I need success stories: From Junk Food Junkie to Healthy Diet.

Hey Bubble Boy. After high school I moved to a party town (where my brother was going to school) and went to work washing dishes at the Red Lobster. I got up to 300 pounds (I'm 6'5"). That work depressed the hell out of me: took everything out of me. I would eat all the shit there all day long, especially the fried stuff and the salad (with TONS of dressing) and the cheddar bay biscuits because I could have as much of all that stuff as I wanted for free. Then I would come home and eat a plate of spicy fried chicken covered in melted cheese. I would drink myself to sleep.

I forget what made me kick it. Actually, I think it was I got this unbelievably hot girlfriend when I was a dump truck (don't ask me how, I'm not a player) and then after several months she cheated on me and dumped me, and I knew she'd never regret that as long as I was a tub. Got me going. I'm at my best when I'm angry, don't ask me to explain it.

So I just started to eat healthy food. I didn't watch calories, that would be far too complicated and discouraging. I kept it simple. Only healthy foods. STOP eating when you're satisfied. Don't eat 4 hours before bed. Cheat if you must, but don't splurge. Drink only water. Accept that while you're losing weight, much of the time you'll feel hunger.

I didn't lift weights at all. That was the best move. Didn't spend an extra ounce of energy lifting. I know all the studies about weightlifting being the best way to improve your metabolism, yada yada yada. Just do push-ups, pull-ups, and sit-ups in the morning. That's enough. I ran 3-5 days a week for 45-75 minutes (first 5 min and last 10 min walking briskly).

I didn't quit at it, that was the biggest key of all. I didn't get down on myself. When I hit 280, I didn't think, "Fuck, that was hard. And I'm still a fat piece of shit. Lookat me. All that work for nothing. 300, 280, it doesn't make a difference. I'm still a troll. It'll take forever before I'm even in the game." I didn't let myself think that way. All I thought was, "You gotta lose it sometime. Sooner is better than later. And you're already 20 pounds in, this is something YOU can do."

After seven months, I dropped from 300 to 230. That was a little fast, actually, but those first pounds went quickly (they were still probably the hardest pounds to lose since when I started to run I would lightly jog for about 30 seconds and literally be bent over begging God for air).

You can do it. And once you kick the bad food, IT starts to taste like shit. I'm not saying I don't have cravings every once in a while, but just last weekend when a friend brought home KFC for everybody, I was like, "Fuck!" I hate fried chicken, now. It's so damn heavy and greasy and overpowering like cheap aftershave. I can barely get it down. Gimme lean grilled chicken breast on anything. Yum.

That's what you have to look forward to.

 

How's this?

Firstly, every single male in my family is over 250lbs, and none of them are over 6' tall. My father is an insulin dependant diabetic with a bad heart, 288lbs, I have an Uncle who is close to 400lbs who has to use an oxygen machine at night to sleep because he has sleep apnea from being so heavy, and his brother is about 260lbs. My grand-dad wasn't so huge, but a little over 250 and all in his gut from alcohol. The women in my family aren't much better, I have an Aunt who snores when she's wide-awake. This woman will take a nice healthy meal of lean meat and a green veggie and dump a lb of ketchup all over it, which she might as well douce it in sugar.

I myself, was 180lbs when I was 12 years-old, and was about 5'5" or so. I'm 5'10" now and weigh about 170lbs, and am going to turn Pro Boxing at the beginning of next year. I was always an athletic kid, played baseball, football, wrestled, did Martial Arts, but I was never totally slim because of terrible eating habits. Quite frankly it was because of my home-life. I spent A LOT of time alone as a child because my Father was never around, my mother had to work two jobs, and my grandparents hated each other so they spent a lot of time apart, and the result was me sitting in houses by myself with only one thing...food. Plus, because everyone felt bad they would buy all kinds of junk food for me in a way of making it up, I grew up in one of those families where if you have a problem, rather than talk, everyone's answer is "here, have some cake, you'll feel better." Food has always been like that for my family.

When I was in my late-teens I was on a mission to be as good as I could get at Martial Arts, so I was training twice a day every day just about, starting at 5:30am before school. I would do 15 minutes of stretching, 45 minutes on a heavy bag, 30 minutes in a weight room, and 30 minutes of lap-swimming in a pool, go to school, go to work, then after work go back to the gym for 15 minutes more of stretching, 45 minutes more of heavy-bag, and 30 minutes of forms or sparring. I was solid, but I still didn't look very athletic. Why? Because I ate like shit. I figured because I was working out all the time I should be able to eat what I want...no, in reality it keeps you from breaking REAL noticable ground in your abilities. It brings you to a plateau you'll never get off unless you change your eating habits, which I never did until a couple of years ago when I started working at GNC.

I got to work side-by-side with a licensed Nutritionist, and a couple of other people who were very knowledgable about the body's use of things, and learned quite a bit, and decided to give it a shot. Almost every person in my family who passes of natural causes is subject to heart-disease, everyone has blood-pressure problems, or is diabetic, I don't want a laundry list of ailments as I age. I want to be that grand-daddy who gets my grand kids in a headlock and they can't get out of it. I want to be one of those 80 year-old men who is as strong as any 40 year-old. In my time working at GNC I've met a couple of these guys. I have a client who is fucking 94 years-old and rides a bike everywhere he goes and is as healthy as can be at his age, doesn't walk with a limp or walk really slow, or anything you would expect. That's really my motivation. That I want to have children. I never got to meet my Great Grandfather who I'm told was this jewel of a human being, because he passed of heart-disease when I was very young. I'm told I knew him as an infant, and took my first steps to him, but I have no recollection of the man and that blows.

So now, I'm like the ONLY member of my family who exercises consistently, as part of a daily/weekly routine. I'm the ONLY member of my family who makes a point to eat more than one serving of green vegetables per day. I'm the ONLY member of my family who can run a mile without having to call 911 at the end. And the funny thing is NO ONE in my family accepts that I work hard to be in the shape I'm in. At my job I get compliments and accolades, because when I started there I was up to 214 and it was all in my gut, but now they say I look like a Boxer, meaning I'm achieving that sleek and cut look a boxer should have, slowly but surely. But my family says shit like "OMG...I don't know HOW he's so slim!!!" Yeah, these are the same jackasses who live with me and watch me work out pretty much every single day. Who hear the house shaking when I hit the heavy bag in the little gym I went as far as to build into my house. Who see me eat all kinds of healthy foods and even talk to me about them saying "ew...that's gross, I just can't see how you eat that shit." And to them, me being in this kind of shape is magic, witchcraft. It CANNOT be that I work my ass off for it. No.

Kick your junk food habit because everyone around you suspects you won't, and that you're too weak to actually go through with it. When I think of junk food I think of all the times I got called "porky" as a child. I think of all the people in my family who came before me whose lives were shortened by horrible eating habits, and thus, they never lived to their full potential, some of them even didn't amount to diddly-fuck because of it. I also think of America. This Country pisses me off because everyone is fucking spoiled rotten and food is half of the problem. Who needs NEVERENDING pancakes at IHOP? Why are there 11 restaurants in the vacinity of my one little shopping center, and why are more than 2 of them "all you can eat"...? Why do people bitch about the expensiveness of eating healthy when they can see the expense is THEIR fault. If we weren't buying so many fucking 59 cent cheeseburgers and buying more healthy alternatives, the healthy alternatives would be much cheaper. People are slowly killing themselves with food. I see it on a daily basis man. People come into my store eating a fucking ice cream cone telling me they have no idea why they're overweight. When they ask "what's the best way to lose weight?" And I respond "eat right and exercise"...you should hear all the bullshit excuses I get as to why they are completely incapable of doing so.

"I have no time for that."

"I just cannot eat anything I don't like."

"I tried that, it doesn't work."

"No, seriously, there's got to be a pill here that will do it faster where I don't have to."

This is what society has come to. You want to define yourself as a person? You want to see how strong you really are? Look into two things regarding your eating habits that people these days are DEATHLY afraid of. Hard work, and discipline. Prove to yourself you can set a goal of eating right and achieve it. It's going to be one of the hardest things you've ever done. You have no idea how harsh it's been for me, a kid who grew up on sugary cereals, doughnuts, cookies, chips, fast food. Sometimes when I'm looking at my food all I can think is "Jesus fucking Christ WHY!?!?!?" But when I'm done with a meal I know why. Because I feel like a damn Sherman Tank. And Mick up there is right. Once you drop the shit food it does taste like shit. I cannot even bring myself to finish a whole slice of cake without wanting to vomit, and soda tastes like drinking straight syrup. I don;t know how I ever lived off that garbage. You really are what you eat, food is fuel, nothing more. You put shit gas in your car what happens? Eventually there's a multitide of complications from improper use of fuels and fluids, same thing with your body. Those idiots saying they don't have the time or money now cannot see the laughable irony, that they WILL have the time and money when they're paying out hospital bills to keep their fat lazy asses alive. Do not become one of those drones.

Good luck, hope this ramble has helped.

 

Every high school athlete in the country should be forced to memorize and recite this passage.

Every one of us ate like SHIT in high school, even the all-staters.

 

Dude, I know you said it's working for you, so this isn't meant to be disrespectful, I use the profanity to emphasize a point: low-carb diets (especially for athletes) are HORSESHIT. Dangerous horseshit.

 

How could I forget this tactic? It's just natural at this point.

Think about it. If you buy only healthy food at the store, you only have to resist temptation once: when you're there (not counting drive-bys of fast food places). If you buy some healthy some bad, you have to resist temptation every time you go to the fridge.

And that eats at your will, and can cause a major setback.

 

So you're calling Kabuki who's about to turn pro-boxer a sissy? Or maybe Randy Couture?

You're going nowhere.

 

Alright, I'm flooding this thread, but holy christ Kabuki, I was just mystified at the part about your family wondering why you're skinny. It's like, "Can people be that stupid?" (forgive me the insult to your loved ones).

Then I thought about a conversation my little brother and I had just today. We were talking about our mother gaining weight. You see, my mother has always been a stick, but she eats the worst food imaginable. She does eat small portions, which is hugely important, because it all comes down to calories, but I mean, this woman boils her green beans with four strips of bacon. All the men in my family aren't so fortunate since we don't have her outstanding metabolism. We have all been overweight.

Well, when I came back from college, where my best friend Chris took my diet and training to a whole new level, I complained to my little brother after I came back from the grocery store with so much SHIT food. I said, "You know, truthfully, I'm a little angry at her, Cam. All that humiliation I suffered from being overweight; it's really largely her to blame. I never realized what crap she fed us growing up, what horrible eating habits we learned from our parents: to eat crap from mom, and to eat behemoth portions from dad."

He looked at me kind of funny, but he seemed to accept what I said.

Well, he's been taking a nutrition class at his college this summer. He says to me today, out of the blue, "Remember what you said about mom? You're right. I didn't understand how right you were. I mean, she really did us a disservice teaching us those habits, and never educating us on why there were wrong. We were kids. We just ate what we ate. I can't believe what she fed us. It's like a who's who list of heart disease agents."

So now my mom's past menopause and her hormones aren't doing it for her anymore. She's getting fat. I hope she realizes it before she's 50 pounds overweight, but you know what I think she's doing, as she balloons, as we speak (I know she can see it in the mirror)? The same thing your family does. I bet you she's telling herself, "Oh. Shoot. God, getting old really is a burden."

Mom, it has little to do with age. Look at the rest of the world. Change your diet.

 

Yeah man, and you know, as I also mentioned in my post the state of affairs of America is not helping one bit. Because everywhere your mom turns there's advertisements and other people saying "oh no, eat up, enjoy...health? Who cares!? You've put in your time, you've raised your kids, you DESERVE to eat yourself numb to everything around you." I place bad eating habits in the same rubbish bin as I place drug addiction, because inevitably it does the same thing, kills you. At the same time, though, they have this weapon on their behalf. This weapon is that we all die anyway. So they say "why shouldn't I enjoy myself, I mean I'm going to die anyhow right?" If you really want to play on her heart-strings you have to pull out the big guns and say things like "Yes yes we all die someday, but you know, I plan to have children someday...don't you want to meet them? Don't you want to perhaps even meet their children? Don't you think it would be slghtly unfair if you kill YOURSELF with food before they can come to know the wonderful person in you that I know?" But otherwise not a whole lot can be done about it.

My grandmother has an excuse though. She was raised in the days coming off the depression, so in her day you literally had to make use of everything (including recycling the fat you fry bacon in), and eat every bit of food you could get your hands on because of necessity. And she never really did get it that we don't have the same food shortages now that she did then. I literally had to look her in the eye and tell her "you know we don't have to eat every last bit of everything we get nowadays, there's plenty of food, and there's plenty healthy alternatives to choose from." I think that's the first time anyone she trusted ever told her that. Now the woman eats wheat bread, quit smoking after 55 years, and has begun cooking more healthy for me for my training (she lives with me and I take care of her).

Now her daughter, my Aunt, she's the one who works in a Doctor's office and is just totally numb and dumb to everything. Like she came home a week ago saying she had to get tested for sleep apnea because the Doctor she works for noticed she snores when she's awake (she's heavy to the degree of breathing difficulties). And she was all pissed off about it saying she had NO IDEA why they wanted to test her. And sadly, her mom was like "yeah, how do they know!?!?" See, that right there, her mom pacifies her, and enables her to stay as she is (I studied psychology for a long time). Meanwhile my reaction was: "Well you know...you do this to yourself. You KNOW the answer to solving sleep apnea, you NEED to exercise, and you need to stop eating so much sugar, even in the form of starches and sugar-filled vegetables, you know the answers to this, you work in the Medical field" (as did her mom as an RN). And again, just a blank stare as if I had uttered the words in Martian. And to her, me being slim is Voodoo. Sure she's tried everything, for one week at a time.

So what does this come down to? She wants to die. If you ask her she'll outright deny it...which again, denial IS the first stage of acceptance. If she denied it to me I would just tell her: "you spend about 10 hours a day in front of the TV, the other hours sitting down or sleeping, you dump kethcup over everything remotely good you eat, thus negating it's health benefits, you DO NOT exercise, nor do you give up the food vices you have. You see me every day, I have the SAME metabolism as you, and stretchmarks from when I was too heavy, but I work it off, you don't want to...because you don't want to live. I think that's absurd because you've been paralyzed by this fear for what...26 years? As long as I've been alive? All over something that happened when you were a teenager (I know her problem, it's a legitimate problem but the only reason she persists is she's scared shitless to confront it, just ONE issue that the family has never confronted at all). And you're going to find soon enough here that you're going to succeed. You're going to kill yourself. You have high cholesterol, blood pressure problems, you can't breathe right, you're going to die. But I've done everything I can to help you, it really depends on you."

So when you see your mom bro, and you see her in a deep denial about it all, thinking it's just old age (which you know it kind of is, because her metabolism is not what it used to be), ask yourself what is the food acting as a vice for? Why is it so powerfully addicting that despite the good influences in your family, yourself, your brother, and you said your Dad is a Doctor right? And yet she still seems determined to put that high-fat high-sugar gun to her head...something else is going on. Just like in the threads up here about weed, if you read them what do you see? I think ONE or two guys in the "Smoking Marijuana Ok?" thread admitted they were addicted to it...the rest seem willing to fucking throw hands with me to prove they're not...why? Why is weed THAT powerful to them? Why do they NEED to defend it so bad? Same with anyone who eats bad...why? Most people know that eating is very sedative, and when you're eating something sweet the world could be ending and you won't care. All you'll think is "mmmm, cake good." And yet so many people who endanger their health are..."Oh I don't have any kind of problem...I just like good food." I hear this everyday and wanna know the best part? I never even ask if they have any problems. They offer the information and begin to deny before a question is asked. Or you should see people's faces when I mention emotional eaters. "Oh I am NOT one of those. That shit is not true, it doesn't exist." When I myself have gone through a whole pack of fucking cookies just to occupy time and not realise I was alone. It's getting just as bad a drug-addiction in America. But the only way to combat it is to just set the example yourself, and learn your own children better.

For your family's sake though I hope your mom snaps out of that shit eventually.

Oh and no offense taken, a lot of my family are not stupid at all, but their favorite thing to do is feign stupidity because it makes their life "easier".