PHOTOS Melanie from Skin Tight continues to awe in new weight loss gallery
The latest success story to come from Skin Tight Season Three is 29-year-old Melanie Mason of Dallas — and Melanie from Skin Tight is looking even better in her most recent updates than she did at the end of her episode.
Melanie’s Skin Tight episode began with one of the most successful weight loss stories in the show’s history. Thanks to two separate bariatric surgeries in the past five years, Melanie was down to 175 pounds total — a whopping 360 pounds away from her peak weight. But the extra skin that Melanie’s weight loss left behind meant she had to wear two different body shapers simultaneously — and kept her dreaming of life as a “normal” 29-year-old.
“You can just feel the extra skin weighing on your bones. When it pulls on your body, it feels heavy, you can feel the skin rubbing together,” Melanie said. She added that she had to practically bathe herself in talcum powder every day in order to reduce the sweatiness and friction that her body shapers caused.
Melanie from Skin Tight was able to find solace in swimming, which she called “the only workout where I don’t feel the skin weighing me down.
“I’ve been going to the pool when it’s not busy,” Melanie went on, “but I get very nervous when there are other people there. I feel that people are going to judge me, look at me, laugh at me. And I get it, I’m not stupid, but it still hurts. I try so hard to look normal but you can’t really hide all this excess skin.”
By episode’s end, however, Dr. Nowzaradan had approved Melanie for skin removal surgery. He planned the full removal over three separate surgeries — the first of which we saw in the episode, and which resulted in Melanie losing fourteen more pounds of skin.
But how does Melanie from Skin Tight look now? Here’s a photo gallery to help you better appreciate the Texan’s transformation. The first photo, a waist-up shot of Melanie and her mom, comes from near the beginning of Melanie’s weight loss journey, almost five years ago in May of 2013:
And here’s another shot of Melanie, this time of just her face, from October of the same year
Fast-forward to a more recent shot, and Melanie’s transformation comes into sharp focus. Here she is in August of last year:
Finally, here’s the most recent photo that Melanie from Skin Tight has made public. In fact, she took it just a couple of days after her episode aired — which you could probably tell just by the glow on her face:
Melanie hasn’t yet revealed whether she’s undergone the second and third of her planned skin removal surgeries. But she did take to Facebook after her episode’s world premiere to thank all of her family, friends, and newfound well-wishers.
“Thank guys so very much for watching and supporting!” Melanie said. “This has been hard for me, but I’m glad that I was able to share my story. You guys have inspired and encourage me in your own ways and I appreciate everyone. I love y’all!”
If you’re interested in keeping up with Melanie from Skin Tight, you can follow her Facebook page here. And you can stream her episode here, via TLC.
(Photo credits: Melanie from Skin Tight via Facebook, Instagram)
