Anne lost 230 lbs: Pls help with skin removal

GREAT NEWS: This is now a Matching Fund Drive!

A sponsor has generously offered to MATCH all donations! Including those already made!

Please, please, please, help spread the word!

(My reach isn't far - it would have been further with my dear brother here, as he was very well networked...especially with our Shoreline crowd.)

Note all extra goes directly to a fund to support our Mom, Audrey.

Hugs, love, and light!

Thank you for your time, donations, shares, and your kindness.

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My name is Anne and this is my story.

I’ve been in this obesity battle since I was a toddler through to elementary, middle, high school, college, and beyond.

To this day, I have lost and maintained a total of 230 lbs from a combination of weight loss surgery, a changed relationship with food, and exercise.

During the last three years, I have built muscle and aerobic endurance, walking 3-4 days a week and weight-lifting 4x a week. I did my first 5k this summer and look forward to doing many more, but there is something in my way. My excess skin and deflated tissue.

A surgical procedure is given only to those with massive weight loss. It's called "reconstructive surgery." It is a specialization within plastic surgery, as it's an intricate procedure. (There are many more blood vessels and much more skin and "deflated" or "semi-deflated" fat cells to remove in this type of surgery.)

I’ve researched and consulted with multiple surgeons and reviewed outcomes. I have finally found one that I am confident will give me a great result. However, my insurance will not cover any of the procedures recommended, and the cost looks astronomical from where I sit. I’m having only the abdominal reconstruction, as that’s the part that gets in my way, and it’s safer for me to have one reconstructive surgery at a time.

My surgery, just the abdomen, costs approximately $15,000. For the last three years, I’ve been saving and saving, and I’m shy about $3,000.

I’m humbled to be asking for any assistance at all.

I’ve worked tirelessly since 2017 to change the course of my life in more ways than in health and fitness:

- I moved from Kirkland to the Edmonds Bowl (near where I grew up, and 10 minutes away from Mom’s assisted living facility – which has already paid off – I’ve been able to get “on scene” when she’s needed me right away!). This took a big bite out of my saving-for-surgery fund.

- I changed careers from editor and web content manager to project manager.

- I studied and passed my Professional Management Certification exam in 2021 (a very rigorous exam).

- I’ve continued to move up in my career. However, I haven’t found full-time employment as yet. (Contract work at Amazon and Microsoft has kept me going in 6-to-18-month gigs.)

- I plan to find permanent, full-time employment next.

An aside:

I was planning on going to Iceland with my brother, sister, and cousins – but most of you are aware of brother Charles’ death (COVID-related), and then the following horrific passing of my sister’s husband Larry – which has led me to reassess where I am in my life, the days I have left, and instead of Iceland, I’ve chosen to reach for my lifelong goal – to live in a smaller, more fit body. (Sorry team Hillman/Westford!)

Any donation is welcome and helps me take one step further to finishing this weight loss journey, fitness and health journey, and living life to its fullest.

Thank you for listening.

All the best,

-Anne Stein

P.S.

If there are any leftover donations, they will be managed between my sister and I, earmarked for Mom-Audrey spending only (she has incidentals and unexpected needs her fixed income doesn’t cover i.e. scooter repair, OTC vitamins/supplements/medical devices and daily consumables that are not covered by Medicare).

A RATHER DETAILED BACKSTORY:

I can tell from old family photos that I was overweight, heavier than my siblings, from an incredibly early age (pics in comments). The first time I was on Weight Watchers was in third grade. I wore boy's husky size pants, and tops made by my grandmother (Amma). I couldn't fit into regular kid-sized clothing.

I was tortured every day in elementary, middle, and high school.

From kids throwing rocks at me when walking to and from elementary school, yelling "fatty fatty two by four, can't fit through the kitchen door" only to be doubled in numbers in middle school!

I remember this from middle school:

Right before U.S. History class began, I took a seat in the front row. (Remember those all-in-one designed desks?) It was hard for me to get in and out of that desk. My fat body pushed its excess through the metal bars and rolled out over the desktop. I was sitting in front of a cheerleader, who was giggling, and I sensed it was about me.

The cheerleader had everyone's attention in the room, and I felt all eyes on me. Little did I know the cheerleader had everybody’s attention because she was about to stick me with a big safety pin. She stuck me, piercing my skin, making me bleed. I let out a yelp and struggled to get out of the desk. Everyone in class was snickering. When they settled down, the cheerleader yelled, "GEE! I THOUGHT YOU WOULD POP!" The class roared with laughter.

In high school, there were even more mean kids. Bullies. I was 16 years old and had put on more weight. I was 250 pounds as a freshman. Size 24 wasn’t in the mall’s juniors' section, nor even the Sears store. I ordered my size through a mail-order catalog meant for a much older consumer – with moo-moos and housecoats. I was depressed (undiagnosed), and distracted, always on alert to deal with bully after bully.

I would change my paths to and from my locker to avoid them. I was always late to health class because Tommy’s favorite way to tease me was to plaster himself against the locker doors and yell out “EARTHQUAKE” as I walked into the classroom. He pretended to shake uncontrollably. To most of the class, it was funny. To me? I wanted to be invisible. I was so full of shame and self-loathing. I was in a constant state of hyper-awareness, tension, and fear. Yet I put on a brave face and pretended it didn’t bother me.

My adult life has been an odd roller-coaster. I have been lucky to have an easy-to-look-at face, but the comments “you have such a pretty face, why don’t you lose some weight” and “he’ll have to love you for you, not for your size” has been the constant refrain. Body and to-the-core self-shaming, blaming, and all the vicious cycles of diets, weight losses, and weight gains took their toll.

Before succumbing to my last-ditch effort to battle obesity through weight loss surgery, I had to fill in a form asking for details concerning which diets and exercise programs were tried, what weight I had lost, and how much I had gained after my weight loss. At completion, I found I had been on more than 23 diet and exercise programs and had gained and lost 535 pounds over my lifetime. (Not including the 230 pounds.)

My weight loss surgery was approved in 2007, due to several obesity-related comorbidities (the simultaneous presence of two or more diseases). I had high blood pressure, severe sleep apnea, borderline adult-onset diabetes, a non-conclusive “heart event,” and a round of acute depression. After weight loss surgery, ALL of these medical issues resolved (except depression – now managed as a chronic disorder – not unusual these days).

From 2006 to 2007, I was 445 pounds, in a size 32/34 dress. My BMI (body mass index) was 72. For context BMIs between 18.5 and 24.9 is the healthy weight range. 30 and 39.9 are in the obese range. At the time of weight loss surgery, I was more than double obese in BMI!

Life restarted nicely after weight loss surgery in 2008. I had a software developer boyfriend, and I weighed between 250 and 255 and was a size 22 dress. He was a big guy, and liked big women. I stayed that same weight and size for many years (2008 – 2019).

In 2019, I began making further weight loss progress by walking every day, rain, snow, or shine, and by adopting a low-carb lifestyle.

Now in 2022, I am 215 pounds, in a size 16 jean, and size 18 top – why the top is bigger than the bottom is because the bulk of my weight was/is carried in my torso that’s deflated and left me with an “innertube like” shape on top. (The deflated fat cells, and extra skin.)

I am excited and a bit proud of myself for overcoming my lifelong challenge with obesity. Knowing it’s a daily mission, and attending to it out of habits that I’ve built in over time, remaining consistent in it, and accepting and loving the wonderful emotional support I’ve received from so many amazing people. Thanks has to go to so many people! Gregory Price, Molly Tecca, Audrey Steinberg (Mom), sister Jeanne Rose Roxby, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends, friends of friends, the list can go on – there are 225 people in my FB friends list! Wish I could list you all!

Again, thank you very much for your time.

Any donation is appreciated, and please know that any amount above the target number will go straight to support for Audrey.