It's WEIGH-IN MONDAY!

Weigh-in Monday has arrived!!! Drum roll please!!

Weight on Monday (8/12/2013): 222.2 lbs
Weight on Monday (8/12/2013): 218.0 lbs

Total Weight Lost last week: 4.2 lbs

Total Weight Lost: 34.6 lbs


I am finally in my 210's!!! It had been a struggle to lose those last couple of pounds to say goodbye to my 220's. As a personal reward went out shopping for new clothes on Saturday (just a couple of items, as I intend on losing more weight). I had a $30 savings coupon for Banana Republic; a store I love, but had not been able to shop in a while as I was just too big. At the start of my journey I wore 40w jeans (which were starting to fit very tightly). I went to the jeans section and looked for 38w and 36w jeans. I expected to buy a pair of 38" waist jeans but just wanted to try out a pair of the 36", just to see how it was beginning to fit. It turns out Banana Republic had no 38w jeans. I was, to say the least, upset but decided to try the 36" pair anyways. And guess what? They fit perfectly!!! Hurray!!!  


And as promised....

Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

It's WEIGH-IN MONDAY!

Weigh-in Monday has arrived!!! Drum roll please!!

Weight on Monday (8/5/2013): 224.2 lbs
Weight on Monday (8/12/2013): 222.2 lbs

Total Weight Lost last week: 2.0 lbs

Total Weight Lost: 30.4 lbs
I must confess I have been a little frustrated this week. There has been a slowdown in my weight loss and although rationally I understand that plateaus are normal and that a it is impossible for anyone to keep losing weight as quickly indefinitely I am for lack of a better word bummed out. I have been in my 220's for 34 days now and I am very anxious to get to my 210's. Hopefully by next week I will be able to write I got to my 210's. I need to keep myself motivated and keep focused on the fact that being Healthy is more important than losing pounds.


And as promised....

Wheatgrass Sprouts

My wheatgrass seedlings are sprouting quickly!! I’m going to have to harvest sooner than expected. Here are some progress pictures. Growing your own plants for consumption is so much fun! (Nerd alert!) hehehehe

DAY ONE

DAY THREE

Wheatgrass; a Little Giant

As I mentioned yesterday I have been juicing and pulping away for about a week now. It’s a great, fast and easy way to get a boost of natural minerals, vitamins and nutrients. For this first week I have been drinking a juice made of wheatgrass, green onions, carrots and blueberries which isn’t half bad.

After a couple of days of enjoying my blend I decided to grow my own whaetgrass. Side note: I have always loved growing fruits and vegetables. This was right up my alley. Keep your eyes open for upcoming progress on the wheatgrass front!

And as always...  Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

And a JUICING and a PULPING!

As you all know I've been introducing healthier options and activities into my life on a step by step basis. I've done this very consciously. I know myself enough to know that in the past whenever I tried something new and went in heads-on too quickly, I usually ended up quitting as it could become overwhelming.

This time from the beginning I knew I had to let my boy and MIND adjust to the changes slowly, adding new things step by step. I am very glad I did just that. If you have followed my blog you might remember that before my path to healthier living began I did not eat any vegetables and very rarely ate fruit. I slowly started to change the way I ate. Started trying out new vegetables by making vegetable soup. I kept introducing new vegetables to the soup one by one, slowly appreciating the different flavors. I was then able to start eating raw vegetables in forms of simple salads. Just as I had done with the soup I kept introducing new vegetables to my salads. In the course of three months I can say my palate has changed, from strongly disliking and avoiding vegetables (to the extreme of removing the lettuce, tomato and onions from burgers) to actively looking for new veggie options to eat.

I have introduced a new facet into my transformation. It is called pulping. In simple terms it involves using a food processor to effectively process/liquefy vegetables and fruits in order to better absorb their nutrients. I bough one such processor called the Nutribullet.

I started juicing this past Saturday. I bough a variety of vegetables and made my first juice (wheatgrass, watercress, carrots, green onions and blueberries). As soon as I tried it I almost threw up. Yep, the complete truth. The juice tasted horribly to me. As I had introduced two greens which I had never eaten before (wheatgrass and watercress) I decided to taste them individually to see which one was the culprit of the horrible tasting juice. DRUM ROLL... It was watercress. Made a new batch without the watercress and it was great!!




I am enjoying one full glass of fresh vegetable juice everyday now, boosting my consumption of nutrients, antioxidants and vitamins.

And why did I start juicing/pulping you may ask? Well, I saw a couple of very good documentaries showing the benefits of juicing. But most importantly I have several good friends and mentors who also validated the advice given by the documentaries. If I had started juicing/pulping at the beginning of my transformation towards healthier living I would have most likely hated the taste and would have quit altogether. My palate has changed and adapted to these new tastes.

Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

It's WEIGH-IN MONDAY!

Weigh-in Monday has arrived!!! Drum roll please!!

Weight on Monday (7/29/2013): 228.2 lbs
Weight on Monday (7/15/2013): 224.2 lbs

Total Weight Lost last week: 4.0 lbs

Total Weight Lost: 28.4 lbs

And as promised....

Oh,yes I did!!!! Bad habit week

My plan is not to hide on bad days and only boast about my good result days. The idea of this blog is to be honest about the process and take time to put my thoughts down.

Last week was a bad habits week. As you know I was traveling last week on business. It was not a good week at all. Diet wise went off the track completely. Ate all of those things that had made me into the unhealthy and FAT person I was three months ago. Yep, ate things like:

1) Fettuccine Alfredo
2) Burgers
3) Fries (Lots of Fries)
4) Fried Chicken
5) Bread (Oh the bread!!)
6) Pizza
7) Fries (Had I mentioned I ate lots of fries?)

Portion control: None whatsoever.

The only good habit I kept up with was my exercise regimen, which thankfully helped me only having gained 3lbs. Otherwise, I am sure I would have gained at least 6 lbs.


Weight on Monday (7/22/2013): 225.2 lbs
Weight on Monday (7/29/2013): 228.2 lbs

Total Weight GAINED in a week: 3.0 lbs

Peer pressure was surely a factor. It is not an excuse however. As soon as I got back home though went into an intense path to regain my track. Doubled my cardiovascular exercise on Monday and Tuesday and eliminated all carbohydrates from my diet (only vegetables and lean meat). And within three days lost all of the weight gained plus some. In summary, we are all going to have bad days, even bad weeks, the important thing is to know that we have set a long term goal and these events are just that, small events. As I did not post my graph this past Monday (Weigh-in Monday), I will post the graph today.

Weight on Monday (7/29/2013): 228.2 lbs
Weight on Today (8/1/2013): 222.5 lbs

Total Weight Lost: 30.1 lbs

I HAVE NOW LOST MORE THAN 30 LBS!!!

On the road again

On the road again. This time I will be away from home for a full week, and day one was not a good day at all! I stumbled hard. It's back to the plan tomorrow. No turning back now.

Reader Tips #1

Hello my friends and family, and welcome to my first "Reader Tips" post! In this section I will share with you all different tips that readers of my blog have shared with me, either as comments to the blog or personally and that have helped me on my path.

The first reader tip comes from a loyal reader to the blog and a great friend. A couple of days ago he shared with me a post named "How to Keep Habits Going During Travel" by Leo Babauta. As I have mentioned earlier traveling presents extra hazards to any routine, including dietary and exercise routines. I will be traveling next week. I will follow the tips given by Leo Babauta and hopefully will continue losing weight uninterrupted. Here's the link:

http://zenhabits.net/travel-habit/


Thanks to all of you who have kept me motivated through emails, texts, comments, etc. It means a great deal to me to feel than support along my transformation. Feel free to continue helping me throughout this process.

Special thanks to my parents who have given the extra mile to be there for me throughout the process. Just this weekend my mother went out food shopping for me and my father bought me a device to help me track my progress (keep an eye open for an upcoming "Readers Tips" dad).


Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

Its WEIGH-IN MONDAY!

Weigh-in Monday has arrived!!! Drum roll please!!

Weight on Monday (7/8/2013): 227.6 lbs
Weight on Monday (7/15/2013): 227.4 lbs

Total Weight Lost last week: 0.2 lbs

Total Weight Lost: 25.2 lbs

And as promised....

Aside from the Weigh Loss Graph I wanted to share with you something I noticed yesterday. As you know I have been in a process of learning to eat and most importantly enjoy vegetables. One way in which I have succeeded in this is by introducing vegetables one by one to a basic soup. This way I learn to appreciate the different tastes vegetables have and then start introducing them into salads. Yesterday I decided to a fresh tomato to the soup. Before my transformation commenced I disliked vegetables in general, but I  despised raw tomatoes. Hated their taste, after taste and texture.

Well, I added the tomatoes to the soup and I was able to eat the soup without much hassle or dislike. However, soon after I started having abdominal discomfort. The tomatoes did not sit well. I felt bloated and uncomfortable all throughout yesterday and even today. I think I might be sensitive to tomatoes.

Second Mini-Goal Met!

Today I accomplished my second mini-goal. I have now lost 10% of my body weight!

Starting Weight: 252.6
Today's Weight: 226.0

Total Weight Lost: 26.6 lbs
Percent of body weight lost: 10.5%


Mini-goals:

1) Lose 20 lbs (Done)
2) Lose 10% of my body weight (Done)
3) Lose 50 lbs
4) Be under 200 lbs
5) Be able to jog an entire 5k race
6) Be able to do one (1) pull-up
7) Try every single fresh vegetable in my supermarket
8) Switch to organic


My long term goals

1) Have my doctor take me off all of my high blood pressure meds
2) Have normal cholesterol levels
3) Have normal triglyceride levels
4) Reach my goal weight
5) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 3 lbs) for 3 months
6) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 3 lbs) for 6 months
7) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 5 lbs) for 1 year
8) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 10 lbs) for life


My end goal:

1) Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

Back on Track!

I feel sufficiently well now to re-start my cardio and weight lifting exercises. I'm back!! I have continued to lose weight regardless of not being able to exercise. However I fell I might have lost some of my muscle mass from stopping the weight-lifting training for a week.

Feeling very positive though. As I was thinking about my blog today I have decided to add two sections to my blog.

1) Reader Tips
2) Weigh-in Monday's

In the "Reader Tips" section I will share with you all different tips that readers of my blog have shared with me, either as comments to the blog or personally and that have helped me on my path. So keep the tips coming y'all!

I have also decided to add a section named "Weigh-in Monday's" in which I will post my weight graph and Total Weight Lost. This way you can all see my progress on a weekly basis, although as I have mentioned earlier I do weigh myself daily regardless of what my personal trainer thinks.

And even though today is Tuesday, here is what my "Weigh-in Mondays" posts will look like

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Weigh-in Monday has arrived!!! Drum roll please!!

Weight on Monday (7/1/2013): 231.2 lbs
Weight on Monday (7/8/2013): 227.6 lbs

Total Weight Lost last week: 3.6 lbs

Total Weight Lost: 25.0 lbs

And as promised....

Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

Recuperating from the attack

Hello everyone. A little update is needed. I am doing very well. My wounds are healing faster than I would have anticipated, which is good because I'm anxious to start my exercise routine again (indoors for now).

In regards to the pitbull that bit me I have no news unfortunately. The government which is supposed to have called me after the attack and send an investigator to take away the dog and put it under quarantine for rabies is yet to do anything. It is ultimately a question of public health. This bothers me incredibly.

The Pitbull Attack

Sorry guys for not posting earlier. On Monday night as I was walking as part of my exercise routine I was attacked by a pitbull. I was walking down a hill I passed a house, out of the corner of my eye I saw a dog charging at me. In a split second the dog lunged, broke away from his chains and bit me in the groin area. I immediately recognized it as a pitbull. For some reason, a very lucky one indeed although he bit me he wasn't able to clamp down his jaws. The pitbull then started trying to bite down on my leg. I was screaming and jumping up and down trying to prevent my leg from being bitten. The owner came out and hit the pitbull, which shocked the dog and allowed him to grab his collar and me to run away.

When I got home my underwear and shorts were full of blood. I washed the area and went to the hospital. In general I was extremely lucky. Had the pitbull been able to clamp down, had he bitten me a couple of inches to the left, or had the owner not been right there, the story would be a completely different one.

My parent were a godsend. They drove me to the hospital, stayed with me and took care of me as only parents can. Needless to say I'm recuperating, both physically and emotionally.

A little comedy to lighten the mood:

The Travel Challenge SUCCESS!

As I had written in my post named "The Travel Challenge", I was extremely nervous about the week I was to be traveling on business. I have always gained weight when traveling due to so many unknowns (food options, meal schedules, dinner meetings, etc). It was hence my personal goal to do all I could (diet and exercise) to offset the above unknowns and end up losing weight.

So did I meet the goal? Yes, SUCCESS

Weight on departure date (6/22/2013): 231.7 lbs
Weight upon arrival date (6/30/2013): 230.8 lbs

Total Weight Lost during trip: 0.9 lbs


I sure would have desired to have lost more than one pound. But very happy indeed to have lost weight. This week is back to my new normal schedule. The pounds will start dropping quickly once again. As promised before I left, below is my weight loss graph.

As you can see I am tracking my progress in a graph (typical engineer). The blue line is my daily weight (yes, I do weigh myself every day regardless of what my personal trainer says), and the green line is the rate in which I need to lose weight in order to meet my goal. As long as I'm under the green line, I'm golden!

Starting Weight: 252.6 lbsToday's Weight: 230.0 lbs
Total Weight Lost: 22.6 lbs

Keep wishing me success guys!

Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

Tip of the Day (3)

As I have mentioned I am on the path of eating healthier, getting rid of my many past bad habits which made me the unhealthy person I was. Unfortunately our lives are surrounded by many unhealthy food options. There is a fast food joint in every corner and restaurant options in many cases are no better. Something I have learned in this process is that I have to be proactive. I was addicted to bad food, addicted to highly processed carbohydrates. Addictions are hard to break, and so I have to be proactive and not let hunger build up to the point in which I eat the first thing I find in a world full of poor and unhealthy choices.

TIP OF THE DAY

Be proactive, have healthy snacks at hand. A great snack of course is history's first packaged food: fruit. Fruits come pre-packaged (peel) and are ready to eat. Every week I buy a week's supply of snack fruit (apples, pears, strawberries, blackberries, etc). I bring my fruit with me wherever I go. Keep that ravenous hunger at bay.

Being even more proactive is to to also buy less perishable snacks that although might be more processed than fruit are healthier than lets say, a Big Mac with fries. I keep these snacks stored in case I run out of fruit, fruit spoils, or if I am going somewhere where carrying space is limited. In my search for a snack in this category I made sure I found a snack that was convenient (small and easy to carry), high in fiber, low in calories and that satisfies my taste buds (if it is not satisfying, those fries might start pushing their way into my head). Below is a snack in this category. It is high in fiber and I find it to be delicious.

Please note that I eat these only in emergencies as they are indeed a processed item, and my goal is to replace processed foods for natural food (the less processed the better).

Bon Voyage: Day Four

I'm back on track! Writing yesterday's post did the trick. No way I'm going back to my old habits. And although today was pretty much uneventful, I do have an anecdote to share. At lunch today, I ordered a grilled steak salad.

I was expecting a full salad with strips of steak. I got strips of steak with lettuce. I felt a great deal of disappointment as it was jut plain lettuce. I thought to myself, boy I wish there were more veggies. Who would have ever imagined that I would be disappointed for not getting enough veggies! A guy who three months ago NEVER ate vegetables and detested salads.

Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

Oh no, you didn't!!! Bad Habits Part 2

Welcome to my "Oh no you didn't!! Bad Habits section, where I give examples of my previous horrible habits that made me the overweight, unhealthy way I was.

Bad Habit #2: Pizza Sunday's

For all of you who know me well, you remember my so called Pizza Sundays. So what's a Pizza Sunday? Well, it is basically a Sunday in which my whole day revolved around eating pizza. I would wake up late (on purpose) so that as soon as I woke up I could pick up the phone and order pizza (delivery). I would order one large pepperoni pizza and one large cheese pizza.

I would eat one of the pizzas as soon as it was delivered. The second pizza I would eat slowly, slice by slice, throughout the day while watching TV. Then, I would go to bed. I know this is hard to believe, but Pizza Sundays were a part of my life. I would have pizza Sundays once and sometimes twice a month.

And just to give you an idea of the calories:

I) Pizza Hut

a) Large Pepperoni Pan Pizza: 2,960 calories
b) Large Cheese Pan Pizza: 2,800

Total Calories: 5,760 calories

Bon Voyage: Day Three

Today was a bad day. Since I am traveling on business, decisions on food can get complicated. Breakfast which was under my control was fine, however, lunch was not. I was visiting one of my company's supplier today. In order to make most of the day lunch was to be brought in. I requested my lunch to be healthy option such as salad and chicken. There was a mix up in the order and everyone got pasta with Alfredo sauce. I was not about to create a scene so I ate the pasta, although my insides were bursting out. Fettuccine Alfredo is one of my favorite dishes, but it is the perfect disaster combination, high in simple carbohydrates which triggers the bodies insulin response quickly, and high in fat.

It had been months since I had eaten pasta and such a high amount of processed carbs. My body responded to this now new type of food. After a couple of hours my energy plummeted, I felt sleepy and tired. An hour or so after that and suddenly I was starving!! But due to a very long line to cross the Mexico/US Border (2 hours in line) I wasn't able to eat until 8 hours after having had lunch. I was so hungry by then I started having cold sweats and my mind turned foggy. My co-worker and I, both in the midst of insanity from hunger stopped at the first fast food joint. Needless to say I had the usual burger/fries combo.

And such is the refined carb trap. You eat them, they spike your blood sugar level, prompting the body to release massive amounts of insulin to bring the sugar levels back down. But after such a large amount of insulin blood sugar can fall too much, which then prompts the body to eat again in order to raise the blood sugar up again. Exactly what happened to me today.

At least I am now conscious of the way food interacts with my body. I have learned a great deal. In fact, I think I will share with you another of my past bad habits. Keep your eyes open for my next "Oh No you didn't!!!: Bad Habits" section.

Bon Voyage: Day Two

Day two was a great day for exercise! Woke up in the morning eager to have a walk in the open air. I turned on my MapMyRun app (refer to Tip of the Day (2) ) and started my walk. See my results below:

Sunny San Diego was; well, sunny. It was a beautiful day and a beautiful walk. Day two, success!

Bon Voyage: Day One

As I had mentioned, I was very anxious on traveling at this particular moment of my weight loss and transformation process. I have ALWAYS gained weight when I travel. Feeling a lot less anxious. Day one of my trip was a success! Even on trips its just a matter of choices. Choosing the best option every time. The sum of all those individual options is what makes an everlasting change.

When you are flying you are at the mercy of the limited options available. As such, I brought with me from home my favorite high fiber bars (USDA prevents transporting fresh fruit) and roasted peanuts, just in case the meals available throughout the day were not healthy I would have something to nibble on.

I was very lucky to get upgraded to first class on my first flight. Lunch on the plane consisted of chicken or pasta. I chose the chicken dish. Pasta is made of processed flour, which once eaten elevates blood sugar very quickly, inciting a strong insulin response within the body. The less processed the food you're eating, the better.The chicken dish consisted of:

1) Green Salad
2) Chicken Breast with steamed broccoli
3) Bread
4) Chocolate Cake

I ate  my salad (which I now like, refer to my older posts) and ate the chicken with broccoli. When the stewardess came around with the bread, politely said no. Finally, I tried a small bite of the dessert and made the choice of not eating it.

I was even luckier to get upgraded to first class cabin on my second flight as well. Dinner again was a choice between chicken or pasta. Chose the chicken again. This time the chicken dish consisted of:

1) Mandarin salad
2) Chicken Breast with roasted peppers and gravy
3) Bread
4) Lemon Pie

Ate my salad again (Loved it), ate the chicken (without the gravy as the gravy tasted very sweet) and ate all of my peppers. I said no to the bread, and this time didn't even taste the dessert. Both meals were very satisfying and I felt full. Boy my life is changing! I would have never felt this way 3 months ago.

I finally got to my hotel (13 hours travel time total), checked in and went to the gym. I was planning on doing my weight lifting circuit as well as 40 minutes of cardio. I completed my circuit training, but was too tired to complete my cardio. But it will be done.

In summary, its a matter of making the best choice possible in a consistent manner. That's the recipe for success.

The Travel Challenge

My stomach's in a knot! Why? Because I am traveling tomorrow for work, and traveling is one of the easiest ways to gain weight. It has always been extremely hard for me to maintain my weight while traveling due to so many unknowns (food options, meal schedules, dinner meetings, etc). I will also not have my scale to weigh myself every day. I trust I will make the correct options and exercise as much as possible and by the time I get back (a whole week) I will have lost weight.

I will post my weight loss graph once I get back.

Keep your fingers crossed!

Tip of the Day (2)

Here's another good tip. Variety is the spice of life, which is why I find the treadmill so incredibly boring! I much prefer doing my walking/jogging out in the open where I can appreciate the sky, the sun, the trees. But being a metric oriented engineer (here we go again!), I needed information that were limited by me walking/jogging out in the open.

Until I found the following application. Attention all you smartphone users!

The Map My Run app gives you all the nifty information you need. Even more than the regular treadmill; information such as: distance, duration, pace, calories burned, climbs and elevation among others. You can also see a representation of the route taken. Nice, huh?

Here's one of my short walks:

Oh, and its free!!! Feel free to share other good (and hopefully free) apps with me guys and gals.

First Mini-Goal met!

Today I accomplished my first mini-goal. I have now lost 20 lbs!

Starting Weight: 252.6
Today's Weight: 231.9

Total Weight Lost: 20.7 lbs


Mini-goals:

1) Lose 20 lbs (Done)
2) Lose 10% of my body weight
3) Lose 50 lbs
4) Be under 200 lbs
5) Be able to jog an entire 5k race
6) Be able to do one (1) pull-up
7) Try every single fresh vegetable in my supermarket
8) Switch to organic


My long term goals

1) Have my doctor take me off all of my high blood pressure meds
2) Have normal cholesterol levels
3) Reach my goal weight
4) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 3 lbs) for 3 months
5) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 3 lbs) for 6 months
6) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 5 lbs) for 1 year
7) Maintain my goal weight (+/- 10 lbs) for life


My end goal:

1) Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

Oh no, you didn't!!! Bad Habits Part 1

Welcome to my "Oh no you didn't!! Bad Habits" section where I give examples of my previous horrible habits that made me the way I was.

Bad Habit #1: Eating Fast Food

I know everyone knows that fast food is bad. I knew it was bad as well, what I had no clue of was the amount of calories I was taking in every time I ordered fast food. I'll give you two of my typical fast food dinner menus. I ate the particular meals shown below at least twice a week. I would eat fast food at least 4-5 times a week.

I) Wendy's

a) Baconator Burger: 970 calories
b) Fries (Large): 500 calories
c) Chicken Nuggets (4): 180 calories
d) Barbecue Sauce: 50 calories
e) Ketchup packets (5): 75 calories

Total Calories: 1,775 calories


II) Burger King

a) Italian International Chicken Sandwich: 710 calories (approx)
b) Large Fries: 500 calories
c) Large Onion Rings: 500 calories
d) Ketchup packets (4): 60 calories

Total Calories: 1,770 Calories


One of the first things I learned when I started keeping track of all I ate, boy was I eating a lot of calories!! An average of 4,200 calories a day to be more precise.

Father's Day weekend? No problem!

Not even the traditional Father's Day feast kept me from my goal. Sure there was lots of food, appetizers, fritters, lots of bread, rice, meat and desserts... Oh the desserts...  But no, kept my mind on the prize, ate only what my diet dictated and after our family gathering subsided, did my 40 minutes of exercise (2.5 miles).

Starting Weight: 252.6
Today's Weight: 233.2

I have now lost a total of 19.4 lbs.

As you can see I am tracking my progress in a graph (typical engineer). The blue line is my daily weight (yes, I do weigh myself every day regardless of what my personal trainer says), and the green line is the rate in which I need to lose weight in order to meet my goal. As long as I'm under the green line, I'm golden!

For those of you looking at the graph. That strange looking peak was a loooong 5 day weekend visiting my best friend in DC (you know who you are!). Trips/vacations are always the hardest! Keep your eyes open for more tips and a new upcoming section I will name "Oh no, you didn't!!! Bad Habits"

Tip of the Day

This is my first tip for this blog. I have learned many new things during the start of my journey, many tricks that have helped me along the way.

If you are like me (and I  know many overweight people are), you barely eat vegetables. I sincerely did not enjoy vegetables. I even removed tomatoes from my burgers as they took away from the real burger taste. I did not eat salads at all.

For me to switch my diet from a highly processed, to a more natural one I needed to start including lots more vegetables. How did I start getting around that? I started making vegetable/chicken soup (from scratch).

To make the soup I had to first go to the supermarket and expose myself to the vegetable aisle (which I had always by-passed). I was amazed by all the different varieties of vegetables there are, many I had never eaten, let alone seen.

Every couple of days I would make soup, using different vegetables. It was like an experiment for me, almost a game. Having my taste buds pick out the different tastes, the different textures. I started adding more and more vegetables as I went along. Onions, celery, squash, carrots, leek, pumpkin, green peppers, leafy greens, culantro, different roots, green beans, corn, etc).

Slowly but surely I started appreciating the different tastes. Now I can make myself a simple salad and enjoy it.

Pump it up!

The good news towards health continues. A week ago the company I worked for launched a new fitness program. As the keystone for the program they hired a Doctor (MD)/Nutritionist and active bodybuilder, who would pick 30 company employees (out of 1,200) to personally train and transform. Yesterday I received the news I was one of the chosen few. The remaining component of my transformation is now in place.

PUMPI IT UP!

First day and had to hit the gym with the trainer! One hour of quick paced circuit training + 30 mins of cardio in the treadmill while the personal trainer watched intensely all my expressions of pain! hehehe I swear he was counting all of my sweat drops. My routine from today on: Circuit training with weights 3 days a week, cardio training 5 days a week.

What are you waiting for?

Before I continue let me re-assure that all the tests turned out negative. The tender lump was probably due to a contusion in the area. However the blood work did show I also had high cholesterol. My path had begun. It was time to start getting healthy.

As a good engineer I decided to precisely measure and quantify all I was eating. I spent two weeks eating as I normally would and writing down and breaking down all I ate. The results surprised even me. I was eating an average of 4,200 calories a day!! And less than 10 grams of fiber. The results spoke to me clearly. My diet was all processed food. Nothing natural. Everything was high calorie, low nutrition.

And my new motto was born: Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

Immediately started to limit processed foods (flour, sugars, packaged food, etc) and starting filling my meals with natural food. Set a couple of goals I had to meet daily such as eating 1,800 calories a day (instead of my 4,200 calories) and eat more than 28 grams of fiber. To be able to meet these goals I automatically had to change my eating habits to include more vegetables and fruit and continued to limit processed foods as much as I possibly could (empty calories).

In 60 days and just with this diet (no additional physical activity) I have lost 17.2 pounds.

Starting Weight: 252.6
Today's Weight: 235.4

My cardiologist a couple of weeks ago listened to my heart and saw my electrocardiogram results and told me my heart sounded better than it had in years. He proceeded to take me off one of the two blood pressure pills I was taking. My goal? No pills. No high blood pressure, no high cholesterol. This body is mine and I will take care of it.

Eat Healthy, Live Healthy

How it all began...

Hello friends and family! This is my first blog. And why did I start this blog you ask? Here it goes...

I was born in October of 1979, into a beautiful and very close family, and ever since I have battled with my weight. At the beginning I was thin, for my first seven or eight years of life or so. I was an asthmatic child back then and suffered constantly from ear infections. These conditions; I believe, kept me underweight. I still remember hearing my grandma saying "Esta demasiado flaco ese nene" (That boy is just too thin!!). But when these two conditions were brought under control my weight went up quickly, and ever since I've been either overweight or according to those BMI tables; plainly obese. I remember I weighed more than a 100 lbs by the time I was in the sixth grade. I remember because I was not allowed in a ride at a birthday party (in Felicilandia) because I was too heavy.


AND THE JOURNEY BEGINS

One day I woke-up, a day like any other and suddenly I noticed a tender lump on my left breast. It was more than tender, it hurt. Being the type of person I am, quickly set up an appointment with the doctor. A couple of days later and I'm at my doctors. Before he even asks me why I'm there he weighs me.

And the scale read: 252.6 lbs

Denial was my first reaction of course. No way I was that heavy! One eighth of a ton!! I was dumbfounded. The doctor proceeds to go over my history, and without me telling him anything about the lump (which was why I was there) he tells me point blank. You are at 250 lbs, you have high blood pressure and you re only 33, what are you waiting for?