The newst of new guys (Hi everyone!)

[RobotSpacePlane]

Hello everybody! How's everyone doing?

My name is Vincent, but Vinny works just fine. I'm a 19 year old college student who is pretty much hooked on video games, gadgets, all sorts of cartoons and comics. I have really strange interests ranging from aeronautics to archery to language and more. One thing I have been trying to get into, though, is fitness!

My fitness "journey" began a couple of years ago after a childhood of always being chubby, nonathletic, and a bit of a social outcast. I was the guy who'd rather stay inside and play an RPG than go outside with friends or attend a party (unless Super Smash Bros. was involved). One day while sitting on the couch at about 230 pounds, something inside me kind of snapped and told me to get off my lazy behind and lose some weight. I guess it was a mixture of being depressed, bored, and just not happy with where I was in life. I think I just randomly started to mature at that moment.

With little knowledge of health or fitness to back me up, I put myself on a pretty low-calorie diet and did a 45 minute cardio exercise every weekday. About 4 or 5 months after I started, I lost a monumental 60lbs. I was at 170lbs and 6'1". Normally that would be perfect, but it just wasn't.

This is one of the reasons why I joined this site. I'm not sure if it is something to do with the way my body naturally is built, or if I made some kind of horrible mistake while dieting years ago, but my body just dosen't look right. I've put on more weight since then (I'm now 200lbs and an inch taller) and things still just don't look right. It's hard to try and paint a picture of it, but I'll do my best to explain:

I'm going to get right down to it. I have some really big hips for a guy. It's probably my biggest and most embarrassing problem. It's really strange to imagine, but it's how I am. I thought "hey, maybe it's just fat and I can burn it off!" when I first noticed it, and indeed there is a little bit of fat there which makes it look worse, but I can feel it's actually my bone structure. The good news is my shoulders are wider than my hips, so I can hide it in a t-shirt. (I also have a small gut, which just makes things look even worse.)

The thing is, I'm not happy with doing this. Naturally, I want to have a good looking body, but my body isn't even on a normal level. It's like I'm skinny, but I'm also fat! It's really embarrassing and confusing to deal with. I've gotten many "womanly curves" comments after taking my shirt off at the beach or pool.

My fitness goal is to transform my body or balance it out so that my chest can match the size of my hips, and maybe even surpass them! I'd like to gain muscle in my arms, back, and chest while losing weight around my gut and hips. I've never really had a real workout routine and I never really have a clue what I'm doing at the gym. I want to put an end to feeling embarrassed with my body. I want to make into something I can feel proud of!

Another reason I want to get into shape is because after I get my associates degree, I want to join the United States Air Force. I've always had a huge interest in aeronautics and planes in general. However I don't think I'll be able to pass any of their fitness tests with the condition my body is in now. My arms are too skinny to lift some serious weight and I can only meet the bare minimum running requirement.

I hope I can find some people here who have some advice to share, or people who have had or currently have the same problem as me. It's very hard to find support when you have such a specific problem, but I hope upper-body exercises will be the cure for this! If you guys can think of some specific exercises to share or foods to eat, I'm all ears. I'm very inexperienced when it comes to exact exercises.

Thanks for taking the time to read this, guys. I really appreciate it. I know it's long but this has been a problem that's been going on for so long that I just have to take a stand now and fix this while I'm young. I hope to get to know you all and talk to you on the forum!

[BAMF]

Welcome Vincent!

You have been very specific as to your "problem areas," but honestly, the advice I can give that will probably be the most helpful is just to focus on becoming extremely strong. Fat cannot be spot reduced, and muscle can be spot gained, but the best solution is to do compound exercises, eat a lot of good food, and focus on building muscle everywhere. If you do that, everything will balance out more. It will also take you far with your career goals!

Don't worry, many of us are in a similar position. Ten years ago, I gained 50 lbs. I lost it all but it still looked weird and I was left kind of weak. We can fix it!

[ebm1224]

welcome vinny! i know since you've gotten the "womanly curves" comment before maybe i shouldn't say this, but i totally know how you feel. i have what you might call a "pear shaped" body where my hips/thighs/butt are fuller than the rest of my body. it's the first place i gain weight and the last place i lose it. and it's totally frustrating. there are other guys out there with the same dilemma as you - so don't worry about that...but just know i know how it feels. and it's something we can totally overcome. ultimately, the goal is to the be in the best shape for YOUR BODY. we may not end up looking like something on the cover of a magazine but we'll look pretty damn good and feel even better. something that has helped me tremendously to start (slowly) making progress is to track what i eat. have you ever done that?

[RobotSpacePlane]

Thank you guys for the warm welcome!

@BAMF: That's some good advice. I've heard before that you can't exactly chose where you lose fat. It just happens. It just so happens that my fat decided to stay in some pretty annoying places even when I was starting to lose fat all over. Now most of it is gone, but the worst is at my hips and thighs. I'm going to definitely try and gain as much muscle as I can in my upper body. I just hope while I try to gain muscle in my arms and chest I don't end up gaining fat in my gut or hips! That's something that always worried me. Thanks for the welcome again!

@ebm1224: Thanks for the support. Not many people understand it when I talk about it (which is very VERY rarely) so I usually just drop it and think I'm deformed. Especially for being a guy. I feel like fat gets distributed in a different way for guys, but for me it happens more like a woman. It's really strange. And I know what you mean. I think it's unrealistic to want to have the body of a professional athlete or bodybuilder, but I do want to make my body look the best that it can. I'm more than positive there is room for improvement! Also, when I first went on a diet I used sites like CalorieCount and FitDay to help monitor my food intake and it did a damn good job of making me realize just how much I was eating. I do eat a lot better than I have years ago, but maybe I should use those sites again. My main concern is that I am absolutely clueless when it comes to lifting weights and what I should do and when. If I could just master that I'd be on a pretty good path I think! Thank you so much for reading all of that though! Together we can defeat this pear-shaped obstacle!

[cremshoff]

Howdy and welcome to the Rebellion! Glad to have you! Hows your eating and fitness as of now?

[cremshoff]

Oh and (hand shake for armed services) whoop!

[RobotSpacePlane]

(hand shake back) I've always felt a need to serve, but I'm not quite there yet! I guess that's what being here is all about. As for my eating and fitness habits:

I usually eat 3 meals a day with a snack or 2 in between (I don't really time them, even though alot of people tell me to do that). For breakfast and lunch I usually go pretty lite. I'll either have a PB&J on wheat bread or nuke a whole-wheat eggo. I always have a glass of 2% milk, too. Lunch is just as lite. Usually I'll have some kind of soup or a turkey sandwich on whole wheat. I have milk with that as well. I also have an apple in-between lunch & dinner. Dinner usually is bad, though. My father usually makes something absolutely unhealthy (like pasta covered in butter sauce and what-not) and I feel obligated to eat it. If I don't, he gets personally offended! I know it's not the best diet, but that's one thing I need to work on.

My fitness is a different story. Physically, I'm skinny in some places and have some fat in others. I'm mostly a skinny guy now, but naturally I think I'm meant to be fatter or something. I have kinda wimpy arms, small chest, large hips (as stated before), kinda big thighs, although I'm not too worried about my legs.

I don't exactly have a proper routine, so I'd really love some advice if you have any for that. I have a gym membership but I'm clueless as to what I should be doing there. I usually go with my buddy and he tells me what to do. I usually feel sore going out, but I can never remember the moves and proper forms of any of the exercises. If I cant figure anything out, I just put myself on a treadmill and sprint for 10 or 15 minutes (which I assume is good for you but I'm not too sure).

Any advice would be immensely appreciated. I'm in this for the long haul and would really love out come out on top.