This is a LONG essay of my current weight loss journey! Be prepared to hear my story. It wasn't easy, but it was sure as hell satisfying in the long run!
If you want to just see my results, I recommend skimming through, and reading the results at the end.
Some background:
About 3 months ago, I weighed 230 pounds. I'm 16 years old, and I am 6ft. I had never exercised on my own, (only when I was forced to) and I used to hate exercising.
If I'm going to be honest, I hated my body. The stigma of having man boobs, my cousin calling me fat, and I also hated being tired, and my outwards gut.
Even though I hated exercising, a burning passion was created out of hateridge. I was sick and tired of being called fat. I decided to take action for my own life.
Sleep Management:
I started by fixing my sleep schedule. My school starts at 7 am, and I live 40 minutes from my school, so I naturally had to wake up at 5:30 am every day. Sounds completely healthy, until you consider I had been staying up until 3 am playing video games.
I had been getting 2 hours and 30 minutes of sleep every day, for the past few months.
This is completely unacceptable. How am I going to build muscle, if my body doesn't even have enough time to sort memories? Thankfully, with my new exercising routine, I became able to fall asleep at 10:30 pm every night! So that was that.
Cardio Exercises:
I started running. I live in a neighborhood with a looped road. Around 5 laps around this driveway loop was about 3 kilometers, or 1.89 miles. Every step was fueled by every time I was made fun of, every name I was called, and how much I hated how I was.
3 kilometers a day. That will be my goal.
The first few days were complete hell. When you've been sitting on your ass playing video games all day, your muscles tend to be a little (how do I phrase this), complete jello.
It was like every time I walked, my body said STOP. The runs had me gasping for air. I'm sure there was no doubt some of my neighbors were looking at me saying, what the hell is he doing?
Oh, the pain I felt. I'm sure you all know it. A side effect of Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness. These jabbing pains every time I moved my muscles. My friends were asking what was wrong with me, and if I was ok. I could barely move, and I decided my break days would be Wednesday, and Saturday.
The muscle soreness was nowhere near the mental pain I had been through. Cringe, I know. But I'm not kidding.
Strength Training:
On top of running, I knew Cardio wouldn't be enough. Running would help me lose weight, but to maintain muscle efficiency, and prevent injury, I would need to tone my muscles at least a fair bit.
After my runs, when my heartbeat was fast, I would do crunches. About 50 per session. I would then switch to pushups. At the time, I was too fat to do a proper pushup. I resorted to keeping my knees on the ground, pushing up and down. I did about 20 of these, then switched to wall pushups. I do about 20 of those as well.
After my crunches and pushups, I performed squat presses.
The thing is, I didn't have any weights, so I filled a suitcase with heavy items to compensate. I would hold the suitcase above my head, and do about 12 squats.
After all of these strength exercises, I do about 40 jumping jacks to get my heart rate up again, and take a 5 minute break, and perform these exercises 4 more times in a row.
Diet:
To be honest, I wasn't the healthiest eater. I would just eat whatever was on my plate, on top of some junky foods and fizzy drinks. I knew these eating habits needed to change.
I asked my Mom to buy smaller plates, tricking my brain into eating less, and feeling more satisfied. I started eating greens and fruits, boosting protein intake, and lowering carbs.
I had a hard time with fizzy drinks. At first, I didn't want to quit, so I started moving to diet soda. I knew this also wasn't good for my health, so gradually, I started moving from diet soda to protein powders and water.
Overtime, my habits changed. I ate less junk, exercised more, increased protein intake, and I'd say I'm a pretty healthy eater now! Aside from some cheat days of course :).
Results:
I couldn't believe it. After 3 months of hard work,
I was at an astonishing 200 pounds! (230 -> 200)
My man boobs? GONE! My muscles? Toned! I have a belly, but about 50 percent smaller than before! Running has become a million times easier, even fun now! I can do proper pushups, sit-ups, and I bought some weights to properly exercise.
I have confidence. My grades have improved. It's easier to talk to people. My cousin, who once called me fat, was astonished when I saw him for my Thanksgiving Break. "How did you do it?" - Everyone asked. Just hard work, and a motivation for change.
I can't believe I even made it this far. For years I had been trying to lose weight, but never have I actually been able to.
For once, I have energy throughout the day. I can do things that everyone else can do now. I can go to the beach, the pool, try on clothes I've never been able to. It's amazing.
Thanks:
I'd like to thank everyone on this subreddit. I browse it for tips every once in a while.
Funny enough, that one show "Fit to Fat to Fit" actually motivated me the most. Seeing the trainers become fat, and helping their clients just inspired me the most. If they can do it, I can too!
If any of you guys are struggling with motivation, or depression, that's ok. You can take time to come up with a plan to better yourself. It doesn't need to be all at once.
Thank you all!
