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Former Fatty Skin Removal Surgery

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Hello and thank you for stopping by this page and letting me beg you for money.  The short version of this story is that I've always been a big dude. The long version goes like this...I was always over the weight limit for my age for pop warner football and would have to play with the kids who were older than me. By the time I was in 5th grade I was 175 and having to fight adults when I took Tae Kwon Do. The only bonus to being that big that young was that I got to wear my older brothers more teenage hand me down clothes, like a sweet Queensryche tour t-shirt. The downside is realizing that your man boobs definitely make you an easy target for ridicule.  By the time I was a senior in high school I was 6'0 and 240lbs. I was always active though, I played football, wrestling, shot put, weight lifting. I just always stayed big. After high school, I became much less active, and the pounds started to pack on. Having never had any self-confidence, putting on weight makes you really feel like hot garbage. When you couple that with a love of substances and garbage food you start down a really bad road. By the time of the picture on the left I was 33 and pushing what must have been 400lbs. I'm not really sure what my heaviest weight was because I was always too scared to go to the Dr and get checked out. I knew that my weight was killing me, but I was in a really dark place emotionally and I had kind of just given up. I was smoking two packs of L&M menthol 100's and drinking somewhere between 12-18 beers a night. I really should be dead, I'm not quite sure how I'm not. What started the change and decision to start fixing myself was a couple of good friends really encouraging me to take a chance and move out of the place I was living and in with a friend of ours. That was in April of 2016. The February before that I caught the flu and had to go see a doctor. This is how I discovered that I was 360lbs, this is the heaviest actual number I have. That April I moved and started making little changes. I stopped drinking regular soda. I stopped living on frozen pizza and cold cuts and tried these things called fruits and vegetables. I went from drinking every night, to two nights a week. That December I decided to quit smoking. Like an idiot, I can't remember the actual day, so I like to go with Pearl Habor Day, as this is also a day that will live in infamy. I should also mention at this point that I didn't have a drivers license or a car because of a 10-year-old DUI. Quitting smoking was hard and I wanted to get in better shape and to work off some of the withdrawals by working out. A sweet and dear friend came out of his way and picked me up four times a week to go to the gym with him. Without him, I don't know where this story would end up. By January I was in school full time, working full time, and spending an hour in the gym 4 days a week. For the first time in my entire life, I was really attacking who I wanted to be. I noticed some weight start coming off, but to me, it wasn't enough. I started to research different diets and workouts that I felt would help me and I stopped drinking completely. It wasn't that I had a problem, I did, it was I couldn't drink and quit smoking. It made the cravings to hard to handle. So on January 6th, 2017 I decided to take a break from Miller Lite. That break continues and always will. I don't miss it, and I'm much happier with myself as a sober individual than I ever was with the drunk version of myself. I bought a car in February and now could go to the gym as much as I wanted. That turned into 6 days a week for 2-3 hours a day. I pushed my body harder and farther than I ever thought I could. When my body said stop, my mind said FUCK YOU and I pushed on. I braved a full physical for the first time since I was 18 and I was within 10lbs of my football weight. I expected everything to be wrong with me, and surprisingly I had none of the things that had scared me for so long. No diabeetus, no high blood pressure, no cancer, my HDL, and LDL were almost perfect. I was shocked and beyond relieved. So with this knowledge, I focused even harder on getting in the best possible shape I could. I've always hated running, its the worst. On Halloween, I decided to run a 5k and by Thanksgiving, I ran one and finished in under 30 minutes and 32nd out of 76 in my age group. Not bad for someone who trained for less than a month. My weight plateaued around this point. on any given day I weigh somewhere between 190-193, putting me a basically 170lbs lost in about sixteen months. The problem now is that like many people who have had massive weight loss, I have a bunch of extra skin that's causing some health issues. I went to a surgeon for a consultation and she recommended a  panniculectomy. This is a surgery where they remove the hanging skin and fat. The Doctor also recommended Gynecomastia surgery which would get rid of the ol' fat tits and tighten the skin on my chest. Obviously, because we live in America and life is a fucking nightmare, insurance denied both of my claims...which leads me to asking you good folks for the spare change in you pockets. If not, no hard feelings. Like the boss says "its high times on Wall St and hard times on Main St".
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Donations 

  • James Rucker
    • $100 
    • 6 yrs
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Organizer

Jeremiah Burns
Organizer
Winston-Salem, NC

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