Before Thanksgiving 2000 I was a skinny fat person. That means that
you aren't really fat but you are flabby and jiggle like jello all over and might as well be a fat person. My thighs jiggled,
my butt jiggled, my upper arms really jiggled and there were three rolls on my stomach where the six pack should have been.
I loved grocery shopping especially the center aisles. Ring Dings,
Ding Dongs, Cocoa Krispies, and bagels were only a few of my favorite foods. What I did not love was standing in line at the
checkout and looking at those fitness magazines staring back at me with those women with superfit bodies and chiseled abs.
It was very intimidating and the day came when I had seen enough. I bought one of those magazines, Muscle and Fitness I think
it was, and vowed that I too could look like that. I was sick and tired of being flabby and stuffing myself into a size 5
when I probably should have been wearing a size 9.
I also went out and bought the Body for Life book by Bill Phillips.
I was well armed with information. Being the self propelled sort it was no problem getting started.
Twelve weeks later, a "challenge" as per the Body for Life book, I
did notice that I could see some beginnings of muscles there but a layer of bodyfat still remained so I simply continued.
The changes occurred very slowly and most of the time I just forgot about it and just kept to the program. Eight months after
I started I was really lean but not too muscular.
After doing bodybuilding for a while you tend to see things in a different
light. I didn't just want to just be lean and toned, I wanted to look like Arnold(minus the steriods).
Three years later I'm pretty satisfied with the results. I'm frantic
that I'll lose some of the muscle because it was so hard to build and required many different types of sacrifices
to get to this point. Some of the sacrifices were, avoiding all alcohol, not staying out too late too often, packing
my own food everywhere I went, avoiding many food establishments that had nothing I could safely eat, declining invitations
of friends to go have ice cream or some other such treat, and especially avoiding invitations to go for a drink. Coffee shops
have replaced bars completely for the social scene.
