My weight problem is a pretty recent thing. I never had to worry about it before, and in fact was always more worried about being too muscular. I'm a former bodybuilder. I say "former" because my weight now makes it really hard to train anymore and I've got a lot to work off before I can really consider myself a bodybuilder.

I've always loved bodybuilding and muscles. I was never a big macho type, I just was always really into the human body, and physique. I wanted to reach the full potential of my body, and I was willing to do whatever it takes, and work as hard as I could. I started around the age of 13, with my father's weight bench. He was a pretty big guy, himself, and he was really proud of me and encouraged me a lot to get into it. It wasn't long before I started getting really big, like big enough to make my dad jealous. I think he was more proud than anything though. How could he not be -- his son being interested in the same things he was. It doesn't always happen that way.

When I was 18 I was becoming seriously developed. My Father encouraged me to enter local bodybuilding competitions. I competed a little, with modest success. The main thing was that it helped me to feel better about myself. I felt it was something I was good at, something that I could maybe turn into a serious lifelong thing. But as it always goes, life happened and I became interested in different things. I got married and had children, and now there was no chance of me having any time to do any serious training. I suppose I could have kept it up if I managed my time well enough, but my heart just wasn't in it. I was more interested in my family.

My job wasn't particularly physical. I was working in a health food and nutritional supplement store. It was something I at least knew something about. But the job involved mostly standing around and talking to people. At home I was mostly hanging out with the kids or my wife. Family life was something new and invigorating for me. I felt totally complete for once. Unfortunately my lifestyle didn't exactly promote good health. I always ate well, I mean I was so used to eating a nutritious, energy-packed diet for so many years that there's no getting me out of that. But now that I had taken the physical training part out of my life, I saw that my hard-earned muscle was starting to sag and turn into fat. It happened quickly too. I felt like everything I'd worked so hard for was being thrown into the garbage.

My wife noticed too. She has always been a health nut too, we both were. We like to take care of ourselves. But she too was having her own weight problem as a result of the childbirth. The most important thing in this situation is to have support, and there's no support in the world like a loved one to help you out. So, we decided to do it together.

The problem was the kids, they needed a lot of care and attention. So we attacked that problem with a number of ideas. First, we tried to include the kids in as many activities as we could. When we were working out at home, we would have the kids join us in the weight room and we'd put them on simple, low-intensity exercises here and there. They enjoyed being a part of things. Secondly, we got a babysitter to come and watch them for a few hours 3 times a week, so that me and my wife could go and train at a more professional facility. And wow, I'm amazed at how well it has worked up to now. It's been about 5 months since we began training again, and we've both noticed major results. My muscles have come back, not as sculpted as they were before, but they are there. My wife also has slimmed down quite a bit, and we're both feeling energized like never before.