The Journey Begins Anew.

First of all, welcome to my new weight loss blog.

My name is Matt, I am going to get back into shape... and I will document it all publicly.

More accurately, this is for me... I need to be holding myself accountable for my progress on this path, so if you are not me (and you are not, I hope.) you will most likely not find this helpful.
I will be posting pictures of myself in all of my splendid, unattractive glory, in hopes of finally have the big payoff in my return to being handsome.

So, what inspired me to start this blog?

Here is the quick story:
I went to Hawaii on vacation with my family, the whole trip was videotaped and when we got back and I watched the tapes... I did not recognize the person on the screen who seemed to be standing in all of the places that I did and talking like I did. I was quite literally speechlessly horrified by what I saw, at this moment I knew... Immediate action needed to be taken.

The longer story:
(The woe is me part... we need to get this out of the way. So that we don't need to keep coming back to it, The past is just that, so let's identify some things and put them to bed, what really matters is what I do today, tomorrow and from now on.)
I was an extremely athletic child... yadda yadda... I have ridden several bicycle races, I played football in high school and college, wrestled in high school, ran track, fought professionally, I have a black belt in tae kwon do, certified in hapkido, kickboxing, judo... blah blah... I WAS in great shape, I had an eight pack for abs, I had gigantic arms and you could see the ripples in the muscles of my calves through snowpants, yea, I was in great shape... key word, WAS, the only shape that I am in now is round.
I went to college for art, (Oh really? What are you going to be when you grow up smart guy?) After spending years in college for traditional art, I decided it would be more profitable to go into computer arts. (great career move... terrible fitness tactic.) I went from working out and training for many hours each day to... occasionally moving from my desk chair to attend some classes, or to drink heavily and shower. Yea... that was about it, I went from a calorie burning inferno of energy... to a sedentary bump. (This did not happen overnight, it was just gradual enough to notice... but not fast enough for people to send out a search party.)
Since graduation, I have hopped from one decently paying office job to the next. Occasionally I get a somewhat manual labor job, (one job... moving safes, yea like the ones in the roadrunner cartoons, ended up doing some pretty major damage to my back, this may become an issue later) but usually office jobs. I have bopped around for several years since I graduated from college meeting with varying degrees of success along the way. I have made good money and bad money. During my adventures I have started several companies (You see... I am an overachiever, and a perfectionist... this is not an easy combination.) I have one company that makes custom steel furniture and handrails. I have a clothing company, mostly t-shirts and work shirts. I have created a web comic. I do day trading. I have a company that does freelance 3D animation/graphic design, mostly architectural previsualization and logos but I have just begun work on a great new project that involves slot machine publishers and gambling interfaces. I work about 16+ hours a day... usually more... on any of my pursuits.

So, here I am.
Great job(s) and all.
I am 6'6" and I weigh more than I ever have in my entire life.
I weigh 378 pounds.

That is what my scale says... and I trust it, it was quite expensive and it also measures about 1000 other things digitally... it can tell me my bone density, body fat percentage, muscle mass percentage, eye color, favorite movie... all from basically digitally licking the soles of my feet. (I have to assume that this is the scientific process... as I am not a scientist.)

Oh yea... I almost forgot.

I have nearly died several times in the past two years.

During a rough period of time, I was told that my blood pressure was so high that it was going to kill me (quickly). I do not normally have blood pressure problems... I usually have normal blood pressure.

I also developed sleep apnea because of my weight, I had a surgery (PPP) to correct this 2 years ago.

I was also assaulted a year and a half ago, this left me with a pretty major scar up the back of my head and an unwaivering headache since the incident. The doctor who stapled my scalp back on said that if I had been smaller, I would have died.

So... my back hurts (i go to a chiropractor) and my head hurts (I do nothing) and my body hurts (so I do Nothing... *cough*) and I generally have no energy, and I work all of the time to "justify" my condition... "Hey Matt, do you want to come with us snowboarding?" "No, sorry I have to work", "Hey Matt, do you want to go downtown and shoot some pool?" "Nah, sorry guys, I have a lot of work to do, but probably next time." All things that I do to avoid going out into public or possibly hurting myself doing some activity that my neglected body is seriously under prepared to do.

I have realized that this aspect of my life alone is responsible for most of the things in my life that are unhappy.

The weird things is that I still walk around with the confidence of that skinny athletic handsome man that I used to be... as if I have not looked in a mirror for the past 8 years.
This little fantasy has fallen apart.
I am a big fat guy.
I need to fix this, more accurately I need to become obsessed with this.
I need to spend as much time focused on this that I do on caparison shopping for HDTVs.

I am not going to go on a "diet"
I am not signing up for jenny craig... or weight watchers... or nutrisystem.
I am also not going to be wasting my money by signing up for a pass to 24 hour fitness, so I can not go and pay through the nose for something that I am going to do "tomorrow".
I have heavy things... I can lift those, I don't need to pay ridiculous sums of money to be glared at and judged by the gum smacking 16 year old girl who works at the front desk at 24 hour fitness just because I am most comfortable working out in cut off sweatpants and a t-shirt from a graphics card manufacturer. I have found one "system" that has worked for me in the past, it is called The Abs Diet, and it is not a "Diet" in the traditional sense as the misleading title would indicate, it is instead a lifestyle change. A complete lifestyle change. I have embarked down this road before, and the reasons that I stopped were outside of the control of the program... as in, my stopping had nothing to do with the program, it had to do mostly with the assault that I had previously mentioned. This program is phenomenal, I started it at 335 lbs. and in just under two months I had transformed to 285 lbs., my shoulders were 2" wider, my pecs flattened and squared out, my arms were tight in all of my shirts (in the good way) my thighs were getting their "horseshoes" back and I was getting up when I wanted, working as hard as I needed and sleeping when I needed. Oh yea, I was smiling the whole time.

This program, system, diet... whatever you want to call it, it works. (No this website is not an advertisement for The ABS Diet, but that would be awesome... getting healthy is much easier if you have a sponsor.)

So.

After a long winded... and yet strangely incomplete... introduction, I am presenting myself to you. Hi, I'm me... and my fat ass is going to get healthy.

Thanks,
Matt