I'm fat, ya know. Overweight. If you care about BMIs (which I think are bullshit...oh, I need to add that to the list), today I fall into the "obese" category. But if I were to lose three pounds (water weight or whatever, the BMI calculator DNGAF), I would be in the "overweight" category. Regardless of how I feel about BMIs, it is true that I would look and feel better if I lost about 40 lbs.
I wasn't always overweight. I am 5'2". I had to gain three pounds to join the military at age 18, as the minimum weight for my height was 95 lbs. I was 120 lbs and 30 years old when I received my official depression diagnosis. The antidepressants they put me on were supposed to cause weight loss, but I gained weight instead. The nausea that the pills caused made me constantly feel like I'd gone too long without a meal, so snacks helped keep the nausea at bay. My job was fast-paced, we didn't receive lunch breaks. We ducked into the break room and gulped down a snack or meal whenever we had a few minutes. As a result, anyone who was eating would be left alone. Anyone who happened to be in the breakroom without food in their hand could be asked to come back out and work, even during their break. So I ate on every single break.
Here it is a decade later, and I haven't gotten back down to 120 lbs even once. I maxed out at 170, and I am close to that now. There are so many reasons, excuses, things that sidelined me. The antidepressants caused sleep disturbances. I could fall asleep, but my body wasn't truly sleeping. The sleep study the doc sent me for showed 50+ arousals per hour (no sleep apnea, even though I'm fat!), so basically I did not have a solid night's sleep for almost a decade. I (seemingly) slept long hours, 8-18 hours per day. When I was up and about, I was dragging. I drank coffee all day, every day. I rarely had the energy to work out. In retrospect, it's amazing that I even held a job.
I realize there are people with harder, more difficult lives than mine. But there it is.
So now that I'm 41, I've pretty much trashed my body (super weak, flabby, & chubby), I don't have a significant other and don't care to find one in the near future and, as a depressive person, I kind of don't care if I die of a stroke or heart attack tomorrow, I am trying to find reasons to get my shit together.
Some days, "I want to wear cute outfits again someday" is not enough of a motivator. I might need a memory jogger that, say, pulmonary fibrosis runs in the family and the better my cardio is now, the easier it'll be to tolerate when I'm 80.
That's where you come in. I'm collecting reasons to get fit and stay fit besides the usual generic cosmetic and health reasons. I want to hear your personal reason in 140 characters or fewer. If you don't want me to use your name here, just let me know. Thanks!
1. "I have a long family history of diabetes. If I get too heavy, I put myself at an even greater risk to develop it." --@dcas1978
2. "To lose weight so my back and knees won't hurt so much!" --@Zaerion
3. "I try to keep active to help keep the black cloud at bay. And because I don't want to end up like my father." --@racerabbit
4. "I've got a bad back. When I get too fat it really starts to hurt. :)" --@ocularnervosa
5. "Pulmonary fibrosis runs in my family and the better my cardio is now, the easier it'll be to tolerate when I'm 80." --@binkytoes
6. "Free drugs* with every excercise session!
*endorphins" --@binkytoes
