Weight Loss

I really hate to be a braggart but I am feeling really good about myself and need to spend a little time gloating.

Unfortunately I am not naturally disposed to having a health looking body (i.e it is really easy for me to look unhealthy/overweight), and over the past nine years I have done little or nothing to change that fact. In high school as I played football and ran track I was able to maintain a descent weight even though I stuffed my face with whatever I felt like. In the year between my graduating from High School and leaving on my mission I ballooned fairly unfortunate proportions. Then came a 2 year stint in Peru eating rice and beans every day and walking everywhere. One of those weeks in Peru included some jungle sickness where I lost 10 pounds and reached my lowest adult weight of 175.

After my mission I returned to my life of idleness with occasional forays into extra physical activities but none of them ever stuck. As I replaced clothes that where worn (and maybe a little tighter), I found myself looking at bigger sizes than I have worn before and justified it to myself by saying that everything is cut differently and clothes are just smaller. I moved up to a 40 inch waist and began buying XXL shirts. My weight topped out at 244 (at least that was my highest measured weight).

In January my parents decided to sponsor a Biggest Loser contest. Not wanting to adjust my life style too much I figured I could make minimal changes, lose a few pounds and still walk away maybe in third (I apologize now to my family for my lack of confidence in your abilities to lose weight, we all did wonderfully). So I added 2 nights of Basketball to my weekly schedule thinking that it would be enough to lose a few pounds.

After a couple of weeks I had lost nothing! And I was getting frustrated! About this time I read several articles about adjusting your eating being more important for weight loss than exercise. So I began eating less. The major change I made was in not taking seconds. I had got into the habit of eating until I could not eat anymore, usually a large first serving with a descent second serving. I made my first servings the size of what my seconds had been and was done after my first plate. I also made my snacks healthier and limited the amount of sweets I would eat (one desert a day, 2 scoops of Ice Cream instead on 3). And I began to lose weight! Slowly, I lost 1-2 lbs a week.

I was able to consistently maintain that weight loss all the way through the summer. In July I began running again and ran a 10K on the 24th of July. The big race that I have been training for is coming up on Sat., The Dirty Dash a 10K in mud with Obstacles and I am really excited. As of last week I have really reached many of my goals and had a few extra bonuses thrown in. I am now wearing pants with a 36 inch waist (I actually got a 34 inch pair on and buttoned but nobody wants to see me in skinny jeans) and the shirts that I buy for the most part are larges. As fun as this is it does tend to be a little hard on the budget. And for the most significant accomplishment, I now weigh less than 200 pounds! This is the most healthy, and best I have been in my adult life! I have plans to keep it up and I hope to get down to even healthier levels but I am very satisfied with where I am now and am excited for Becky to join me as we work together to be healthier.