Allow me to reintroduce myself...

PasDeGras

I have been here before...

Yes, the same screen name that says "No Fat" in French. Pasdegras, as it were, is actually three words mashed up into one for the internet speak we all now struggle to master. So, I am back under the same name with the same goals and a new approach. A simple approach, the only approach. LIMIT THE INTAKE, pasdegras! I have been gone for 40 months or more and all has not been well. To be fair, all has not been terrible either.

I, for the better part of my life, had a trim and athletic body. Then, just before my third decade of life, I decided to take the lift back up the mountain at 3:45 PM rather than join my friends and Lillian, my newlywed wife for the Après Ski toddy for that last run of the day. The light gets flat, the body is tired, the mind is slowed a bit having spent the day dealing with fatigue and altitude. Yes, I did wipe out and upon coming back to earth, I had heartily jolted a rib, mid back and it hurt.

The shortened story is that the injury healed and on went life. Fast forward twelve years and I am in the hospital with the strangest issue of having difficulty breathing. Through tests and reflection to the days gone by, my Pulmonary Physician and I deduced that it was that fall that caused the trauma that led to a slow and methodical deterioration of the right Phrenic Nerve that happens to make it's exit from the spinal cord and it winds its way around the right lung before it descends and ends up attached to the right Hemi-Diaphragm Muscle, delivering the electric impulses from he brain that tell the muscle to contract and relax at the required rate needed to help the lung bring fresh air in to oxygenate the blood, then expel the used up air mostly composed of carbon dioxide gas. The injury from that fall a dozen years past had finally killed the Phrenic Nerve , rendering that right diaphragm paralyzed and permanently in the relaxed state, which meant it was expanded and collapsed half of the right lung.

The resulting diagnosis meant that I would eventually become fully disabled and requiring 24/7 oxygen use and a new found inability to stay as active as I once was. Breathing is very easy to take for granted, until one cannot breathe like they could before. Panic sets in daily as the act of tying ones shoes becomes an impossibility at first...I allowed myself to sink into a deep depression and a state of self pity as I allowed myself to eat, eat, eat. This was an easy task since I had been a Chef for most of my life. Before I realized it, I was nearing 400 pounds and it was ugly.

My daughter, Katie saved my *kitten* because she grew tired of seeing me waste away and get huge. Her motivation got me off my butt and out of bed to a Bootcamp workout regime that was AWESOME until the ownership fell apart and disbanded. I found another trainer who was working out until he went sideways on me and that was that. Two years ago was the last time that I worked out until 2 weeks ago. Katie and I are working alone together and we are feeling pretty good about things as we are relying on my culinary skills to eat smart but well. We have been working hard five days a week and are both experiencing a much different outlook and positive sense that this is the time to get healthy. I am back. I am ready. I am motivated and I have a short term goal to be at a weight that I have not been in several years. I need this to be done by the 28th of this October as I will then go to my 40th High School reunion in Dallas. That goal is just the starting point for me to get on with the life I know I can recapture. Strength in numbers...Numbers that fall off of my body in sweat and hard work. Ktie and I are all over this.

WISH US WELL AS WE MAKE THIS HAPPEN FOR LIFE !!!