She calls herself the Miracle Woman.
The Starkville native and mother of five has been through adversity. But faith, determination and her unbridled self-confidence have transformed Gwendolyn Outlaw Sharp into an inspiration to an entire community. And if she has her way, she will become an inspiration to the entire world.
In 2000, Sharp suffered a massive stroke as a result of high blood pressure and untreated stress. She spent two months in North Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo”s Intensive Care Unit.
“All the doctors said I wasn”t going to make it,” she said. “I think they were just getting my children ready for the worst.”
For eight weeks Sharp laid in bed, one tube pumping blood and fluids directly into her brain another pumping nutrients into her stomach.
“I attribute my recovery to my son, Brandon, who was only 4 years old at the time,” said Sharp. “I just kept thinking about him sitting on a log somewhere waiting on his momma. I couldn”t let that baby down.”
Despite the dire prognosis of the medical professionals who cared for her, Sharp eventually was released from the hospital and allowed to go home. But her recovery only brought on new problems.
“One of the drugs they had me on, the steroid Prednisone, caused me to gain weight,” she said. “All I wanted to do was eat. I had a chair set up in the kitchen so I could sit down between the oven and the sink. I could cook my food and do the dishes without getting up.”
In the months following her release from the hospital, Sharp”s weight exploded to 368 pounds.
“It wasn”t until I found a new doctor that I was able to start turning it around,” she said. “He weaned me off the Prednisone and told me to start exercising.”
Sharp started small. At first, her modest exercise routine involved little more than walking to the mailbox in front of her house. Then it grew to short walks around the block in her Starkville neighborhood.
“I would have to sit down, because I would get so out of breath,” she said. “But I never would quit.”
As the weight started cascading off, Sharp switched from easy walks to more intensive jogging exercises. Today, she runs about 8 miles a day, seven days a week.
“I go out first at about 5:30 and run 4 miles, then I go out at about 9:30 and run another four miles,” she said.
Sharp has managed to lose more than 150 pounds since she first began exercising about five years ago.
Sharp says people constantly stop her and tell her what an inspiration she is to them. Eventually, Sharp decided there was enough interest out there to start sharing her story with others.
“Ever since I was a little girl I always wanted to write a book,” said Sharp. “So I did my research and got a lot of help from R.H. Brown.”
Brown, a preacher, television journalist and author of the book “Call Me Gullah,” guided Sharp through the process of translating personal stories onto the page.
“We just worked so hard, and he”s such a wonderful man,” said Sharp.
The result was the book “The Winning Loser, A Mississippi Miracle.” The book recounts not only Sharp”s struggle with weight and other health problems, but the story of her life as a whole.
These days, when Sharp isn”t busy promoting her book, she”s writing to celebrities like Jim Carrey and Samuel L. Jackson to try and convince them to appear in a film version of her story.
“The biggest thing is the health part, but God gave me double for my trouble,” she said. “I never thought I would achieve my dream out of all of this. Because all of this happened to me I”ve got a zeal, I”ve got a drive and now I”ve got a book!”
Copies of Sharp”s book can be purchased from the Barnes & Noble bookstore at Mississippi State University or from the Web site www.callmegullah.com.
The Dispatch Editorial Board is made up of publisher Peter Imes, columnist Slim Smith, managing editor Zack Plair and senior newsroom staff.
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