Ben’s Profile Journey: The Beginning

Hey everyone, I am starting a journey, and I 'm inviting you to come along with me. Here's the deal, I'm what you'd call a thick gentleman. I have to shop in the husky section of the store. To put it simply, I'm overweight. I haven't always been this way, and I don't want to always be this way.

So, in order to not be this way any more I've spent the last few years, AKA the end of my 30s and start of my 40s, trying different ways to lose weight and get healthy. When I'm starting something new I most always start with research. Whenever I've moved to a new city I've done it, when my wife and I had our kids I did it. So, I've read a lot about weight loss and different diets, and how the body process food and what exercised are best for whatever. It always came down to 'eat less and move more.'

But, when you live an average life, working in an office environment and a tight budget, there are a whole set of challenges that I didn't know about. Let alone know how to overcome. In all my research it seemed that the advice was aimed at someone with unlimited time who lived on an organic farm in California where fresh vegetables are available year-round. Or someone who's a pro-am body builder looking to be the next Iron Man champion.

Every time I researched and then put into practice the techniques I'd fail. I've learned a lot about myself, how my brain works and my emotional connection to food, but couldn't translate enthusiasm into results. I came to the conclusion that the missing piece for me was help. I needed to talk, in person, with someone. That's kind of a big deal for me. I am an oldest child that has been out of the house since I was 18. I've always done things on my own. I work best on my own. I'm not an antisocial outcast, but I've always liked to be self sufficient. But, this problem had gotten to the point that I needed to swallow my pride and get help.

I talked to my doctor about my weight, after he had very politely been hinting for a while that it was becoming a problem, and he suggested I look into Profile by Sanford. This guy has taken care of my family for nearly a decade, helped bring my children into the world and had always been a honest shepherd of our health. He probably knows what he's talking about.

So, I looked into Profile. As I read about it and talked to the Profile coaches I was struck by something. The ultimate goal of the program is to get you off the program. That's how I saw it and it's what hooked me. What I mean by that is that Profile wants to teach me how to eat and live a healthy life and they have an outline that is designed for the individual. This was important to me because, well it's clear I don't know how to eat well, and my life experience is different from other people. The end goal is to help you get to a place where you live life eating regular food from the grocery store and know how to eat so you can enjoy piece of pizza on Friday or some potatoes at Thanksgiving.

Another big thing for me was that Profile was created by doctors and other medical professionals at Sanford. It's not the wish-fulfillment brainchild of a grad of Google University. It's not a program that's more about getting other people to sell a product than it is about weight loss. They've taken the best parts of lots of weight loss ideas and combined them in a plan that aims to help you lose weight and live better.

Then there's the coaching. This was the part that I was, and still am, most nervous about. How Profile works is that when you sign up you get teamed-up with a Profile coach. That person works with you to develop your eating plan and be a sort of health-mentor. I do not open up easily to other people, especially when it come to something like my weight and its close ties to emotional and anxiety issues. But, I'm self-aware enough to know that the only way to make this work is to confront this stuff, and the alternative: living like I am forever, is less desirable. I've had to admit that, in this, I need some hand-holding.

All this build up is to say that I am embarking on a mission. A mission to not be fat when I turn 42 years-old in February of 2018. To do that I've partnered with Profile by Sanford to go through the program, and I want to take you with me. I want you to experience my journey through the blog here, in videos and on the radio at Hot 104.7.

I'm going to be as open a possible with my struggles and what I'm doing. I believe in Profile, I know it works, the rest is up to me. I think this will be an interesting time and I hope you enjoy it with me.

More about Profile by Sanford.

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