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2004/04/27, 11:48 AM
Hello everyone!
I am a 31 year old man from NE Mississippi who’s made the decision to change his lifestyle to a much healthier one. Like so many others, my weight gains began when I was in college. At that time, I was a full time student working a near-full time job and had a full time girlfriend/fiancée. As you can imagine, that left little or no time for taking care of myself. The trend continued even after I graduated college, got married (same girl) and went about my merry way. Nine years later finds me weighing in at 265lbs, and although I am still a very active outdoorsman and hunter, I am quite lacking in overall physical fitness.
I realized a few years ago that I would have to change my lifestyle or face severe penalties for it later in life. I made several attempts at changing those habits here and there with mixed results, but none lasting. At one time, I even managed to drop nearly fifty pounds in two months following the Weight Watchers® plan. (That’s no exaggeration.) However, when my wife and I began expecting our first child, the Weight Watchers® plan went the way of the wind. After all, she really did need help eating all that food while she was pregnant. Didn’t she?
Now, I’ve decided once and for all, I’m making changes. Permanent changes. I’m not talking about just losing a few pounds or just toning up, I mean real changes. In other words, from now on I want to adopt healthy eating, weight training, bodybuilding and other forms of physical fitness as permanent fixtures in my life. It’s not just about me anymore, now there’s a little boy that needs his dad to set a good example for him and a wife that needs a husband that will be healthy, happy and satisfying to her for years to come.
I’ve never been a fan of fad diets. Though I’m sure each have their merits, Dr. Atkins, the cabbage soup gang, and stomach staplers don’t offer much enticement for me. I’ve always believed that if a person should lose weight and get fit, they should do it the right way – eat right, exercise, and challenge themselves to do better. I don’t believe the answers lie in quick fixes or little pills, at least not alone.
Beginning last week, I began a somewhat organized and restrictive program of combining the Weight Watcher®’s method (counting points) with Bill Phillips’ “Body For Life” program. I believe in WW because it’s not a fad diet, it simply teaches you how to moderate your intake. I am impressed with the BFL program because I believe that it delivers just what I need – a beginners guide to weight training that will inspire me to pursue this more in the future. However, instead of trying to cram all those results into just twelve weeks of intense workouts, I have decided to commit myself to six months of training and proper eating.
However, there is just one main obstacle that stands in my way of this progress – I work too much! I currently have two jobs and they require me to work from 7am to 10:00pm each weekday. I often work on Saturdays and Sundays as well. Usually, I have at least one or two evenings off per week and sometimes a weekend day such as Saturday. As you can imagine, this leaves precious little time for rest and exercise, especially since it takes a minimum of an hour and a half of road time each day to complete the course from home to work and then back home again. As it stands, I am living off of an average of four (sometimes five) hours of sleep each night. (Right now it’s even less…turkey season is in and I have to get up early for that!)
So, as you can see, I have quite a task on my hand figuring out how I’m going to fit this new part of my life into my already full schedule. But, I’m gonna do it. Somehow.
Fortunately, I’m already making progress. A quick check of the scales this morning told me that I’ve already lost a good bit of weight. I now weigh 253lbs, twelve pounds lighter than a month ago and five and a half pounds lighter than I did when I made this commitment nearly a week ago. In addition, the soreness in my abdomen, shoulders, arms and back reminds me that I am now a wannabe weight lifter. I’m honestly excited about my progress thus far.
I found this site just yesterday while looking for information about certain weight loss products. I am very thrilled to be here, and look forward to being a productive and positive-if not a most inquisitive-member of this site. I can only hope that the many questions I will probably ask will not prove to be annoying or too elementary for you veterans of the iron and sweat.
So far, I have found this site to be very informative with a great bunch of members. As I am a member of a couple of other online forums (hunting and outdoors related), I look forward to being a part of this forum as well.
Have a wonderful day,
Welby
My stats:
Age: 31, Male Honkey
Current Weight: 253lbs (Check back tomorrow!)
Height: 6’1-3/4” (Though I’m sure I was a full 6’3” a few years ago!)
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