The saucy snap I send all my admirers
Despite losing half her body weight, Hannah Hails, 42, from Pulborough, still struggles to find love…
Browsing the website for another outfit, I frowned.
While most women get excited about ordering new clothes online, every time I did, I was filled with dread.
You see, I wasn’t buying slinky dresses and pretty tops from your regular stores.
At a size 38, I had to buy specially-made clothing from stores in America.
Tipping the scales at 33 stone, I was morbidly obese.
Just a few days before, I’d nearly had to call my husband Donald upstairs to help me get off the toilet.
As my thighs spilled over the toilet seat, I pulled a few sheets of paper from the rail and desperately tried to reach round my flabby rolls to wipe.
Eventually, after holding my breath and twisting awkwardly, I managed to wipe, heave myself up and flush the loo.
It was mortifying. One day I’m not going to be able to do this on my own, I thought, embarrassed.
Growing up, I’d always been on the larger side.
By 18, I was 15 stone, and the weight just kept on coming.
During pregnancy, I developed symphysis pubis dysfunction, which caused painful stiffness in my pelvic joints.
The constant pain between my legs meant that I could hardly move at all, and as I result, I piled on even more weight. Now I was unable to run after my girls, Meredith, seven, and Alice, six.
I couldn’t make it up the stairs, so I slept on a makeshift bed in the front room.
And even if I could make it out of the house without my legs collapsing, where would I go?
I couldn’t go to the cinema as I wouldn’t be able to fit in the seat.
And I could never jet off on holiday, as I’d need three seats on the plane. It was embarrassing. One day, in despair, I realised I had to do something.
So I booked an appointment with my GP, and as soon as I saw him, I broke down in floods of tears.
‘I can’t live like this anymore,’ I cried. ‘My weight is killing me.’
After a few consultations, the doctor agreed to refer me for weight-loss surgery.
‘The process is lengthy,’ the doctor warned.
It involved weekly appointments, keeping a diet diary, and losing some weight to prove I was serious about slimming down.
With a lot of hard work, I managed to shift a stone and a half, and finally had a gastric balloon fitted, which made me feel full.
In six months, I lost five stone and was able to undergo the full gastric bypass, which saw my stomach shrink to the size of a golf ball.
And after that, the weight began to fall off.
In a year, I lost 18 stone – more than half my body weight. My daughters were thrilled. ‘We loved you as Big Mummy, but we love you even more as Little Mummy,’ Meredith told me.
‘You’re much more fun now,’ Alice chirped.
I was finally able to keep up with them – running around, doing things I’d never been able to do before.
I started to help out at their school and volunteer on trips.
I was more sociable and had a big circle of friends. But there was a downside. As I slimmed, I felt like a deflating balloon when my skin began to sag.
Long, drooping flaps of flesh started to hang below my belly.
It was like I had a saddle bag around my nether regions!
‘I hate how I look,’ I grumbled to Donald.
‘Don’t be silly,’ he said. ‘You’re so confident now.’
But despite his reassurance, just a few months later, I was in for a shock.
One day, Donald sat me down…
‘I’m sorry,’ he said gently.
‘But I just don’t love you anymore.’
Then he packed his things and left.
I was distraught.
Our 22-year
It really was no way to live
marriage had fallen apart.
Donald had been my world – I’d lost my virginity to him and had never been intimate with anyone else before that.
After two months on my own, I was desperately lonely. So I decided to take the plunge and sign up to online dating. What do I have to lose? I thought to myself. I downloaded Tinder and set up a profile in the hope of meeting a Prince Charming who would sweep me off my feet.
I also turned to Plenty of Fish and Badoo, but I was just inundated with unpleasant photos.
‘Well!’ I gasped, glaring at yet another image of a penis.
‘Don’t these men know how to woo a woman anymore?’
One day, my phone pinged with yet another notification.
You’ve got a match, it said. Cautiously, I opened it and looked at my suitor’s profile.
And I was completely taken aback by it. Wow! I thought. He was very handsome. As we started chatting, I learnt he was delightful, too. He was a businessman from London, and we pinged messages back and forth faster than a tennis ball at Wimbledon. Then, after a few weeks of getting to know each other, he suggested we meet up. I’d love to, I replied. We were after the same thing, and I wasn’t exactly talking about a friendly chitchat. We planned to be intimate with each other. I had booked a hotel. But as the night drew nearer, something nagged at the back of my mind. I’d told him I’d lost a lot of weight – but I wanted to make sure he knew the real me – saggy skin and all. In a bid to prepare him, I undressed down to my underwear, and sent him a saucy snap. Then I waited nervously for his reaction. There was no response. I didn’t hear a peep out of him – just like that, he had cut all contact. I take it you’ve changed your mind, I texted. I was hurt, but I tried to see the positive side to it. ‘At least he rejected me before we actually met,’ I told myself. So I started on my quest for love again, and sent the picture to a couple more men, but the same thing happened. Again and again, they would just go cold. Am truly shocked, one wrote.
When I prompted another guy for a reply, he backed out as well. No no not this Saturday, he said. OK then, let’s just forget about it, I wrote back, humiliated.
There was one guy who liked my picture, but it turned out he had a fetish for bigger ladies. That wasn’t what I was after. I wanted a serious relationship. I couldn’t help feeling unlovable. Now a healthier 14st 10lb, I’ve started a crowdfunding campaign in the hopes of raising enough money for a skin-removal operation, which will give me my life back.
The treatment will cost £25,000, which I can’t afford on my own.
But if it means a man sees my body and doesn’t run a mile, then it will be worth every penny.
I was left feeling unlovable