In the news today lol

A quickie to update yesterdays BP readings...

10:30 am Sept 24th - 120/94
3:05 pm Sept 24th - 119/100
9:45 pm Sept 24th - 128/101

Much better, though I do have a high diastolic number....

Progress.... progress is good!

Good news...

Took my BP this morning and surprise surprise, it was a much healthier 120/94. Looks like the pills are going to do the job, at least, the early optimistic prognosis is that!

I need to have the BP under control for 2 weeks before I am allowed in the gym. So lets hope that I can do that!

The deal

OK...

Went to the Doc's this morning as I mentioned. Was feeling pretty good about it. Was feeling even better when I walked into his office and looked at me with raised eyebrows and said " Hey you are really losing weight huh?".

We chatted about that and how that was going for a while, and then the time came for the BP check.

210/111

Let me say that again

210/111

First reaction was fear. A kind of deep in the stomach primal fear. I think I tapped into something ancient in my psyche. I imagine that this is what our barely erect fore-fathers felt when they were faced with a true fight or flight scenario. That feeling quickly turned to bewilderment. I mean, I was doing it wasn't I? I was losing the weight, getting the exercise, sticking to the low fat low sodium diet, drinking my water? All the things I was supposed to do to correct the BP. I mean I certainly didn't expect to go from elevated to normal in the space of a month, but goddammit I certainly expected to be moving in that direction, NOT the other way. The doc was equally not impressed, though I think he wasn't as bewildered as I was.

So, where from there? Well, meds, I am on 25 mgs once daily of NOVO-HYDRAZIDE. I won't go into all the possible side affects here, google it if you are interested. However, I did have to leave work early today because I was starting to feel a little disjointed. I'm not tooooo bad right now, obviously, I mean I am typing and making sense, well, as much as I eve have anyway. I do have a long drive home though, so I figured I wouldn't take any risks at all and not be able to drive later.

No gym, sadly, that really hurts more than I thought it would. I'm ready for it, I am actually burning for it, but it's just not a risk I can take. Can you imagine doing a squat or a leg press with a BP of 210/111?? Mt. Etna mean anything to any of you?

No strenuous activity for a while, just walking at a moderate pace. It's not much, but it will have to do the job for now.

I also now have a home BP monitor. I have to take my BP thrice daily and in a week I go back to the docs and we review the numbers. If it isn't down, then there will be yet another medication on top of the current one, the same applies in 2 weeks.

SO, I know I have been asked several times what caused this. The short answer is the ugly one, I am a fat lethargic 38 year old who wasn't taking care of business the way it should have been attended to. I commit ed a crime against my body and my family and I have been sentenced to this. There are some genetics in play, but the long and short of it is that it is 100% my fault. Not going to whine or bemoan it, I AM going to fix it.

As of today there will be another addition to my daily blogs, my BP readings. I take my last one at bedtime, so I will post a short blog each night with the 3 BP readings from that day. This is another tool of accountability, but it will also hopefully show a dropping number and serve as a warning, and a kick in the ass, to the large percentage of the male middle ago population out there who like me, are fat, lethargic and marching blissfully towards a very early grave.

Wake up folks, wake up before you don't wake up anymore....

Monday Mass Day 3

Quickie, on my way to work, be back later with pics to post.

Modest weight loss for this week, well, that's what the scales said anyway. Down about a pound, maybe a pound and a half.

SOoooo...

August 25th Start weight ??? - we figure anywhere from 310-320
Sept 8th - 301 lbs
Sept 15th - 297 lbs
Sept 22nd - 296 lbs - change of -1 lbs, 95 to goal

Sunday stuff

Not much to blog about today, but figured I would make an appearance.

Yesterday was kind of a blahish type day. No, I shouldn't say that, it was a great day actually. Dee had a bridal shower and myself and the two wee fellas spent the afternoon cruising around. It was a blahish type day from a meal persepctive. As I mentioned, Dee had this bridal shower. She ended up bringing home a bunch of leftover sandwichs and cookies and cake. I stayed away from the cookies and cake, but did end up eating around 2 sandwichs. For whatever reason, I thought I would end up well over my caloric intake.... complete opposite actually... which ticks me off even more.

Oh well...

Hey guess what? Tuesday I go to the Doc, and will either be ok with the BP or not, and on meds, either way, this is the week I should be able to start at the gym...

YAY!!!

Other blogs and more bric-brac

You know, I love blogging, One of the things I like about blogging is interacting with the people who not only read MY blog, but actively going out there and finding other blogs that are on the same topic as mine. One thing that has really saddened me, as well as reminding me of my own lapse, it the number of blogs that just end. Usually these blogs have one last entry that talks about slipping, or going off plan, with promises made to get back on track, and then nothing. Some of them have ended a month or so ago, some a year or more. It makes me wonder where these people are now, what their story is, if they are continuing their own personal journeys or if the wheels just fell off all together. I even wrote a couple of them, asking those very questions and sadly, no responses.

If you are one of those people, if by chance you followed the e-mail link back to this blog. I want you to know that all is not lost, you can start up again, a lapse can be just that, a lapse and you CAN get it back on course. If you want, I can help, and you can help me. Obesity and food addiction are serious illnesses, and it can make the effort to overcome them easier if you have a large support group there to prop you up.

Now, in my travels through the WWW looking for weight loss blogs I stumbled upon a blog that frankly made me very very angry, a little sad, a little disgusted, a little perplexed and a bunch of other emotions all at once. I don't have the link to the blog, but I can find it again, if you want it let me know. I don't want to post the link here because I don't want to be a source of more visitors for this blog. The blog is basically just pictures. Pictures of people, mostly women, suffering from Anorexia. Now, the pictures themselves are powerful, in a punch in the stomach kinda way, and really, everyone should look at pictures like these. They serve as a strong visual reminding us of the horrible wasting this terrible affliction can inflect on a body. I want to make one thing absolutely clear. I am NOT disgusted or angry or anything other than sympathetic towards the people who have this affliction. I have a person in my life who suffered from anorexia. They are on the mend thank you very much for asking and I couldn't be prouder of them. No, my chagrin is targeted squarely on the shoulders of the people out there who ENCOURAGE people with this disease to loss ever MORE weight.

Honestly, comments on the pictures of these wasted bodies, bones protruding, skin tight, just haunted looking women, comments saying beautiful, or sexy or amazing and even more stunning, comments saying that they would be perfect with just a little more weight gone, another 5 lbs and they would be perfect, another 10 lbs and they would be a goddess. You ignorant, thoughtless, enabling, PRICKS.... it's like opening a bar tab for an alcoholic and then driving them to the bar, come on people, get a friggin' clue!! Unreal... just unreal...

Makes me sick...

sigh...

Shifting gears. Dee and I watched a great show last night. It was on W channel on Rogers, but is a Channel 4 creation. Channel 4 is the British channel that launched Gordon Ramsey's TV career.... its called Super Size vs. Super Skinny, the basic premise is simple, you take a morbidly obese person, and team them up with a very very skinny person and have them live the others life for a period of time. Diets, exercise, everything. It was pretty interesting and entertaining to watch. What I found most interesting, at least in the episode I watched last night, was that the skinny person had a MUCH harder time adjusting than the Super Sized person. At the end both took some valuable lessons out of the exercise, and I am happy to report that they both are living a healthier life now. Brit shows are always so much better than US shows... but that's a whole other blog for a whole other time.

On the progress front. Dee and Gabe had Mary Browns tonight for supper, for those of you who don't know, that's like KFC, only better. The smell damn near killed me. I am happy to report however that I made it through and I just grilled a couple of chicken breasts for myself. They were awesome as well, though without the yummy coating and oh so delicious grease.... lol...

Hopefully gym next week, really am chomping at the bit now.... bring it on!

Shrink you say? Why yes, don't mind if I do....

Yay!

So, I have like 3 pairs of jeans. One pair was a tad big on me, yes I know, the shock and awe of a pair of jeans to big for my ample girth, who woulda thunk it! Anyhoooo... one pair was a bit big ( stop snickering ) the other two pairs were a tad tight ( again, stop with the snickering ). I got up this morning, grabbed a shower and got dressed, put my jeans on and went about my way. I started having to hitch them up over my derrier in short order. I figured oh well, gonna have to retire the tad too big jeans soon I guess.. I hate saying good bye to old jeans, well, hate it and love it in a way...progress baby yeaaaaah... BUT I then realized that the jeans I was wearing were NOT the tad too big ones, but rather, a pair of the tad too SMALL ones!!

VICTORY!!!

I love that the weight is coming off, one of the more rewarding things about losing weight is the excuse to buy new clothes. Value Village here I come. I had a look through some of my older clothes as well. I kept a bunch of stuff as I expanded, but I got rid of a lot of it as well. I should be ok for the next 50 lbs or so, but after that I have nothing. Actually, now that I think on it, I may be in the market for some new undies pretty soon though... not that the ones I have on shouldn't fit, its just that the waists are stretched and I don't see them contracting anytime soon. Folks, let me just state here what we all know but seldom say, there is NOTHING on this earth that sucks worse than your undies sliding down over your ass while you are walking, I mean, how do you fix them without looking like your scratching your butt???

Just a little overall update. I don't feel this time like the weight is coming off as fast as last time. That might have something to do with my age, it might have something to do with the fact that I shocked my body the first time around, and it's prepared for it this time ( I have a mental picture of all my fat cells digging into foxholes with little helmets on and bayonets at the ready ), it might not be anything, it might be coming off just as fast, I wish I had weighed myself from the start so I would know if I had the HUGE losses in the first couple of weeks I had the first time around ( I dropped 11 lbs in week one first time, it was a shock ). Either way, I just KNOW I HAVE to get back into that gym ASAP. I don't want what happened first time around to happen this time, were I become this sickly skinny thing first at 180 lbs and had to get back up to the hunky pile of man flesh I was prior to just becoming a pile of chunky man flesh. I think if I start lifting sooner rather than later the transition will be more fluid. Last time it was almost like I had to mutate once, and then undergo a secondary mutation later.

Either way, meals are fine, I could actually be walking more, its proving to be a little more difficult to get the walks in this time around, wife, a 5 year old and a 8 month old constricts my time somewhat. I don't begrudge them that, hell no, the best part of my day is going home and seeing Damian flap his arms with glee at seeing me and having Gabe run out and damn near knock my legs out from under me hugging me and saying he missed me. It does make it harder to just get up and go though. Regardless, I am getting enough walking in, I just want to get MORE in is all... perhaps I will have to start getting up an hour earlier and just going...hmmm... bah, who needs sleep anyway!!

Holy long post Batman... bored yet???

Sunday Suuuuuuuuuunday.........

What a BEAUTIFUL Sunday here in Newfoundland!

Just getting ready for another day out with the family. The best part about what I am doing this time around as opposed to the first time is the fact that I get to share it day by day with my family, and folks, that's a very special thing.

Dee has been nothing short of wonderful through this, she still has her treats, as she should but she considerately asks me if its ok to have say, a chocolate bar, with me in the van with her. lol... She's amazing, always checking the labels with me, eating the meals I need to make this work, walking with me, encouraging, complimenting, why, one would almost think she loves me or something..lol...

Gabe still has his moments of almost forcing food on me. I had a chat with him last night about why Daddy can't eat some of the stuff he is offering me, about how Daddy wants to loss weight so he can play better with him and his brother and ride bike with him next summer. I think he is understanding it, though I don't think he really cares about the belly...lol... it's his snuggle pillow after all. He's been great on the walks though, a real trooper!

We are about to leave the house and go for another walk, and it makes me feel very happy. The one unexpected side effect of this whole thing is the way it has brought our little family closer together and the great activities we are now doing as a group. Fantastic...

Switching gears... I am nervous about next Monday, I have to head to the Docs and get my BP taken again. If it remains high it's medication time for me. I am dreading that really. I have been reading a little about BP meds and the tendency they have to make you feel a little dragged out and such. Nervous... lol... gonna drive my BP up stressing about it... sigh...

There's eye openers, then there eye SHOCKERS!

Well...

Ahem...

So, we bought a new scale. I was in error, I was not 285 as I thought, but in actuality I must have been around 310-15 or so. I know I have lost weight in the past two weeks, I can tell, Dee can tell.... so I figure 310-15 is a good guess. I don't need to guess anymore though... nope... I am a svelte and trim 301 lbs.... hey, that's not bad, it's only heaver than a new born elephant, or a year old cow, or 3 Andy Dicks...

All joking aside... I'm not floored anymore, I am getting used to the shocks that keep assaulting me in regards to my weight, health and appearance. I am once again struck though by how damn easy it is to fool yourself into thinking you are something you obviously aren't, and trust me, it was VERY VERY easy.

So, 301 lbs ( important to get that 1 lb in there ), only 121 to go, thats 10 lbs a month, 2.5 lbs a week and exactly 365 from today I will be a totally different baby elephant, I mean, MAN... yeah...

I am joking because I know I can and will do this, it will have ups and downs, peaks and valleys, but in the end the changes will be made and the transformation will be dramatic, this I promise you. I can further promise that in 730 days from now I will look even better as my promise to myself to be in better shape at 40 than 20 will come to fruition.

Now, on to the very very ugly... the pics.... please folks.... not for the weak..



Pretty bad huh? I was kinda floored by these pics. Again, at the risk of sounding like a broken record here, I had NO idea that I was this bad. Again, I knew I was bad, but this bad... nahhhh... Well, yes, it IS this bad. It will NEVER EVER be this bad again.

Now that I have these done and posted, I am taking great comfort in knowing that the next ones will be better, and the ones after that, and the ones after that and so on and so on... Time to skin this pelt!

Tidbits

My son is a demon spawn.

He was eating Chocolate Chip Pop-Tarts. And he was insisting I have one.

"Come on Daddy," he said, " You know you want one.."

"No thanks Gabe, Dad isn't eating that stuff anymore.."

"But it's full of chocolate, it's goooo-oooooood."

"I bet it is Gabe but daddy had his breakfast."

"But you want it don't you, it's yummy!"

Demon... demon... DEMON... lol... I persevered though, whew....

I DO love Pop-Tarts though... heh

I've missed blogging, as you might be able to tell from the frequency of my posts. I enjoy it, it motivates me and keeps me honest. I also missed just talking, telling a story, weaving a tale and reviewing it way down the road to see how full of shit I was at any given point. Not looking for lies, when I say full of shit I mean how confident I was in one thing or another only to not see it come to fruition. It's why I am being cautious with my goals this time, and a little guarded about my progress. I will get back to where I was and better ( by better I mean better in the cardio department, I am going to be biking this time, mainly because I want to be able to share that with my boys ), but I am not going to obsess and nitpick each and every milestone along the way. I used to do that, and I was also a camera whore. I'll take pics, but I won't be doing it as often and to the frequency I was in the past.

But yeah, back to missing blogging. It's like putting on an old comfortable sweater and being surprised to find it still fits. I slip into blogging mode that easily and with the same amount of comfort. If anything, I have to really watch myself to make sure I take the sweater off from time to time so it dosn't start stinking up the joint or wearing thin you know. Yes yes, I do like me a good anaology from time to time lol. It's also nice to see I have some returning visitors each day, means that some of you are enjoying this enough to come back each day, and thats satisying to me, and rewarding. My hope is as we progress that some of you may feel comfortable enough to take part in the comments section, ask some questions, take me to task on any of the more isiotic things I might say...

Shifting gears...

Was watching X-weighted last night. I generally enjoy the show if for no other reason than to see the looks of joy on peoples faces at the end of the program. However, I am more and more becoming a little miffed with the draconian measures the show takes. It's almost as if they treat these folks not at adults who have made a positive lifestyle change, but as hardened criminals who have pleaded guilty to the crime of obesity and must now pay the price. It obviously works, for the most part, but sometimes the extremes seem, well, a little extreme to me. Hey, god knows that maybe that kind of constant vigilance might have kept the weight off of me, but I am a firm believer, and it worked to at least TAKE the weight off me, that you MUST allow yourself a treat occasionally, and that you MUST make a gradual adjustment to ease in, other wise, lapses can and will happen. Just my opinion...

Said something to Shane today that I think will become my motto...

"I must learn to not only be excited about the journey, but I MUST be every bit as excited about the destination"

Odds and Ends

A couple of quick points before I go to bed.

My calories need to increase. Yes yes, i sound like a broken record, but its 100% true, they do need to get bumped. I also need to increase my protein intake. So, the solution to both problems? Returning to my nightly protein shake. I love those things and I am actually looking very forward to having them again. There was a time I would come home from work and be craving that smoothie, that time has come again. Yay for protein!!

Also, its become clear that I have to start taking a multi-vitamin. I knew that anyway but it was affirmed by what I have been seeing on my Fitday journal. I was looking at some tonight and I think I am just going to go with a typical Mans Multi. Once I start in the gym I will also be back to taking the creatine and glutamine and very likely glucosamine. My shoulder has really been bugging my lately, calcification of the joint was suspected but seems its just age and wear and tear. I have to be careful about that. I also expect to be in the gym sooner than I had originally speculated. I am really feeling that good about where I am now and where I feel I can be in a short time. Amazing...

I wanted to also say how much easier this has been with the support of my wife. When I last did this I had a lot of support from friends and family, but this time it feels different. To have someone to talk to this stuff about every day, to help remind me to make my entries and the encourage me... it makes it so much easier to stay focused and on target.

Well, I think thats about it for now. Thanks for dropping by!

Before pics.... kinda... lol

What a great day! Got up this morning after a wee sleep in, a real treat for us let me tell you. Started in on some dishes, had a little breakfast ( mini-wheats and skim milk ), and went out and mowed the lawn. Now, I know its not much of a mile stone, however, 3 weeks ago when I mowed the lawn I actually had to take a break a couple of times, it was long and the mower was bogging down... same this time, it's been mega raining here and today was actually the first time I got a chance to mow the lawn. Well, not a problem, mowed the whole thing AND racked it and didn't feel like I needed much of a break at all. Little steps people, little steps...


Anyhoo... the reason for this post, beyond the lawn mowing thing, was that Dee took a couple of pics of Gabe and I when we were raking. I look huge, well, the reason being, I AM huge, but I look happy, and I don't look worn out and for now I am ok with that. Thing is it will serve as a decent before pic for now. When you have the mass to lose I do clothed pics can show as much as semi-nekkid ones. I figure come X-mas I'll have enough mass gone to start in on the shirt off pics and start tracking the progress on a finer scale.

Wow, that was painless...lol... kinda

Measurements addition

Just found some of my old blogs from 4 years ago. I thought, and I was right, that I had some measurements in there from what I am now calling my pinnacle, the period of time that I was at my best prior to the fulcrum swinging back to the condition I now find myself in... I don't want to beat myself up over this much more, but just for my own benifit here they are...

First, from March 2002...

Neck- 15.5 '
Chest- 46 '
Waist - 40 '
Left Upper Arm un-flexed - 12 '
Left forearm - 10
Thigh - 23' (both side)
Calf - 16' (both side)

Not bad... this was 7 months into my transformation. Sadly I don't have any measurements from the very start, this was 100 lbs later...

Now, from Feb 2004

Neck- 16 '
Chest- 44.5 '
Waist - 34.5 '
Left Upper Arm un-flexed - 13.5 '
Left Upper Arm flexed - 15.75 '
Right Upper Arm un-flexed - 13'
Left Upper Arm flexed - 15.25'
Left forearm - 11.5
Right forearm - 11.5
Thigh - 22' (both side)
Calf - 16.5 (both side)

I could seriously cry...

I'll be happy to get back to the first lot, be happier when I am closer to the second lot.

Label reading and sodium

Well, after our walk this evening Dee and I went to Wal-Mart to pick up a few things. We ended up just cruising the aisles and reading the labels on a bunch of stuff. At first blush, sodium is EVERYWHERE and in EVERYTHING. In large amounts. In using my FitDay food calculator I was noticing a fair amount of sodium and was wondering where the heck all that crap was coming from, the sort answer is EVERYWHERE. Crazy...

We ended up in the cereal aisle. Now I am a HUGE fan of Vector Cereal. It's marketed as a healthy alternative, a meal replacement even, and supposed to have a ton of wholesome goodness in it... well, you know what else it has, a BUCKETLOAD of sodium! 365 mgs of the stuff to be exact, and thats before you add the milk, which by the way has, you guess it, sodium as well! What was even more surprising to me was when I compared the Vector to a kids cereal. You would expect the kids cereal to have not so much goodness and more calories via sugar. Surprise, not so... the kids cereal had half the calories in the same serving, only 25 mgs and the actual nutritional values were much the same. Crazy, and then, shreaded wheat... top dog by far, more fibre, no sodium and low calories. Needless to say the shreaded wheat was what came home with me!

Lesson to be learned? Read labels, understand that what you may believe about a food and whats in it may be very far removed from the truth.

The holy shit aftermath...

Nada...

After brewing over it and really feeling kinda freaked out, depressed, pissed off and a gambit of other emotions, the wife, the kids and I loaded up and went for a 3.8 klick walk around Quidi Vidi.

Thing is, it's a number, a horrible one, but it'll never be that high again... all it will do is look even better once I take this crap off...

Anyhoo... just a shortie to say that I am not letting that hinder or depress me in the least... time to move on and take it all off..

A holy shit moment...

There's not really much to say... I was riding such a high and now I just want to crawl away and sob...

Starting taking my measurements, was going to do the whole gambit... from neck down to calves and all points in between but I just stopped when I had a few... no point in taking smaller measurements when the bigger ones paint an obvious story... once I lose some inches in the core I'll take them elsewhere...

For now, here's the awful awful truth...

Neck - 17
Chest - 55
Abdomen - 53
Hips - 51

Pictures will be coming at a later date, I've taken as much visual truth as I can for a couple of days.

Quickie post on calorie intake

Well, one thing I have learned over the past couple of days is that I really need to increase my caloric intake. Ideally I would like to be up around 2000 calories daily right now, until I start in the gym in any event, at which time I should boost that by 500 or so, protein calories mostly, easily accomplished with a shake!

It's amazing to me how little calories can be eaten in a day and still feel satisfied. So far, just 10 days in, I have zero desire to cheat or anything. My business partner actually left a bag of cookies at the office , the bastard, lol, and I had zero cravings for them despite them being RIGHT there large as life... this is a HUGE step for me.

On last thing, it looks like I will have my pics and measurements up this weekend as well... still not looking forward to the pics... blah...

And finally, I am going to leave you with a pic of my main man Gabe. He started in kindergarten today and I really couldn't be prouder of him... HE is my inspiration, along with his brother and my sweetie...

Later folks!

Oh gross

Ye gads.... I knew I was bad, but man, this is just crazy!!! For shits and grins I decided to log what would be a typical Tuesday for me. Here in Canada Tuesday is known as Twoonie Tuesdays at KFC. I would get two of these, which amounted to 2 legs, 2 wings and 2 servings of fries. I would eat one for lunch and another a little later. Typically in the morning prior to heading into the office I would either finish Gabes Sandwich or have one of my own. On the way into work we would grab coffees at Timmies and more often than not a box of timbits. That night when I got home we would have a late supper, and during the summer a BBQ wouldn't be out of the question. Typically again we would BBQ a pack of wieners first, then steaks. We would have say baked spuds with ranch dressing and a heaping pile of mushrooms, onions and peppers sauteed. Then later than night it wouldn't be a stretch to have a big bag of Doritos with a onion dip. Ice cream is not unheard of as well...

HOOOOOOOOOOOOOLY shit, its just sickening when you lay it all out there like that... sick sick sick... NO MORE... this Fitday program is going to make me SO responsible for what goes into my body... wow... I am floored. Floored that I could eat that in a day and NOT think it would affect me, floored that I had gotten to a state of denial so thorough and complete that it would allow me to function like that... wow... kick in the ass??? Oh hell yeah.... this will NEVER happen again, it can't, I'll die... literally, I will die, intakes like that will kill me as sure as a bullet to the brain will kill me...

Folks, if you eat fastfood, if you eat crap... do yourself a favor and enter a fitday journal for ONE day and see what it gets you... it could be the best thing you have EVER done...

Now I am going to go and shake my head a little more... and bear this shame...

Fitday Journal

Well, just started up my fitday journal. I really liked this tool when I last lost weight and I plan on using it to make it a success this time around as well...

You can view my summary anytime by following this link.

It's also over there on the right in my link section.

Man, I need to actually UP my caloric intake right now... thats actually a surprise as I am not at all hungry...

I'll be filling in more details there as well as I proceed...

Try it out, it works like a charm!

Blah...

Still waiting on those before pics. I am hoping to get a chance to get them done this evening, if not, for sure by the weekend. I do have a rather GROSS picture to share though. This was taken the weekend of our wedding. At a beach in the town next door. Not pretty at all. You know at the time I didn't think I was that big. It was when I started seeing the wedding pictures that I really realized that something was terribly wrong with me. Still though, that wasn't enough to kick me in the ass and snap out of it.

Luckily though, in looking at other pictures taken more recently, for example when Damian came home, I don't THINK I look near as bloated and just soft as I did there. I have to admit, the winter and spring leading up to our wedding was something of a mess for me. My mother passed away in Jan, we actually debated getting married at all that summer as planned, we then decided to have a scaled back version and finally decided to go all out and do what we would have done had Mom not passed. I am not for one moment blaming the way I looked on Mom's passing, that would be a cop-out. I am however not so naive as to think I wasn't doing and EXTREME amount of comfort and stress related eating, once again, falling back on my addiction with full force.

I do feel bad for Dee though, she fell in love with a guy who was in pretty decent shape, active and full of energy, she ended up marrying a bloated version who was in poor shape and lethargic. I apologized to her for letting it get to that point. I really didn't mean for it to happen, I really didn't realize how bad it was... she is an amazing woman to love me equally throughout...