LilMtnCbn
07-02-2004, 07:10 AM
ooookay
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/tm_objectid=14385588&method=full&site
id=50143&headline=i-lost-half-of-my-body-weight-in-a-year-to-have-the-baby
-i-craved-name_page.html
AMAZING WOMAN'S FIGHT FOR MOTHERHOOD Jul 2 2004
By Louise Baty
SHAKING with worry, Kathleen Bugg looked up at the doctor standing in front of
her.
Desperate to have a baby, she and her husband Dave were moments away from
discovering whether or not she was a suitable candidate for IVF treatment.
The doctor's verdict was as devastating as it was inevitable - at 18st 7lbs she
was simply too overweight for treatment.
"When the doctor said I was too fat, I hit rock bottom," says Kathleen, now 38.
"Having a baby was the most important thing in the world for me and now I felt
I had no future."
Kathleen's despair was especially poignant. An adopted child, she had never
known her own mother and wanted more than anything to experience the joys of
her own family.
"I'd always dreamed of being a mother," she says. "Although I loved my adoptive
parents I felt there was something missing from my life."
In 1966, Nancy and Wilf, a British couple then living temporarily in Australia,
had adopted her at just four-days-old. Shortly afterwards, they returned to
Leeds where Kathleen was brought up.
"I was an only child and my parents called me 'their precious gift'," says
Kathleen.
"They spoiled me rotten, but I developed health problems - dark, coarse body
and facial hair and heavy, painful periods which regularly reduced me to tears.
"I lost confidence and began to think I'd never lead a normal life."
When she was 19, Kathleen was diagnosed with polycystic ovaries - and doctors
told the stunned teenager that it was likely to hinder her chances of
conceiving naturally.
"I'd always believed that my life would be complete once I had a family of my
own, it was a way of creating someone I was actually related to," she says.
"Now I'd even been robbed of that."
In June 1988 Kathleen met David - a railway worker - at a party and quickly
realised she had met the man she wanted to spend her life with. "Everything
between us was great," says Kathleen, a manicurist. "When I told him that I
probably couldn't give him children, he said it didn't matter."
They moved into a house in Leeds together but, despite her happiness in the
relationship, there was a void in her life.
Not only could she never have children, but her efforts to trace her real
mother in Australia was proving hopeless.
Then, in September 1988, Kathleen discovered to her amazement that she was
pregnant - but her joy was short-lived and she miscarried after a few weeks.
"We were devastated," says Kathleen. "Just as my hopes had been raised, they
were dashed again. I was utterly miserable."
And in her despair, she began to pile on weight, her problems exacerbated by
the drugs the doctors had given her to prevent future miscarriages.
"I ballooned in weight, gaining 5st 7lbs in a year. David said he didn't mind,
but I hated the way _ I looked."
David and Kathleen married in 1993. Refusing to give up their dream of having a
family, they tried again to conceive.
And over the next 11 years, Kathleen suffered 16 more miscarriages.
"I was so miserable," she says. "I'd continued to gain weight. At 18st 7lbs I
could barely squeeze into size 28 clothes and found it difficult to walk as I
was carrying around so much weight.
"I knew my weight was aggravating my ability to conceive naturally. I tried
every diet going, but nothing worked. I thought there was no hope."
David was always supportive.
"My relationship with Kathleen was much more important," he says. "Each time
she miscarried, she told me I'd be better off finding someone else, but I loved
her so much that was never an option."
In 2001 Kathleen, now so heavy she was reliant on crutches to walk but
determined to have one last try at motherhood, consulted the fertility expert
at Leeds General Infirmary.
The doctor was sympathetic, but told her that unless she lost weight she might
never conceive.
Worse, he warned her that her excess weight was causing irreparable damage to
her body.
The consultant offered a drastic solution - a gastric bypass operation. "I had
no choice but to go for it. If it helped me have a baby, I had to do it," says
Kathleen.
On August 29, 2001, Kathleen was admitted to St James Hospital, Leeds, for the
operation that was to change her life.
During the four-hour operation, surgeons stapled off a third of Kathleen's
stomach, leaving her capacity for food greatly reduced.
"The recovery process was hard and slow," says Kathleen. "The wound became
infected and I was in a great deal of pain, but I told myself that it would all
be worthwhile."
Kathleen's determination was rewarded when she lost a stone in the first month.
ABLE to only eat small amounts of liquidised foods, she continued to shed a
stone a month for the next nine months.
By the anniversary of the operation, Kathleen was 9st 7lbs, and a size 10/12,
trimmer than she'd ever been.
"I lost half my body weight in less than a year," says Kathleen. "I could only
eat very small portions and felt sick if I overate.
"It was just incredible. I felt like I'd got my life back and my confidence
soared."
But, just as her life came out of the shadows, Kathleen's beloved mother Nancy
died, aged just 72 in September, 2002.
"I was numb with grief," she says. "When I missed a period the month after
Mum's funeral I presumed it was due to stress but I did a test, just to be
sure."
The test revealed she was pregnant - and her doctor confirmed that she had
conceived naturally.
"Although I never stopped thinking about Mum I loved watching my bump grow. It
was a miracle. The pregnancy was almost too good to be true. I didn't even
suffer any morning sickness."
But just one month before her due date, Kathleen was dealt another devastating
blow when her dad Wilf died from a heart attack.
"I knew I had to stay strong for the baby's sake, but my life was falling apart
around me," she says.
"While my greatest wish had been realised and I was just weeks away from having
a baby, I felt as though I'd lost everything. David tried to comfort me but I
slipped into depression."
And then, just two weeks from the birth of the baby she had so longed for, came
some news she had never thought to hear.
A social worker called to say she was contacting Kathleen on behalf of two
female members of her birth family in Australia.
"My heart soared. It felt as though Mum and Dad had left me one last gift."
The social worker put her in touch with her sister Peggy, 33, and her birth
mother Beverley, now in her sixties.
"Hearing my mother's voice for the first time was strange but wonderful. It was
one of the most emotional moments of my life."
Beverley told her that she had seven brothers and sisters in Australia, two of
them younger than Kathleen.
Two weeks later, her life now a blaze of happiness, she gave birth to baby
Connor. Weighing 6lb 12oz, he was perfectly healthy.
"I couldn't believe that he was mine. I knew then that the gastric bypass had
been worth it. I'd made the right decision. No words could express how happy I
was to finally have a baby of my own."
Now Kathleen had more family that she could ever have dreamed of - and when
Connor was six months old she and Dave took him to Adelaide to meet her birth
family.
"When they put their arms around me, I felt whole for the first time in my
life. I felt instantly comfortable, as though I'd known them all my life. All
of them."
As well as falling in love with her new family Kathleen and Dave fell in love
with Australia and have decided to sell up in Leeds and move Down Under.
Connor will grow up, unlike his mother, surrounded by a large and caring
family.
-------------------------
A good friend will come and bail you out of jail . . . but, a true friend will
be sitting next to you saying, "Damn . . . that was fun!"
-----Unknown
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/tm_objectid=14385588&method=full&site
id=50143&headline=i-lost-half-of-my-body-weight-in-a-year-to-have-the-baby
-i-craved-name_page.html
AMAZING WOMAN'S FIGHT FOR MOTHERHOOD Jul 2 2004
By Louise Baty
SHAKING with worry, Kathleen Bugg looked up at the doctor standing in front of
her.
Desperate to have a baby, she and her husband Dave were moments away from
discovering whether or not she was a suitable candidate for IVF treatment.
The doctor's verdict was as devastating as it was inevitable - at 18st 7lbs she
was simply too overweight for treatment.
"When the doctor said I was too fat, I hit rock bottom," says Kathleen, now 38.
"Having a baby was the most important thing in the world for me and now I felt
I had no future."
Kathleen's despair was especially poignant. An adopted child, she had never
known her own mother and wanted more than anything to experience the joys of
her own family.
"I'd always dreamed of being a mother," she says. "Although I loved my adoptive
parents I felt there was something missing from my life."
In 1966, Nancy and Wilf, a British couple then living temporarily in Australia,
had adopted her at just four-days-old. Shortly afterwards, they returned to
Leeds where Kathleen was brought up.
"I was an only child and my parents called me 'their precious gift'," says
Kathleen.
"They spoiled me rotten, but I developed health problems - dark, coarse body
and facial hair and heavy, painful periods which regularly reduced me to tears.
"I lost confidence and began to think I'd never lead a normal life."
When she was 19, Kathleen was diagnosed with polycystic ovaries - and doctors
told the stunned teenager that it was likely to hinder her chances of
conceiving naturally.
"I'd always believed that my life would be complete once I had a family of my
own, it was a way of creating someone I was actually related to," she says.
"Now I'd even been robbed of that."
In June 1988 Kathleen met David - a railway worker - at a party and quickly
realised she had met the man she wanted to spend her life with. "Everything
between us was great," says Kathleen, a manicurist. "When I told him that I
probably couldn't give him children, he said it didn't matter."
They moved into a house in Leeds together but, despite her happiness in the
relationship, there was a void in her life.
Not only could she never have children, but her efforts to trace her real
mother in Australia was proving hopeless.
Then, in September 1988, Kathleen discovered to her amazement that she was
pregnant - but her joy was short-lived and she miscarried after a few weeks.
"We were devastated," says Kathleen. "Just as my hopes had been raised, they
were dashed again. I was utterly miserable."
And in her despair, she began to pile on weight, her problems exacerbated by
the drugs the doctors had given her to prevent future miscarriages.
"I ballooned in weight, gaining 5st 7lbs in a year. David said he didn't mind,
but I hated the way _ I looked."
David and Kathleen married in 1993. Refusing to give up their dream of having a
family, they tried again to conceive.
And over the next 11 years, Kathleen suffered 16 more miscarriages.
"I was so miserable," she says. "I'd continued to gain weight. At 18st 7lbs I
could barely squeeze into size 28 clothes and found it difficult to walk as I
was carrying around so much weight.
"I knew my weight was aggravating my ability to conceive naturally. I tried
every diet going, but nothing worked. I thought there was no hope."
David was always supportive.
"My relationship with Kathleen was much more important," he says. "Each time
she miscarried, she told me I'd be better off finding someone else, but I loved
her so much that was never an option."
In 2001 Kathleen, now so heavy she was reliant on crutches to walk but
determined to have one last try at motherhood, consulted the fertility expert
at Leeds General Infirmary.
The doctor was sympathetic, but told her that unless she lost weight she might
never conceive.
Worse, he warned her that her excess weight was causing irreparable damage to
her body.
The consultant offered a drastic solution - a gastric bypass operation. "I had
no choice but to go for it. If it helped me have a baby, I had to do it," says
Kathleen.
On August 29, 2001, Kathleen was admitted to St James Hospital, Leeds, for the
operation that was to change her life.
During the four-hour operation, surgeons stapled off a third of Kathleen's
stomach, leaving her capacity for food greatly reduced.
"The recovery process was hard and slow," says Kathleen. "The wound became
infected and I was in a great deal of pain, but I told myself that it would all
be worthwhile."
Kathleen's determination was rewarded when she lost a stone in the first month.
ABLE to only eat small amounts of liquidised foods, she continued to shed a
stone a month for the next nine months.
By the anniversary of the operation, Kathleen was 9st 7lbs, and a size 10/12,
trimmer than she'd ever been.
"I lost half my body weight in less than a year," says Kathleen. "I could only
eat very small portions and felt sick if I overate.
"It was just incredible. I felt like I'd got my life back and my confidence
soared."
But, just as her life came out of the shadows, Kathleen's beloved mother Nancy
died, aged just 72 in September, 2002.
"I was numb with grief," she says. "When I missed a period the month after
Mum's funeral I presumed it was due to stress but I did a test, just to be
sure."
The test revealed she was pregnant - and her doctor confirmed that she had
conceived naturally.
"Although I never stopped thinking about Mum I loved watching my bump grow. It
was a miracle. The pregnancy was almost too good to be true. I didn't even
suffer any morning sickness."
But just one month before her due date, Kathleen was dealt another devastating
blow when her dad Wilf died from a heart attack.
"I knew I had to stay strong for the baby's sake, but my life was falling apart
around me," she says.
"While my greatest wish had been realised and I was just weeks away from having
a baby, I felt as though I'd lost everything. David tried to comfort me but I
slipped into depression."
And then, just two weeks from the birth of the baby she had so longed for, came
some news she had never thought to hear.
A social worker called to say she was contacting Kathleen on behalf of two
female members of her birth family in Australia.
"My heart soared. It felt as though Mum and Dad had left me one last gift."
The social worker put her in touch with her sister Peggy, 33, and her birth
mother Beverley, now in her sixties.
"Hearing my mother's voice for the first time was strange but wonderful. It was
one of the most emotional moments of my life."
Beverley told her that she had seven brothers and sisters in Australia, two of
them younger than Kathleen.
Two weeks later, her life now a blaze of happiness, she gave birth to baby
Connor. Weighing 6lb 12oz, he was perfectly healthy.
"I couldn't believe that he was mine. I knew then that the gastric bypass had
been worth it. I'd made the right decision. No words could express how happy I
was to finally have a baby of my own."
Now Kathleen had more family that she could ever have dreamed of - and when
Connor was six months old she and Dave took him to Adelaide to meet her birth
family.
"When they put their arms around me, I felt whole for the first time in my
life. I felt instantly comfortable, as though I'd known them all my life. All
of them."
As well as falling in love with her new family Kathleen and Dave fell in love
with Australia and have decided to sell up in Leeds and move Down Under.
Connor will grow up, unlike his mother, surrounded by a large and caring
family.
-------------------------
A good friend will come and bail you out of jail . . . but, a true friend will
be sitting next to you saying, "Damn . . . that was fun!"
-----Unknown
