Just joined MFP!

jfarena

Hi Everyone,

Hope you are doing well. Figured I would give everyone the unabridged version of why I'm here. Help and guidance would be appreciated

Why I'm here: On 5/24/11, my 30th birthday, I weighed 360 lbs. My parents subtly bought me a scale as a gift...i got the hint. Since then (as of 4/29/12) primarily due to some lifestyle changes, I am down to 300. My end weight goal is 225. I have plans of running a 10k and hopefully getting my 5k times down below 30 minutes before the end of the year.

About Me: I would describe myself as a "recovering workaholic". While that has helped my career immensely, I let all other aspects of my life fall by the wayside, especially my health. I made a conscious decision that my lifestyle was unsustainable and unhealthy to continue so I've spent the last year reflecting and making corrections to all aspects of my life. The changes I have made have been gradual over the year. I started by simply forcing myself to eat 3 meals a day (instead of 1 which was really late at night) and cutting out soda altogether, then I forced myself to get 7 hours of sleep instead of 5. I also took my phone number off the on call lists at work because I was getting 4-5 calls a night. Then I started using the elliptical which doubled as a coat rack for a while and ramped that up. In Jan 2012, I decided I was going to run a 5k and on 4/28/12, I did it in 36:41 after several months of ramping up my time and distance through running. In January I took note of my beer consumption also and recognized that it also had to be reduced. The next step is to control the quantity of food going into my body which is why I signed up for MyFitnessPal. I expect that in controlling the quantity of food, the quality of food will follow suit in short order.

Jon