May 3rd, ’15: One Year Gone

You ever do something so out of the ordinary that you strongly believe that your older self wouldn’t recognize what you’ve become? 

Well, a year ago I took that step. A little after 10 AM eastern exactly one year ago today, I completed the daunting task of the Philaedphia Broad Street 10 Mile Run. A task, at least for now, proved to be the crowing moment of my running career. 

Seriously, who would have thought this moment could have developed from the person that I used to be. I couldn’t. I’m sure the high school me would have had a heart attack just thinking about such an endeavor. 

Sadly, I wasn’t able to compete in this years race due to other obligations, but 2017 will mark the return to broad street for this runner and I will be ready.  
Since you guys on here are some of my biggest supporters, I wanted to privy you to some important information before I reveal it to the world. 

I figured there is no better day to do this, but I am officially signing up for my first ever half marathon today in honor of my anniversary. 

Wish me luck! 

Quick Rewind

So, if you read my last blog post, you may be wondering “hey, it’s been ages since we heard from you, what have you been up to”? So glad you asked. 

Here is a quick rewind of what the time we spent apart: 

So it seems that we last touched base after I performed a feat that seemed unreal just a decade ago, I ran the 10 mile broad street run in my home city of Philadelphia. It was euphoria to me and a moment I I’ll forever remember. 

Sadly, I won’t be doing it this year because I…. Wait for it…. Moved down to sunny Florida. I had planned to fly up for the race, but a great pair of folks decided to get married at the end of the month and I simply couldn’t afford to flights in a month. However, I will be back in 2017. You can book it. 

I won’t bore you with all the details of my life down here. I came down in May and my running was okay and then it slowed down for reasons that I outlined in my post before this. If you haven’t read the post, I welcome you to do so, but I won’t go back over that here since this is a positive post.  

Oh and during this time, I almost met the girl of my dreams and she is truly incredible. 

I don’t think there’s anymore to tell so I hope you enjoyed my quick rewind and I’ll talk to you guys soon! 

Rock on ladies and gents and be strong. And remember, keep up the good work in whatever path of life you are on and always strive to be the best you can be.

Your pal,

John



I’m Back

Wow, I’m sitting here and I can’t believe it’s been a whole year since I wrote to you guys. Gosh, so much has happened. Too much to talk about. However, I will give you the cliff notes. I gained weight back, lost it, gained it, lost it, and am still fighting. I lost sight of my running goals for awhile, I will explain more to that later, but it’s been a topsy-Turvy roundabout for me. 

I do need to start this post by issuing an apology. I’m hearty sorry for ditching my readers for so long. It was a down time for me, I had a lot of internal struggles and I feel like I let a lot of you down. I’ve been told by some that I’m an inspiration and that what I do has pushed folks to reach their goals, but sometimes I feel like a fraud. I don’t feel like I deserve to be put on such a pedistool since I am far from perfect. Having said that, when I lost my running knack, I felt like I was letting all those folks down and that made me shy away from writing here. 

I figured I’d give a brief account of what I went through and why I slowed my run, no pun itended. Not only because I want to be open and honest on this blog, but also that I feel like it perhaps could help someone out going through similar experiences. 

When I was younger and bigger, I recieved a lot of criticism from outsiders and it really affected me, but anyone that’s read this blog before knows this. Part of me thought this would cease as I shrunk down. Turns out, I was incorrect. 

A few months ago, I was met with harsh words from an outsider about me and my running. I won’t go into specifics since I’ve put it behind me and learned that not all people are going to be fully supportive. However, at the time I recieved such negativity I was stressed. I fell into the hole and let the words affect me, way more than they should have. I slowed my running, ate poorly out of stress and began to see myself fall into the dark ways that I had worked so hard to get out of. 

Then I had a dream one night. A dream about my old self, presumably brought on by the stress, and it clicked. I saw my past and it freightened my greatly. I woke up as if I had had a nightmare: I didn’t want to relive that all over again so I bucked up and vowed to change. 

So after a long and calm hour of thought, I finally started to realize that not everybody is going to agree with me. People may find what I do to be pointless or stupid or constantly remind me of future knee problems. 

Some may say that what I do is nothing and anybody could do it so I shouldn’t go broadcasting it for all to see. To them I say, to each their own. I don’t put you down for your inactivity so don’t question me for the opposite. Please keep your opinions to yourself and don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out. For any of you going through any sort of problems thanks to the words of others, just remember I am here for you and will always be here for you. 

Just remember the words of my favorite musical artist of all time and tell them…. 

You can speak your mind, but not on my time.

New Page

Folks!

This is just a friendly update that I added a new page to the top of my blog. It’s my “10 Mile Dedication!”

 

Check It out, please

The Walking John vs. Broad Street : Round 1

Happy Tuesday everyone!

Hope your day is going well today. It’s been an up and down week for me thus far. Saturday, as most of you have seen by the pictures, I participated in the Broad Street Run 10 miler in Philly on Sunday. I’ll get back to that in a bit, but the following morning, I was subjected to a triple tooth extraction. Ugh, not fun to say the least. So, I’m laying around here recovering and deciding to do some blogging.

It’s been awhile since have written to you guys. A lot has changed since we last spoke. I spent the month of March either on vacation or ill so I had little time and or energy to get serious running in. Conversely, during April, I had to reteach myself how to run outside. I just assumed that it would be easy to fully transition from one to the other, but boy was I wrong. So, a month before the big 10 mile race when I ran outside and had barely enough energy to do a 5K’s worth of length, I knew I had to build all that back up again. I believe I had been spoiled with my quick treadmill times and was frustrated when it wasn’t as quick outside. Thanks to a couple good friends’ advice, I changed my overall thinking and went for distance over pace and found myself just rolling along after a few runs. It was a huge boost for me since I took to the pavement on the 3rd and ran my heart out those 10 miles and all in a sub 2 hour time (1:56:15 to be exact).

If you remember my post about a year ago when I stated that I was ready to put my hat into the ring and run this race, you would know why this race was so important to me. I was beyond nervous that day. I had to wake up early to make sure I didn’t miss the start of the race. I even was lucky to get a pre run in hustling for the trolley since I fell behind getting ready in the morning. It was a surreal moment loading onto the subway squashed together like sardines and then emerging onto the busy streets of North Philly. I was tempted to take a picture of the whole scene, the starting line, endless amount of runners stretching and prepping for the long road ahead of them, and just the overall atmosphere, but I did not want to be “that guy”. I already took a number of pre and post race selfies and of the medal that I got for runner and don’t worry I’ll probably post them later in the post.

The running part was probably my favorite part of the whole experience. Being beside all these other runners traversing through the streets of Philadelphia. Residents leaning outside their windows and sitting on their steps cheering and yelling we all ran past complete with hundreds of spectators with signs and bands playing. It really was more than I was expecting. I still couldn’t believe I was actually doing it. It really got me thinking about all the people and things in my life that helped get me to where I am now, but that’s a topic for another post soon. I was able to do some self exploration and even though, I nearly felt like giving up around mile 6, I pressed on.

When the Mile 9 marker flew past me, I knew I had it in me to finish this thing. It wasn’t easy and it was completely exhausting, but I knew this last mile was going to be my strongest. I buckled down and busted it the remainder of the way.

Soon, the finish line.

I was finished.

I had completed the event that I had been counting down to for almost a year. 

An event that just several years ago would have been in my wildest dreams to complete and all in a speedy sub 2 hour time.

Oh how far we’ve come.

Round 2 in 2016, anyone?

Bring it.

Validation achieved.

The “After” Myth

Can Anybody Hear Me?

After.

It’s here.

In my first post, Before, 3 years ago, I said “I’m not to After yet, but I’m closer to After than to Before.”

I now weigh 117 – 120 pounds (depending on the day), and standing at 5-foot 6-inches, that measurement means that After is very, very here. But, before you congratulate me, dear readers…if I have any…and dear friends and family who I know follow this blog… I have to come clean with you: I don’t feel like I’m at After. I’m terrified of being at After. And, I don’t like that After is here.

The tagline of my blog is “uncovering myself one pound at a time.” For most of this blog, I’ve spoken strongly about how my relationship with food and myself was what caused my weight struggles. I stand by that. The thing is, the symptoms have resolved faster than I’ve been able to…

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Seesaw

One of the best points when it comes to this whole weight loss thing is also one of its worst. How easily everything can fluctuate both for and against you.

(Oh and yes, folks. I am back and I didn’t forget about this place. Just been really busy with work lately and sick too (yuck) so I haven’t had a lot of time to sit back and just write out my thoughts here. But, I am happy to be back to writing to you fantastic fans of mine and I hope you didn’t forget about me!)

Back to my topic. The whole weight loss battle seems to be a giant seesaw. One day you can be up and upbeat and active, when the very next day you are down and out for the count. It’s a constant daily swing, really.

However, you always have the advantage for one simple reason: everyday is a new day for you. It’s a new start, a new chance to start a new upbeat trend. Just because you fall off the wagon, doesn’t mean you can’t pick yourself right back up and keep moving. I see a lot of posts during my readings about fellow weight battlers about their down feelings and their lapses in eating / breaking their diets. To them, I simply say, “take a walk into the next day ahead of you and don’t let the past get in your way. You aren’t your past. Take it one day at a time. Don’t forget that a new day is always a sleep away.”

The reason I bring this topic up is because I had fallen off the horse recently. I had been sick for a little bit (gotta love sinuses) and it took a lot out of me and I felt down about it all and during that time, I was very inactive and ate badly. Well, as I started to feel better, I still kept up this poor food trend with the occasional, let’s call it an indulging of sorts, and every though I knew what I was doing, I still maintained the “unJohnlike” eating that I had been developing. I didn’t do much running. I would come home from work and just sit around eating with little to no running.

And then a few days ago, I said enough. I was done. I vowed to flip the switch and changed it up, and I started back up with my activeness.

It really is a day-to-day struggle and you can’t look ahead because each date is totally unpredictable. I get that this is different for everyone, but I just want to remind any of those out there struggling with “losing” their way that there is always a new day right around the corner and slip ups are bound to happen and you shouldn’t let that discourage you. Keep your heads up and keep moving forward.

If anyone on here is going through a weight loss journey and would like to chat, send me a message. I really love meeting people batting like I am and sharing stories and being a cheerleader if they need be . Don’t hesitate to say hello!

and remember….

John

New page!

Hey everyone!

Just giving you an update. I did a very important blog post to me. In fact it was so important that I made it a new page. So, check it out and enjoy my Testimony up above in the pages list!

Thank you guys for reading.

John

Throwback Thursday

So, I am going to go with the “throwback Thursday” ideal with this post. I promise to keep this short and sweet, but I wanted to reminisce for a second. Have you ever sat back and just looked at who you were in the past and wonder how on Earth that you were ever that type of person. I do that a lot. Especially when I look at this mini timeline.

 

 

I know most of you have seen this picture before, but for those of you new to this page, I figured I would post it here. I simply cannot recognize myself at times and I sit back and go “wow!”. Is that me? Am I just fooling myself? Is this real life or is this just fantasy? It is as if I have been living in a bad dream for a very long time and now it is finally turning into something happy, bright, and positive.

I know it’s a long and probably life long battle though and I continue to have ups and downs, but it is just nice to look back and see how far I have come and imagine how far I could go if I keep pressing on.

I guess I am using this post to build into a longer post that I am doing. It will probably be the most important post of my entire blog. It’s going to be a bit longer than most and there will be some emotion in there and some opening up that you guys may not have seen from me before. I won’t give away too much but I will say that It will be an honest testimony from me to all you, my devoted readers, out there. A friend of mine proposed the actual idea and it is one that I am going to use. 

So I just wanted to give you all a heads up about it and to give you a post since I haven’t blogged in a week.

You guys are awesome and I truly love you all and the support you give.

Thank you all so, so much!

I truly treasure each one of you.

John

Inspiration

I wanted to thank you all for being so patient with me, I’ve been dwelling on this post for awhile. Actually, this wasn’t the post I was planning on presenting to you next, but this is a topic that has been revving it’s head recently an I wanted to share a post on it. I promise this is going to be a short, sweet, and straight to the point type of post.

During my weight loss battle, I have received a lot of compliments and I truly are grateful for everyone single one that I have received. However, I have had a few conversations with a couple folks recently that really stood out to me. During the past few weeks, I have heard from a handful folks that I am a part of / am their inspiration for getting in shape.

Words like this floor me. I mean, I honestly have no real reaction to these words. I don’t think there is a higher compliment that someone can receive, is there? A person tells you that you are the reason that they are trying to better themselves. They say they look at you as a role model of sorts.

A role model?!?!

I don’t know how to respond to that. When I think of role models, I think of famous people that have great talent and showcase their amazing skills on a big stage like actors or athletes.  Perhaps close family members like parents or siblings that they are close to.

When I look at myself, I just see a regular guy trying to keep himself on the healthy track. I have no special talents, no special skills. I’m just a guy trying to make himself better. To be totally honest, I don’t see myself as role model material. I will happily except that title, though no doubt. Maybe, I’m just too modest? I mean, I look at these people telling me this as role models for my own journey. I couldn’t believe that they view me in the same light.

So, I just wanted to thank those people who paid me the ultimate compliment over the past few weeks. Your support and kind words mean so much to me and I cannot thank you enough. You have given me the greatest feeling in the world.

I pledge that I will continue to do my best to give you a reason to stay inspired.

Stay inspired, my friends.

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