Week 1, Day 1 (Part II): Here We Go Again

The Facebook promise from ten years ago

An interesting status came up in my Facebook memories a few days ago, where I saw I made a promise to myself to lose a bunch of weight when I turned 30. I have an issue with motivation, so it doesn't surprise me that it took me four months to attempt to make good on that promise. But I did it.

From January 1, 2010 to January 1, 2011, I committed to losing as much weight as I could. I set a goal for to weigh 180 pounds (enough to just be labeled overweight apparently). In the end, I lost 56 pounds. I was a very different person when I last wrote in this blog.

I was 31 years old. I worked at a job on the west side of Chicago that was miles away from what I'm doing today, in both literal distance and experience. I had just met the woman I would eventually marry (and then divorce) and I was years away from meeting the amazing woman to which I am currently married. Creatively speaking, it was the first year I decided to trust myself in performing solo pieces to great success, although I haven't done too much since. Interestingly, hosting monthly Simpsons trivia was only two and a half years away.

My final post was very optimistic, as it should've been. I had just completed a physical feat I had never managed to even come close to achieving in years prior. Despite having had gym memberships, I had a sedentary job and I had managed to balloon to 254 pounds at age 29. This is, gratefully, still the most I've ever weighed in my life. It's been almost nine years since my last entry and I still have managed not to gain all that weight back.

Basically, what saved my life then and continues to save my life now is bicycling. When I started bicycling, I really went all-in within a few days. I biked the drive. I even started biking to work, which was not a small trip. I lived in Lincoln Square and worked in North Lawndale and it took me two hours round trip to bike to-and-from work. I didn't do this every day, but I think I did it at least once a week.

Once I finished this blog, I slowly started to gain weight back. I was in a relationship and started getting lazy with my habits. I would say within two years I had gained half of my weight back. I would yo-yo right around 220-230 throughout most of the 2010s. I haven't stopped bicycling, but I have stopped eating as well as I used to. I've also gotten older and gotten lazier in my comfortable and happy home life. Eventually, the status I posted above became true again, and I began to pine for how great I looked through most of year 30.

This year, I started out alright, but I've let myself get up to 238, much closer to my heaviest weight than my lightest. So I've given myself a new challenge for age 40... lose 40 pounds. It's the same amount I ended on in 2010 and it's a great round number.

So, here we go again, guys. I don't even know if blogging is a thing that people do anymore, but it's the only thing that really worked for me!