What pushed you to make a change ?

[Guest Gemeaux]

I always said that I would get fit by a certain time , but didn't really have a reason to do it . I am not overweight , but very unfit and unhealthy . After the man I wanted to marry broke up with me last year I went into a deep depression and just didn't care .

I found this site through a relationship forum and just hung out a bit . Then my ex wanted me back , saying all the right things and then from one day to the next he decided we shouldn't be together . So as you can imagine that fucked me up a bit .

I dragged myself to the gym and worked my arse off like never before . And I LOVED it ! I actually felt good and empowered . I decided that instead of focusing on becoming skinny and hot , I am going to work towards becoming strong and pushing my body to do things like run for 30 minutes without giving up .

In a way , keeping fit is keeping me from going down that dark hole again , it is giving me a purpose . Sorry for going on and on .

I would like to hear everyones story now

[scarletleavy]

What pushed me to make a big change in my life was really just a functional requirement. I graduated from university in 2010 about 15-20 pounds heavier than I'd prefer, but not overweight, and horrendously out of shape. I spent about 4 years drinking copious amounts of booze and late-night binging on junk, so once I got home and settled I set out to lose weight. With crash dieting, cardio and some silly little workout DVDs I quickly dropped about 20 pounds, but I still wasn't happy with how I looked or felt. I was skinnier, but I wasn't necessarily any healthier or in any better shape.

In parallel I was invited by an old high school friend to go hiking and I fell in love, with hiking that is. I still remember the feeling of setting foot on that first summit, I was hooked. I started hiking and rock climbing more often, but then I hit a wall. I had leg strength from years of playing soccer, but I completely and utterly lacked any upper body strength. I got on a rock face that required an incline climb and I just couldn't hold my body up enough to climb. I remember getting so frustrated and crying because I couldn't do it, it was not one of my finer moments. I swore that wouldn't happen to me again. So I started training, alone. I researched, started lifting weights, stopped doing cardio, practiced climbing technique, started practicing yoga and the pieces began to fall into place. My body started to look and perform the way I wanted it to. I also gained 10 pounds, which is funny because I used to be so concerned with numbers on a scale, but I've never looked better. Form follows function indeed.

So yeah that's my story. Basically I changed my life so I could do the things I wanted to. I want my strength and abilities to be functional. I love to ski and to hike/climb so I'm all about doing things that will help me in those areas. That plus yoga for the mind, also increased flexibility & balance are a nice bonus.

[Deansy]

I was out walking my dog one day and saw a massive unit of a guy in the park with his kids. Full credit to the guy, even though he was struggling, he was out there with them. I decided that day that when I had kids, I didn't want to be struggling and look like I was about to collapse.

Started to work on myself, eat better, get some exercise in, all the usual stuff. I was doing OK too, dropped 120lbs and felt good, but them my wife left. That was killer, fell off the wagon. My work suffered and I left that job. More downwards spiralling. Got a new job, a better job, heaps closer to home etc, every started to look up, but then my landlord decided to sell the flat & I ended up living two hours from work.

With four hours of driving a day and my days consisting of driving, working, driving eating & sleeping, my weight started to creep up. Cut to six months later, is Jan 2012 and a few people at work are making the new years resolutions get get fit. One mate started to tell me about water fasting, I ended up googling it. That lead to a podcast, that lead to here, that lead to eating Paleo. I've decided that I can fit in a workout four days a week, I can eat healthier at every meal, I can use my time in the car for productive each day.

I've set myself the goal of 10lbs a month, started to read more about different techniques and ways of living my life. No meal replacement shakes, no ordering food online. These options cannot be done long term. With all that I have read here, mainly Paleo and Convict Conditioning, I can see myself making those changes now, and keeping them forever.

Eating Paleo is 2 weeks tomorrow (I will have a blog update with numbers)

I start the proper plan of Convict Conditioning this week.

On Wednesday I order a heap of steel tubing to make some A-frame workout equipment, delivered Thursday and welded up Saturday (pics to follow)

It's all about having the drive to make it work for you. I figure I don't see my mates anywhere near as much as I used to now, maybe twice a month instead of three times weekly, so the changes I make with be drastic and I will get a lot of positive feedback.

Also, living at home means I don't do washing or cleaning or any of the day to day chores that I used to, so I do have time to look after me. (Shout out to my mum who is making sure I have clean & ironed clothes for work!!)

This year, 2012, I got over the excuses, I got over the downwards spiral and I got over feeling sorry for myself.

[Grosby]

A few things.

1. Facebook. I hate adding old friends.. mainly because they can see how fat I'd gotten.

2. ALWAYS being the fat friend. I wanted a new role.

3. The kicker - my son. 5 years old.. going to school where his mum works (DORK) and all the mums starting that year are thin/athletic .. and I realised my son is going to have to go to school with a fat mum - would he be ashamed? Would he not want to bring his friends around? Would his friends make fun behind my back and put him in a position where he had to either joke with them or defend me?

And then.. really, when my dear little son sat across from me at the dinner table and said... "Mum.. can fat people hop?" "Yes bub, they can." ..... "Show me." *blink* That's when I realised, REALLY realised, I needed to change.

So when people ask my goal, I while I do have a number I'd like to be under, or a clothes size I'd like to be in - the main thing I say is "So my 5 year old stops making fat jokes at me."

[Guest Snake McClain]

Okay...well I've be er been fat. Quite the opposite really. Growing up I had skinny pimply faced kid mentality. I was so thin people often asked if I was easting or not. I'd wake up dreading going to school because I'd get picked horribly and I graduated high school at 150lbs. Rail thin at 6ft tall. That was a decade ago. Since I've put on 40lbs of healthy weight. I'm not fat but built well and blah blah. But I got divorced like...a year ago exactly almost. She cheated for for at least the second time and that really tore up my self esteem. I've never had a lot of confidence but that made it worse...

...so fast forward to august. I've always dreamed of being a pro wrestler. I went to a show here in Indianapolis and ran into solenoid friends...who ARE wrestlers. So of course we were talking and they were telling me a great guy to train with. So that kick started me physically. I started with body weight routines thinking these things called Philips were impossible. As weeks went by I started realizingbim not that scrawny kid anymore and I can lift weights too. Then I had my wrestling tryout. It went great. So then I had to get serious. Switched to stronglift barbell training for about 10you weeks and now I just added a ton of exercises in.him in wrestling training and following my dream.

I'd like to send a shout out to my ex wife for cheating on me and making this all possible.

[Sloth the Enduring]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]1649[/ATTACH]

This. The little guy on my lap and his sister. I didn't get a chance to know my grandfathers or my uncles because of their bad tickers and I finally realized that if I didn't make some changes I might not see how my kids grow up either.

Also, I looked awful and my midlife crisis is making me want to race mountain bikes again.

[Guest Snake McClain]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]1649[/ATTACH]

This. The little guy on my lap and his sister. I didn't get a chance to know my grandfathers or my uncles because of their bad tickers and I finally realized that if I didn't make some changes I might not see how my kids grow up either.

Also, I looked awful and my midlife crisis is making me want to race mountain bikes again.

Kids. Best reason ever right there.

[Guest guest4729]

I think the thing that pushed me to make a change was just that general feeling of being unfit and unhealthy. My highest weight is much lower than most people's (highest was 150, briefly) but I wasn't ever happy with my weight. Right now I'm down to around 140ish and hover around there. I think the biggest motivator for me was seeing all the girls on my college campus that are fit AND healthy, and I envied that. I just thought it was something unattainable that I could never reach because I was too busy or I couldn't cook or I didn't know how to exercise and so on. After the excuses mounted to the point where I was pissing myself off, I decided to make a change. It was over Thanksgiving break and I was going to be back to school in a few days so I thought "Why not?"

I went into it the wrong way, though. I had no clue what to do so I basically did 10 minutes of terribly boring cardio and about 30 minutes of machines. Not fun. Hated it. Almost stopped going to the gym. Then, I did what I always do...I looked for a fitness forum for some sort of guidance. Then I found NF, Paleo and free weights and I lived happily ever after... The End!

[Atalan]

Having to buy bigger pants yet again.

[ebm1224]

my weight has fluxuated over the years for various reasons. i was always a little on the heavy side but never anything i was too worried about. i have had anxiety disorder and panic attacks on and off since i was about 10 and, when that situation would get bad, i would often drop alot of weight very quickly without trying due to a decrease in appetite. people would sometimes compliment my weight loss and i would hate it because i hadn't EARNED the compliments. besides that, i felt like crap. i looked good but felt awful. nevertheless, i always hated when i would put the weight back on because i would feel like i "failed" at being thin.

then, a few years ago, i started losing weight again. i assumed it was anxiety related but, since i didn't have very good insurance, i put off going to a psychiatrist. then i realized i was having other stomach issues i had never experienced before...and i was getting a little scared. eventually, i found my way to a doctor. while i don't have an actual diagnosis to date, i think that a medication i took in high school (acutane) may have caused some problems. the drug has since been linked to crohn's disease and other similiar illnesses. i am still in the process of figuring out what foods cause problems for my stomach and ways to avoid some of the symptoms (ideally without medication) but, through this, i realized a few things:

1) i'm getting closer to 30 every day. and i've heard that the older you get, the more difficult it is to change your habits. my mom yo-yo'd for years and didn't find a fitness program that worked for her until she was in her 50s. i don't want to be that way. i don't want to look at pictures of myself and hate how i look.

2) i may continue with my weight-gain/loss cycle due to anxiety in the future. i want to have a healthy "home base" to come back to when that happens. once i started some stomach medication, i gained weight so quickly (more than i wanted) because i was so relieved to be able to eat my favorite foods again. and i have missed some of them so much. i want to create healthy habits that can last me through any medical hurdles i may encounter.

3) i'm starting a new life in alot of ways. i just finished school in december and, while i tried to be healthy during school, the schedule made it hard. i now have a more reliable income. i have a very caring boyfriend who loves and supports me and wants to get healthier too. i have wonderful friends and family. i see a future. and i want to be my best self in that future. i want to look awesome at my wedding (not that one is planned but i'd like to think it will be eventually). i want to be able to run and play with my future kids.

i want to prove to myself that i can. i mentioned earlier that i hated the compliments about how great i looked when i lost weight. i think i hated them because i didn't really do anything to make myself look better. i hadn't changed anything on purpose. i hadn't made a choice. my weight has always been a consequence of bad choices and things happening TO me. i want to reverse that trend and have not just my weight but my fitness be an outcome of good choices i make and good habits i have.

[CalvinHobbes]

Reading Spezzy's article. Learning normal people can be superhuman. Impending college graduation and deciding I'm going to enact livelong changes, not just fad diets to look good on spring break.

[MatthewD]

Hitting size 48 pants and then those getting too tight.. then my doctor starting this BS about lap band surgery which I had told him the last time that he said something that I was not doing and not to bring it up. So got home from the doctor's office talk to my wife about it and how he had managed to piss me off royally (he is/was a friend from high school) and how I wanted to lose the weight and go tell him where he can take his medical degree... well I am still on the road right now but the end is getting closer each month

[Deansy]

and i've heard that the older you get, the more difficult it is to change your habits.

As someone over the dreaded 30, I have to say that this is false. It's more a thought of, "oh well, why bother now?" All it takes is to wake up one morning & know in your soul that you want to change. If you truly do, it doesn't matter your age.

My mum (please forgive me mum) is 54 (sorry mum) and she saw that I was reading Robb Wolf's book every night for three nights instead of watching one of the two dozen CSI's. She borrowed it when I finished and is now cutting down on grains & cutting out Gluten. At 54 (sorry again) she is taking charge and making changes that she will keep doing and live a better quality of life because of it. [/Thread Hijack]

[oystergirl]

Wow, loads of amazing stories and inspiration for change!

For me, this journey started about 15 years ago when I got bit by a lyme tick. I was medicated for about 11 years and gained tons of weight--lost it all doing unhealthy things, gained it all back when my life got very out of control (kid going to college, husband unemployed, dear friend with cancer, among other stuff and eating and having drinks was simply a way to stuff it all down)...

I realized this past Thanksgiving as we were waiting for my brother in law (60) to die of self inflicted bodily harm that basically killed his liver (he died new years eve) that no matter what was happening around me, the ONLY thing I could control in my life was how I treated myself. So I stopped food blogging which wasn't paying very much www.amoderatelife.com which will come down in march I think, but the stress of it was driving me crazy. I started eating Archevore/primal full time, researched a moderate exercise program, enlisted my daughter to join me who wanted to get healthy and lose what she calls her baby belly (she is my baby!)....Things are going great and even though life can still throw a curve ball at me, sticking to my program has brought me STRENGTH and STABILITY which I never would have thought possible.

Best of luck to you all in your journey to level up your life!

[sashi]

Vanity. Seriously. I was always the thin girl. But I had not been fit since high school. (Btw, I'm one of the over 30 crowd.) I was a smoker, so I stayed thin, but when I did put on any weight it was all fat. But I could cover that up. What drove me? I noticed I was getting those tiny little wrinkles around the mouth -- a sign of a long-term smoker. (Or maybe just age, but I attributed it to smoking.) So I quit smoking. I needed to become more active to counteract the hit on my metabolism from dropping one of my stimulants. Thus I began to work out.

TL;DR -- I got wrinkles. I stopped smoking. I joined a gym. The four horsemen appeared. (Okay, maybe not that last part.)

[ebm1224]

As someone over the dreaded 30, I have to say that this is false. It's more a thought of, "oh well, why bother now?" All it takes is to wake up one morning & know in your soul that you want to change. If you truly do, it doesn't matter your age.

this is really true the more i think about it. and i guess you really hit the nail on the head here. my mom didn't find an exercise she loves (jazzercise) until her 50s so i understand about your mom (or mum).

i guess what you said is really what i was trying to get at. i want to get my health and fitness habits established now so that i never get to a point where i think i'm too far gone to do anything (not that anyone is ever too far gone...but i don't want to test my limits on that one).

[MollytheMO]

Well....for a serious and a silly reason. The serious bit is because I've always had stomach problems and am positive that grains make it worse, hence the switch over to a more primal diet for the past month. (It's made me feel so much better, by the way, to not have the constant crashing/carb craving). Plus my overall strength and endurance have been getting worse over the past couple of years.

The silly reason is because my boyfriend and I are planning on getting married within the next year, and I want to look awesome when that happens.

[Rosie]

Spezzys story is awesome and I think reading that was the inspiration for me and I didn't just want to have a flat stomach again, I want to be strong and fit and make all the changes for the better.

*edit!*

[Hammlin]

What made me make a change was watching my dad die suddenly at 51 from very preventable medical conditions.

[oystergirl]

Hugs Hammlin....

[Cookie]

Spazzy? Hahaha!

---

I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=-27.559743,152.914802

[Cookie]

Er, sorry Hammlin. Didn't see your post about your Dad before I posted. So sorry to hear about your Dad

[Cookie]

And why is my iPad telling you all where I am at??

[Rosie]

Really sorry to hear that Hammlin. I lost my dad 4 years ago to something that would have been preventable if he'd changed just a few small things. He was 52

[Hammlin]

Thanks guys- it is sad, hard, and like I said avoidable, but it was what I needed to save my own life- 69 (so far) pounds lighter and here I am Now I just need some muscles hehe

viva la revolucion! lol

(ps, my iPad was telling everyone where I am too. stalking purposes only, no biggie)