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    703: How I Lost More Than a Quarter Ton and Gained a Life
    703: How I Lost More Than a Quarter Ton and Gained a Life
    703: How I Lost More Than a Quarter Ton and Gained a Life
    Audiobook8 hours

    703: How I Lost More Than a Quarter Ton and Gained a Life

    Written by Nancy Makin

    Narrated by Coleen Marlo

    3.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Nancy Makin weighed an astounding 703 pounds in May 2000. She was forty-five years old and had diabetes and heart disease. Thanks in equal parts to shame and logistics, she'd been homebound for a dozen years.

    But all that changed after a gift from her sister: a computer. A technophobe, Nancy ignored it for months, until finally boredom and curiosity pushed her into cyberspace. And there, in a chat room, she found the friendliness, the support, and even the love she'd been missing for so long. Nobody flinched when Nancy spoke up; people treated her with the same respect accorded to everybody else. Thanks to these emotional connections, Nancy's life was transformed.

    She followed no diet plan; no pills, potions, or ab-crunching exercises played a part. There was no silver bullet, no magical, elusive ingredient-yet Nancy has lost more than 530 pounds. Nancy's tale is one of redemption, a story of reevaluating her worth and insisting she had value simply because she was human. It will show a growing America that life is sweet and always worth living.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateApr 20, 2010
    ISBN9781400187072
    703: How I Lost More Than a Quarter Ton and Gained a Life

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    Reviews for 703

    3.5/5

    19 ratings3 reviews

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    • 3/5
      The author had a top weight of 703 lbs. She lost the majority (over 500 lbs) of that weight and recounts her story here in hopes of inspiring other people. It was a decent story. The author started the story as a child and worked her way forward, but there were large gaps in time in her story. I listened to the audio, so sometimes lost where we were: what age she was, what weight. I found her childhood particularly interesting. She never really said how she lost all the weight, but I still found the perspective interesting. She didn’t leave her house for years; when she did, they needed special equipment to get her out and to the hospital. The comments and stares are things you don’t think about. Even how to do so many things that so many of us take for granted. When she did leave her house, her son would stand in such a way to try to block people’s stares. There are just so many things we take for granted.
    • 2/5
      Despite its title, this memoir tells the reader little about how Makin lost more than 500 pounds, much less how she gained it in the first place. I can understand not wanting to sensationalize her story, but the reader might be forgiven for expecting some answers to the how and the why and the what. As it is, Makin tells of a rather turbulent childhood, fraught relationship with her parents, teen motherhood and marriage, and all of a sudden she weighs 700 pounds. She pays lip service to her personal responsibility for the damage she does to herself (including being a 3-pack a day smoker at one point) but she seems more inclined to blame other people and bad circumstances for the worst of it.Other problems I had with this (audio)book:- According to Makin, most of the doctors and other "experts" (you can see her rolling her eyes) she came into contact with were all stupid and unhelpful- Throughout the portion about her childhood, her mother is made out to be an evil witch and her father the understanding and loving parent, but later on she and her mother are basically chummy with a normal mother/daughter relationship and her father is no where to be found. I hate holes in stories like that.- The reader of the audio had a really annoying, breathy voice.- The reader also mispronounced words a lot - my favorite was "mis-shapen" pronounced "mis-happen."- Makin talks about how she deflected her pain with humor but all the examples of her humor were awful and there is nothing worse than listening to more than 8 hours of the story of a person who thinks she's funny, when she's just not.And what I found most hypocritical and obnoxious:Makin traveled to Chicago to appear on Oprah as part of a show about successful weight loss. She is riding in a limo with other guests while they discuss their food plans and exercise regimens. Because, I'm sorry, don't we all know that eating healthy and exercising is really the key to healthy, sustained weight loss? Well, Makin takes these people to task in her book about how they will probably fall off the wagon because they are so worried about what they eat and how they exercise, whereas she knows the real secret is accepting oneself and being content. How she knows these people haven't discovered the same secret is beyond me, but the judgmental and critical tone she uses -she who has been the victim of judgement and criticism her whole life! - was just beyond the pale. Infuriating.So, yeah, not recommended.
    • 3/5
      A slow start, but a great read once I got into it. Malkin is in a very different place than I am but I could see shades of myself in her. I like to think I caught myself in time, and I hope I did. I totally understand the role of the web in a WLJ - I don't think I'd be where I am today without it. It's never easy - but it makes it somewhat easier to have resources at hand.