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How it started

Well first off a background about me. Basically last year (August 2006) I decided enough was enough. I was tired of being overweight. And it hit me that at the time I was 27 - almost 30 and that I need to move on with my life and that my weight was holding me back from doing things I wanted to do. So the first step was joining the gym.

I have to say that I did lose weight from August until November. I didn't weigh myself but I knew that I was losing weight by my face and clothes being too big on me. In saying that though I wasn't losing anywhere near as much as I should have been. I plodded on, not really knowing what I was doing just getting on a machine and being on it until my muscles hurt enough that I couldn't do it anymore - then moving on. It was working to about 20% of what I should have been doing if I was doing things correctly.

The one day one of the personal trainers came up to me and asked me if I trained with anyone. I have to say it, as wanky as it sounds, but that is easily the best thing that I have ever done. If you want to lose weight and are a lazy sod like me then getting a PT is one of the best things you can do. I started with her mid November - and the first thing that she got me to do was weigh myself.

This probably doesn't seem like a big deal to a normal person, it is just a number. But getting on those scales for the first time in over 12 years (I am 28) was one of the scariest things I have ever had to do. I kept on telling myself it was just a number, but it was more than that. It was a measure of how far I had let myself go. But I got round it by thinking that this number is going down, and that this time is the biggest it will /ever/ be.

In the first few weeks I noticed a good change in my fitness. However I wasn't losing any weight, it was a weird feeling. Still I stuck with it, done exactly what I was told and the weight then started to fall off the week after christmas!!

It has slowed done a good bit lately. But I have accepted that I will plateau now and again and that the weight is just a number and it will go down. I am now doing things that I never thought possible before. I am running outside, I am lifting heavier weights and doing matt work. Every two or three weeks I have found myself doing something new and it is a great feeling.

I know it is a change in myself as well, the fact that I am doing something about it. But I really doubt that I would still be at the gym if it wasn't for my PT. She keeps me motivated, gives me a kick in the crotch when I don't do what I am supposed to and generally keeps on track.

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