From Muffin Top to Mountain Top

Thanatos_2099

Hey all,

Steve here. Ex-soldier, father and currently a desk-bound couch potato who has let himself go.

I am currently rocking a ridiculous level of body fat (waist to height 0.64 and BMI 32) and am actually embarrassed. I put away around 2-3 litres of coca-cola per day (20 cans in a weekend is not uncommon) with a few cups of coffee on top with sugar added.

I wasn't always like this - In 2011 I once ran 187 miles in 7 days over the height of Everest to raise money for a children's ward so I have decided to set me mind to shifting the weight and accomplishing some real milestones along the way.

My goals are quite simple

a. To go from 107 kilos of blubber to 90 kilos of muscle
b. To attend 6 x weightlifting sessions per week
c. To attend 1 x swimming session per week
d. To run or circuit class 4 x per week
e. To remove processed/refined sugar from my diet
f. To blog regularly about the experience (especially for other dads)
g. To move from a processed meat based diet to a plant based diet rich in nuts, fish and vegetables
h. To climb Mount Triglav in Slovenia before 01/10/2014
i. To fight in my first amateur MMA match before 01/06/2015
j. To complete the PADI Open and Advanced qualifications prior to 01/02/2015

I am tracking every aspect with MyFitnessPal and a couplpe of custom excel spreadsheets that I set up.

Challenges?

I am fairly busy - I serve as the Portfolio/Project Manager for a number of high profile projects for a large FTSE company. I also have 3 children all under 5 (at time of writing). In addition to blog regularly about business/start-up (stevenfeeney.com) and also am committed to reading 52 books a year and reviewing each one (fiftytwobooks.co.uk). I also am studying various online courses and doing Six Sigma training.

Don't feel obliged to click the links - they are just illustrative.

Sugar addiction - I am not totally sure where I am at with this. My partner suspects possible diabetes but each check has shown an exceptionally low blood sugar level despite my intake of the various -ose (fruct, suc, dex etc). I do know that I get extremely irritable, snappy and anxious without coca cola or pepsi daily.

Habit - I cannot imagine sitting down to a film or an event without an entire plate of snacks (chocolate etc)

Portion control - I come form a family where you ate until it was gone. If there was something left in the pot you added it to your plate. If it was on your plate you ate it all regardless of the portion size. It will be hard to break that cycle but MyFitnessPal looks ideal.


Summary -

Man, it feels good to write it all down. Join me on the journey and let's see how far this journey goes!