Losing weight won't cure you

I had been tired all fall, I've described it several different ways to family, but it's a noticeable fatigue. Mostly in my head, and by that I don't mean phycological, I mean that I feel like my face is tired, my BRAIN is tired. I've told people that I feel like someone is sitting on my cheeks. I know, odd way to describe it, but true. I was associating it with the pain, but now know they are not related.

When I was in college I felt a smiliar way, tired all the time, wanting to just sleep, a nagging headache. I gave into it back then and indulged my weariness with crap food and a groove on my sofa. Blood work would eventually show that I was hypothyroid. My father and aunt also have this condition and so the addition of the pill didn't mean much to me. Just something else to add to my daily routine, it didn't occur to me that it was due to my weight. I chalked it up to family history. The Levoxyl perked me up and I went on with my life never giving it another thought. Six years later when I got below 200 pounds I came off the little yellow pill. I was feeling hyper and rushed and jittery and tweeked and I had no idea why. I had been in job transition with no health insurance and was still taking the dose for 345 lb Sarah. This was in 2004 sometime and once again I never gave it another thought. Well, except to proudly declare that losing the weight had "cured" my hypothyroidism. And it did, for a while.

Today, like every morning I got up and headed to the bathroom. I hopped on the scale (after the toilet tmi) and was happy with the number at my toes. 158 lbs is something I used to dream about. I feel like I am living at this weight. After a lifetime of being heavy to now be normal is something that is so wonderful I can sometimes not put words to it. But at the same time, I can't escape what those years did to me. The body is simply not equipped to handle the excess weight. I have no idea how many extra pounds or how long you carry them is too much but I do know that losing weight is not going to cure you of all the problems that you had while you were heavy. Anyone who tells you different is selling something. It drives me crazy to see people talk about the need to cure the obesity epidemic because hey-- if all those fat people just lost weight health care costs would go down. Yeah, notsomuch.

So there is a chat with my PCP in my future. My blood work gets automatically released to me via my electronic chart and I knew she was testing my thyroid because of my fatigue complaint and so was not really surprised to see the little flags next to the abnormal results. I am however bummed out by this turn of events. In the what could be wrong with you scale it's not a big deal, but something I thought I had left behind in my fat days. Apparently not. This sadness will pass and I'll get re-medicated but I know now that you have to give your health some thought. Just because you have reached thin, doesn't give you a free pass. Thanks for the reminder universe.