My Story

My story begins somewhere in the early 1980s. After completing a 7-year stint in the military I was honorably discharged in 1978. I maintained a very active time while in the military so eating and weight was never an issue. I got lazy with any regular exercise and I increased my daily eating most would not see as a problem on the surface. But when you looked at the day overall instead of each meal you then begin to see a pattern or ‘habit’ develop that began my downfall.
For breakfast I abhorred cereal. Oh, once in a while (every 6 months) I may have a bowl. No my breakfast consisted of 3-egg omelet running with cheese and sometimes mushrooms (had to be cooked in butter) and then I poured chili over the omelet. Then I had potatoes, 2-3 slices of ham of 6-7 pieces of bacon and toast smeared with jelly. Mmmm, what a wonderful start to the day. I would go to work and sit at a desk for 8-10 hours. Lunch was anything fast food. You know, my employer only lets me have so much time for lunch so fast food was the way to go. Super was usually meat and potatoes. It did not matter what meat as long as it was on my plate. Also super was after 7pm. Then around 9pm nibble on a bag of chips until I went to bed. So my daily calorie levels never were below 3,000, sometimes over 6,000.

I went from about 178-lbs in 1978 to as much as 264-lbs sometime in the 1983 or 84. My joke now to people was I was built like a refrigerator 48 X 48 X 48. I was so big during this time that I would wear a moo moo dress in the evenings and on weekends. It was the only thing that felt comfortable on me.
1985 was my first attempt to takeoff weight. I was dealing with personal issues in my life at that time. I was dealing with separating from my wife, my father suddenly past away and I was coming to terms about my sexuality. I was not eating much during the day so I made a conscious effort to exercise and weight started to come off. At one point in late 1985 I was down to about 195-lbs. Go to next page