Almost Half a Ton, Continued
Katie Peterson realized she needed help, but was trapped in the old catch-22 known as needing help too much. She had to lose 200 pounds before any medical institution would even consider her case; and was turned away by several facilities, which did not even want to make an appointment to talk it over until those 200 pounds were gone.
The general guidelines to qualify for bariatric surgery would frustrate a saint. As journalist Kati Blocker explained in a meticulously detailed piece for UCHealth.org,
You must have a BMI of 40 or more; or a BMI of 35 or more, plus a serious obesity-related health problem, such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, or sleep apnea.
But at the same time, with all that going on, the patient must be deemed healthy enough to undergo surgery. Also, the doctors require the patient not to be a smoker — which Peterson was. The hopeful patient must have tried other weight-loss methods, like diet and exercise. There is a mandatory psychological exam.
Blocker writes,
Most importantly, you have to be committed to the long-term process of weight loss. By following the post-surgery recommendations, you give yourself the best possible chance to begin successfully.
In 2016, the family encountered both interpersonal and financial difficulties. Katie’s son got in some trouble serious enough to be arrested for. At this point, her lifelong habit of stress eating extended to consuming a bottle of pills all at once. She was hospitalized until a judge had pretty much no choice other than to let her go home, because no mental health facility would take her. She was still too big. Despite periodic talks with a therapist, she reverted to type:
I again stress ate. I was eating this whole time. From when I woke up to when I went to bed, I was eating something.
Although outside pressures eased a bit, Katie was up to 700 pounds and facing even more determined rejection from medical institutions. The math was simple. No 200-pound loss equals no surgery. Her depression did not lift, and the non-stop stress eating continued. But when her son graduated from high school, she felt inspired to look for help again and found an intriguing article online. After filling out a form, she was invited to meet with Dr. Robert Quaid of UCHealth.
The three-hour trip to Colorado involved being loaded into a minivan by half a dozen firefighters, and at Poudre Valley Hospital she weighed in at 890 pounds. This was the occasion of the quotation borrowed for our title:
I was flabbergasted. I couldn’t believe I’d let my life go that far where I was almost half a ton.
Dr. Quaid, the bariatric surgeon, made a treatment plan that would include attempted removal of the lap band, then a sleeve gastrectomy, to be followed around 18 months later by a single anastomosis duodenal switch, and then at some future point the removal of around 100 pounds of “excess tissue and skin.”
To help her attain mental and physical readiness, Peterson was paired up with nurse navigator Michelle Carpenter for ten months of preparatory life changes. In May of 2022, it finally happened. After the very complicated first surgery, she spend five days in the hospital before returning to Wyoming where therapy continued, along with virtual support group attendance and communication with Carpenter. The three-month follow-up visit was good, and by the six-month check-up Peterson had lost 242 pounds since surgery. She was down to 648.
Almost exactly one year ago, journalist Kati Blocker published another follow-up story about Katie Peterson, who had already lost 330 pounds at that point, a considerable improvement from her days of weighing “almost half a ton.” In the meantime, she had been cheered by messages from many strangers who reached out to encourage her and also to express how much she had encouraged them. These include a young man (almost 700 pounds) about whom Kati Blocker also wrote a very recent article.
Your responses and feedback are welcome!
Source: “900 pounds and hopeless:” Katie’s weight-loss story, UCHealth.org, 01/17/23
Source: “From 900 pounds to independence,” UCHealth.org, 11/07/23
Source: “Once nearly 700 pounds, this young man is on the road to better health,” UCHealth.org, 09/19/24
Image by Ian Britton/Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0 Generic
