SEMO Newbie Introduction

[jaredsmith83]

Hi all! As you can tell from the title, I'm a new guy around here. I came across Nerd Fitness in search of a good strength workout for a beginner, then found out GREAT community existed! I felt like I should dive in further.

 

I'm Jared, a 30 year old from Southeast Missouri, right on the Mississippi River. I'm a dispatcher for a busy, local concrete company. Many days I'm glued to this chair and desk because the phone and radios are going off left and right. There are times where I'm stuck here for 11-12 hours, sometimes more. Needless to say, my work situation doesn't allow much movement aside from the quick trip to the bathroom and water fountain.

 

I'm a former high school athlete, so I do have a bit of athletic ability in me. I, like many, got lazy in college and turned dumbbell curls into 12 ounce adult beverage curls hahaha then factor in the 2 AM trips to Denny's and loading up on food at the buffet on my meal card. That developed some bad habits. After graduating college, I found myself falling asleep on the couch with bags of chips, cookies, or even pizza boxes on me. I was never really a street eater, but I did eat out of convenience. If the food near me looked good, yeah I was going to eat it regardless of time, or even if I had just eaten. Going out to eat was always a "the more fried food the better" sort of thing and the bigger the portion the better. Bragging about the clean plate club was the guy I became. 

 

Needless to say, 12 years since high school graduation and I've packed on somewhere between 60-70 pounds. I tried many times to lose weight. I would love 10-12 pounds, then gain it and about 5 more back. Failed crash diets, diet fads, none of it worked. I thought I would be able to get back out and run like I used to in high school, where I could turn in a 7 minute mile, but quickly learned I couldn't. That would set me back even more, add more pounds, etc.

 

So here I am. I've started counting my calories and realizing the things I were eating were loading me up on calories, then not doing much at all after work was letting them add the pounds. I've started using a beginner style strength workout circuit that I found on here. Two weeks ago, I had started jogging/walking, which I believe I will still use to supplement it. I'm not sure of my clear goals just yet, 20 pounds off will be a great start. Size 36 pants as well. I was 220 pounds starting and I would love to be back at around 165. But more importantly, I just want to be healthy with a new lifestyle including being more active and just more energized. Thanks for taking the time to read baout me! I can't wait to hear more about all of you!