~ The Weight Loss Challange ~

So I made a promise to myself and so did my wife that this year we will together work on our weight loss.  We both set a target and got on with it.

I wasn't really that heavy but I wanted to trim down to a suitable size in preparation for the London to Brighton bike ride 2016, so I set a target weight of 78kg.  My start weight was 84.4kg.

I am happy to say that this morning I achieved that goal after 74days in a row (logged by the MyFitnessPal app).

So what did I do?

I basically thought to myself that I will not crash diet I have the health of my heart to think about and didn't want to put any un-needed stress on my body.  I wanted to enjoy my weight loss and thought there has to be a simple formula.

Eat less
Eat more veg
Eliminate Fizzy drinks
Drop the snack foods
Grill ALL my meat
Count those calories

You might have noticed I didn't put down "Exercise"?

Well I wanted to be realistic to my health and I thought if I do all the above will I need to exercise at all? so I made it a test to see if it could be done while doing my normal everyday activities.

I work in IT so I have a desk job.  My health, hours and family life make it near impossible to go to the Gym on a regular basis.

I like to ride and I do TaiChi once a week so how do I make this work?

So firstly I bought a FitBit band to monitor my steps and give me that constant motivation everyday to get up and move.  Friendly "steps" competition with my wife and friends gets you moving.

Fitness Pal, counted those calories, weighed my food.

I decided at first that I want more control on my lunch so out went the buying food an in came the cooking food.

I would buy:

Beef Steak
Chicken Breast
Fish

Cut them up to make them weigh 100 grams (RAW) and grilled them for lunch.  I would then have with this either:

Brown rice or
Broccoli

For breakfast Mon-Fri I had two eggs and 25g of Smoked salmon. (EVERY WEEK)

I managed to keep this up for about two months and watched the weight fall off.

At home we grilled EVERYTHING. added more veg to our meals and continued to weighed everything.
Junk food was out, I haven't had a slice of pizza for over three months!!

During all this my exercise was no more than 2hrs a week of Tai Chi.  The odd 10mile bike ride (3 times, yeah I know really bad)  and that was it.

I made the change in diet my priority and it has worked out fine. along with trying to get 10,000 steps in each day.

So you see there is no magic to loosing weight, none of those stupid magic pills or weight busting shakes.

Going to the gym would have made this process quicker but not if you are not mentally ready to really loosing the weight.

What's the point in counting your calories and then going to the gym, burning 500Kcals off and then thinking oh ill have a chip shop chips and pie for dinner?

Do you know how many calories are in chip shop chips and pie!!!

Check this out 200g of French fries is between 300-450Kcals ALONE!!! add that to your dairy and you will be shocked how much calories pile on.

So look this is my story I'm sure I could have gone in more detail somewhere, I been typing so long i have lost track.  So if you want to ask me anything just post in the comments below and ill be glad to help.

I may have met my goal but now I have to focus on bike training and just manage my weight form no on.

PEACE!!!

Filling the Gap from 2013

Well its a new year and a new me since 2013.  It sure has been a long time since I have updated this and thought now is the time to "report in"

My Pacemaker has been ticking along greatly since it's first implantation of 2010 but then a little thing happened last year September 2015.

So I'm at my new job and my mobile rings.  It's the Barts Hospital.  I have this cool device you see that monitors my heart activity and ICD from home so my old 6 monthly visits to the hospital is all but gone.

Yep I'm WiFi baby this is really the future and I tell my son that I am part robot/cyborg and you know how cool that sounds for a 7 year old.

Anyway sidetracked, so Barts Hospital state that they need to see my right away to go over the results of my last lot of scans form my home system.  I was like OK but I'm in the office right now could I not come after work?

Hay Ho the answer was no, so I explain to my boss I'm sorry but I have to quickly pop out at lunch and might be a little longer than my 1hr.  Two shakes of the tail and I'm off.

3hrs later get seen and the assessment is grim. Now you see this was a Friday and I had great plans for the family and kids for the weekend.  But now the doctor tells me

"Mr Pratt I'm sorry but it seems your ICD has a serious fault and has been sending out false readings taking you very close each time to getting a shock"

FFS!!!! (I said in my head)

So this means...yep it needs to be swapped out today. Looool just great.

So I update work, wife and family in Jamaica and head on home to pack a hospital bag.

Two days later I'm out of hospital with a brand new ICD.  The recovery period was horrible as the cables that lead from the ICD to my heart had pretty much fused with my veins and when they pulled them out it scared the entire route to my heart so my left shoulder and arm was killing me for at least two months oh man wouldn't wish this pain on anyone but not sure everyone goes through this.

The plus side is technology has moved on so well and my device is state of the art, only due to stock issues did they not give me the newer one that allows you to even go into MRI scanners if you need to in your life.  How cool is that :-)

So it's been 5 months since my new ICD implant and cool new home monitoring system (smaller, faster better) and all seems well, in fact all is really great.

I have had a chat with my doctors at the hospital and they have even said it's ok to exercise more and I got the green light to take part in the BHF London to Brighton cycle ride something that I have wanted to do since 2011.

You cannot imagine the joy this brings as I was such an active person.

So 2016 I have decided to take drastic action in my health and well-being.  An all new diet to help reduce that growing waste line back to an acceptable target.  Got a new bike and starting to slowing rack up the miles on practice rides in the park of 10miles a pop.

And once again I have a fund raising page to help raise money for the BHF who have undeniably done so much for me.

I will start to update this blog a lot more with my training and progress on my ride so watch this space.

PS:  I want to give a mini shout out to Harriet Southwood a Media Officer from the BHF.  She contacted me and has been working with me to write up a profile on my condition and plans for the cycle ride.  It will appear in my local papers telling everyone about my story over the last 5 years.


If you wish to donate to the cause please take a look at my Just Giving page here and thank you in advance.