This could be a book, not a post. The life limitations are enormous. My BMI is 57, I know what I'm talking about. Even if you are still mobile, what you can and cannot do vary vastly from what normal people can.
They never tell you, do they? Ever since you are a teenager you get to see ads for diets and diet products, then you grow up and you hear how obesity is an epidemic and the major comorbidity with the leading causes of death (stroke, heartattack, etc.). Nobody ever tells you what it is like to live morbidly obese.
You cannot walk
“Forget walks, not just a nice walk in the woods, but also walking from shop to shop for some nice retail therapy, and shopping in a big supermarket”
I never liked walking since I was a young girl, the sport of walking alone for some time to "clear your head" as people say never appealed to me. Of course, that was because I actually could physically do it and it was my own choice not to do it.
Today I would give anything to stick on my headphones and walk to the nearby park for a nice, long walk there. I cannot even walk comfortably the distances required at the airports and need a wheelchair and an assistant to push it - how humiliating. I cannot visit a museum because of walking and standing. Even walking across the road to bring out the rubbish is a real, real effort. This has become almost a disability.
Forget about being agile
Getting into a car is very, very difficult. I can get into my driver's seat for some miracle, but getting into any other seat, even of my own car, requires a lot of effort, and heaving and puffing. By the time I finally settle down I'm entirely breathless. I am almost reaching a panic state when I'm in a taxi (where I wear a mask, of course) and I cannot breath. Really horrible. When I am sitting a the back I cannot put on my seating belt. It's either too short, or the connecting dongle is sitting just beneath my butt and I cannot reach it. People need to come over and help out, or I just fake I have it on if I'm too ashamed to ask.
Your personal hygene becomes a problem
“You cannot reach. Period. You cannot reach parts of your body that you always were able to reach. Even if you become a contortionist. A strong power jet shower becomes your most intimate trusted friend and ally”
Plus the folds, oh the folds of your flesh! They harbour sweat, dirt, and soon develop a fungal infection. Even wondered why fat people also smell? It's not that they don't want to wash or clean themselves, it's just that it is so extremely hard to do it that one gives up the daily routine, and maybe goes through the big effort (an hour long of heaving and difficulty breathing) once a week, if they're lucky. Think about it: even standing for a time long enough to have a shower is a problem as your back gets too sore and you must find a way of sitting down. And no, those little stools they sell for old people for their showers? They're far too weak and would not bear my weight.
You are a ball, you roll over everywhere
“Getting out of bed is a challenge, rolling out of it is more accurate: you cannot simply sit up as you don't have those minimum abs required”
I wanted to lay in bed close to my boyfriend one day, you know the way: on my side, one arm around him, facing him. Ha, easier said than done: instead of sitting on the bed and then moving myself into position, the absolute only thing I could do was to lay in bed as if I was to go asleep, then gently and with a lot of effort roll over to the side. 5 solid minutes instead of a couple of seconds. While he was there watching all the effort. He never said anything, bless him, but... what a shame!
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