Creekwood

Recently I went to Chicago with my family for 5 days. I have been exercising 6 days a week (walking/jogging and strength training). While on vacation I was excited to use the hotel gym. On my first day though I woke up early and was the first person to the gym! It felt good to be THAT guy in the gym working out at 7 a.m.!!

Started my journey at 369 (March 1st).
Surgery on May 6th (333).
Today's weight 303.

Recently I went to Chicago with my family for 5 days. I have been exercising 6 days a week (walking/jogging and strength training). While on vacation I was excited to use the hotel gym. On my first day though I woke up early and was the first person to the gym! It felt good to be THAT guy in the gym working out at 7 a.m.!!

Started my journey at 369 (March 1st).
Surgery on May 6th (333).
Today's weight 303.

I wish that I remembered more, I need to have him make me a binder. He gave one to all of the brothers, not sure what happened to my Dad's when he passed. I just remember that we have Native Americans in our family tree and somehow it was connected to Matoaka aka Pocahontas. So I was related to the lady who had the first interracial marriage in the United States
Another cool thing they did was track down a school that my great great great grandmother taught at hundreds of years ago. It was in a tiny village in Kentucky, about the size of an average shed (literally). But, it was still standing (barely!), and was really cool to see. It's a neat site, I suggest that you give it a try. BUT, to make real progress you must put in a considerable amount of time. Unless, someone in your family has already put together some pieces I the site.

Thanks everyone! It was awesome and I'm happy that this has motivated others to get active as well!! Yesterday I spent 4 hours at the zoo and today I'm at the Water park (2 hours already, probably be here another 2) my son is loving this new active lifestyle!! .

Walked 6.2 miles in the rain today! NO MORE EXCUSES!!!

Thanks everyone! It was awesome and I'm happy that this has motivated others to get active as well!! Yesterday I spent 4 hours at the zoo and today I'm at the Water park (2 hours already, probably be here another 2) my son is loving this new active lifestyle!! .

I'm on purée foods because I had a fill yesterday, Protein Shakes for me too!

So a lady stopped me this morning around mile 4. She lives right around the corner from me. "I see you walking every morning when I'm getting my coffee. You look great, you're losing weight, your posture has improved, your gait is faster. You are doing great, it motivates me to get off my butt and get moving" man that made that last mile easy!
It reminds me to show up and work hard because you never know who's counting on you for motivation!
I remember that I used to be embarrassed to exercise outside. I thought people would think "oh look another fat guy trying to lose weight, bet he gives up in a couple days." I don't know why I thought that just did. But I've been busting my butt walking/jogging between 1-5 miles 6 days a week for about a month now. I even completed my first 5k! Keep working hard everyone, you are someone's source of motivation, whether you believe it or not!!

Thank you! Worked like a charm :-)

The Lap Band didn't work for me... How many times do we hear this? The fact is the Lap Band DOESN't "work" for anybody... YOU work for YOU... Getting banded and just expecting to drop all of your excess fat is like buying a lawn mower; parking it in the driveway; pulling up a lawn chair; and then complaining that the grass is tall...
Fact is if you aren't getting the desired result then have the equipment fine tuned and try a different strategy. If the equipment is functional then you are the key to achieving success...
Brad

Thanks everyone! It was awesome and I'm happy that this has motivated others to get active as well!! Yesterday I spent 4 hours at the zoo and today I'm at the Water park (2 hours already, probably be here another 2) my son is loving this new active lifestyle!! .

So a lady stopped me this morning around mile 4. She lives right around the corner from me. "I see you walking every morning when I'm getting my coffee. You look great, you're losing weight, your posture has improved, your gait is faster. You are doing great, it motivates me to get off my butt and get moving" man that made that last mile easy!
It reminds me to show up and work hard because you never know who's counting on you for motivation!
I remember that I used to be embarrassed to exercise outside. I thought people would think "oh look another fat guy trying to lose weight, bet he gives up in a couple days." I don't know why I thought that just did. But I've been busting my butt walking/jogging between 1-5 miles 6 days a week for about a month now. I even completed my first 5k! Keep working hard everyone, you are someone's source of motivation, whether you believe it or not!!

Bellefontaine is a little over an hour away from me

Awesome post as always Missy!! Wow, it sounds like you literally were living in hell... I'm glad that you pulled through. God is good!! It's so true that everyone will have stress/bad situations in life. We all let ourselves down from time to time and make bad food choices. But, it's what you do afterwards that matters!
The other day I had a health scare with a VERY close person to me. That night I went out to dinner and ate 1,400 calories! Which included an Oreo sundae.. Did it make me feel better? Nope. Did it taste good? YES but it would be easy to continue to eat crappy, but the next morning I went on my 3 mile jog/walk like planned, made better good choices and got right back on track! If you can do it going through what you went through, everyone else can too!
P.S. I did chuckle thinking of you counting calories in ICU. That's dedication right there!!

So a lady stopped me this morning around mile 4. She lives right around the corner from me. "I see you walking every morning when I'm getting my coffee. You look great, you're losing weight, your posture has improved, your gait is faster. You are doing great, it motivates me to get off my butt and get moving" man that made that last mile easy!
It reminds me to show up and work hard because you never know who's counting on you for motivation!
I remember that I used to be embarrassed to exercise outside. I thought people would think "oh look another fat guy trying to lose weight, bet he gives up in a couple days." I don't know why I thought that just did. But I've been busting my butt walking/jogging between 1-5 miles 6 days a week for about a month now. I even completed my first 5k! Keep working hard everyone, you are someone's source of motivation, whether you believe it or not!!

Congrats!! That's awesome!! But, I just ate dinner man, can you get that nasty looking bird off of here

I won't lie, the ICU was hell, but God IS good and He saw me through it all
It was actually kinda funny in the ICU. I couldn't eat until the 5th day I was there because I was being sedated daily for the TPA procedure to dissolve the blood clots. But my very first meal was complete junk- I actually complained to the food service woman asking how they could feed sick people fried, fatty trash? I'm not kidding, it was *that* bad. My nurse overheard and said there were some Ensure shakes at the nurse's station- did I want one? YES!!
The Ensure shakes weren't nearly high enough in Protein and were too high in calories, however I still had one brought to me with every meal. This way, when the food served was nothing I'd even consider eating, I'd just send it back and have the Ensure instead. 85% of the time the Ensure was the better option.

Awesome post as always Missy!! Wow, it sounds like you literally were living in hell... I'm glad that you pulled through. God is good!! It's so true that everyone will have stress/bad situations in life. We all let ourselves down from time to time and make bad food choices. But, it's what you do afterwards that matters!
The other day I had a health scare with a VERY close person to me. That night I went out to dinner and ate 1,400 calories! Which included an Oreo sundae.. Did it make me feel better? Nope. Did it taste good? YES but it would be easy to continue to eat crappy, but the next morning I went on my 3 mile jog/walk like planned, made better good choices and got right back on track! If you can do it going through what you went through, everyone else can too!
P.S. I did chuckle thinking of you counting calories in ICU. That's dedication right there!!

Thank you
I am a very spiritual person, actually. I very much believe in God and pray to Him daily. In fact, I believe thoroughly the only I reason I lived through the blood clots without permanent damage was because of the enormous amount of prayer cover I was receiving from tons of people.

Congrats!! That's awesome!! But, I just ate dinner man, can you get that nasty looking bird off of here

If have to throw that ugly thing overboard

If have to throw that ugly thing overboard

I'm only 6 weeks post-op but I do eat SOME of the same foods that aren't great for me (hot dogs, cheeseburgers that i make on the grill) but I eliminated A LOT of foods! I don't go through drive-thru's anymore, no pizza, stay away from Desserts (except for very rare small snack), pastas, and the list goes on. I eat a lot of Protein filled foods/snacks now. Ham, chicken, turkey bacon, turkey pepperoni, nuts, Protein Shakes (for breakfast almost every day). But, even when I do eat some of the same things as before its in much smaller amounts.

Saw the Dr. Today and he put me on antibiotics and I go back on July 10 to hopefully get my first adjustment/Fill .