Warfarinking
Well-known member
Before / After pictures: http://imgur.com/a/3ler7
My story:
I've been overweight since I could remember. I recall having to weigh in my last day of 5th grade; I weighed 170 pounds. I played a lot of games during my childhood, was a professional Counter-Strike player at the age of 13 and then played World of Warcraft 12~ hours a day after my Counter-Strike career. I lived in a cycle of being depressed, eating to help with my depression and then regretting eating. It came to a point that my parents didn't know what to do or how to help me, they saw how depressed I was but had no answers for me.
My dad tried to pay me $100 a week to go to the gym 5 days during the week and not even that I could do. I was a failure. I grew up never having a girlfriend and having to watch all my friends talk about getting laid and doing couple stuff, I don't blame any girl though, I wouldn't have wanted myself either -- I was a monster.
Fast forward to 2011, I'm 325 pounds at the age of 22. I remember being stuck in the middle seat on a 12 hour flight to Europe. I could tell the two people next to me were pissed to have been stuck with me in the middle since I unintentionally was taking both their arm rests because I didn't fit. The flight attendant over the speaker tells us all to fasten our seat belts, only to realize my seat belt would not lock in. I pushed and pushed, sucked in my stomach as much as I could, and squeezed as much as my stomach would let me but nothing was working. Anxiety hit, I could not lock in the seat belt to save my life. One by one the attendant is passing by making sure everyone had their seat belt on and as she approached my aisle she quickly realized the problem I was having. She got me a fucken extension. I was beyond embarrassed. I have never in my life been so embarrassed in my life, I still remember the day like it was yesterday. 2 hours into our flight one of the flight attendants approached me and told me they had made room in another aisle for me. They had people move around in another aisle so I could have two seats to myself. I spent the next 10 hours of that flight starring out into the clouds while quietly crying.
That was the last straw for me, as soon as I got back from Europe I signed up to a gym and went everyday for a month straight -- I was proud of myself and thought I had finally gotten the hang of it. One day while at the gym I get this cold feeling around my heart area, long story short, I ended up passing out at the gym. Turned out I was born with a defective heart valve and I had to go through open heart surgery at the age of 22. Doctor told me all the weight was putting a lot of pressure on an already defective valve. I had my aortic valve replaced with a mechanical valve that year. Due to the open heart surgery, I had to drop out of College in order to focus on rehab. I was now this handicap, depressed, obese, college dropout. Honestly, I was at my lowest point. I lost all my friends, didn't talk to anyone and didn't see anyone for a year.
How I did it:
Doctor said I needed to strengthen my heart and open my lungs once again (they close your lungs completely during the surgery). I couldn't run so I walked. I adopted a 3 month old mixed lab from the shelter and just walked every day 30 minutes a day around the block. Soon walking became jogging for 30 seconds, then a minute, then two minutes. After 3 months of walking and slowly jogging I joined a gym and began to walk on the treadmill and set myself running goals. I remember not being able to run longer than 3 minutes without needing to stop to breath.
As for my diet, I eliminated one bad thing every two days. If I drank two cans of soda, I would only drink one. If I had three pancakes for breakfast I would only have two. Eliminating one item at a time may not seem like much, but once you look back you'll see how far you've progressed since that first day you decided to eliminate your first item. Next thing I knew, I had changed my diet around without feeling like I had changed anything. I don't mean this to come out that it's easy because it isn't. Anything worth having is not easy. It will hurt, it will drive you crazy, and you will suffer. The worst you can do to yourself is look back to this day and tell yourself, if only I had started that day...where would I be. In the end, you have to want to change and no one in this world has the power to do that but you.
Where I am now:
Ended up going back to finish college at the age of 26. Got a B.S. and I'm now a Marketing Coordinator. As for fitness, I'm running 8 minute miles and do a 5k in roughly 26 minutes. I wake up everyday at 5 am M-F and go to the gym before work at 8am. I'm focusing on filling in some of the loose skin by building muscle. I have a workout plan my roommate gave me that I've been following. It's essentially Strong Lifts with added exercises. I'm eating roughly 1700 cal a day and take in 160g~ of protein. I count my calories M-F using MyFitness Pal and use weekends to relax a bit.
If I could give you one tip, I would say anything worth having takes time, patience, and commitment. In order to get to the top of a staircase, you don't leap from the bottom to the top. You take one step at a time. Treat any goal you ever set for yourself like a staircase and you'll find yourself at the top
My story:
I've been overweight since I could remember. I recall having to weigh in my last day of 5th grade; I weighed 170 pounds. I played a lot of games during my childhood, was a professional Counter-Strike player at the age of 13 and then played World of Warcraft 12~ hours a day after my Counter-Strike career. I lived in a cycle of being depressed, eating to help with my depression and then regretting eating. It came to a point that my parents didn't know what to do or how to help me, they saw how depressed I was but had no answers for me.
My dad tried to pay me $100 a week to go to the gym 5 days during the week and not even that I could do. I was a failure. I grew up never having a girlfriend and having to watch all my friends talk about getting laid and doing couple stuff, I don't blame any girl though, I wouldn't have wanted myself either -- I was a monster.
Fast forward to 2011, I'm 325 pounds at the age of 22. I remember being stuck in the middle seat on a 12 hour flight to Europe. I could tell the two people next to me were pissed to have been stuck with me in the middle since I unintentionally was taking both their arm rests because I didn't fit. The flight attendant over the speaker tells us all to fasten our seat belts, only to realize my seat belt would not lock in. I pushed and pushed, sucked in my stomach as much as I could, and squeezed as much as my stomach would let me but nothing was working. Anxiety hit, I could not lock in the seat belt to save my life. One by one the attendant is passing by making sure everyone had their seat belt on and as she approached my aisle she quickly realized the problem I was having. She got me a fucken extension. I was beyond embarrassed. I have never in my life been so embarrassed in my life, I still remember the day like it was yesterday. 2 hours into our flight one of the flight attendants approached me and told me they had made room in another aisle for me. They had people move around in another aisle so I could have two seats to myself. I spent the next 10 hours of that flight starring out into the clouds while quietly crying.
That was the last straw for me, as soon as I got back from Europe I signed up to a gym and went everyday for a month straight -- I was proud of myself and thought I had finally gotten the hang of it. One day while at the gym I get this cold feeling around my heart area, long story short, I ended up passing out at the gym. Turned out I was born with a defective heart valve and I had to go through open heart surgery at the age of 22. Doctor told me all the weight was putting a lot of pressure on an already defective valve. I had my aortic valve replaced with a mechanical valve that year. Due to the open heart surgery, I had to drop out of College in order to focus on rehab. I was now this handicap, depressed, obese, college dropout. Honestly, I was at my lowest point. I lost all my friends, didn't talk to anyone and didn't see anyone for a year.
How I did it:
Doctor said I needed to strengthen my heart and open my lungs once again (they close your lungs completely during the surgery). I couldn't run so I walked. I adopted a 3 month old mixed lab from the shelter and just walked every day 30 minutes a day around the block. Soon walking became jogging for 30 seconds, then a minute, then two minutes. After 3 months of walking and slowly jogging I joined a gym and began to walk on the treadmill and set myself running goals. I remember not being able to run longer than 3 minutes without needing to stop to breath.
As for my diet, I eliminated one bad thing every two days. If I drank two cans of soda, I would only drink one. If I had three pancakes for breakfast I would only have two. Eliminating one item at a time may not seem like much, but once you look back you'll see how far you've progressed since that first day you decided to eliminate your first item. Next thing I knew, I had changed my diet around without feeling like I had changed anything. I don't mean this to come out that it's easy because it isn't. Anything worth having is not easy. It will hurt, it will drive you crazy, and you will suffer. The worst you can do to yourself is look back to this day and tell yourself, if only I had started that day...where would I be. In the end, you have to want to change and no one in this world has the power to do that but you.
Where I am now:
Ended up going back to finish college at the age of 26. Got a B.S. and I'm now a Marketing Coordinator. As for fitness, I'm running 8 minute miles and do a 5k in roughly 26 minutes. I wake up everyday at 5 am M-F and go to the gym before work at 8am. I'm focusing on filling in some of the loose skin by building muscle. I have a workout plan my roommate gave me that I've been following. It's essentially Strong Lifts with added exercises. I'm eating roughly 1700 cal a day and take in 160g~ of protein. I count my calories M-F using MyFitness Pal and use weekends to relax a bit.
If I could give you one tip, I would say anything worth having takes time, patience, and commitment. In order to get to the top of a staircase, you don't leap from the bottom to the top. You take one step at a time. Treat any goal you ever set for yourself like a staircase and you'll find yourself at the top
