My Weight Loss Journey - Returning To The Original Me.

I wasn't always 400 plus pounds. This is something I think of every time I struggle with getting up out of a chair, walking, getting out of bed, and dressing after a shower, the little things of daily life have become a struggle upon having gained the weight.

When I was younger, before being an adult, I always played outside, I was active and went fairly high up in the martial arts class I took. Then I became an adult and joined the military and after the military even though I had some residual injuries from my time in service I was active, I rode my bike almost daily and went to the gym just as often, I was fit. I took CrossFit, ran both the first Tough Mudder and the first Spartan Race in Germany, and enjoyed my health to the point of taking it for granted.

Then my family and I moved, we had three kids and the place where we were staying simply was too small and we could not find accommodations in the city where we lived, so we left Nuremberg, Germany, and moved to Wurzburg where we did find a three-room apartment, and yeah the girls have to share a room but everyone has their own space now.

I sold my bike because my knees couldn't take the pain of riding the hills of Wurzburg which is in the heart of wine country with beautiful rolling hills that have no mercy or consideration for sore knees.

Then because there was no gym nearby I quit working out, I could have continued to do workouts on YouTube, but I didn't and then the chronic back pain, bad knees, and plantar fasciitis all seemed to act as one and took me to the pain cave where I dwelt for several years, all the while slowly becoming less and less in shape but not noticing it because in my head I was still a spry 24 years old.

Then it turned out I have paranoid schizophrenia and was taken to a psych ward several times. Each time I went off the meds until the fourth time I was taken away. Then, I stayed on my medication.

In the time that I stayed on my medication, I gained two hundred pounds in roughly the span of two years. I became stagnant in my lifestyle and at a loss of what direction to take my life.

Earlier this year my wife asked me for a divorce and once I accepted it I know that I wanted to move back to America. I had lived in Germany for 20 years and made no friends.

Before living in Germany I was always somewhat popular and never at a loss for friendship or companionship, this is not to say anything against the Germans, they simply have different personalities to me and I could seem to only communicate with them in a formal capacity and setting.

Before leaving Germany last month I was sick of the side effects of being overweight and determined to lose the weight. I made my resolution on June 19th that I will not stop attempting to lose weight until I have gone from 403 pounds to 185 pounds. I figure this will take me two years.

My wife, shortly before I left for America, one day, was showing off how much weight she had lost and that her six pack had made a comeback. Curious as to how she did it I asked her what the secret was and she showed me.

She was taking fat burners with her multivitamins and a tablet called Orlistat. Bribri said the Orlistat is the main culpret of her fourty pound weight loss and she gave me a few tablets to try.

The next day I went to the bathroom like I had been doing it wrong my whole life up to that point and within three days I had lost 8 pounds.

Now that I am in America I had a look into Orlistat and saw that the weight loss supplement Alli contains Orlistat. I talked to my sister and she sent me a picture of Alli being sold on the military post where her husband is stationed. I decided if it's good enough for the troops it's good enough for me and ordered a bottle off Amazon.

Also since living Stateside I have taken up walking on a daily basis and between the daily walks and the magic of Alli, I have lost 20 pounds in a month.

I know, it's only twenty pounds and it's only been a month but in comparison to how I was feeling a month ago something has changed. I feel better, and encouraged and look forward to dropping the next twenty pounds.

Thanks for reading!

Moving To America

The first twenty years of my life I spent living outside of the United States, my parents are non-denominational Christian missionaries and they raised me in Papua New Guinea where they had found an unreached tribe, established a church, school, and built an airstrip so that the government could provide teachers and medical aid.

The family moved to America around the time I turned thirteen, we lived in Georgia for about a year then the mission organization my parents are with had them move to their headquarters in Orlando, Florida. Orlando is where I went to high school, actually, I ended up being homeschooled throughout most of high school and made most of my friends and social connections at our local church which has since shut down and I no longer really know anybody who attended there, but the memories are fond and I had a fun teenage experience that you could describe as fairly wholesome.

After graduating high school in 1999 I did not know what I wanted to do with my life and one of my parent’s friends suggested I attend one of the Torchbearer Bible Schools, an international organization of Bible Schools with locations spread across the globe.

So, shortly after graduating high school in 1999, I attended Bodenseehof in Germany where all of the students called Bode2k in reference to the Y2K conspiracy theory that all of the computers were going to fail when the year turned 2000. Then I went on to study in Austria in the spring of 2000 at a school called Tauernhof in the small town of Schladming.

I came home and not much longer after that September 11th occurred and a friend of mine who had student loans asked me to join the US Army with him as part of a buddy program. Well long story short, it turned out my “buddy” didn’t get his loans forgiven by the Army and he ended up not joining, he had planned it all out and was hellbent on becoming an infantryman and really pushed selecting that MOS or Military Occupational Service, he even took me to see Black Hawk Down in order to show me how great an infantry job could be.

Before he backed out on me we did go to MEPs in Tampa, Florida together and took the ASVAB, sort of the enlisted services version of an IQ test. Before taking the test they filled us up with water and had us go through a series of physical qualifications and all the while I kept drinking every time the soldier told us to “drink water.” Needless to say by the time it was time to take the ASVAB I had had far too much water and really needed to pee, but was told I could only go to the bathroom after taking the test.

That was the fastest test I ever took, I flew through the answers and came out of the testing facility ecstatic to finally be able to relieve myself. Ultimately I scored in the high 80s and was told I could select any MOS I wanted but my buddy was still gung ho at the time about us signing up together as infantry and I didn’t particularly care so I stuck with his decision to be trained by the infantry.

My friend, let me know that his debts were not going to be covered and that he was no longer going to join the service, he went on to be a pilot and actually flew soldiers to bordering countries of combat zones later in life.

About six months after I was in the Army, serving as an Infantry Mortar I received a letter from West Point stating that I had scored in the top 1 percentile of enlisted on my ASVAB and that I could receive a full scholarship to West Point in exchange for six years of active duty service. Ultimately I decided to decline the offer because I had no interest in being in the military for ten years.

Sometimes I regret that decision, but it is what it is.

I deployed to Kosovo on a peacekeeping mission and while there America invaded Iraq, so after finishing the tour of duty in Kosovo, I went to Iraq.

The summer after I was in Iraq I went out with a group of friends who wanted to get off post and explore Germany where we were stationed. That night I met a Fraulien who would ultimately become my wife. She had no interest in living the lifestyle the military provided and I really wanted to marry her so I left the Army and started living in Germany with my new wife.

I adopted her kid and we have two daughters together. Germany is nice but never somewhere I felt at home. I always felt homesick while living there and that I was only there because I was asked to stay for the relationship.

A few months just shy of 17 years passed of living in Germany with my family when my wife asked me for a divorce. One thing was for certain, I knew I would not thrive or enjoy life living in Germany separate from my wife and kids, I simply did not fit in and did not enjoy myself there. So I decided to move back to America.

It’s been a month since living in America, I have registered with the Veteran’s Affairs Hospital here in Orlando, Florida where I am living with family until I can figure out how to get back on my feet.

I am a paranoid schizophrenic and the VA decided to take me off two of my German prescribed anti psychotic medications to get a baseline of what I need and what they feel comfortable prescribing because in the past two years that I have been taking the medication consistently I gained 200 pounds and ballooned up to 403 pounds at my heaviest.

I was still in Germany last month which was June when I determined to go on a weight loss journey starting on the 19th of that month which was both Juneteenth and Father’s Day.

It has been a month since determining to lose the weight and I have lost exactly 20 pounds, hopefully, I can stay on only one form of medication for my schizophrenia, what I am currently on does not contribute to weight gain and I feel much more myself.

In future posts, I will write more about my weight loss journey.

In the meantime, I have been looking for ways to derive a sustainable income that is flexible with all of my doctor’s visits at the VA and the potential of dealing with manic episodes brought about by my Schizophrenia.

So far I have taken to starting a YouTube channel which I think I am mediocre at, an Etsy store, and a Patreon. I also document my weight loss journey regularly on OnlyFans but no takers yet.

So, yeah, that is me in a nutshell. Thanks for reading.