TLDR: Lost 85lbs in six months through diet and exercise but no calorie counting.
About me: 6ft1 (slightly less) SW 301 CW 215 GW - not 100% sure but maybe 185ish.
I’ve always been overweight for as long as I can remember.. When I started middle school, i had to buy an adults blazer because the kids sizes didn’t fit my chest.. I have no idea what i weighed back then, but it was certainly more than most of my peers. I can’t remember a time that I was at a normal/healthy weight, the closest I’ve ever been was back in 2002 when I weighed about 220lbs.
I was constantly tired, falling asleep on the couch in the afternoons, rarely got up to do any exercise, had to order all of my clothes online because the stores here don’t cater to people of my size and when they arrived they’d be tight in certain places because the cut wasn’t right for my body shape etc.. it was a nightmare, i had about 20 pairs of 46” waist jeans of which three fit me comfortably..
In March this year, I had a bad back.. I thought it was maybe sciatica but after seeing a doctor about it, it was similar but a different nerve. I was prescribed a load of strong pain killers and they really didn’t help much.. I knew that I needed to get up and move around to make it better but the pain was unbelievable.. It was at this point that I decided that something had to change.. I’m in my early 40’s and was already moving around like a 70+ year old and it was only going to get worse.. That said, it still took me a few weeks to get my ass into gear.. The doctor told me I needed to walk for 30 mins twice a day.. I didn’t change much at first, just took the dog for his usual walk (1/2 a mile at a leisurely pace around a local park) but towards the end of April I decided I needed to make some meaningful changes..
I started to take longer walks with the dog - every morning early I’d go out and walk two miles - this was a killer at the beginning, my shins felt like they were on fire and i thought they were going to pop out of my legs.. this lasted probably a month - it hurt whilst walking (not afterwards, just during the walk - because I was exercising muscles that hadn’t been used for so long). Then, it began to subside, and I could do the walk without any pain.. This became a non-negotiable part of my day.. I’d get up at 5:30am and take the dog out for 35-40 minutes. I’ve done this every day since March and I don’t see it changing.
Outside of walking, I have never been a fan of exercise.. The only thing i can tolerate is swimming, but being as big as I was i was always very self conscious about my body and how bad I looked when wearing just swimming trunks. Something changed though, I realised that I didn’t give a shit about what other people thought of me - I needed to do this for myself, for my wife, and for my kids.. Otherwise i was heading for an early grave. So i dug out the only pair of swimming trunks that I had that fit and hit the pool. Initially I went twice a week, the first time i got into the pool i managed 30 lengths (~750m) before the cramps started kicking in - i had to rest at the end of every length because I was so out of breath, but i persevered.
After a few weeks I wanted to make my swimming a daily thing, after doing some rough math i realised that this would cost me ~$150 a month, a cost I couldn’t really afford, so I started looking around for Gyms and joined a local one with a pool at the end of May, costing $60 a month and allowing me to use the pool as much as i wanted to. I struggled a little at first, everyone in there was one of the “beautiful people” and i felt like the odd one out.. but i continued.
I also made changes to my diet. I ate a lot of crap, but also a lot of healthy stuff, I just ate too much. It was the snacking that was the real killer though - I would eat a snack in between every single meal, maybe a bag of chips, or a candy bar - whatever, and after my evening meal, I’d eat crap in the evening whilst watching TV or playing video games.. I cut the snacking out cold turkey and started to replace the unhealthy options (chips, candy etc.) with healthier variants (berries, nuts..). I started eating fat free Greek yoghurt with berries and seeds in the mornings, and have done so almost every day since march - it’s a great, filling meal. I make my own lunches to take to work - usually a sandwich on whole meal bread with a few cashew nuts on the side and a couple of pieces of fruit.. and I eat whatever my wife makes for dinner in the evening when I get home from work..
The weight has been falling off. I weighed 301lbs at the start of my journey (May 4th) and as of this morning, weighed in at 215lbs. That’s an average loss of ~3lbs per week. I have not tracked any calories during this time - just made sensible choices and avoided snacks. My swimming is a daily thing now, I do 80 lengths in a 25m pool for a total of 2000m per day - it takes me about 50 mins to complete. Which is a massive improvement over where i started.
I bought an Apple Watch at the start of this process - I wasn’t just in this for the weight loss (though that was the main driver) I also wanted to improve my fitness. A few days after starting to wear the watch, I got what I refer to as the “Fat f***” notification - my watch telling me that my cardio fitness was dangerously low. I don’t know (or care frankly) how accurate the measurement is, but it had my vo2max (a cardio fitness measurement) at 25. Over the last six months, this has moved up to 39, which is considered “above average” for my age - the rising graph has been a huge motivator for me.. and the difference is tangible. I can now run up stairs and not collapse when I reach the top.. I can walk at a brisk pace (4mph) and maintain a conversation - the difference is night and day to where I was before.
The watch estimates that I burn, through activity, around 1800 calories per day. This may or may not be accurate, and again I don’t really care - the results are what I am interested in and they are there. Looking at the average loss, I am in an overall deficit of 10500 calories per week - and I’m rarely hungry - I eat plenty of protein, carbs, lots of veg etc.. what I would consider a “balanced diet” i guess.. I’m sure that many people here will look at the rate of loss as unhealthy, but based on my dialogue with my doctor, it’s all good and there’s nothing to be concerned about.
My resting heart rate has gone from high-70s down to 55. I sleep better, I no longer snore, I feel great and I’m looking forward to reaching my goal.
It hasn’t always been easy though - I still have bad days where a slight slip leads to over indulgence, but I’ve decided that none of this matters if I return to my healthy habits the following day. One day (or more!) of poor choices doesn’t ruin everything, I know that if I get back to my balanced diet and continue with my exercise, I’ll be fine.
I am now no longer “obese”, just overweight. I feel like I’ve added years to my life, and I really enjoy the more active lifestyle I have now - I won’t swim every day forever, but I also can’t see a future where I’m not swimming 3 - 4 days a week.
I still have some way to go, and no doubt it’ll slow down the closer i get to being a “healthy” weight, but i feel like I’ve broken the back of my journey now - it’s achievable, it’s just a matter of time and patience. I’ll get there.
I now wear 38” jeans, L shirts / sweaters and can shop in pretty much any store - this has been a massive thing for me - clothes that fit, and look good.. I look like a different person, my face has changed a lot, my body has changed even more.. I am so much happier with how I look. It’s not all roses though, my body underneath my clothes is still a mess - I have a lot of loose skin and my man-boobs are still much bigger than I’d like them to be - but i don’t care - que sera sera and all that.
This sub has been a huge motivation for me too - I’ve been lurking here for a few months, reading people stories and looking forward to being at the same point some of you lot are in your journey. I feel like I’ve got a point in my own journey where perhaps what I share will do the same for other lurkers on here.. thankyou people of /r/loseit.
