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Jamie's Journey
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My name is Jamie and I am 25 years old and I live in Bradenton FL. I am the oldest of 4 children and my family is one of the most important things in my life. I am very active in my church and I love my pastor and his family. They have really meant a lot in my life. I also love to go to the movies and the theater. I love to read and listen to music. My all time favorite thing to do has got to be SHOPPING!! Especially shopping with my sister and spending time with my wonderful goddaughter. It is so neat to see the world through the eyes of a child.

I have been overweight pretty much since childhood, but I never really thought of myself as fat until the summer after my 6th grade year when my parents sent me to Camp Weight Watchers for 2 weeks. I remember I lost like 12 pounds and weighed right around 110 pounds. (That's the last time I ever saw 110 pounds!!) From that moment on I always had a little voice inside me that said I was fat. Since then I have tried every diet known to man and I have been successful at some, but not for long. I was always the best liar, you know the lies like...I like myself this way, I am comfortable being this size and so on. Well, I was so convincing I actually started to believe that I liked being fat. I basically used that point of view as a survival tactic so that I wouldn't be hurt when my family would make comments to me about my weight or suggest a diet. It has taken me a long time to realize that I love who I am on the inside (I really am a great girl :o)!!) and I use who I am on the outside as an excuse. An excuse not to go and have fun and live the life that I want to. I find myself not wanting to go to the mall or not wanting to go to a new restaurant because I know that I can't fit in a booth. I love to shop with my sister, but it is hard to go with her into all the "skinny" stores because I feel like everyone is looking at me like what is she doing in here. I hate the fact that I can only shop in certain stores and that I get tired at the mention of a full day of shopping. I also have very bad knees. I used to play softball all through school and in my Senior year I hurt my right knee and had my first surgery 2 days after graduation. That next year I hurt my left knee and had another surgery. After that injury I hung up my cleats and I haven't played since. I have had more knee surgeries due in part to the rapid weight gain since I can't really exercise. Due to the excess weight I can't have the additional surgeries to repair my knees. I am hoping that with the gastric bypass procedure and the weight loss I won't even need the other knee surgeries.

I decided to have gastric bypass surgery about a year ago. I even thought about not telling my family that I was having surgery and just going with my best friend Christina to the doctor. At first I was ashamed about even thinking of having the surgery, like I was a failure since I couldn't lose weight any other way. But as I have researched the procedure and I have talked to people who have had the surgery I am more excited than ever to have it done and I don't really care who knows. I hope that through this website and through reading my journal I can give you a little glimpse at what it is like to be me and what it is like to jump through all the hoops to have gastric bypass surgery.

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Favorites

Here are my favorite movies (in no random order!!)

Ever After
Pretty Woman
Austin Powers 1 & 2
American Dreamer

My favorite TV shows

ER
Friends
Days of Our Lives
Trading Spaces (Anyone want to trade??)

Favorite Authors

James Patterson
John Grisham
Lilian Jackson Braun
Rita Mae Brown
Mary Higgens Clark

My favorite actors and actress'

Julia Roberts
Drew Barrymore
George Clooney
Paul Walker (YUMMY!!)

My favorite music groups (no comments please!!)

NSYNC
Backstreet Boys
Ricky Martin
Tim McGraw
Creed

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WOW! Look at him! Paul Walker is my dream man!!