JOLIET JERRY'S DORM ROOM

“Dude, you should write a book.” I cannot tell you how many times I have heard this in the last year or so. My response? “Um, thanks, but no I shouldn’t.” Here’s a little background. New Year’s Day, 2006 I weighed 296 pounds. I couldn’t walk up the stairs in my house without being winded. Couldn’t play with my kids for more than a minute or two without needing to rest. I cannot tell you things like how high my cholesterol was, what my body fat percentage was, or even my blood pressure though I know all these things were off the charts. I can tell you I wasn’t happy…with myself, with life, with anything. Funny thing is, I never thought I looked liked someone who weighed nearly 300 pounds. I was wrong.

So how does someone get there? How do you become the guy who was always the “husky” kid (and don’t we all love that word), to the teenager who was athletic and strong, to the middle aged adult who leads a completely sedentary lifestyle and ends up weighing 300 pounds? To give the reasons sounds like making excuses, which I have never done and will never do, but let’s just say a nasty divorce, issues with my family, a “road warrior” sales job, and an extremist, addictive personality are a deadly combination. I really do consider myself lucky. I sought solace in food rather than alcohol or drugs which may have been more difficult to gain control over and could have easily killed me.

So it sounds like the kind of story that could inspire people and help motivate people to make positive changes in their own lives, and therein lies the reason to bring the message to the masses, right? Well there is a problem with that…the people who need the message most, don’t want to hear it. If I had a miracle drug, the latest gadget or gizmo, or if I was a doctor that could perform the miracle surgery the world would beat a path to my door. But I don’t have any of those things. All I have to offer people is what works. And that’s what no one wants to hear…because it isn’t quick and easy, it doesn’t come in a bottle, you cannot order it from TV for three easy payments, and it requires effort.

So just what is the secret? The people reading this likely already know it. It boils down to a couple very basic things: stop treating your stomach like a garbage disposal, push yourself away from the table, and get off the couch and start moving. This is all you need to know to get started and the weight loss business in America is a billion dollar industry.

People ask me for more specifics. Okay, basic dietary rule of thumb is that if a food isn’t doing something good for your body, don’t eat it. The less processed the better (how many people know that the byproducts of most food processing plants are required to be disposed of as hazardous materials? That should tell us something). I would have 6 oz of meat or protein, five fruits and vegetables, 2 servings of low fat or fat free dairy, and 9 servings of carbs (mostly complex, whole grains) per day. I added fat to nothing…no butter, no margarine, no cooking oil, no salad dressing. The meats were grilled chicken breast, turkey breast, and grilled fish or water packed tuna only. No red meat, though a lean steak once in a while is okay. Once a week I would have a cheat meal, though after a few weeks of eating this clean the fats in the cheat meal made me sick so didn’t even want that anymore.

Is this a restrictive diet? No, it is one that promotes creativity in the kitchen. No one has less time to prepare foods than I did. Restaurant meals are a fact of life? Try being a salesman, on the road, having lunches and dinners with clients. You can do this if you take control of what goes into your body. There isn’t a restaurant in the country that I can’t walk into and end up eating a healthy meal. It just has to be important to you.

What about exercise? My first workout consisted of going down to my basement and un-burying my treadmill. After I cleaned the accumulated dust and debris from it, and made sure it still worked, I walked on it for 15 minutes at what seemed to be a fairly brisk pace. Workout number two I walked for 15 minutes then increased the pace to a jog for one minute. I thought I was going to die. Every workout after that I increased that jog time by one minute. Before to long I was running for 45 minutes 4-5 times per week.

I shed 90 pounds in about seven months. After I had lost about 50 I hit a plateau where I didn’t lose anything for a month. Then the rest came off. So now I was almost at my 200 pound goal weight and I could run like crazy, but I still felt weak. That’s when I hit the gym. I started lifting, got my weight down to 185 and felt great. Now it is a year and a half from the time I started and I weigh 190 with bodyfat in the low teens. My cholesterol and blood pressure are excellent and I have a new lease on life.

When I lay this out for people who ask (believe me, I NEVER offer this story unsolicited) the typical responses I get and my replies look something like this…

“I wish I could do that so easy” I never said it was easy. It isn’t. If I ever made it look easy it is because I took responsibility for myself and made a commitment to change.

“I just don’t have the time” When I got started I worked a 40 hour plus job, much of it spent on the road. Not to mention raising my 14 and 12 year old sons never missing a game, concert, play, parent teacher conference, or any other activity.

“That would never work for me” You are right. It will never work for you as long as you sit there believing it won’t. You have to do it, you have to believe in it, and believe in yourself in order to change.

“That would just take forever” I answer this one with a question. How long has it been since you looked the way you want to look? Since you weighed what you want to weigh? The typical response is along the lines of, “Oh God, it’s been ten years!” or “Not since I was a kid!”. Exactly. It took you years and years and years to get to where you are now. I promise…I guarantee…that if you do the things I describe (healthy eating, portion control, and exercise) it will take you a small fraction of the time to reverse all the abuse you have been putting your body through.

My final thought is this. If this is such a simple thing, why isn’t everyone doing it? Remember that billion dollar weight loss industry? I have a secret for you…they don’t want you to know what works because they want you to fail. Does it not strike anyone as odd that the more weight loss centers, miracle drugs, fad diet books, diet bars and drinks, five-minutes-a-day exercise gadgets there are the fatter America gets? If everyone made simple changes in their lifestyle that don’t require any of these products what would happen to that billion dollar industry? It would dry up and blow away. How does any business assure their success? Repeat business. If your potential market (in this case obese people) decreases in numbers, there are fewer people and fewer dollars to allocate to your products. The life of these companies depends on keeping America fat.

So maybe you can see why I respond as I do when told about writing a book. I am passionate and perhaps a little to harsh about this topic. I want nothing more than to destroy all evidence of the fat, weak person I was and just show the world who I am now. But I don’t, and I won’t destroy that evidence. That is why I posted a picture of who I was here on my profile. I can never forget that because it reminds me of what was and what could be again if I am not always vigilant. So now I go to the gym, I even work there, and when I see someone who is what I used to be I befriend them. I encourage them. I let them know that I understand what they are going through…even though sometimes I have to convince them that I do. I try to help them. I will be seeking my personal training certificate and trying to make a business of helping people in that situation. The problem I will face there is that I will see people needing help who won’t or can’t pay for it and I will help them anyway. I guess that’s what they call karma.

Thanks for reading my rant.

Jerry