When it comes to my health and weight, I used to call myself “the king of the yo-yo.” In high school I was in pretty good shape until I tore up my knees playing football; I got heavy after that. I use P90X to get down to a good weight—then a few years of college life had me back to being heavier. P90X helped me out again, until I got my first full-time job out of school, got married, had a kid. Fast forward three years and I had once again ended up at the heaviest I’ve ever been: 194 pounds. I felt depressed and was disgusted with how I looked.
One January, I went in for my yearly physical, including a blood workup. All of my numbers were either bad or on the verge of getting bad. I remember just staring at them and thinking to myself “How did I let this happen?” Even then, it took me a few months of cold starts, good and bad diet days, and sparse workouts, before I really committed to change. Finally I decided if I’m going to do this, I’m going to go all out: I didn’t want to just lose the excess weight, but really see how fit I could get.
Since P90X had worked for me in the past, I went back to it. With a job, a wife, and a kid, I wasn’t very keen on waking up at 4:30 AM to work out. Instead, I tried P90X3, banging out a 30-minutes high-intensity workout every night when I got home from work. After a month I upped it to two workouts a day, before and after work.
Before I reined in my diet, I was eating probably 3000 calories a day. Along with my workouts, I picked a macro ratio (1650 calories, 40 percent protein, 25 percent fat, and 25 percent carbs) and started using MyFitnessPal and a food scale to track it.
When I felt like I’d plateaued, around 155 pounds, I reached out to Jason Helmes with AnyMan Fitness, he completely changed my diet regimen and exercise routine. So far it’s yielded amazing results.
In 11 months I lost 52 pounds, putting me at 142 pounds on a 5’7” frame. I feel like a completely different person: A better husband, better father, better friend. I’m more confident and energetic, and I look forward to working out. The exercise and diet-related changes I’ve made in my life have become habits—that’s probably the most beneficial part of this whole process. I can confidently say I will never go back to the way I was. I’ve since become a personal trainer.
The road wasn’t always easy. I had a rough start, but watching that weight slowly go down on the scale was enough for me to keep going. My 3-year-old would also get out a little 5 pound weight and roll out a yoga mat and “exercise” with me in the afternoons. I loved that. It made me realize how important it is for me to be a good role model for him.
