The Story of My Transformation

For years, I seriously wondered if I was anaemic or had a testosterone deficiency because of the way I felt most days.  It was a very rare occurrence for me to wake up energetic and be able to sustain that feeling much past 10:00 am.  It got progressively worse throughout the day.  By 4:30, when I was ready to head home to my family, I was physically and mentally spent.  I would also be ravenously hungry, even after having a "healthy" snack around 2:30 pm.

I contemplated going to the doctor a few times, but I convinced myself that I was just out of shape.  I needed to workout more...do more cardio...maybe take up yoga?!?!  I didn't know for sure, but I was certain that it was due to my physical activity, or lack there of.

July 2012, 190 lbs.

In late July 2012, I had just started my 35th year on this planet and was so out of shape, I could barely muster up the energy to play with my boys for more than 15 minutes.  I had spent an awesome 10-day vacation in Colorado in some of the worst shape I've ever been in and after seeing the MANY pictures from that vacation and the mushy, man-boob wielding dude that was looking back at me; I finally realized that I had to do something!  I spent the first week back stewing about it under the influence of a vacation hangover.  The next weekend, I made the permanent choice to change.  I asked Shannon to take an unflattering picture of me shirtless, bearing full moobage!

After that, I decided to dust off my gym membership card and start using it starting on Monday.  On top of that, we as a family decided to go one year without fast food.  We left a caveat in that rule by allowing Jimmy John's and Chipotle because they qualified as "healthy" fast food.  After two months of some regular exercise and a cleaner diet, I was at a more respectable weight, but I still felt like I needed something more to take the next step.  I was still a good 15 pounds from my goal weight of 165.

As many of my friends and family know, I decided to start P90X in October 2012.  I was laser focused on the end goal when I committed to "Bring It" for three months.  I was fully prepared to be sore as hell, but stronger than ever with stamina through the roof!  I spent three months forcing myself to wake up every morning around 4:45 - 5:00.  In three months, I missed a total of three workouts.  For those of you who have tried P90X, you know there are six workouts a week!  In 13 weeks, I worked out 75 times to the tune of a 96% success rate.  I even worked out during Christmas break!  I bet you're thinking that I was a buff stallion after that!  See for yourself...

January 2013, 175 lbs.

After the New Year, I continued to push myself harder, but decided to ease up on the schedule.  I had a ton of stuff going on at work and didn't have the time or energy to devote an hour a day, six days a week.  I continued to eat a "healthy" balanced diet filled with whole grains, dairy, lean meats, and some fruits/vegetables.  I was getting stronger!  I went from being able to do three unassisted pull-ups in October to 10 in April, 24 push-ups to 36, and a vertical leap of 11 inches to 18 inches.

March 2013, 170 lbs.

So, now I was 6 months into this extreme fitness stage, but didn't hold much regard for the nutrition plan set forth in the program.  I thought it was all about "calories in, calories out" and I was going to get my beachbody by working out intensely on a daily basis.  As you can see, it was hardly beach worthy. There is a faint glimpse of abs and my moobs were pretty much gone, but I wasn't fully satisfied with the results.  I was still five pounds from my healthy weight, my love handles still prominent, and my physique was still a little...meh.  At this point, my wife and I were finally ready to do what it took to get healthy.  We just didn't know how to do it!  So, we did what we had done before and started Atkins to start the ball rolling on the weight loss and to lose the cravings for carbs.

Upon starting Atkins on April 7th, 2012, I remembered a book that my boss recommended to me in February.  I started reading Why We Get Fat during this extreme low carb phase.  The Pandora's Box that I opened up at that point was, in hindsight, the most liberating experience of my life.  It finally started to click!  I now know why my belly still jiggles and my energy level was still awful.  It's all in the nutritional plate I was sitting in front of on a daily basis!  I was living proof of how calories in, calories out is flawed logic.  As it turns out, that theory was just that...a theory based on basic physics and not physiology or actual scientific fact!  What????  We have been fed this basic tenet of health for decades based on nothing but assumptions?  That is when I started to question EVERYTHING!

One book led to an article, which led to another book, which snowballed into all of the information you see on our blog and on Facebook.  It is shocking how we have been misled with half truths and bold-faced lies!  We have been told to eat a certain way that is just not natural.  We have been assured that we would avoid disease if we had under a certain number of calories a day with a huge percentage of that being foods we weren't even capable of digesting effectively and that have anti-nutrients!  Yes, that means what you think it means.  Grains have components that actually have a negative net health effect on your body!  On top of that, we have been told to avoid things that are actually some of the best foods for us to consume (eggs, saturated fat, red meat, etc.).  Mind completely blown!

My weight tracked over the past year

Based on a previous post, you know how the transition to Paleo happened for our family, so I won't get into those details, but the transition in my body and my energy level was the most notable part of this whole process.  Simply stated:  I feel AMAZING!  I have energy through the roof, even after a grueling workout.  I don't crash physically or mentally at 2:30 in the afternoon.  I'm not a freaking Tasmanian devil raiding the fridge when I get home from work.  Many days, I don't have snacks and some days I even fast for about 18 hours (more on intermittent fasting in another post) without feeling very hungry, all while functioning at a high level at work and home.

July 2013, 154 lbs.

Here we are one year after that embarrassing picture.  My family still hasn't had fast food.  We cut out Jimmy John's and Chipotle in April.  I'm 30+ pounds lighter.  I can do 17 unassisted pull-ups. I'm lifting more weight than ever.  My gut has now turned into abs.  And my moobs can now officially be called pecs!  It wasn't from working out to exhaustion daily.  It wasn't from taking supplements or questionable muscle enhancers.  It wasn't even from lifting really heavy weights like the meatheads you see in the gym.  It was from working hard, getting plenty of rest and cleaning up my nutritional plate Paleo style.  That's it!  It's not complicated, but it's also not easy.  Your mind will tell you that you NEED grains.  You NEED dairy.  You CAN'T live without pasta, pizza and beer.  There can be nothing further from the truth.  They are all designed to draw you in and keep you coming back for more through actual brain manipulation.

All I ask is that you learn from me.  Don't wait until your blood work tells you that you need a change, or worse yet, when you already have health problems.  Stop overworking your heart, kidneys and liver.  Clean up your kitchen and you will feel a rush like nothing you have ever felt.  If you have any questions or would like our help with anything, contact us on here or via our Facebook page.  The whole goal behind this is to help change the tide in the battle against nutritional misinformation and put an end to our country's obesity and inflammatory disease pandemic.  Don't allow yourself to be a guinea pig for Big Food/Pharma anymore!  We need you to help us put a stop to it!