My Story

Pamela’s Story

I've had a weight struggle since I was 17. By 18 I was married. By the end of our first year together, I was pregnant, and by the time I was in my early twenties I had three sons, a partial hysterectomy, and a very thorough understanding of what the phrase "it's been a lot" actually means.

Then came the diets. All of them. If you were a young woman in the nineties, you already know. Shape magazine was basically handing out increasingly unhinged instructions every month and we were all just doing it. Atkins. Grapefruit. SlimFast. I collected recycled bottle deposits to buy SlimFast because we couldn't afford it otherwise. (We were in Michigan. Ten cents a bottle. It added up.) I did step aerobics six times a week, which sounds extreme until you understand that the morning class had free daycare and the evening class meant daddy was in charge. It was exercise and escape and I was not giving either one up. Six step classes a week, chalky shakes I was technically gagging down rather than drinking, and the pudge did not budge. Not even a little. I kept showing up anyway because what else do you do.

Eventually came keto, which I stuck with long enough that I'm fairly certain I smelled like a new leather handbag. Then in 2011, bariatric surgery. A duodenal switch, specifically, which is the one with the dramatic name. The first year went well. But I never got to a normal BMI, and the dream I'd had before surgery — finally being strong enough to hike the Appalachian Trail — stayed just out of reach. In 2019 I finally stopped waiting and just went. It just hurt. A lot.

In 2024, I tore my meniscus on the trail. On Valentine's Day, on a mountain called Blood Mountain, which honestly feels like the trail was trying to tell me something. Surgery, physical therapy, clearance to return to normal activity, continued pain anyway. Eventually the diagnosis: arthritis in both knees. Excellent news. Really great timing.

Late in 2024 my doctor suggested Zepbound. Insurance said no for a while and then eventually just kept saying no, so I decided to pay out of pocket. Best decision I've made in years. Before I lost a single pound, the inflammation I'd been quietly carrying for years was simply gone. Pain I'd stopped registering as unusual because it had always been there, just gone.

Which brings me to here. Thirty-plus years of trying, a body that has genuinely been through it, and finally a combination of tools and understanding that works with my biology instead of staging an ongoing uprising against it.

That's why I do this work. Not because I have a clean before-and-after. But because I know what it feels like to try for a very long time and still feel stuck. And I know what it means to finally feel like yourself again.