At my heaviest in University I was 11st 6lbs (Feb 08). Around September 08 after the summer of running, the time I went to Magaluf, I weighed in at 10st 5lbs. A good weight for someone of my body type. However, for some reason I started to feel sick everytime I ate. I would be blindingly hungry and take a bite of something and immediately feel sick. And not just a little nauseous; I would honestly feel like it was a struggle to hold my food down. But I carried on running. And obviously, through lack of appetite and feeling sick, I wasn't consuming enough calories to continue with an active lifestyle and the weight started to fall off. I realised this and stopped running, yet I continued to lose weight. I was tested for H.Pylori (stomach ulcers), Diabetes, Coeliacs and a whole host of other things, all of which came back negative & normal. Ultimately, the good Doctor told me he had concerns that I was depressed and that a combination of anxiety and depression could be the cause of my troubles. I would agree in hindsight - I was under a lot of stress with university and so on, and I also house an irrational fear of being sick (emetophobia - more on that another day maybe!) which didn't help!
However he didn't want to put me on anti-depressants until I had kicked the nausea (as anti-depressants are known to cause nausea themselves!). So he gave me a perscription for some tablets to be taken to ease the sick feeling... but I didn't take them. May sound crazy but in a way I wanted to master my own body. I knew it was stupid that I was feeling sick, I just couldn't seem to shift it.
At my lowest I dropped to an exceptionally unhealthy 9st 3lbs - well, that's the lowest I have recorded, no doubt I fell below that at some point. And that was around June '09. I gained and lost weight intermittently here but was still very skinny and scrawny. As I see myself everyday, I couldn't really see it, but I was frequently told by people I'd not seen for a while that I had lost a lot of weight or that I looked unwell. Looking back at pictures from the time you can really see it, especially when compared with now.
Around Sep/Oct, I started to think enough is enough. Motivation? Well. I've always sheltered a desire to be a god-like specimen of a man who's irresistible to every woman (I think every man does whereas some act on it and others don't!). And, regardless of doing Martial Arts for years, I felt like a 'victim' and weak and vulnerable. I wanted to look strong and powerful as well as BE strong and BE powerful. Ultimately, I wanted to look good and feel good about myself and boost my confidence a bit - when will I finally be happy with it, who knows?
I just started eating more. Simple as that. I ate more food and just manned up and dealt with the sick feeling afterwards and eventually it started to subside and I started feeling hungry ALOT. I also started to get myself into a routine of actually getting up early (even if not working) and eating breakfast. Before, for years and years, I've hardly been able to touch breakfast without feeling queezy cos it's so early, and now I can't go without it! I'm starving when I wake up!
My biggest boost of inspiration came around January. I started thinking about a career in the Marines. The minimum weight they accept is 60kg, yet advise on being 65kg when you start training as everyone loses weight. I started training as if I was going to apply to be a Marine, even if I chose not to be. I also broke up with my girlfriend, and although we were still great friends, I now had more time and a lot of emotional baggage to channel into getting in shape.
I signed up for the local gym along with all the other New Years Resolutioners and have seen many of them fall by the wayside!
I succumbed to supplements and got hold of some Whey Protein to boost my protein intake.
I got some L-Glutamine to keep my immune system up whilst my body works hard - but only after getting ill about 3 times in 2 months. Damn sweaty, germ-filled people at the gym!
I made a point of drinking alot of water.
I read up on everything! It took over my life for a little while whilst I planned training routines, looked at different exercises, read websites and magazines all about the ins and outs of 'bulking up'. I've even kept a food diary keeping track of my protein intake from 23/01/2010 until now, 14/05/2010 and beyond.
I entered myself in some runs such as a 6 Mile run for Sport Relief and a 10k Military course involving chest-deep water pools, crawling under nets and so on.
I got myself some proper running shoes. Weight gloves. An armband for my iPod. A barbell for my workouts at home. I even got a towel specially for the gym.
I was in it to win it!
The Results
Date: Weight in Stone & Lbs
06/02/2008 11.6
05/05/2008 11.2
11/06/2008 11.6
08/07/2008 10.13
03/09/2008 10.5
17/09/2008 10.3
23/10/2008 10
30/10/2008 10
19/02/2009 9.6
16/06/2009 9.3
06/08/2009 9.5
23/08/2009 9.5
05/10/2009 9.8
22/10/2009 9.7
31/10/2009 9.8
23/11/2009 9.10
07/12/2009 9.13
29/12/2009 9.13
21/01/2009 9.11
21/02/2010 10.1
21/03/2010 10.4
31/03/2010 10.5
06/05/2010 10.5
And there I hit a 'plateau' as it's known in the industry. And I'm working through that now. Will keep you posted! But as you can see I'm now back at a pretty ideal weight for my height and I have a good BMI and a good fat percentage.
For the Marines you have to run 1.5miles on a 2% incline in less than 12minutes and 30seconds followed by a further 1.5 miles 'return' in less than 10m 30s as a best effort run. Here are my return run times:
13th Jan: 10.13
15th Jan: 9.25
17th Jan: 9.05
24th Jan: 9.02
28th Jan: 8.20
15th Feb: 8.10
I took a break from the Marines training as I was working on the 10km runs and therefore more endurance than speed. I came back and tried it in April expecting the worst and I got:
23rd April: 6.50
A personal best! And almost 4 minutes quicker than the accepted time.
So, let it be a lesson to you - you can do whatever you put your mind too. Putting on weight is SO much harder than losing it. You have to appreciate that it doesn't happen over night, but you have to persist and take it one step at a time. To quote "Always I will take another step - and if that is to no avail, I will take another. And yet another. For in truth, one step at a time is not difficult. I know that small attempts repeated will complete any undertaking. I will persist until I succeed."
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