How Did I Get So Fat?

Originally posted on April 23, 2006.

Planning to ship a couple of boxes to some friends in France, my wife asked me to help her weigh them to get an idea of how much this would cost. Having only a bathroom scale and the boxes being too big to fit on it; we decided I would weigh myself, and then I would hold onto a box – the difference between me and me with the box should be the weight of the box.

I stood on the scale and looked down.

200 pounds!

How can I weigh 200 pounds?

It’s true I have been weighing in at about 190 pounds for the last several weeks, but where did the extra ten pounds come in?

Like so many others I have a job that keeps me sitting sedentary for most of the day. The hours of sitting are moved along with mouth fulls of junk food: carbonated soda, salty chips, chocolate bars, and doughnuts.

I have a moving and rather odd shift that doesn’t allow for too many daylight hours in which I can be active. By the time I do get home, I’m often so exhausted that all I want to do is sit on the couch and vegetate.

Even on a day like today when my shift gets off early and I start the day with plans of eating right and maybe hitting the gym on my way home I am sabotaged by the local vending lady and her pies.

As a way to say thank you for using her services, she brought in a dozen or so lovely, delicious pies. Chocolate pies, lemon pies, and scrumptious, coconut cream pies.

How could I resist?

It’s like this all the time. Folks go to Steak and Shake and pick me up a caramel vanilla milkshake. The boss brings in pastries for a Friday morning meeting. One of the supervisors orders pizza for her meeting. On and on it is a steady stream of sugar, salts, and fats paraded in front of my useless willpower.

I used to live on the other side of town and so would bring my lunch to work. I’d spend the rest of my lunch hour taking power walks down the sidewalk. I now live about a mile away and take the five-minute drive home for lunch. This means I go home, check my e-mail, and play a quick game of Zuma ending my hour with a quick meal and absolutely no exercise.

200 pounds of this and I have got to find a better way. I have vowed to take my lunch to work each day, a sandwich or a salad. I’m ordering an iPod which I plan to fill with good tunes and some audiobooks which will motivate me to walk again. Then I’m swearing off sodas (again.) Sodas are killer. I despise coffee so soda has become the method of choice for my caffeine addiction. If I can manage to get over the three-day hump of no caffeine and convince my body I wake up better, and healthier with a glass of juice or some herbal tea.

I’ve always known I’d never make a good muscle-bound stud. I don’t have the personality for it. Seeing that scale tip the 200 mark has punched me in the solar plexus. If I can’t be on the cover of Muscle Magazine, I hope I can at least lose a few pounds and become healthier.