In the beginning...

It was February 2010.  I woke up that morning and had a slight pain in my abdomen.  I shrugged it off and thought, “Maybe it’s just some indigestion.”  I continued about my morning and showed up to work early like I always do.  By this time the pain had increased steadily and now it was a blinding, throbbing pain in my gut.  It felt like someone was stabbing me in the side.  I wrote a quick email informing my supervisor that I’d be going home and left while I was still able to drive.

I got home and hoped that maybe a little nap would make me feel better.  I thought it would pass and I’d feel better if I could just sleep through the worst of the pain.  I was wrong.  I ended up having my brother drive me to the emergency room.  Luckily it was near by. 

As soon as I walked in and described the pain I was having they pretty much knew exactly what it was.  Gallstone Pancreatitis.  Apparently they get about 5-6 of these a day.  During the initial exam the nurse asked me if I was diabetic.  Quizzically I said, “No?”   She replied, “You will be fine,” and left the room.  Its funny she said this because somewhere in the back of my mind I knew it.  I had been looking up the symptoms of diabetes on the internet for a while and a lot of what I was going through fit.  Having the nurse confirm it was just the final nail in the coffin.

I spent a long 4 days in the hospital and by the time I got out I had lost 20 pounds.  I believe it was mostly water weight, since I wasn’t able to eat anything and could barely drink anything while I was in there.  It was this weight loss that got me started.  I figured if I could keep off these 20 pounds and by eating healthy then I’d be ok.  Right?  Wrong… As soon as I started eating normal food again the 20 pounds came right back on.  But I wasn’t about to give up. 

I kept trying to eat healthier and before I knew it, it was January.  I don’t think I had actually lost any weight by this time.  In fact I was probably at my heaviest.  My best guesstimate would be 260-270 lbs.  I realized that I needed to actually start doing something.  I needed to find a way to track what I was eating and I needed to start working out again.

In February of 2011 I started tracking my calorie intake on an app I found for my phone.  This is the catalyst that jump started my weight loss and got me motivated.  I started seeing immediate results in the first few weeks of eating right and actually tracking what I was eating.  I immediately felt better.  Now I just need to find a way to start being more active.

I decided then that I’d start walking on my lunch breaks.  It started out by walking about 40 minutes a day at lunch.  I did this for about a couple weeks before I started walking to and from work as well for a total of just about 8 miles a day.  I even got motivated enough to walk on the weekends too.  I’d wake up and walk 5 miles up and down the river trail by my house on the weekends.  It was great.  I’d see all the runners and cyclists go by and I’d wish I could do that.

I bought a bike and started riding the trail on the weekends.  It was a Specialized Crosstrail Hybrid.  I would ride the trail from home out to the beach and back every weekend.  Roughly 44 miles round trip and it would take me somewhere between 3-4 hours depending on the wind.

After a couple weekends of this I decided I wanted to be a runner too.  I started C25K on March 15 and committed myself to finishing it.  I wanted to be able to run a 5k so much I signed up for my first 5k on March 27.  I finished in 34:25.

That 5K ended up being my gateway drug. I figured hell I’m riding every weekend, and just ran a 5k, why not start swimming and I could do a triathlon!  I signed up for my first tri.  The San Bernardino Sunset Rotary TinMan Triathlon on June 26.  It was a reverse mini-sprint on the CSSB campus.  I had to make sure that my first tri had a pool swim since my swimming was still a little shaky.  I could do only do about 100 meters at a time by this point.  And having to swim after running a 5k and biking 9 miles and out of breath was tougher than I imagined.

I decided that I needed to be faster.  I had so much fun that there was no way to hold me back at this point.  I started swimming at 4 AM every morning 5-6 days a week, running 3-4 days a week and riding 2 times during the week and getting in my long ride on the weekends. 

Not long after I ended up hooking up with the guys from LB Tri and I’m glad I did.  They are an amazing group of people that helped motivate me.  A few more sprints, a half marathon and hours of training have brought me here…