I just want to check in with the women on this site to see if any of you have experienced increasing weight gain after being treated with Prednisone prior to your surgery and even after being off steroids for several years or more.

Are you experiencing increasing weight gain no matter how much you diet and exercise? (This is starting to sound like a commercial…lol) Trust me, it’s not.

There’s a fat disorder called Lipedema. It usually only strikes women and seems to be related to hormones. It’s believed that 11% of women have it. Many women appear to be much smaller on top than they are on the bottom. Some have a noticeable “cuff” at their wrists or their ankles where the fat just stops.

I first noticed symptoms in junior high. I quit eating at 14, because I always felt like a giant around my friends. At 73 lbs. they would ask me why I was so skinny on top and so fat on the bottom. With each of my four pregnancies I put on more weight that I couldn’t lose afterward no matter what I did.

After being on steroids off and on for five years fighting Ulcerative Colitis, it just got completely out of control. I can lose obesity weight, but the weight from Lipedema does not come off. And the fat doesn’t look the same as the fat on other women. I lived near the beach and noticed other women my size that had smooth fat on their arms and legs. My fat on the other hand looks like cellulite that has grown way out of control. They call it cellulite on steroids. I always wondered how I could have ruined my body this way and it seemed like there was nothing I could do about it.

While researching something else, I came across information on Lipedema. It explained everything that was going on with my body.

Since steroids really mess with your hormones, I thought there could possibly other women on this site suffering this way and wondering what in the world is going on.

It’s a condition that is progressive, and may be hereditary so if you have it, it’s very important that you have some support. In this age of fat shaming, you need other people in your corner who know that it’s not your fault and you really aren’t sneaking Twinkies when no one is looking.

Many women go through invasive and sometimes dangerous gastric surgery thinking it will solve the problem. It won’t. So please check this out before doing something drastic like that and especially if you have daughters with the condition…you could spare them from a lot more grief.

If you think this might be you, or someone that you know, please Google Lipedema, find yourself a support system and stop blaming yourself. You didn’t do this to your body. Your body did it to you.

Feel free to get ahold of me if you need to talk.

Take care!

-Roni