One year ago, I was 460lbs and on a quest to lose 230lbs. To meet my goals, I created Donate My Weight, the campaign that uses my own weight loss to help raise food and money for food banks all over America.
The basic premise of Donate My Weight is the idea that for every pound I lose, I will donate one pound of food to my local food bank (Second Harvest of the Lehigh Valley).
When I started Donate My Weight, I was at a crossroads in my life. I had recently married my wife, Andrea, and welcomed two stepchildren into my life. I was living an unhealthy lifestyle of overeating and not exercising, which was no doubt taking years off my life.
Andrea has always supported me and loved me for who I was, not the way I looked, so she never pressured me to lose weight to improve my appearance. She was concerned that I was significantly shortening my life and it upset her to think of the possibility that I could die at a young age. We also planned on having children of our own and it was a sobering realization to think that if I didn’t make some changes, I would never see them grow up.
We had so many hopes and dreams and both Andrea and I wanted to make sure I was around to see them all realized. So, I vowed to lose weight, and together, Andrea and I came up with the idea for Donate My Weight. We figured it would just be a small, local thing and it was our way of making a difference.
Well, after a bunch of TV, newspaper, and radio interviews, things took a much different path. I began receiving hundreds of e-mails. People were so supportive of me and wrote to tell me about their own personal weight loss stories or to sponsor me by donating to their local food banks. Within a few months, I received a call from Wegmans, the grocery store, who agreed to donate a whopping 40,000+ lbs of food on my behalf!
It has been a wild ride so far and I’m only getting started! Throughout 2008, I lost a total of 80 lbs and I am still going strong.
People always ask me how I’m doing it and I think they’re surprised when I tell them the answer. I count my calories and exercise three to four days in the gym with my trainer, Misty. There are no gimmicks or secret strategies and I don’t subscribe to any commercial weight loss programs. I just go about things the old-fashioned way.
There have been some setbacks, which is something anyone who has ever tried to lose weight will understand, right? I went through a few extremely stressful months and I fell back into old habits, eating things I should have avoided and canceling my exercise. There were absolutely times when I felt defeated, like I would never reach my goal.
But I refused to quit and no matter how bad things seemed to get, I just kept picking myself up. I acknowledged my mistakes and tried to figure out ways to avoid them for the next time. The way I see it, it’s not the person who never falls down who wins in the end, it’s the one who keeps getting back up!
The year 2009 promises to be a huge year for me and I have vowed to lose at least the same amount as in 2008, though I’m shooting for even more. This year is going to be even more special for Andrea and me, because as we found out last July, Andrea is pregnant and due in March!
If you’re interested in learning more about who I am or what I’m trying to do, please take a moment and visit DonateMyWeight.com.
Thanks for all your support!
