My Heart's Content: Chapter One

 

Hi, my name is Ange Stroup, pronounced Ang-E. Some of you already know a little bit about me but a lot of you reading this are meeting me for the first time so I thought it would be a good idea to open some of my pages for you. After all, just like you, I have a story, and parts of my story shed massive amounts of light on where I am headed in my journey AND why you might find yourself inspired to join my circle of friends in a meaningful way. That is after all my entire reason behind everything that you will ever see, hear, and feel me do…I intend to contribute greatly to raising awareness about several things that matter to me as well as to life on our planet.

More on that later…first things first…

Avoiding ugly details is one thing that I will always encourage every friend of mine to do. I feel that we become exactly what we surround ourselves with, so filling this page with any of the

Horrors of my childhood,

Mistakes of my youth,

Flat out stupidity of my adulthood,

Or any other such nonsense defeats the point that I am trying to make about setting my focus…

Some of you KNOW the details and although I would greatly and genuinely appreciate you keeping them to yourself, I am well aware of the human condition and KNOW that some of you will not be able to resist sharing what you know, simply not knowing that you spread ugly by doing so. It is, however, your call.

I will tell you the important things to note because these are the things that make me different from the rest of you. I have made a choice here to reveal myself and to open my book to the world in an attempt to raise awareness and to PROVE that none of you have a good enough reason to wallow.

I will apologize up front and say that I WILL offend some people by being brutally honest and open. What each person chooses to do with what I write here today is entirely up to each of you but I would avidly recommend that if I do offend you, let it go. Being offended and holding onto the things that cause anger in your heart will surely poison your day and that is NOT my intent.

Moving Forward...

I weighed 469 pounds at my heaviest. This was actually what I weighed the day that I walked into the Sparrow Weight Management Clinic, determined to make some serious changes for myself in my life and I did not care that it would be hard.

I knew that it would be hard... but nothing in the world could have prepared me for everything that has happened since that day.

The first thing I feel it is essential to draw your attention to is the great number of pounds that I walked around carrying every single day. I am actually tall for a woman at 5’8" currently (I was 5’10” upon graduating high school so I have lost 2 inches total from my height) but even for someone so tall, this is a HUGE number of pounds for one person to carry around all day, every day.

What makes a person pack pounds onto themselves like that, in my view, should be obvious and it is those things that I will not be writing about here. I will say that anyone with even one psychology class in their educational background can attest to the fact that I did that to myself, on purpose and with intent, even though I was unaware of doing it at that time.

The point here is that I was finally fed UP!! I was DONE being a victim to what had been done to me by others. I was FINISHED wallowing in the icky filth of despair and I was READY for the changes that I needed to make in my life. At the time I had no idea where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do, or even how I was going to do it. I knew these things:

• I wanted OUT

• I wanted to be FREE

• I wanted to RUN, to CLIMB, to DANCE, to FLY

• I wanted to BREATH

• I wanted to LIVE

Yet I knew I could not do any of those things on my own. I didn’t know how. I was stuck inside the prison of my own making…the prison of flesh that I had designed specifically to keep me safe and the rest of the world OUT.

The date was June 2002 and my little daughter, my angel, was just 4 years old. We had just recently walked out of the biggest mistake in my adult life and she had snapped a picture of me that woke me from my self-imposed funk and depression. The look in my eyes, on my face…and her words;

‘Mommy your beautiful’…

Her bright blue eyes beaming at me…

Her true and pure love shining in her smile.

How could I continue on the path that I had been on? How could I justify being who I was when I had so much to live for?

While it is true that the first step toward change was signing up for Sparrows version of a weight loss program, I think it is very important to be honest and say that I did only some of what they said and most of what I did was based on my own knowledge and experience. The fact is that they had never dealt with someone like me before and some of the exercises they "required" were next to impossible for me to do. So instead I followed my very own routine. (More on this later)

By this point, I had been an adult for a few years and while I had worked in a few fast food joints, my first real job was as a telemarketer for a gourmet home grocery delivery service. While working there I learned a ton about food processing, packaging, and getting it out to consumers. I worked as a trainer/motivator/cold call agent/asst. floor manager and in my time there I absorbed EVERYTHING that I could learn that could make the job of getting the product to the customer easier.

I made, what to me, seemed a fortune taking home around $1000 every 2 weeks. I believed in what I was telling my customers because I educated myself on the actual product. I avoided the money part because numbers are not my thing so I still have no idea if it was better as far as cost but I knew that a person could not get better quality meat. (I don’t eat cow now at all but I’ll get to that later)

From there, I moved on to other jobs, but the one I want to draw focus on is Protocol Communications. This company was a call center that answered all incoming calls for infomercials on TV, radio, the net, newspapers, and magazines. I was particularly good at selling exercise equipment to callers. Products like the Total Gym, Gazelle, Ab Scissor, Crossbow, Ab Lounge, and the Cardio Cruiser to name just a few. These products were products that I believed in.

I KNEW that they could deliver on the promises that were made not only in the ads but also by me on the phone to the clients. What I needed to do was to listen and uncover what each person really and truly wanted to get out of the product that they called about. They usually wanted to get healthier, more in shape, have longer and more fulfilling lives.

I was super awesome at overcoming their objections and convincing my callers that they could change their lives, that this product could help them do it, and that all they needed to do was to take that step and give me their credit card information. While it needs to be said that I believed strongly every word that I ever said to any of my callers, there still remained a massive hole in my existence. Something was still missing.

I, of course had experienced some type of relationships in my life on a romantic level but let’s be honest, what kind of man goes after fat, depressed woman with money? You and I both know what kind of man does that don’t we…and there is never a shortage of those.

I was working at this company full time, as one of the better sales producers, on the day that I took control of my life. On that day, I sat through an information meeting about all of the programs that Sparrow Weight Management had to offer. After that I sat down with a consultant, her name I can’t recall, and she explained what process I would need to take. She said yes, I was definitely a candidate for the gastric bypass surgery called the Rouen-y but that I was much too heavy and that I would need to drop a minimum of 50 pounds before the surgeon would even be willing to meet with me.

So she explained the Opti-fast program which was what I started with the very next day. I had to go in and have a full exam with my own doctor, where several things were discovered. I was very sick in many ways and the realization that I either lost some of my body mass or I was going to die was only the beginning. Good thing I had already made the choice to change.

I really want to shorten this up as much as possible and just say that I had sleep apnea so severe that I had 88 episodes of apnea in a 60 minute period. That means I stopped breathing that many times. I was literally waking around my life asleep. My cholesterol and other counts were ridiculous as you can imagine and I was retaining water so badly that I shocked my doctor.

The reactions of the doctors and nurses should have been the big indicator that I was unlike any of the patients that had walked through their doors and I might have realized then that my case was indeed unique, but I still held to the belief that I was just another fat lady making changes.

I went through all kinds of tests…EKG, BMI, blood work, all kinds and there wasn’t one thing about my physical body that the Sparrow weight management staff did not know when I showed up for my first meeting. This was at the end of that same week and I was given my first weeks supply of the opti-fast product.

Opti-fast is all liquid folks. 6 drink box size servings of health everyday…nothing else was I to consume. I did of course eat green beans like crazy but they did say I could ;D…lol…I lived on that form of "food" from mid June 2002 till March 3, 2003 when I actually had the gastric bypass surgery.

On the day of my surgery, open incision by the way since my surgeon was not certified to do laparoscopic, (more on this later) I weighed 382 pounds. So in order to have the surgery I needed to lose 50 pounds but in the 8 months that it took to set the surgery up, go through the entire process, the psych evaluation (this I have a lot to say about at another time) I lost exactly 87 pounds.

I had used every single piece of exercise equipment that I sold, a different one every day, I surrounded myself with music (usually wordless) positive people (usually working as much as possible because home just did not understand why I wouldn’t eat donuts and French fries with them any more) and I stayed very busy…filling my head with exactly what I knew I wanted for myself. The biggest difference was that I could not be still and I was absolutely in love with the sky...the earth...the smells and sounds of nature. Things I had noticed before a few times fleetingly but that I had never really allowed to sooth me. I could not get enough!!(More later...I bet you like hearing this...lol)

April 2002, I moved into an apartment of my own with my then 5 year old daughter, I had already dropped another 20 pounds and I was making an income of around $3000 every 2 weeks. I was able to cancel all of the government programs of assistance that I was on, buy my very first car from a lot (interest rate 24.7%) and was feeling eager and excited just to be alive.

I had found my daughter an awesome school, I had made some seriously fantastic friends and I just knew that I was on my way. I had no clue to where, just that I was going there and headed there fast.

September 2003, I weighed 298 pounds (only 10 pounds more than what I weigh right now so yes I am still a hefty woman AND I do yoga...;D more on that later) and something strange started to happen. I was feeling awesome…looking exactly how I was feeling…and everyone I knew noticed. The one thing I had not even thought about was that some would suddenly want to have me in their lives as more than what I already was. Some people began to look at me differently...as an attractive female instead of as Ange, the woman on a mission.

Men and women both …some people I had known for years and some I was just meeting for the first time started to ask me for dates…inquired as to how I felt about them emotional...physically, and whether I thought that a future with them would be possible.

What was happening?? In my mind they were ALL my loves. I wanted to keep them all just as I had them for the rest of my days. My way has not changed even a little bit in that regard as I was designed to be a lover of life...of people...of the earth...Sex or sexuality...sensuality even was a very foreign concept to me and it frankly freaked me out.

 

I did not understand why so many people were beginning to act so strongly toward me...to see me as different than the person that I saw in myself…after all, I was still me…the same Ange that I always was…Then some grew bold and began to make moves…physical moves…some just touched with intimate intent while others would grasp and try to hold me…I freaked a little and started to push and to be afraid and to pray.

 

 I no longer felt safe at all…I was terrified…scared to death…I was confused…these people were my friends…No one had explained any of this to me. While in my rational mind I knew that what they were feeling and doing was probably very normal, what I could not understand was why they were looking that way at ME! That is when the universe brought me Paul.

 

Now, one thing I want to interject at this point and then I'm actually going to pause and allow you to absorb this all, is that I had gone through what was classified as a full blown and legitimate psychological evaluation prior to my receiving the surgery. When the psychologist asked me why I wanted this surgery, my response was quick and it was simple..."because I want to climb mountains, jump from a plane, and be free for the rest of my life!" He had laughed. Said something like, 'Well that is understandable.' and approved me for the surgery.

 

I do not feel that I was prepared at all for what happened after and only now...as my life unfolds as it should...do I finally see that I NEEDED to experience every moment that I did so that I can share every detail with all of you. I have yet to meet another me. I know that there are a lot of other people in our world who have overcome their own trials and I get that there are even people out there that have lost massive amounts of weight. Something though that sets me apart is in a note that I posted before.

 

I am THE certified professional on me. Not one person can possibly have lived my life and made my choices exactly as I have. Every single thing that I have done in my life has led me not to my yesterdays, nor even my tomorrows but rather to my RIGHT NOW...I have shared with you today an obviously very brief and very shallow glimpse of what life has occurred to create me. I have done this for a few reasons and the biggest reason is that I desire more than anything that only those of you who are genuine and actually CARE to KNOW ME and what I'm about respond to this. Also that same thing said differently. I DESIRE THAT THOSE OF YOU WHO ARE GENUINE...AND ACTUALLY CARE TO KNOW ME PLEASE RESPOND TO THIS!!

 

Writing is something that I do to communicate but what I really love to do is TALK! My story is a big one I know and is like many of yours...I share it in an effort to expose myself and to allow the universe to bring to me those people that will be as blessed by me as I will by them. We have a mission...one of massive and global proportions...We CAN and WILL heal many...TOGETHER!! Be Lifted!!