For good or ill, I'm putting this one up for everyone to see. Hopefully it'll help keep me motivated to keep working. First, I'll give you a brief background of my accomplishments for health and fitness so far. Feel free to skip down if you don't want a bunch of history.
Early this year, I decided that I was going to stop playing games with my health. I was 26, 5'10", and weighed 245 lbs. I 'carried it well', or at least that's what everyone told me when they didn't believe I could weigh that much. Regardless, I knew it, I was in 38 waist pants (should have been 40s if I was honest), and I felt like crap.
Both my wife and I decided if we didn't start getting healthy then, we probably never would. We knew it only got harder as you got older, and every day we walked around out of shape, carrying extra weight, it was taking time off our lives that we'd rather keep. So we started cutting bad foods. When I say 'bad foods' I mean foods that have been processed so heavily that they've got more ingredients than there are items in their aisle at the store. I'm talking as well about foods with extra sugars (in any form, not just high fructose corn syrup), foods that have a bunch of dyes and preservatives added in to keep them on the shelves and looking pretty. I'm talking about stuff that has been created rather than grown. We started eating real food.
After cutting out things like pizza rolls, sweet drinks (soft drinks, tons of sweet tea) and fast food in January, we'd both lost about 20 lbs by May. We were feeling better and our clothes fit better, but we both wanted to be a lot healthier. That was when we started monitoring our caloric intakes and balancing that against what we needed per day and how much we should be eating per day to continue losing weight. By September I had dropped another 40 lbs down to where I am now, which is 185. I've dropped down to a comfortable 34 waist in pants, and medium shirts down from extra large. My wife has dropped over 30 more lbs, for over 50 lbs lost since January.
I began jogging for exercise in June of this year. I'd never been a runner before, but it sounded like something that would be fun. It also sounded like a good way to challenge myself to do meet goals, get exercise, gain cardiovascular fitness, and use up some extra calories where needed. I started out running a mile in about 12 minutes, and from there I'm consistently down to about 7 minutes if I just go 1 mile. I also ran a 5k at the end of October in 25:59, down from an initial run time of almost 39 minutes in July. I really enjoy running now and it's become a permanent part of my life and fitness.
We're beginning to cut out almost all foods except those that we make at home. I'm talking about things like not buying bread any more - just making loaves at home. Instead of canned soups, we're creating stocks from raw ingredients and making our own. We haven't bought any manner of frozen dinners in such a long time; the only things in our freezer are vegetables and meat. The food tastes much better than boxed meals as well, which is another bonus.
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<span style="font-weight: bold">Short version if you skipped all that:</span> I cut most processed foods, kept track of what exactly I was eating, started running in June, and ended up losing about 6" off my waist, 3 shirt sizes, and 60 lbs.
This morning (November 7) I started the P90X workout program for the third time. I've started it twice before now, but I've never stuck with it. This time, I'm aiming to. I'm going to be posting my progress and results here for everyone to see. Hopefully the thought of internet humiliation from y'all will keep me motivated when I don't feel like getting up at 4:30 in the morning to have time to work out.
I want to be in the best shape of my life. I want to feel as good as I can, I want to be as healthy as I can be, and I want to be able to do anything I want. When I have kids, I want to be able to run with them as long as they can go. I also want to be an inspiration to them to be in the best shape they can as well. My family has never really been big on fitness, so I'm hoping to start that mindset with my generation.
Pictures of progress from one year ago (August '10) to day 1 of P90X (November '11) below.
Progress through Phase 1 is here.
Progress through Phase 2 is here.
Early this year, I decided that I was going to stop playing games with my health. I was 26, 5'10", and weighed 245 lbs. I 'carried it well', or at least that's what everyone told me when they didn't believe I could weigh that much. Regardless, I knew it, I was in 38 waist pants (should have been 40s if I was honest), and I felt like crap.
Both my wife and I decided if we didn't start getting healthy then, we probably never would. We knew it only got harder as you got older, and every day we walked around out of shape, carrying extra weight, it was taking time off our lives that we'd rather keep. So we started cutting bad foods. When I say 'bad foods' I mean foods that have been processed so heavily that they've got more ingredients than there are items in their aisle at the store. I'm talking as well about foods with extra sugars (in any form, not just high fructose corn syrup), foods that have a bunch of dyes and preservatives added in to keep them on the shelves and looking pretty. I'm talking about stuff that has been created rather than grown. We started eating real food.
After cutting out things like pizza rolls, sweet drinks (soft drinks, tons of sweet tea) and fast food in January, we'd both lost about 20 lbs by May. We were feeling better and our clothes fit better, but we both wanted to be a lot healthier. That was when we started monitoring our caloric intakes and balancing that against what we needed per day and how much we should be eating per day to continue losing weight. By September I had dropped another 40 lbs down to where I am now, which is 185. I've dropped down to a comfortable 34 waist in pants, and medium shirts down from extra large. My wife has dropped over 30 more lbs, for over 50 lbs lost since January.
I began jogging for exercise in June of this year. I'd never been a runner before, but it sounded like something that would be fun. It also sounded like a good way to challenge myself to do meet goals, get exercise, gain cardiovascular fitness, and use up some extra calories where needed. I started out running a mile in about 12 minutes, and from there I'm consistently down to about 7 minutes if I just go 1 mile. I also ran a 5k at the end of October in 25:59, down from an initial run time of almost 39 minutes in July. I really enjoy running now and it's become a permanent part of my life and fitness.
We're beginning to cut out almost all foods except those that we make at home. I'm talking about things like not buying bread any more - just making loaves at home. Instead of canned soups, we're creating stocks from raw ingredients and making our own. We haven't bought any manner of frozen dinners in such a long time; the only things in our freezer are vegetables and meat. The food tastes much better than boxed meals as well, which is another bonus.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
<span style="font-weight: bold">Short version if you skipped all that:</span> I cut most processed foods, kept track of what exactly I was eating, started running in June, and ended up losing about 6" off my waist, 3 shirt sizes, and 60 lbs.
This morning (November 7) I started the P90X workout program for the third time. I've started it twice before now, but I've never stuck with it. This time, I'm aiming to. I'm going to be posting my progress and results here for everyone to see. Hopefully the thought of internet humiliation from y'all will keep me motivated when I don't feel like getting up at 4:30 in the morning to have time to work out.
I want to be in the best shape of my life. I want to feel as good as I can, I want to be as healthy as I can be, and I want to be able to do anything I want. When I have kids, I want to be able to run with them as long as they can go. I also want to be an inspiration to them to be in the best shape they can as well. My family has never really been big on fitness, so I'm hoping to start that mindset with my generation.
Pictures of progress from one year ago (August '10) to day 1 of P90X (November '11) below.
Progress through Phase 1 is here.
Progress through Phase 2 is here.
i used to love bread 
