My name is Shawn, and I'm not fat anymore! I'm enjoying the success of a hard-fought battle against my weight. It's taken a long time, but not as long as it took me to get big. I began dieting and exercising about 14 months ago, and I've already reached my goal weight. I attribute my success to determination and hard work.

When I was growing up, I was really thin. I was kinda one of those pale, thin, geeky kids that got laughed at. But that really changed when I entered high school. I found a look that worked for me, and I was proud of being thin, no matter what anyone said. People would always say things like "You need to eat something" or "You're gonna blow away in the wind." But I took that as a good sign. I got really into health food and exercise. I wanted to do what it took to maintain the same weight as I got older, because I noticed a lot of my friends were gaining weight and I didn't want to do the same.

When I entered University, things changed. I got complacent, I figured that my metabolism would take care of me no matter what I did. I mentally justified every bad thing that I ate, and I never realized just how bad my diet got. I was poor, and under a lot of stress with schoolwork, so I couldn't eat the way I used to. But when I really thought about what I was doing, I knew deep down that my diet was just terrible. I noticed that I had started growing a pot belly as well, I just didn't want to believe it. But eventually I had to get larger shirts and pants because I no longer fit into my clothes.

I wanted to make a plan and stick to it, and lose weight, but it's harder than it sounds. I started with diets, but I couldn't stick to them, and I got lazy. I had done it before, I used to eat healthy.. but it had been so long that I couldn't seem to get into that mode again. To help me out, I developed an interesting plan. I scoured the internet for pictures of large people, printed them out, and pasted them on my walls. Sounds funny, I know. All of my friends laughed at me. But hey, it worked. Every time I started to slip with my diet or doubted myself or thought I didn't have the energy to go out and get some exercise... I just looked at my walls. I couldn't get away from the pictures, so I just let them inspire me. Without that, I'm sure I wouldn't have been able to get where I have. After I put the pictures up, I started taking the diet really seriously. I ate smaller portions, and better food. I stopped eating junk fod altogether - instead of eating a bag of chips for a snack, I would have a piece of fruit. I always craved the junk of course, but I always found that after eating a piece of fruit, I no longer needed to eat anything else. And, eventually I got used to the idea of having fruit for a snack, and I actually came to enjoy it the way I used to enjoy junk food. Plus I found myself no longer craving junk food, and in fact found it totally unappealing.

The healthy eating continued, and I needed to supplement it with physical activity. A diet is basically useless without exercise. You have to have some way to work off the calories. I played basketball in the park. I've always loved basketball, and it was something fun that I could do in my spare time without thinking too hard. It was a stress releaser, definitely. So after changing my lifestyle I began losing weight - just like that. It's not rocket science, it's just the changing things that's so hard and so daunting. I don't envy anyone that has weight to lose, but just know that it can be done if you stick to a program. I started at 210 pounds 2 years ago, and I reached my goal weight of 140 pounds just a year and a half later - I've succesfully kept the weight off for 6 months, because I didn't give up the lifestyle. I didn't even want to go back to my old ways, I have so much more energy now.