Originally Posted by
Kevin.Imel
A bit late to the overall party but I'll toss my story on the fire as it might help others.
Summer 2015. Age: 53. Weight: >365lbs (no actual solid data on how heavy I was but that was the last recorded weight for me earlier that year at a doctor's office). Height: 6' 2". Hypertensive, pre-diabetic, etc. I pilot a desk all day, every day, as an IT manager. I rode the bus or drove everywhere. I started having a lot of sharp pain L4/L5 and landed in a spinal orthopedist's office (eventually). You can guess the diagnosis. Spinal stenosis, arthritis, spinal degradation, bulged L3/L4/L5 disks. Doc puts it out there plain and simple. If I keep going where I am going I will be unable to walk much, if at all in about five years and will likely be dead within seven. Then he does what no other doctor had ever done before. He gave me tools. He suggested a diet plan and pointed me at MFP to start logging what I ate. I downloaded the app before I left the parking lot and started logging the next day. A Fitbit followed soon after. I didn't modify anything for a couple days because I didn't believe I was eating that badly. I was, of course, dead wrong. A blast of cortisone in the spine takes care of the pain.
Because I didn't know any better, I began walking at lunch and did a total overhaul on my diet (this later would send me into the land of malnutrition but I am getting ahead of myself). The first week I made it about a half mile, had to sit down and rest, and barely made it the half mile back to my office. I was drenched in sweat and exhausted. Over the next six months I kept at it, walking five-six days a week until I was walking a 5K at a good clip (>3 mph according to my Fitbit) five to six days a week. My knees and ankles have been so abused by my weight that running wasn't really a consideration.
The weight came off, fast. Probably too fast. People started asking if I was "sick" (euphemism for cancer, I think). I am feeling pretty darn good (felt great at the time) and once again buying clothes off the racks that aren't in the "big and tall" section. The first time I bought a new winter coat off that wasn't in the big and tall or mail order I was in tears. It had been more than 20 years since I had done that.
Then I hit around 275 and the weight stopped coming off. According to my Fitbit even pushing at a 3.5 mph pace my heart rate didn't elevate much. I started carrying dumbbells then a weighted backpack but very rapidly any heart rate increase I could cause would level out. I finally got below 265 lbs but my annual blood work was a mess and I wasn't feeling all that great. I was off into the land of malnutrition. Turns out 2000 calories a day with all that activity was destroying my body. I spent a few hours talking to a friend who is a nutritionist and they tweaked my diet up to 2500 calories and adjusted the macros (increased carbs and fat, held protein).
Spring 2016 I had to have my left shoulder rotator cuff repaired. I weighed 273 lbs when I checked in at the surgery center. I was feeling better because my nutrition was closer to correct. Surgery and initial recovery were normal. PT was where things changed. My PT wanted not just range of motion like my prior rotator cuff PT had wanted. He wanted ROM and weight bearing capacity. This was all bands, body weight, some dumbbells/kettlebells and some machine work...but I discovered I liked weight training...a lot! My weight started climbing again but I resisted the urge to cut calories suspecting that the gain was muscle mass, not fat. A quick check with the nutritionist and some tweaks to macros and bumping up the calories again and I was off to the races.
The next several months I got into TRX then Sandbags (which are a lot of fun and I still enjoy the work). Then I found Starting Strength 3rd edition earlier this year and my world changed. When Barbell Prescription came out I devoured that as well. I had never, ever done any formal weight training. I was told at a young age I had a bad back (discovered after a bad skiing accident left me unable to walk without massive pain for a couple wekes) and that I would not be able to lift heavy things, ever. Damn.
Today, my home gym build out is underway while I do what I can with low ceilings and tight space in the house (the gym bro factor in the campus gyms is far too high for me to tolerate...I tried, but no way). Right now I am limited on my squats to my heaviest sandbag (130 lbs) in a weird goblet-esque squat. DL was 295 lbs for five this morning. Due to shoulder issues I've been avoiding the overhead work but am checking on that and will probably play and see if the docs are wrong about that too. Bench will come when the rack gets built (hopefully this weekend). Body weight has stabilized around 295. I've lost 8% body fat over the last year down to 29% and falling (I get tested in a body pod six times a year through a research program here on campus) but my body weight hasn't really fluctuated and solid mass has gone up, as one would expect.
Would my path have been different if I had gone under the bar at 375? I don't honestly know. I most probably wouldn't have wandered off into the land of malnutrition.
By most estimates I am still obese so that makes me an obese trainee, I guess. My GP likes to tell me I am obese, then he laughs because he knows how ludicrous the BMI charts are and he has seen me at my worst. My A1c is now low normal. I once again am hypertensive because they decided to drop the threshold of hypertension, whatever. As my numbers show, my body fat % is dropping as my solid mass % climbs.
I am stronger now than I have ever been in my entire life and realizing that I allowed misinformation and ignorance to steal almost 40 years of my life. I don't know where LP will end (do any of us?) but I am determined to figure that out and see just how strong this "Elderly, obese" body can get.
I am also a volunteer EMT in the small town where I live. The other night as I was helping carry a patient out of their house on a gurney I started grinning...because I had the heavy end of the cot...only it wasn't heavy. Awesome.