USER GUIDE: Fast Food Detox

My background: Recently, I pinpointed when my battle of the bulge started. It was actually surprisingly easier to figure out than I anticipated. I was fairly average/not overweight until I started driving and working (which happened at about the same time in 1998/99), so that means I’m going on about a decade of obesity. My low (or high depending on how you look at it) was the end of my sophomore year of college. To this day, I’m disgusted by any picture I see that was taken that entire school year. The summer after my sophomore year I decided to do the Atkins diet and actually had quite bit of success, losing close to 60 pounds. Of course, Atkins isn’t sustainable and I gained some weight back. I’ve yoyoed since then. Here’s what you’ll never believe about me though: I love running. I’ve run in 4 or 5 races over the past 2 years, including the Indianapolis Mini Marathon twice. I’m also signed up to run in the next one this coming May. Obviously I find that when I’m consistent with my running, I’m in better shape but I have a really hard time maintaining my training on a year-round basis.

I should also mention that I have family history of obesity, particularly on my dad’s side, where 7 of the 12 cousins (of which I’m the oldest) are obese. More importantly, my immediate family is/has been obese for the last decade with me. Five years ago, my mom “cheated” and got gastric bypass surgery. I don’t actually think she cheated and I am very proud of her particularly because she has maintained the weight loss, but it’s a procedure I personally never want to resort to. My sister and my dad are both significantly overweight. Additionally, no one in my immediate family works out at all. My parents have never belonged to a gym and I am not sure my sister has worked out since it was required in gym class. These are things I want to be different about my life/my future. If I am someday blessed with children I want them to be raised in a healthy home.

My plan: I have been saying for a few years now that I want to lose weight by changing my lifestyle. This is still what I would like to ideally do. I don’t want to make “rules” per se. I don’t want to have any “no foods.” I don’t want to require that I go to the gym X number of days a week or run X number of miles. I want to do everything positively. I want to know that when I eat a cheeseburger as a slip up I can have a salad for dinner and be fine. I can be human and still lose weight. No need to be perfect, but also no need to quit because of one fall off the wagon. So my plan is really simple: eat healthy (focusing on cooking for myself and smaller portion sizes, but not opposed to frozen meals and healthy dining out), work out more, and get to a healthy, comfortable weight. I do not have a goal weight. That has a lot to do with not knowing what my ideal weight is because I’ve never weighed it in my adult life. (I’m going to apologize now for this horrible, and somewhat inappropriate, law reference) It’s like Justice Potter Stewart and pornography: I’ll know it when I see it.

Types of Blogs I will post:

• Daily Updates
• Weekly Workout Summary (Saturdays)
• Weekly Weigh Ins (Sundays)
• Reviews: Reviews are out of 5 stars and I make up the categories and the scoring. There’s no scientific method going on here.
• Recipes
• Anything else that strikes my fancy on a particular day that fits somewhat into the general topics of the blog