My Battle With The Bulge

Well, I guess I've put it off long enough. I spent alot of time in college and in South America as a relatively fit guy, but then when I graduated and joined the sit at my computer and do absolutely no physical exercise at all world, the pounds started sneaking back on to me. And here I am at an unhealthy 285 pounds-- at 5 feet 8 inches, mind you. Two years ago, on my 33rd birthday I was rushed to the emergency room because my fasting blood sugar was at 444, and I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. Each morning with breakfast I need to take a pill and each evening with dinner I need to take another, or my blood sugar will spiral out of control.

That scared the crap out of me--but it served me right. After years of abusing my body by continually living the college lifestyle and eating the typical fast food garbage, my body had finally had enough and started to fight back and tell me that I couldn't live like this anymore. I needed to lose weight.

At this time I was in graduate school, so I had plenty of time to exercise and shop for good wholesome foods that would help me get off the pills and regulate my blood sugar through diet and exercise alone. The fear I had (and I still have now) was that I would still keep my gut and the pills would stop working, which would force me to inject insulin, from which there may be no return. So I bought a gym membership and started eating good foods (which incidentally is much more likely to happen if you do the cooking yourself). Slowly my blood sugar came down as I would hit the treadmill 3 times a week and swim nearly every day (I would swim two miles a day-- it's amazing what the fear of death will do to you). I also ate foods that were high in fiber, good on the protein side, but lower in carbohydrates and fat.

After 3 months I had lost nearly 40 pounds, and my fasting blood sugar hovered around 95. Fasting blood sugar of 95 is characteristics of non diabetics!! This was coming easy.

But then something happened. I went to Mexico city for a week, and I figured that I could take a break from diet and exercise-- after all, I was doing fine. But that turned things around and I began to fall into bad habits. Worse yet, I learned that eating foods with sugar or that were high in carbohydrates would only slightly elevate my blood sugar. Turns out that because I was dieting an exercising regularly, my body had started to release insulin properly again.

That was bad, because I started to believe that I had beat it, and that I could eat bad foods occasionally, which quickly digressed into frequently, and now I find myself in a situation where I no longer fear immediate death from Type 2 Diabetes (it's a much slower and painful one) and am eating poorly again.

Fortunately, I'm not stupid. With each Big Mac I eat, or slice of key lime pie, Ice cream, pizza, or any other high fat/carbohydrate/sugar food my kidneys are slowly dying. I know that if I don't change my lifestyle--not temporarily but permanently-- I will eventually die of kidney failure or another diabetes related disease. And I don't want to. I want to get married, have children, and watch them all have grandchildren before I am called back home. That's what true happiness is.

And that's why I started this blog. To give others with the same difficulty losing weight hope, and to give me accountability, to myself and to those that read this blog. Type 2 diabetes is completely reversible in the sense that it can be completely controlled with diet and exercise--with healthy living. I know this, because I nearly did it before, and it's high time that I went all the way and shed this extra hundred or so pounds so that I can get off of the pills and control the disease with a new, healthy lifestyle.

And even before I was diagnosed with diabetes, I had lost weight before. I used to box in New York City before and after work each day. It was club boxing, so I wasn't going to be the Golden Gloves champ or anything, but that experience taught me physical discipline, but more importantly, it taught me that I could lose weight-- I just had to make a committed effort.

Now's my chance to change this thing and get my life back on track, beat back the beast and take control of my health for good. And all of you get to watch.