30 Years Ago Today (Long)
88olds
Posts: 4,540 Member
Today is the anniversary of the start of my weight loss journey, 12/24/94. It was late in the evening, there wasn’t much left to do but go to bed. So the actual dieting started Christmas Day. I was going to do the New Year resolution thing, something I had always scoffed at, but I wasn't sure I could make it another week. The scale said 285 lbs. Unlike a lot of people I weighed regularly while gaining. I could do at least a paragraph about how I remained in denial in the face of the upward march of the numbers, but we’ll skip it. But although the number was 285, I could see 300 lbs within easy reach. “Where’s this going to stop? I asked myself. Came the answer- “Who says it has to stop?” I felt so bad at 285 I didn’t think I could make it at 300 lbs. The new year was a few weeks away, I figured I’d aim for that.
With my good intentions on the horizon, December, 1994 became an orgy of excess. I started Christmas Eve with a hangover. A regular occurrence. Maybe a reason I wasn’t dead was I couldn’t stand to be around alcohol when I was hungover. So I had spent the day binge eating Christmas cookies. I felt awful. Now I had a stomach to match my aching head. When evening rolled around I went off to our room to watch It’s A Wonderful Life on TV as a distraction. At some point our 2 yo daughter came in and crawled around on bed for a bit. As she was leaving she stopped in the doorway and 2 yr old style gave me a little wave and said “Bye Bye daddy.”
Bamb! It was like Saul on the road to Damascus. She’s going to be doing that at my funeral. I was on my way to leaving 2 little kids with no dad. Hoping that it wasn’t too late, that I hadn’t pushed too close to the edge, I started looking at what I was doing. Good intentions might be better than bad intentions but intentions weren’t getting it done. The NY resolution was BS. There was no time to lose. But what to do, how to start? First thing that had to change was drinking. I knew from considerable experience whatever willpower, discipline or self control I could muster to control my eating went out the window after a couple of drinks. Cutting back was BS. The only way out was to quit. Something I had not really considered. (I could do several paragraphs on denial here too but will skip it.)
I prayed for guidance. Honest truth- with George Bailey howling “I want to live” in the background I prayed. I felt this strange sensation, simultaneously weak as a kitten and strong as a lion. Strength from where? I could do it. I would do it. I could see it. Feel it. All I had to do was fill in the details. Don’t recall Christmas day exactly. Whatever I may have done I’m sure I didn’t drink and sure I did have pumpkin pie.
When the end of the next work day rolled around, instead of looking for a beer I went to the basement to pull the exercise bike out of the corner and remove the clothes covering it. I did 8 minutes on the bike. That was the most I could do. Before long I was doing 30 min 5X per week. Sunday afternoon I would go on a long walk, about 90 min. I could walk about 2 blocks max at my worst. On my own I was losing about 3.5 lbs per month with only slight changes in diet other than not drinking. Those empty calories add up fast.
Eventually I started at a gym. Lots of good things happen at the gym but weight loss isn’t one of them. Kept that up for years. Our kids grew. I ran them into the ground in the parks in Orlando. I met Harry the tailor. I went from dressing like an unmade bed to the office fashion plate. Life was good. But I never got under 210 lbs. I had muscles now. My wife liked it.
Then our neighbor, very active, a few years older and overweight, sat down one day an died. Next time I got on the scale I thought “You know you’ve never really finished this. You could go next. Do you want to leave this unfinished? You’ve always intended to get under 200lbs.” I joined Weight Watchers in April 2006. Made goal of 184 lbs, highest acceptable WW target for me, about September, 2006. Yesterday WI = 178 lbs. I was 175 lbs when I graduated high school in 1968.
If you made it to here, thanks for reading. I’ve been looking forward to this.
With my good intentions on the horizon, December, 1994 became an orgy of excess. I started Christmas Eve with a hangover. A regular occurrence. Maybe a reason I wasn’t dead was I couldn’t stand to be around alcohol when I was hungover. So I had spent the day binge eating Christmas cookies. I felt awful. Now I had a stomach to match my aching head. When evening rolled around I went off to our room to watch It’s A Wonderful Life on TV as a distraction. At some point our 2 yo daughter came in and crawled around on bed for a bit. As she was leaving she stopped in the doorway and 2 yr old style gave me a little wave and said “Bye Bye daddy.”
Bamb! It was like Saul on the road to Damascus. She’s going to be doing that at my funeral. I was on my way to leaving 2 little kids with no dad. Hoping that it wasn’t too late, that I hadn’t pushed too close to the edge, I started looking at what I was doing. Good intentions might be better than bad intentions but intentions weren’t getting it done. The NY resolution was BS. There was no time to lose. But what to do, how to start? First thing that had to change was drinking. I knew from considerable experience whatever willpower, discipline or self control I could muster to control my eating went out the window after a couple of drinks. Cutting back was BS. The only way out was to quit. Something I had not really considered. (I could do several paragraphs on denial here too but will skip it.)
I prayed for guidance. Honest truth- with George Bailey howling “I want to live” in the background I prayed. I felt this strange sensation, simultaneously weak as a kitten and strong as a lion. Strength from where? I could do it. I would do it. I could see it. Feel it. All I had to do was fill in the details. Don’t recall Christmas day exactly. Whatever I may have done I’m sure I didn’t drink and sure I did have pumpkin pie.
When the end of the next work day rolled around, instead of looking for a beer I went to the basement to pull the exercise bike out of the corner and remove the clothes covering it. I did 8 minutes on the bike. That was the most I could do. Before long I was doing 30 min 5X per week. Sunday afternoon I would go on a long walk, about 90 min. I could walk about 2 blocks max at my worst. On my own I was losing about 3.5 lbs per month with only slight changes in diet other than not drinking. Those empty calories add up fast.
Eventually I started at a gym. Lots of good things happen at the gym but weight loss isn’t one of them. Kept that up for years. Our kids grew. I ran them into the ground in the parks in Orlando. I met Harry the tailor. I went from dressing like an unmade bed to the office fashion plate. Life was good. But I never got under 210 lbs. I had muscles now. My wife liked it.
Then our neighbor, very active, a few years older and overweight, sat down one day an died. Next time I got on the scale I thought “You know you’ve never really finished this. You could go next. Do you want to leave this unfinished? You’ve always intended to get under 200lbs.” I joined Weight Watchers in April 2006. Made goal of 184 lbs, highest acceptable WW target for me, about September, 2006. Yesterday WI = 178 lbs. I was 175 lbs when I graduated high school in 1968.
If you made it to here, thanks for reading. I’ve been looking forward to this.
3
Replies
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Wow, amazing story, and congrats on sticking with it and pushing past the 200 pound blockade. 30 years is something!1
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Great journey and story George. 30 years is a long time to have kept it up (or should I say down?). People like you make GOAD the place to be.1
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Stories like yours inspire on many levels. The way the light clicked on for you by way of your 2-year-old’s words, the active steps you took to make changes, the day-to-day perseverance it took to make your weight loss last, the flexibility to see what worked and what did not, Kudos and continued success to you!0
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Persistence and consistency for the win!0
