Showing posts with label obesity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label obesity. Show all posts

October 28, 2015

a nutrition coach for weightlifting!

In 2004 I weighed 292 pounds. And then I found triathlon and I gradually got thinner as I became more involved in the sport. I got down to and maintained my dream racing weight of 175 pounds. I fell off the diet wagon May of 2012 shortly after I got ran over by a vehicle while I was cycling and suffered a traumatic brain injury. I retired from triathlon and since then I've gained a ridiculous amount of weight. My top weight, which I hit this month, was 318 pounds. I've tried dieting a thousand times. It never works. On the rare occasion I do lose weight for a few weeks in a row I always gain it all back and then some. I got tired of struggling to lose weight and failing. I got sick of being embarrassed about how I look. I got sick of not being able to buy clothes anywhere but Big and Tall stores. I got sick of being to fat to be able to play basketball or ride bikes with my kids. And I've developed sleep apnea from being grossly obese. I decided to do something about it. I hired a nutrition coach, weightlifter Barry Schroeder. He owned(still owns) three New Mexico state record in the 35-39 age group 105k weight class. Then he lost a lot of weight, dropped down to the 94k weight class and broke the 3 state records in that weight class too. To lose that much weight and still be strong enough to crush numerous state records means he knows the science of nutrition and how to eat to perform well for weightlifting while losing weight. I contacted him and asked if he'd be willing to help me. He was very enthusiastic about it. His prices are phenomenal too! Only $75 a month! First step is he'll track my food, calories, and weight for a week, then I'll start his diet magic! Next stop is the 105k weight class and qualifying for the masters national weightlifting championships! I'll keep you informed on my progress! I'm pumped!

December 26, 2014

2015 & 2016 Olympic weightlifting goals

When i first started weightlifting in December of 2013 my ultimate goal was to beat an amazing local weightlifter by the name of Barry Schroeder. After watching him lift at a couple meets and seeing him break every New Mexico weightlifting record in both the 94k & 105k thirty five to thirty nine age group i decided to change my goals to something more realistic. 

On August 1st 2014, only 8 months into the sport of weightlifting i was strong enough to break the 105k+ forty to forty four age group New Mexico weightlifting state records. At that time I also become motivated to lose weight and i decided I'd attempt to break the state records in the 105k & 94k forty to forty four age group New Mexico state weightlifting records as i lost weight. Shortly after setting those new goals i fell off the diet wagon and gave up on losing weight. Since then I've gained more weight, for the first time in my life I'm over 300 pounds and I've developed the beginning stages of sleep apnea. So here i am motivated once again to break state records as i lose weight and get to an ideal body weight.  

Barry Schroeder will age up and start lifting in my age group in 2017. So i have until early 2017 to break the old 105k & 94k records, after which its possible he'll crush any records i set between now and then. Or the other option is I gain enough strength to accomplish my original goal of beating Barry Schroeder so my records will stand regardless of what age group he's in. 


My current best lifts after 12 months of Olympic weightlifting are:
Snatch 79k 
Clean and jerk 103k 
Total 182


The records for the 105k 40-44AG are: 
95k snatch set by Doug Briggs in 1999 (I'm currently 16k away from this state record)
122k clean and jerk set by Doug Briggs in 2000 (19k away)
215k total set by Doug Briggs in 1999 (35k away)


The 94k weight class state records are:
100k Snatch set by Jim Snyder in 2005 (I'm currently 21k away from this state record)
117.5k clean and jerk set by Jim Snyder in 2005 (15.5k away)
217.5k total set in 2005 by a Jim Snyder (36.5k away)

June 15, 2008

societies accepted prejudice

I'm well aware that some of my posts about my overeating aren't pretty, & that some people will be uncomfortable with my rampant & destructive overeating. I am trying to keep a promise I've made with myself- to accept responsibility while at the same time striving to shed guilt & leave shame behind I don't think I am shirking if I say I don't believe that I could have behaved any differently than I had. There is a paradox at work there. At each particular moment & with every bite of food I took in, I had a choice. By eating so rampantly, I made the wrong choice again & again. But in a broader, deeper way, I don't believe I had a choice at all. Something was controlling me.

If the exact nature of the fat disease is beyond my understanding, some of it's implications have become painfully clear to me during the 7 years I was overweight to obese. During the time of 2000-2007 I had been shunned for dates, heard unkind nick-names, I came to know firsthand about our culture's deep biases against fat people.

Like every form of prejudice, those biases interfere with our being seen as individuals. Once someone got to know me I became a person. I was Cody. But until that point was reached-if it ever was- I was a stereotype, a silhouette, a cut out with a rounded shape not deemed to be attractive.

If the bias against fat begins as a prejudice regarding how we look, it ends up running much deeper. People tend to make all sorts of assumptions about those of us who are fat. They tend to imagine that in some perverse way we have chosen to be fat & that we could be thin if only we'd get a grip & show some discipline, if only we'd rise up off our fat behinds & get some exercise. In allot of cases its not that easy. Unfat people tend to blame us for our burden even though its our burden, not theirs.

Not only do many people disapprove of us for being fat; they feel perfectly free to show it. Even now, in the 21st century, as we are finally becoming respectful of diversity in things like race & gender, we as a culture still seem to condone sneering & smirking at fat people. Unfat people seem to think it's fine to stare at what we order in restaurants & glare if it doesn't meet with their approval. Fat jokes are still a staple of so-called comedy on TV & in the movies. Fat stereotypes still abound. A fat man is likely to be presented as falsely jolly or a pathetic man. A greedy politician will nearly always have an ample belly. A hero's side kick may be portrayed as fat, for comic relief. The hero of course will be lean.

These insensitive representations of fat people are bad enough if we think of fatness simply as a human difference. They become simply inexcusable as we accept the idea that fatness isn't just a difference but a disease. Can you imagine civilized people making jokes about any other disease the way they make jokes about being fat?

Now, even if you refuse to admit that fatness is a disease let me ask you, why is it ok for our society to treat fat people like they are diseased. If your friends with one, or God forbid you date a fatty, -as if being with a fat man cast doubt on their own attractiveness. Some of the people I've debated this with say its because fatness is a choice. We are fat because we are to lazy not to be. Its true, I can, & did, just like any other fat person could, take steps to become thinner, or in societies eyes become better looking & more attractive. A person who gets cancer, isn't it their choice to get treatment. If they are unsuccessful at that treatment, could any person in their right mind make fun of them or treat them unkindly? People make that choice to treat fat people poorly all the time. I felt horrid about myself every moment I was fat. I didn't like myself. Others made me not like myself, because they acted like they didn't like me. Others treated me differently once I got fat who had never treated me poorly before. I'll never forget the day a family member whom I loved & trusted pulled me aside & told me to be a good Father & husband I needed to not be overweight. Why would he say that to me? I was still the same person I was before I had gained my weight. I feel so bad for people who are fat because of the way they are treated. Treating someone differently because they are fat, being uncomfortable having to talk to one, or being disgusted if you are on a blind date with one is a prejudice. Think prejudice is to harsh a word? Could someone imagine the uproar there would be if someone actually suggested a person of color get some kind of treatment to become less dark so that they will be more successful, trusted, or even accepted? How virulent is today's bias against fat? I recently came across a study in which a group of collage students were asked whom they would least likely marry. When the results were tallied, it turned out these students would Rather be wed to a cocaine user, a former mental patient, a shoplifter, a sexually promiscuous partner, a communist, an atheist, or a blind person than someone who is fat. Welcome to a fat persons life. That's what people hint, & even say to us everyday.

Be nice, fat people are human too. We have emotions just like everyone else, if anything we are even more sensitive than most because we are so often the brunt of mistreatment. Don't treat us differently because we're the same person no matter what we weigh. Its not healthy to be overweight, but we shouldn't be treated like we are doing something wrong.