Added a "Before" Picture to my Photo Gallery

During my "fat" years (2000 to 2009), I avoided the camera like a CIA hit man. If I appear in pictures at all, it's usually at the back of a group where just my head is showing (bad enough).

After I started losing weight, I was a little sorry that I didn't have any recent "before" pictures or starting measurements (other than weight and waist size). The only pictures I had were 5 years old--bad enough, but I had actually gotten worse.

Last night I found a picture from December 2008. It's a cropped picture of my wife and I, taken at the annual Christmas dinner for our wine tasting group.

If it's not obvious, it's the one where I am wearing the blue tie.

The picture with the beige background is an "interim shot" taken in May 2009 after I had been on my program for 2 months, had lost 30 pounds and had a new haircut.

The most recent photo (red tie) is me at the same Christmas dinner in December 2009.

Part of me didn't want to post the "before" picture. It's still embarrassing to look at. Since you don't have to look at yourself, it's possible to kind of stay in denial about how you look, but I had a fairly public position in a fitness-related job for 8 years and looking at that picture still reminds me of how, deep down, it was pretty humiliating to go out every day looking like that.

But, if success stories can help support and motivate others, I want to do my part to help other people in this community, so here it is.