Just before Christmas I was flying back from a funeral of a good friend , Teacher and Mentor, Greg Snowdon-The White Kangaroo. He was a truly Magic Man, but there was a gift for me that I was not expecting. Being at his funeral , and him being only 56, me being 53, sort of scared me, massive heart attack leaving the pool after his regular exercise swim. Gorgeous man, gone.
Whilst waiting for my connecting flight with some time to kill, a saw a book that caught my eye. I picked it up because of the title. " The Great Aussie Bloke Slim Down" How an over 50 former footballer went from fat to fit and lost 45 kilo. by Peter Fitzsimons
Now I have been writing occasionally about my weight battles. It was one of the earlier behavioural medicators I picked up to cover up the pain of growing up in my childhood home with an abusive mentally ill mother, and a father, passive-whom never intervened. He also was trying to save himself as he had married his mother.
In the year of my fathers decline and death, coinciding with the birth and sleep disturbed beautiful Maverick, and stress from a promotion that I was not equipped to deal with, lets say food became my nightly comfort, as it did many years ago. I tried Isagenix, and watched most of my peers lose the weight and look amazing, whilst I would do it for a short while, and end up back at my old habits. I thought when I left the stressful Executive position for a calmer life with being a father as the priority, it would get better, but with another baby, and nearly losing my wife again at birth, I was not able to commit to anything that made a difference.
So as I sat at Melbourne airport, I read, and Peter spoke straight to me. One Bloke talking to another. He said it in the book, and he was right, he knew me, cause he was just like me. Thank you for your honesty mate. I even gave the book to my wife to read the intro, which was written by his wife Lisa Wilkinson, and she shared her pain and fear of watching it all happen from the wings and not be able to help. My wife has supported me gently and with love, and I could not seem to gether the enthusiasm to start , and stay with it.
I didn't stop straight away , but he was planting a seed. The only real success I had losing weight and keeping it off was going off sugar. I would always end up back on it, and I didn't know why, but all of that was answered in the book. So Jan 2nd I went cold turkey, of the white poison. I didn't go on a diet as Peter says, I changed my diet. Real food, every meal.
Then came the Christmas present.
My wife last year won one years personal training with Calvin Douwes
, owner of Never Better Personal Training. Last week was week one. Leading up to "D" Day, I started walking and doing basic exercises, but nothing prepared me for Day one I even arrived late, but the shorter session was all I could handle. I am glad nobody filmed me. I am 35 kilo over weight. I t was humbling to attempt the exercises. I was grateful that there was a bunch of folks, so as unfit as myself, some obviously much further along for already being on the program last year.
Calvin is a gentle humorous encouraging inspiring regular dude. Personal trainers are an interesting breed of folks. They get people moving, and start us from where we are at. In my case, it feels along way behind the starting line. But over the week I did my best, stopped when I had to, kept going when I could. I could never have come anywhere even close to doing what I did without Calvin. Thank you mate. You make the torture me nearly enjoyable .I had stayed strong on the sugar free, and exorcised every day, including my off days.
My body was ridiculously sore all week, but got a bit better on the weekend.Today I went to the beach with my wife and the boys. Harlands first time at the beach In the water. Usually when I would get to the weekend, I would be tired from work, and lacking energy. It was awesome to have the energy already to get up and do something with my boys. I want to be with them for as long as I can. I was also sick of being a survivor-I want to be a thriver. I want my wife to look at me and feel proud, I want my boys to grow up and look at their father and feel proud to. Its not the weight, obesity is awful, and yes you wear it on your body for all to see. It the lack of courage to go to any lengths to be as well as I can be to look after and provide for my family. I want to look my self in the mirror and feel I am taking responsibility for myself, for my recovery. One of my mentors Patrick Carnes states that Rest and Sleep, Healthy Food and regular exercise are the three pillars to a healthy recovery, and in my line of work I felt I was not living in my integrity.
I was feeling disconnected from my core, my purpose, and lacking that inner connectedness to the Universe, to others , to the Creator.
So it's getting late, time to rest, cause when that alarm bell goes off at 5.30am, I will be up, dressed and heading to the park. If your driving to work and see us souls struggling send us some love. Lord knows we need it as we are learning to love ourselves.
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