My Journey into Weightloss

The Journey Begins

I should have written this sooner, but seeing as I'd completely forgotten about having this, it's just never happened and Facebook, while normally useful, does bring out the comments about being an "attention seeker", which in my opinion has it's pros and cons, since everyone likes receiving attention, it's just how you go about looking for that attention that makes it either good or bad.

It's one of those things, where in my younger days lets say in 2007 which was 5 years ago (not that I'm old right now at the ripe age of 33), I used to be able to just eat minimally and lose weight rapidly and still be strong and active....

....The honest truth is that I've always been overweight, I think the last time I can remember being thin was when I was a kid and that's only from seeing pics of when I was younger than 10 years old, given the years that have gone by, I cannot remember what changed from me being thin and active all the time, to turning into the fat kid that got picked on. FYI I'm not mentioning the Fat Kid being picked on as any sort of "AWWW bless him" type thing. 

My family has always been big, my mother, the amazing woman she is, was also thin in her younger days and then picked up weight, I think she has the 3 kids she gave birth to, to blame for that :) my Dad while active in his younger days and thin, also ended up being on the robust side of things. 

My folks have always tried to limit what I ate, but as a child I resisted the idea of being told what I could eat and how much of it I could eat and as the teen years rolled up, even though I was quite active by participating in various school sporting activities, I was still overweight by a large margin compared to others of the same age group.

The year is 1998, that was the year I was fittest I'd ever been in my life, even to this day. I was 19 and I played Rugby for Avonvale RFC in Bath, Somerset, England. I could run and jog all game and only be tired towards the end of the match, my diet was shocking, I couldn't really cook and because money was really scarce sometimes I ate Super Noodles for a whole month and a half for lunch and dinner. I can't begin to tell you how much that sucked, although the weight loss by eating Super Noodles and playing sports was phenomenal, but....

....like every bad diet, when you go back to eating normally again, you gain the weight back and then some. 

I'm going to skip forward a few years to the beginning of 2009, I'd taken up Rugby for the first time since I was 19 and let me tell you what a mistake that was. I was morbidly obese, I hate that term, but it's honest. I played 2 games and I was physically ruined, I couldn't move properly, everything hurt and I'm sure the opposing teams had a good laugh at my inability to jog for more than 10m without feeling the need to stop and catch my breath. It was a horrible time for me health wise and while I thought it couldn't get any worse, but definitely did....

....I tore my Achilles tendon at my first practise session after the aching had gone away from the previous matches. At first I thought it was just a sprained ankle, so in my folly, I continued up to the point where I was in some serious pain, but being rugby players I got called a pussy and told to get over it, but knowing something was wrong and trying to tell Rugby players that that was the case, is like telling grass not to grow, you know it's not going to do any good, but you do it anyway.

Next day, I woke up in SERIOUS agony, I mean the type of agony where you want to get a hacksaw and amputate your leg off, because you know doing that is not going to hurt any worse than it does already. 

I ended up hobbling to the Doctor who confirmed something I'd never even contemplated, I mean who thinks "oh I've just torn my Achilles tendon" especially when you've never even thought about that type of injury or even heard of an Achilles injury? 

This part to be is laughable, I had physio once a week, for 30 mins, on an injury that should have seen my leg strapped in plaster, but wasn't and on an injury that by the Doctors own admission is considered a serious injury which could have serious long term movement implications (no shit, really?). 

I had vigorously argued the point that I should be seeing a Physio more often, but was told I couldn't and with me not really having that much experience dealing with the NHS and the like, just grumbled and accepted it.

Now I'm going to skip over a couple of years, but will add that during those couple of years I was in constant agony. I couldn't walk for more than 5-10 mins without feeling the need to cry due to pain.

See pain has this way of mentally damaging us without us really wanting it to and the more extreme the pain, the more damaging it is mentally. Even when the pain subsides, some people (which includes me), use their injuries as an excuse. I definitely did just that, I used my Achilles injury as an excuse to be lazy, under the premise that "I didn't want to risk injuring my Achilles", which I guess seems like a valid reason, but there's always something you can do fitness wise that avoids causing yourself further injury. 

I mean I could have done upper body work outs, I could have done so many different exercises, but nope, the fear of being in extreme pain again scared me into failure and that's where the mental part comes in, you reason yourself into laziness, you give yourself reasons as to why you cannot achieve something and then the worst of it starts, you get so used to being lazy and not doing anything, that you find any reason to not do something health wise, even though deep down you know the only thing that's stopping you...is you.

Longest introduction OR WHAT?!? :)

Right my journey started in July of 2011, but abruptly ended in August of that very same year. I could come up with excuses or reasons for stopping really quickly after starting, but I guess the biggest reasons were laziness, lack of motivation and low confidence.

My real Journey started in June of 2012 after seeing photos myself play Crazy Golf with a few friends. I could not believe how big I was, I mean I was horrified and shocked at the same time and it all comes down to one of the earlier paragraphs I mentioned earlier, you make excuses to cover other excuses and then you buy into your own bullshit and think it's real and by the time you realise it's not, the work and effort to get where you need to be has doubled and you start thinking "if only I had done this or that months ago" 

That's all bullshit, we as human beings not only have the ability to bullshit others, but the biggest disservice we can do ourselves is bullshitting ourselves. We're all capable of doing anything we want, what differs is ability, like for example, I can play Football/Soccer, but I'll never be a Lionel Messi or even good enough to play in a Sunday League team down the Pub, but I can play Football. 

Anyway, I digress and that's a different conversation altogether....

As I said my journey started in June of 2012, I went to one of the Gyms in Milton Keynes, UK, where I met with my PT or Personal Trainer, we spoke about my health, my health issues, my goals and the one thing I cannot stress enough, is be as brutally honest as you can if you ever decide to get a PT, because end of the day if you want someone like that to help you, they need to know as much about you health wise as humanly possible. 

I did a series of tests to see where my level of fitness was, which needless to say was shocking, although he did remark that my recovery rate was pretty good, which meant I have a strong heart, happy days right? riiiight? RIIIIGHT?! 

Far from it really, my cardio was really bad, all the muscle strength I'd had other the last 10 years may as well have been fresh air, since I struggled A LOT. My breathing was terrible, 10 mins into exercising and I sounded like I was dying, muscles ached like a bitch, but this is where I again cannot recommend a good PT enough, he encouraged me to push myself harder in the gym, to walk faster on the treadmill, to pick up those heavy weights, to push myself harder during the resistance training and you know what? After a month I'd lost 7kg or 1st 1lbs, that feat alone made me want to continue, to push myself harder, to train longer.

Skipping to present date, which is now the 29th October 2012, I have no idea how much weight I've lost, but I can tell you this, I am stronger, I am so much fitter and healthier than I have been in the last 6 years and it comes down to cutting the bullshit, I stopped lying to myself and just started pushing myself in the gym.

I've heard people say "oh well all these meatheads that go there put me off" so fucking what? You're not there to please them, you're there because that's where you feel you have to be to lose weight or to get fit, you're there because you feel that you could be healthier, so what if some heavily muscled dude can do more weights than you? He's been doing it for years and I'm sure even he or even she for that matter, was just like you at one stage, either really skinny or really overweight, the difference is the willingness to change and push yourself and take that first step and getting your ass down to the gym.

I am no pro, I'm not even thin yet, but I have learnt some harsh lessons and I every day I manage to go to the gym I count as a good day, because I know I'm trying to make that change and don't want to blame others or myself any more for being the way I was 4 months ago.

I know that in 12 months time, when I look back at pictures of myself, I want to be proud of what I've achieved and be able to look at myself and say "I worked my ass off to be where I am now"

and if I can do it, so can others.