My Path to Change

So not too long ago I was not in the best of shape. It was a little over four years ago that my wife gave birth to my daughter. During this pregnancy my wife was not well, mentally and physically. She had a miscarriage about a year before and that has stuck with us to this very day. She was also battling debilitating migraines and blood pressure issues as a result of the pregnancy. Thankfully, my daughter was fine and is now a very active and healthy four year old. My wife and I were a different story.

The two of us put on substantial weight and also picked up some bad habits as a result of the stress and depression. I was drinking and my wife was eating sweets, which was an extremely tough addiction for her to break. At one point we were able to break out of this destructive cycle, myself with mixed martial arts and my wife with walking. This got us to a better place, but then we had some troubles with uncertainty with our jobs, which lead me to a new position that had me commuting 2 hours in one direction.

Needless to say, we regressed even further than before and it was not pretty. I ballooned up to 225 pounds, which looked ridiculous on my 5'10" frame. I was lethargic and always achy. Most of my nights were horrible because I had trouble sleeping and was battling horrible bouts of indigestion and acid reflux. I was also drinking more than I ever did before. Funny thing is, I was not an angry or abusive drinker, quite to the contrary I was the fun guy. But inside was a constant loop of regret and embarrassment playing in my head. My work was not affected, but it was a horrible source of stress. All of this at the age of 33.

My wife was not doing any better. She was taking prescriptions for both her headaches and her blood pressure. She was not sleeping because the drugs caused her to hallucinate. They also caused even more weight gain as a side effect, which then contributed to snoring and sleep apnea. She is such a patient and loving person and rarely has mood swings, but during this time, she would go through such highs and lows emotionally that it was frightening.

I do not want to focus on her too much but to say that she had about all she could take and initiated the change. She went to visit a local chiropractor and looked into a 12 week detox, diet, and exercise program for her. When she came home with the info, we looked at it together and it seemed very difficult. It was a calorie restricted diet that was extremely similar to a Raw/ Vegan Diet. I told her that I would do it with her so that she felt she had support and off we went. This diet was very close to Vegan, which was a huge change for us, and introduced numerous herbal supplements, vitamins, and minerals to our diet. I have to say it was very overwhelming at first.

Well I don't want to drag this along too much, but we made it through to the other side and broke some really bad habits and learned some really healthy new ones. I lost 50 pounds and was energetic enough to start MMA again. I am looking to start competing at an amateur level soon. I have stopped drinking all together and have far less stress and depression in my life. All the physical ailments that I was experiencing have gone and I am now left feeling younger than ever.

My wife lost 40 pounds and is far more active than she was before. She rarely has headaches and has not experienced the debilitating migraines she was dealing with regularly since completion. Her blood pressure has gone down to a healthy level and she did all of this without the help of the prescription drugs. They seemed to just cover the problem where as this "Raw/ Vegan Diet" (calling it that because in my mind that is really  what it was) solved her problems and helped her body deal with them with the assistance of healthy foods. Both of our sleeping habits have improved tremendously and we sleep less and feel even more rested.

I want to wrap up this post, but I have to say nutrition is now something I cherish and I will never stray again from a healthy lifestyle. I plan on growing my own food this season so I can be even more independent of all the junk and the businesses that made that junk available to us.

Thanks for sticking in there. Have a good night.