The woman carefully made her way down the narrow airplane aisle and settled into her seat. When she reached to buckle her seatbelt, she realized it didn’t quite fit. Feeling a bit unsure, she quietly raised her hand and gently asked the flight attendant, “I think I need an extension belt.”
The flight attendant smiled warmly and replied, “You don’t have to whisper, sweetie. We give those out to a lot of people.”
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What factors ultimately influence someone to pursue living a healthier life?
Is it a trending diet, encouragement of a loved one or gaining new knowledge and understanding? For Chaston Pruitt, it was his doctor’s advice.
“Chaston, if you keep living the way you’ve been living, you may not make it to age 40 or even 35,” said his primary care physician when Pruitt was in his early 30s.
At the time, Pruitt topped the scales at 430 pounds and battled high blood pressure, diabetes, a fatty liver and kidneys that did not work well. His knees and back always ached.
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Shenell Mobley, a library circulation clerk in Jacksonville, Texas, is working hard to live a healthier life and care for her growing family.
Thanks to successful gastric sleeve surgery by Keith Charles, MD, and Mobley’s efforts to improve her lifestyle and eating habits, the future looks brighter for the 29-year-old.
It wasn’t always this bright.
“Before my surgery, I had sleep apnea, hypertension (high blood pressure) and pre-diabetes,” said Mobley. “I also struggled with back pain, sciatica and joint problems,... Read More »
To care for the health and needs of others, Mary Weathered knew that she first had to improve her own health.
Shown above with her granddaughter Jai’mya, Weathered (left) was born and raised in St. Augustine, Texas. Though she lived for a time in Lufkin, she moved back to St. Augustine to become a home health aide for family members and others.
“I moved back home to help my sister who can’t walk,” said the 68-year-old Weathered. “I have two adult daughters and many grandchildren, so there’s always something to do.”
At her heaviest, Weathered weighed 274 pounds and... Read More »
Let’s be clear – there is nothing easy about the preparations for bariatric surgery, but the rewards can be great.
“I’m not going to lie, it was a big struggle,” said Wendy Blake, 46, who serves as a 911 dispatcher in Mineola. “The preparations and the liquid diet before surgery were not easy. I just had to get through the program and the surgery because losing weight was something I truly wanted.”
Blake had dealt with her weight for many years. She was “big and athletic” during high school while playing softball, basketball and volleyball, but started gaining weight after... Read More »
Aishia Chism, 44, knows the value of unconditional love that a mother, grandmother or even a godmother can instill in a child’s heart.
A Tyler native who now lives in Dallas, Chism remembers fondly the love shown by her family, especially her godmother.
“As a kid, I had an awesome godmother who lived next door to my grandmother,” explained Chism. “She never had children of her own, so I became the ‘apple of her eye.’ I always looked up to her, so I decided to be the same type of person whom children could trust and come to me for anything, no matter if it was something good... Read More »
After years of dieting without successfully losing weight, Maria Tinajero has experienced great improvements after surgery with the UT Health Tyler Bariatric Center.
“Growing up, I was always the overweight child at school,” said Maria, now a 46-year-old mother of six and a manager-in-training at a Tyler restaurant.
“In grade school, my mother kept me out of gym class because of my weight. I guess she wanted to keep the other students from making fun of me. But now that I think about it, I could have tried harder and pushed through all the comments. It could have changed my... Read More »
For Mike White, a 39-year-old salesman from Lindale, Texas, losing 127 pounds wasn’t exclusively the result of the excellent care he received at UT Health Tyler Bariatric Center. Much of his weight loss was also due to the new mindset he developed about food.
“Everyone can temporarily lose weight by having bariatric surgery,” said Mike. “But changing how you think about food can help keep the weight off for the rest of your life.”
As he grew up, Mike said he carried some extra weight as a kid, despite being active. As an adult with his own business, however, it was more... Read More »
For Carla Lee-Ervin, the days were long and stressful. A 51-year-old widow living just south of Tyler in Flint, for 25 years she worked at Sam’s Club. She started as a teller and worked her way up to supervisor of the local store’s marketing and membership department.
As she worked, she also dealt with gaining weight, which started in her late teens and kept increasing for 30 years.
“I gave birth to my son at age 18 and I never lost that weight,” Carla said. “During my married years, I kept putting on the weight and got up to 387 pounds.”
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For Shelby Grimes, a 30-year-old single mom in Lufkin, her dependency on food for comfort started in her teens.
“I used to dance and was very active in high school,” she recalled. “But eventually I got into different extracurricular activities, started working a job and my activity level changed a lot. I even lost a lot of the friends I had, so I started turning to food to feel good about myself.”
At the start of high school, Shelby weighed around 135 but doubled her weight by graduation to a total of 280 pounds.
“My mindset then was always ‘What's going to be my... Read More »