The Gospel According to Matt

Ten years ago I started dating my wife.  I weighed 180 pounds, which certainly wasn’t skinny, but it wasn’t too hefty either.  After we started dating she moved to Africa to work as a Medical Missionary among the Masaii and Turkana Tribes of East Africa.  She lived in Africa for four months.  When she returned I had put on about 25-30 pounds (ouch) in her absence, and since she still loved me I decided to marry her (luckily she didn’t object).  By the time we married I weighed about 215 pounds.  And two years after we were married I weighed 238 pounds.  Do you see a trend here?

Realizing the dangerous health-path I was on, I decided that some things needed to change.  So I started working out regularly, and though I was getting in better shape, I just wasn’t losing weight.  Then I started some trendy diets and I yo-yo’d up and down between 215-230 five or six times over the next four or five years–never being able to break the 215 barrier, and always jumping back up to 230.  Then I just started eating better, and I gave up “sugar” drinks such as Soda Pop, Kool-aide, etc.  Although I started feeling better, and started hovering between 215-220, I still didn’t see significant gains in weight loss.  After my mom passed away last year, my weight again jumped into the 230s.

That’s when a friend named Mike, another friend named Theresa, and my Dad encouraged me to go for a sleep-study.  We discovered that I had a sleep disorder called “Sleep Apnia,” which pretty much prevented me from sleeping for about the last 15 years (Unknown to me I had been waking up about 80 times an hour for years, thus suppressing my metabolism and causing me to crave calories).  They prescribed a CPAP machine to curb the sleeping disorder, and I continued to try to eat better and exercise.

What happened?  I started sleeping better, craving less food, and having more effective workouts due to the increased energy; my metabolism has increased and it’s now easier to lose weight.  This past week I broke the 200lb barrier (that is, I got below 200lbs) for the first time in ten years!  This morning I weighed in at an even 199.  And that is a milestone.  It’s taken ten years, lots of searching, and lots of discipline.  But it’s working–and hopefully it will last.  I’d still like to lose another 30lbs, but for now I’m just enjoying a rather big personal moment.

I don’t know what milestones you need to achieve.  But I believe that God gives us the friends, the help, and the fortitude necessary to accomplish our goals, if we are willing.  Proverbs 16:3 says, “Commit to the Lord whatever you do and your plans will succeed.”