This Is Sparta

There’s nothing like a hot Summer breeze to remind you of the crushing weight of discomfort from being in a fat body.

“Is this my fault?” Mum asks...

“I want to say no but I don’t even know anymore…”

I respond flatly, too distracted to alleviate her misplaced guilt.

It’s the day before my big surgery. Mum and I are sitting on the front verandah, with our customary Greek coffees in hand, in silence.

It’s been a year and a half since I made a decision to undergo this procedure. I've spoken to all the psychologists, the surgeons, the GPs, the physiotherapists and personal trainers. I’ve read all the source material.

“Maybe I should back out?”

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You know how they say that desperate times call for desperate measures? Well, I've definitely done some really weird and wacky shit in the name of weight loss.

But if I had to pick the craziest thing I've ever done in that regard, it would have to be that time I borrowed thousands of dollars from my parents to go on a so-called “health retreat.”

While that doesn't sound so bad in and of itself, and maybe even a little bit spoiled, what makes this one so noteworthy is the fact that I think it was a cult...

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5 and a half years ago I was in a hospital bed recovering from gastric sleeve surgery. When I talk to people about this experience I get the same questions:

**Question One**

“Which one is that? Is that the band?”

No. The surgery I had was the one where they poke five holes into your abdominal cavity and remove at least 70% of your stomach, leaving behind only a “sleeve.”

**Question Two**

“How long did it take?”

The answer to this innocent question is actually not as straightforward as it sounds. The best answer I can offer is that “it depends on what you count as the start and as the finish...” There are just too many parts.

The procedure itself? About 90 minutes. Then recovery in hospital took about 2 extra days. You know that Salvador Dali painting called ‘Sleep’? With the deformed humanoid head held up by flimsy stilts amongst a psychedelic desert? That’s what it felt like for two days. In suspended animation within my own body. Just precariously floating.

Until I got the hiccoughs that is. Oh my god, the hiccoughs. I have never, in my life, experienced a pain like it. I can still feel my cut up stomach convulsing against the sutures. If there was ever a moment I had thought to myself “what have I done?”… it was then.

---

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/this-is-sparta/message

There’s nothing like a hot Summer breeze to remind you of the crushing weight of discomfort from being in a fat body.

“Is this my fault?” Mum asks...

“I want to say no but I don’t even know anymore…”

I respond flatly, too distracted to alleviate her misplaced guilt.

It’s the day before my big surgery. Mum and I are sitting on the front verandah, with our customary Greek coffees in hand, in silence.

It’s been a year and a half since I made a decision to undergo this procedure. I've spoken to all the psychologists, the surgeons, the GPs, the physiotherapists and personal trainers. I’ve read all the source material.

“Maybe I should back out?”

---

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/this-is-sparta/message

It’s been a big week.

We started it with the International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Terrorism and we finished it with the sentencing hearing for the terrorist behind the March 15 massacre in Christchurch last year.

Given the impact these events have on my work and the people I work with, I don’t really feel like talking about how my body looks like a melted candle. For once.

Part of my job is to understand people like that extremist murderer. But own my wounds stir every time think about this particular one.

Like little black lakes.

---

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/this-is-sparta/message

You know how they say that desperate times call for desperate measures? Well, I've definitely done some really weird and wacky shit in the name of weight loss.

But if I had to pick the craziest thing I've ever done in that regard, it would have to be that time I borrowed thousands of dollars from my parents to go on a so-called “health retreat.”

While that doesn't sound so bad in and of itself, and maybe even a little bit spoiled, what makes this one so noteworthy is the fact that I think it was a cult...

---

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/this-is-sparta/message

5 and a half years ago I was in a hospital bed recovering from gastric sleeve surgery. When I talk to people about this experience I get the same questions:

**Question One**

“Which one is that? Is that the band?”

No. The surgery I had was the one where they poke five holes into your abdominal cavity and remove at least 70% of your stomach, leaving behind only a “sleeve.”

**Question Two**

“How long did it take?”

The answer to this innocent question is actually not as straightforward as it sounds. The best answer I can offer is that “it depends on what you count as the start and as the finish...” There are just too many parts.

The procedure itself? About 90 minutes. Then recovery in hospital took about 2 extra days. You know that Salvador Dali painting called ‘Sleep’? With the deformed humanoid head held up by flimsy stilts amongst a psychedelic desert? That’s what it felt like for two days. In suspended animation within my own body. Just precariously floating.

Until I got the hiccoughs that is. Oh my god, the hiccoughs. I have never, in my life, experienced a pain like it. I can still feel my cut up stomach convulsing against the sutures. If there was ever a moment I had thought to myself “what have I done?”… it was then.

---

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/this-is-sparta/message

What does weight loss surgery have to do with suicide and terrorism?

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