so I recieved a couple of pm's

[Don Fernando]

from a few botl's asking me how I've been and if there is a reason why I don't post as much as I did in the recent past. And yes, there is a reason.

Lately my life is a rollercoaster of emotions, lots of negative emotions like stress and frustration, lots of positive emotions like becoming an uncle for the first time soon and a life changing decision and fear for the unknown due to that life changing decision. And dealing with all those emotions, the negative and the positive, is a huge energy drain for me, so when I come home I am too tired to interact on CA.

The negative source is mostly work, I work for a very small company and me and my boss are always fighting about everything. We make a decision, I follow his orders and 2 days later I get chit because he claims that we agreed on something else, he never listens to me what made my job much harder and impossible on some cases. For example: my assistent left in october last year, I told my boss that it would be impossible to service all calls with just a part-timer and a free lancer with a shifting schedule (he is a flight attendent and can only work on days that he is not flying), after 3 months some clients had to wait for over 2 weeks before I could service them even though we have a 48 hour limit in the contracts, I get yelled at by clients and by my boss, but my hands were tied and I warned my boss that this was happening. Another example, august 2008 the guy who did all the network stuff left the company, I told my boss that I don't know chit about networks and that he should hire someone that knows this stuff, especially as in our line of business things are shifting from a stand alone platform into a online platform (we're in background music for retail, hotels, bars etc). Now an important client, a shop chain, wants their music systems online and its quite a technical operation, way over my head, and I get blamed for not knowing this stuff, something I told my boss over a year ago. And there are more examples, things went so bad that after another disrespectful email that he send me I ran upstairs to his office, grabbed a piece of wood but fortunately another free lancer saw this and stopped me. And although I have a big mouth, I am not an agressive person by nature, this shows how bad the situation was.

Now my contract ends october 14, and I decided not to renew. I had some days left, so next thursday is my last day of work before I head into unemploymency, but unemploymency is better then jail and that is where I would probably end up if I had to work longer with this guy. The negative energy, the stress and frustration will be cut out of my life, and due to the great social security system we have in The Netherlands I will be able to leave.

The social security system also allows me to focus on the life changing decision and everything I have to do for that. I made the decision to go for a gastric bypass. I weight about 385lbs with a height of 5ft9, which makes my Body Mass Index about 56. In normal people language that means "you're gonna die fatty" as a friend called it. I am 37, still in good health (bloodwork from recent tests proved that, cholestorol and all are within limits and the doctor said that my body could take at least another 100lbs before it would start giving in) and I like to keep it that way. The surgeon wanted to push the surgery to the spring, but I convinced him to do it in 2009, as I would never get a job with this hanging over my head. He agreed on a late december surgery, but only if I will lose about 30lbs before that time. I get help from a nutrician with that, trying to break the old habbits and learn a new schedule and eat lighter, healthier and less (as that is my future after the surgery). I need to lose that weight to reduce the risks of the surgery (with a >50BMI the risk of serious complications, read: death, is one out of 200) and as the first couple of lbs lost are all from the liver that will create more space for the surgeon to work with.

I'm looking forward to the life after the surgery, i can't remember what it's like to be not fat, to have a weight below 220 lbs (we measure in kilo's here, 219lbs would mean <100 kilo, a 2 digit weight). Just the opportunities that it will offer, simple things like being able to buy clothes much easier, not to be stared at like you are a freak of nature, not being rejected for a job because of prejudice against heavy people, being able to fly to my friends in the US comfortably instead of feeling like spam, pressed in a can and to start running again. But it's also scary, all my adult life I have been fat, it's going to be a new life and like everything unknown there is both exitement and fear, fear for the unknown, and fear for the surgery ofcourse.

Well, now you all know, and you might understand why I haven't been on CA much. This thursday, september 17, is my last day of work, the negative energy will be gone, I will have more time (in between the long walks with the dog that I will be taking to get some extra exercise) to bug you all