but I’m willing. Happy New Year and good luck to all.