Welcome to the Good, the Fat and the Hungry. I'm Karla and I have been -- or am -- all those things. Here, I will share with you my lifelong struggle with my weight and I hope you'll follow along on with my determined attempt to lose nearly 40 pounds. I promise to tell you every win and setback along the way every Tuesday and Friday.

Happy birthday to me! That's right, I'm officially 30 none of your business. HA! What's significant about this birthday is that I am closer in age to 40 than 30. Thanks to weight loss, eating right and working out, I feel closer to 30 than 40. Losing 200 lbs. has turned the clock back. Even simple things are new.

I can never remember crossing my legs until three years ago. Being the girlie girl that I am, I do it all the time. It reminds me that I've come so far and that I will never again be unable to cross my legs. In my old life, I experienced what I grew to call, "turnstile terror." Ever been too fat to get through a turnstile? Over the course of time, I learned to wiggle through sideways but I even outgrew that method.

That takes me back to painful memory 322: When I was 14, my sister hooked me up with a guy she met while working in a hospital. She was a candy striper and he was a patient. He and I spoke for several years by phone because my family moved to another part of the state and we were too young to drive. We were good friends and had great affection for each other. But we'd never met.

Once we were old enough to drive and manuever on our own, we decided to meet at an amusement park where I lived for a day of fun and a concert in the park later that evening. I knew that I'd never really told him that I was overweight but after all this time I had hoped it wouldn't matter. If it did, I had him all wrong. We met face to face at the park for the first time and fortunately, my weight was not an issue for him. He really was as sweet as I'd thought.

He bought our tickets for the show and we went up to the gate to present them to the ticket agent, who tore our tickets and gave us the stubs. Ahead of us was a turnstile. I immediately began to get nervous because this one seemed especially small. He stepped aside to let me go through first but I could not fit through. As I had feared, I was too big to get in. In my panic, I continued to push and push trying to get through but I simply could not fit. The ticket agent came over and told me I could walk through the handicap entrance. As I walked through with those in wheelchairs rolling by next to me, complete humiliation consumed me. He did all he could to comfort me and assure me that it was no big deal, but the entire day was ruined. I was too fat to enjoy anything after that.

I never saw him again, even though he tried many times to reach me -- I just could not recover from the shame I felt. That was more than 20 years ago. I remember it vividly but not so painfully. I'm not her anymore but I appreciate and will always identify with the struggle of being overweight.

I'm feeling great with today as my one-month abdominoplasty anniversary! The tingling and weird sensations have all but disappeared and I'm getting around well. I'm exercising fully but still advised to do no heavy lifting. My new tummy is healing nicely and I won't even complain about the one remaining drain. After much consideration, I've decided to post pictures at the six week mark so please stay tuned!