tl;dr: It’s been almost 6 months since being diagnosed with sleep apnea and tomorrow is my 35th birthday. In the first 3 months I lost 10 lbs and I've now lost 33 lbs more in the last 2 and half. It saddens me to think that I didn't heed what a stranger was trying to tell me on a bus 9 years ago because of my own arrogance. If not for that man's comment and my cousin mentioning it 9 months prior, I may not have made it to my 35th birthday.
For years, my poor sleep and eating habits were the factors that caused me to reach 305 lbs. I was very close to suffering a heart attack or stroke, which may have changed my quality of life forever. Don't wait 9 years or even 9 months. Make a decision to get your health right today and get checked out.
Beginning:
In February of 2021, I hit my all-time high of 305 lbs. I'm not particularly tall at 5'8". All of my clothes had gotten very tight. And my stomach was protruding out well past my waistline, so much so I could hear the whispers of people around me making fun of how big my belly was. Culminating in a woman yelling to a cashier once, "It's a boy!" for him to laugh as he packaged my groceries.
Needless to say, I got to a point where I didn't even want to go shopping anymore. Because I could feel people staring at me as I walked by. I saw young kids giggling, and I even noticed my roommate snickering and videoing me as I walked by when he was face-timing his friends and family. When you're fat people make sure you don't forget it. I could hear their comments even though I know some of them may have been in my head to a degree.
In addition to that, my effort at work was beginning to deteriorate. I've always considered myself a hard-working person, and one thing most people couldn't do was outwork me. That changed a lot as I became more sluggish and tired from day to day.
This led to the night I spent at my parent's house for Father's day. I slept on their living room couch. My cousin slept not far from me on the pull-out bed in my mother's home office. The following day he complained to my parents that he couldn't sleep because I had been snoring loudly all night. At the time, he was a med student at Boston University. He's since graduated with a BS, but he told my parents (possibly because he was too afraid to say it to me) that I may have sleep apnea.
Now I wasn't unfamiliar with sleep apnea. I had heard this once before on a bus in 2012. I'm a veteran of the US Army, and when I was discharged, I took a bus back to my hometown from Philadelphia. While on that bus, I fell asleep and woke up next to a heavy set older man, and he was staring at me strangely. He said, "Hey, I think you may have sleep apnea. While you were sleeping, it sounded like you stopped breathing. You should get that checked out." But I shrugged it off. I was in the best shape of my life. There was no way. I spoke with others and was told sleep apnea affects people who are incredibly overweight. Not healthy, muscular, 25-year-old men like myself. I immediately discarded it and carried on with my life.
Fast forward to March 2021, I'm falling asleep at my desk. And, when I'm driving home from work, stopping at a red light became a great time for a nap, with the car horns as my alarm to wake me up and tell me when it was time to go. I had switched my diet to vegan in hopes it would help me shed pounds to no avail. My father used to joke that I was the fattest vegan he had ever seen. But it wasn't the vegan food that was the problem.
My appetite was insatiable. I'd eat my 3 vegan meals for the day. Then, On the way home, it wasn't unusual for me to stop at Popeyes, KFC, McDonald's, Burger King and etc., for something quick and fulfilling. Sometimes I even binge ate fast food while telling myself that my diet would start tomorrow, but it didn't. And that became my cycle.
So, by the end of March 2021, someone close to me said, "Man, you look terrible. You should take some time off," so that's what I decided to do. I took off the entire month of April with the primary goal of getting my sleeping pattern corrected. At this point, it had also been about 9 months since my cousin mentioned that I might have sleep apnea.
Seeing how my previous Fitbit and my Apple Watch showed that I was getting between 3-4 hours of sleep per night, I decided to buy a CPAP machine. But, instead of just spending $500 or more on something I wasn't even sure I needed, I called my doctor and had a sleep study done.
When the results came back a few days later, I was shocked. The doctor told me that during my sleep, I was experiencing 35 apneas each hour. To put that in perspective, the average person experiences less than 4. That meant, during sleep, I would stop breathing 35 times every hour I was asleep. I was told that I was at significant risk for a heart attack or stroke in my sleep and that I either needed a CPAP machine or surgery immediately. My jaw dropped.
Fast forward to September, I'm in control. I'm getting good sleep, my stomach no longer feels like a bottomless pit, and I'm not overeating or binge eating uncontrollably. As a result, I've lost 43 lbs as of today. 😊I lost about 10 pounds in the first 3 months, and I've ramped things up considerably since July 1st to get to 43 lbs lost.
I know a common question will be how I lost most of the weight over the last 2 and a half months. It's nothing that hasn't already been spoken about on Joe Rogan's Podcast or this subreddit.
- Intermittent fasting (8 hr window, 16 hr fast)
- Eating at a calorie deficit (started with eating 1760, now 1640 calories)
- My diet is 90% Plant-Based and if I cheat, I typically choose chicken or seafood and very little red meat.
- I slowly increased my activity from 30 minutes in the morning to an additional 20 minutes at night (now 30 minutes), then adding exercises in the morning like push-ups, shoulders, and following up for me is pull-ups (I'm into calisthenics).
- I also have a daily goal of 13K-15K steps (started with 10K).
- Lastly, I work out 7 days a week. I use the David Goggins approach, meaning I don't take days off. I listen to my body and take it easier on days I'm sorer.
- Additionally, the 30 minutes of cardio I do at night isn't strenuous. It's relaxed, and I don't push myself. I go hard in the morning, which is supposed to be when we have the most energy.
- For men, I've begun practicing Semen Retention (SR), checkout r/Semenretention for more info.
The most important stat, I'm getting an average of 6-7 hours' worth of sleep per night. It's easy for me to wake up at 4am-5am nowadays. I wake up with the energy to dominate the day.
It's been almost 6 months since being diagnosed with sleep apnea and tomorrow is my 35th birthday. It saddens me to think that I didn't heed what a stranger was trying to tell me on a bus 9 years ago because of my own arrogance. If not for that man's comment and my cousin mentioning it 9 months prior, I may not have made it to my 35 birthday.
Combined with the help of my weight loss and the CPAP machine, I currently experience fewer than 2 apneas per hour each night.
To anyone reading this. If you wake up with headaches, dizziness, and fall asleep in weird places like at work or when you're driving home. Please contact a doctor and ask to be tested for sleep apnea. There is a simple non-evasive at-home test that they can give you, and you just throw it away in the morning. It's that easy! The information will be sent to your doctor through an app on your phone.
My nutritionist explained why I never felt full when eating. Poor sleep quality leads to a hormonal imbalance, which causes your body to not signal when it's full. The real secret to weight loss is good sleep.
For years, my poor sleep and eating habits were the factors that caused me to reach 305 lbs. I was very close to suffering a heart attack or stroke, which may have changed my quality of life forever.
Don't wait 9 years or even 9 months. Make a decision to get your health right today and get checked out. Sleep apnea does not only affect people who are overweight. People who appear to be fit and healthy suffer from sleep apnea too, so get checked out.
As for my weight loss, I'm not done yet. This first 43 lbs lost is only the beginning. Thanks for reading and I hope it helps.
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