The First Step of a Thousand Mile Journey

[Looseid]

Hey, Rebels!

I've been lurking this site for roughly a month now and finally decided to stop visiting and start occupying. It was a pretty easy decision to make after seeing how awesome the community here is! It's difficult to put ones low level of fitness in front of complete strangers, but here goes.

Most of my life I've been overweight. Jokes, charisma, and clothing tricks kept it pretty low bandwidth, but my friends didn't have to shower in my skin and see where I really was. Year after year I slowly became more and more aware of my situation and I grew steadily more weary of being the fabled Swims-In-His-Shirt-Guy. And I really liked swimming! But my self-esteem and image really kept me from doing what I liked.

A couple years back I got fed up and went from nearly 300 to 235 over the course of a summer vacation. No carb, high-protein snacks every couple of hours and a lot of walking to see my pals helped me get there. However, when my senior year of school rolled around again, I ended up falling back into bad habits.. Seniors getting to leave campus for lunch had me grubbing out at the Papa Johns down the street on a near daily basis. The ball kept rolling downhill when I graduated and moved in with my buddies.. brown bags and delivery became our mantra.

Recently having discovered The Rebellion, I realized I wanted change. I wanted better and I knew I could have it if I worked at it. So I've gone full Paleo and started on a bodyweight routine every other day with low impact exercise (hiking, walking, etc) on the off days to keep active. So far it's been about a week and I've already lost 25lbs.. I'm not quite sure how to feel about it because I realize that's A LOT for such a short period of time. I've been informed that its natural for the body to react as such to rapid and extreme changes, but I'm still a little uneasy.

I realize the importance of taking it all a little at a time to build habits, but I personally feel that by jumping in while the water is cold, I've been more successful at keeping at it instead of giving myself any sort of leeway when it comes to start-up "cheats". I also feel the sooner I go all out and full-time, the sooner I'll get results that will keep me coming back for more and establish it as a lifestyle change.

I'd like some feedback about the info above, but if you're not an avid reader here's the TL;DR Version:

It's a real pleasure to be here and I hope I can integrate well into this great community! I have plenty to learn from you all, and any amount of help is appreciated.

[Michael Ramm]

First of all, welcome to the Rebellion!

Congrats on your decision to go Paleo and start with body weight routines. That is a great start. We will always be there for support and accountability to. Keep you on the path thats you want to be on.

Set up a battle log to be able to log your activities and ask for help and get support. It is the best way for us to be able to help you.

Enjoy your stay!

Michael

[Looseid]

Thanks, Michael!

I appreciate your feedback, and I'll definitely jump on the Battle Log as soon as possible to get some specific goals in place as well as a record so I can see what I'm doing right and what I'm doing wrong.

Have a good one!

[BeigeTurtle]

Honestly, I think the best diet/exercise/whatever routine is the one that you actually do and stick with. So hey, if jumping in at the deep end works for you, then go to it! Good luck - it sounds like you're already having some amazing results!

[Looseid]

Thanks, Beige!

I appreciate all the support I can get! I've been bitten by the radioactive fitness bug, and I'm ready to keep at it. Let's just hope I don't end up looking like Toby Mcguire by the end of it all.