deck Whitman said:
HeinekenMan said:
Three weeks ago, I realized at baseball practice that I could barely bend over to pick up balls that the kids rolled to me on the pitching mound. Today, I'm going to run sprints with them. They are in trouble for not paying attention at our last game, and I'm taking the blame for the loss. I figure we'll share the punishment.
I have a question, and take this in amicable spirit in which it is intended, especially because I am confident from your post that you are going to be successful in getting rid of it:
How do some of you get to this point?
As I've posted on this thread, I've been a few dozen pounds overweight before, and am working right now on blasting that last 5-10 pounds of stubborn flab. But I can't imagine getting to, say, 100 pounds overweight. Or to the point where you can't bend over to pick up a baseball.
And please, again, don't take this as some kind of slam. I see obese people all of the time, particularly middle-age men. Is it something that just kind of creeps up on people?
I really could bend over, but I couldn't do it without great effort. Not that it matters. I am about 150 pounds overweight right now. I will tell you a bit about my story.
Right now, I weigh about 330. I have been as high as 350. In high school and in my 20s, I weighed 230. I lost 30 of that a few times, but I never got any lower than about 190.
The last time that I lost the weight, I was running six miles two or three times a week. I did that for about six months. Then I injured my knee and did no exercise for about a year. My weight went from 195 to 230 in a matter of months.
At the end of that year, I met my wife. We lived together for a year before we got married. I gained 30 pounds that year to 260. Then I gained 20 pounds more during our first year of marriage. Two years later, I quit smoking. I gained about 40 pounds after that. That put me at 320. I have hovered between about 320 and 350 since then.
There are factors that caused the weight gain, but they are not all the same. First, I met someone who pulled me away from being active. My wife is not active, and I started to spend more time with her and less time playing basketball with the guys. I also spent more time going out to eat. This is because I had more money than when I was a bachelor. So I could afford food. I also had someone to sit across the table from me.
The rest of the weight was due to stress. Since I quit smoking, normal, everyday annoyances grate on my nerves. I find myself being angrier than I used to be. I also don't sleep as well now that I'm a dad. I can't sleep in or take days off, and I find myself staying up later at night just to enjoy some quiet time. The exhaustion contributes to anger and stress, and I eat more when I'm stressed.
I have read that sleep is one of the most important factors in health and weight loss. I think that's extremely accurate. If I don't get enough sleep, I sit dreary-eyed and long to drown my stress by chowing down on a large pizza.
And all of this has consquences. When I am at the high end, I have serious health problems. I constantly feel drained (likely due to sleep apnea and pre-diabetes). At that point, you put yourself in a dangerous zone. Because you don't get enough sleep, you are constantly stressed out. And because you have no energy, it's a real chore to exercise.
Plus, groceries are outrageously expensive these days. I paid $7.50 for four small organic tomatoes a few days ago. It's cheaper to eat junk than to eat healthy foods. This is particularly true if you are eating foods that other folks in the house will not eat. Another factor is a combination of the pace of my life and laziness. When I lose weight, I am constantly managing meals and cooking them. If I don't have time or just don't take the time, I'm much more likely to grab something unhealthy. And, naturally, being busy or lazy or exhausted from a lack of qualify sleep affects exercise.
A lot of what I've mentioned sounds like excuses. That's another thing I'm guilty of. I can find an excuse for anything. Perhaps some or all of it is accurate. But I also know that excuses can only control you if you submit to them. I need to turn over a new leaf and refuse to let something be my crutch. But I think being dependent on these excuses is just a part of who I am.
By the way, my mom weighs over 400 pounds. It's tough to say how that factors into my situation. We never ate many of the same foods, but I also don't remember her bothering me about my eating habits or my weight. That might have contributed to me being larger in my early years.
