Team Beachbody ¡preestreno!Español Guest

My transformation story began in childhood when I started to realize I was differnet than most of the kids around me. Different in that I was husky, or fat as some like to call it. Through the years I lost weight and gained weight many times through unhealthy means, like fad diets or starvation. To get into the military I even had to lose about 30 pounds. I could always lose the weight but could never keep it off. I came into the Air Force in 1998 and for my first nine years I failed my fitness test. When you fail a fitness test especially back then, you were given another chance 12 weeks later to pass it and thats when I would dig down and just sweak by. In 2003 when I was stationed in Germany I found out that I was promoted to Staff Sergeant (SSgt) the sad news is, because I was so heavy (235 lbs.) they help my stripe until I lost the weight. It took me four months but through everything I knew about weight loss (all the dangerous things) I dropped down to 191 lbs. and finally got my stripe. I am not proud in the way that I lost the weight and it showed when after only two months, I jumped up to 265 lbs. I was slow, fat, lazy, and depressed. I continued my old ways of failing and then passing the fitness test for the next two years in Germany. Next, I moved back to the United States and now reside in New Mexico. I arrived here in 2006 and weighed 265 lbs. My waist was 42" and I was wearing the largest uniform I had ever bought. I thought the larger uniform would hide how fat I had gotten but in reality it just made me look even larger. I masked everything about how I felt toward myself. I was still very depressed and out of sorts with reality. I checked myself into the Life Skills center for thoughts of suicide. Months went by and it was time for another fitness test. Another test that I failed. This time however, things were different. New rules were for the new fitness test standards were actually enforced and because the Air Force was force shaping (slimming down) it meant that I had to do the same thing or else I would be kicked out. For the weeks that followed I had several appointments and counseling sessions and the focus was all on me and how out of shape and fat I was. My supervisor and shop foreman were both on my side and tried to help me as much as they could. They allowed me to run 3 miles instead of the regular 2 miles the squadron did 3 days a week. My shop foreman even put his anual performance report on the line for me. He told senior leadership that if I didn't lose weight and pass my fitness test when I got back from my upcoming deployment, he would take a mark down on his performance report. I continued to go through the motions with diet and exercise and not really giving all I had. My foreman pulled me aside and told me his transformation story. Things began to sink in and I started to feel more and more motivated. My foreman also kept with me daily and asked how I was doing and how my diet and workouts were going, he kept me on track. A couple days before I deployed everything came to culmination and all the stress of hit me and I broke down into a deep depression. I saw my wife and son and how me being over weight was possibly going to change everything we had planned for our future and it sadened me. Knowing that I was under the microscope also added more tension and stress. I made a decision to change for the better, right at that moment. I wouldn't let my life long bad eatting habbits derail yet another thing in my life. I knew at that moment I had to take control over my life. After I dried the tears and hugged my wife and son I asked my wife to take a "Before" picture of me with my shirt off, a picture I had never taken before out of fear that someone would see it and laugh at me. Next, I began to write a journal. I wrote a letter to myself and set goals, told myself how badly I needed to change, and how I would destroy this fat person I see in the mirror. I poured my feeling out onto paper and I made sure I kept that journal to look back on when I returned from my deployment. When I put my deployment uniform on it was skin tight and I felt like a blob. On the bag-drag to the processing center, emotionally drained from saying goodbye to my wife and son, someone made a comment as I passed my "Who's wearing who?". The comment was geared toward how badly I looked in my uniform. Those words made me so upset and angry that they stuck with me for my entire deployment and gave me a burning fire to change. From the first day of my deployment to my last day I gave it my all. My diet and eatting habbits were perfect. My fitness routine was demanding. I continued to take monthly snap shot of myself to help me see the changes taking place. When I arrived back home after four months I weighed 225 pounds and felt on top of the world. ....MORE TO FOLLOW....