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"Taking a
Swing at Weight Loss - Update #20"
01 October 2002
To
those I am honored to call Family and Friends,
I pray you are at peace and I thank you for your continued interest and
support as reflected by your willingness to take the time to read this. I
sincerely appreciate it. Were it not for the daily requests I get
for a website update, I am not sure I would have taken the time to do it.
I cannot believe that exactly six months have passed since the last one.
In some ways, with a measure of routine normalcy having returned to my
existence, I do not feel worthy of even having you spend the time to
ponder my rambling thoughts. On the other hand, I know that there
are many out there who have been skeptical about what I have been able to
accomplish and how and IF I am able to maintain my current state of
health. I can honestly say now that loosing the weight the way I did
was easy! I am so blessed to have come up with the idea of combining
doing something good for my health with doing something that I totally
enjoyed. As I look back on the fantasy I lived through last year, loosing
weight was very doable!! Keeping it off and making it a
permanent reality in some ways is much more difficult! Gone are the
weekly celebrations as I step up on the scale with the positive
reinforcement of additional pounds melting off my body. Maintaining
the same weight is not quite as exciting!!! It is very important for
me to confess that. My whole motivation for sharing the experience
so openly this way is to make myself available as a testimony and even a
potential source of encouragement in the lives of others.
Ultimately, what greater honor could I have but to be blessed with the
possibility to encourage and motivate others through my own struggles,
triumphs and ongoing challenges. And so I offer a few transparent
morsels and pearls of what is currently happening as I strive to maintain
my health and in my quest to be a balanced man who is honoring God with
his life!
With that in mind, another motivation is the fact that today is actually a
monumental day of significance in my life and may actually be the
anniversary of when the concept and convictions for this whole adventure
were first conceived! Being the emotional, reflective and
sappy guy that I am, its days like these that force me to pause, reflect
and ponder the ultimate significance of my existence. In the midst
of this heart felt day of reflection I find it helpful to try to capture
and quantify a few of the thoughts bouncing off the walls of my heart and
mind. It was on October 1, 1997 at the age of 31 that for the first
time in my life I faced my human mortality head on. A day when death
was on my mind. A day that I had to face the possibility that my
life could be cut short. The powerful realization that life itself and my
personal health were God's precious gifts to me and not things that I
could any longer take for granted. Five years ago today a knife was
brought against my skin
and part of me was cut away. Cancer had to be removed from my body.
It was five years ago today that I had surgery for testicular cancer.
This day medically is very important in terms of long term prognosis and
survival. Being alive and well and in full remission five years
after the initial diagnosis of cancer is cause for celebration!!! It
is a very important medical milestone. And so I share with you yet
another day of heartfelt celebration and my heart of thanksgiving
towards God! Thank you Lord God for my health!! It was through
that whole experience that my heart started to churn with the conviction
that I needed to be more deliberate with choices in my life that could
have direct bearing on my health and physical well being. Having
cancer was not something per se that I had direct control over. My
weight and the higher risk associated with it for heart disease, diabetes,
arthritis, and high blood pressure was something that I could actually
change. And so, the genesis of my decision to finally do something
radical to address my need for weight loss was right around that time.
How quickly the time can fly!!
As for where I am with my physical health at this moment: I
have now lost a total of 270 pounds having gone from an initial weight of
467 pounds to my current weight of 197. In loosing 270 pounds and
with each pound having an equivalent of 3500 calories of stored energy, my
body has burned off nearly a million extra calories! 945,000
calories to be exact have been consumed from 270 pounds of fat melting
away!!! That is the equivalent caloric content of 1575 Big Macs,
6655 slices of bacon, 8590 bananas or 93,256 animal cookies! I have
gone from a size 60 waist down to comfortably fitting into some size 32
pants. I am still diligently spending at least two hours a day on
average at the local YMCA gym with the time being evenly split between
aerobic exercise and weight
lifting/muscle building. The loose skin which so many people seem to
be so curious about is slowly improving and everyone tells me that they
can't even see evidence of any loose skin around my face and arms.
Of course certain parts of the body are looser than others but then again
my goal in life is not to be a speedo model so I have no intentions of
surgical intervention for what seems to be a mild cosmetic issue.
Two weeks ago I was able to do something that two years ago would have
only been a dream. Having struggled in the past to make it up a
flight of steps, I was able hike to the peak of the tallest mountain in
the continental United States! It is my good friend Dr. Jim Schultz
(who took over my role as medical director at the network of clinics I had
spent 8 years with) that came up with the suggestion for the ultimate
backpacking trip. It is a wise thing to always have a goal of some
sort especially with regard to physical fitness. I was eager to have
something to motivate me to maintain healthy habits besides getting up on
a scale in the morning and seeing the same weight recorded day after day.
And so I, my brother John, Jim, and three of Jim's friends from church
spent 6 days and 5 nights backpacking and hiking a nearly 50 mile loop in
the High Sierras of California including the peak of MT. Whitney which is
the tallest mountain in the continental United States at 14,497 feet.
Though I was quite anxious about my ability to make it or at least make it
without pushing myself to the edge of my body's physical capacity, the
hike was almost easy. The many hours at the gym over the past year
paid off in a big way and I was very comfortable doing something
physically that not long ago I could not have even considered being a part
of. There is a whole new array of activities and recreational options that
in the past I was excluded from participating in. Drinking
pumped stream water, going a week without a shower, eating dehydrated food
and dealing with below freezing temperatures at night proved to be much
bigger challenges than the physical exertion needed to conquer a mountain
peak!!
God has recently provided some very unique and fun venues in which to
share my story and weight loss adventure with others. Besides many
word of mouth inquiries through friends and family and through the
website, I have had hundreds of emails from people eager to receive advice
and counsel with regard to their own weight, fitness and health issues.
I have had so many people tell me to write a book or get a publicist but I
have decided to just have a wait and see attitude with regard to what if
anything unfolds. Well, I recently received a call from a very
unlikely media source. The National Enquirer called me after they
had received a tip from a local resident who had heard me speak and who
had been following my journey through the local media for quite some time.
She sent in a scrap book of sorts and the editors decided to pursue the
story. Despite my disbelief about the legitimacy of the
request and the magazine's motivation and interest in my story, after
seeking advice from my family and pastor I decided to go ahead and share
my recent experiences with them. Although all of the spiritual
aspects and the emphasis of my reliance on God was left completely out of
the feature article, it was otherwise amazingly right on and fully
accurate. What a unique experience to see yourself on the pages of a
publication like that! It is actually supposedly the most widely
read newspaper in the world! As a result of the article there
have been other secondary media opportunities that have since come up in
the last month. One of the largest German TV stations flew out a
crew to shoot about 10 hours of footage with me last Saturday that will be
used for a prime time show sometime this month that will be broadcast
across the whole European Continent. All of this has been for
free and besides being a lot of fun may open up some even further
opportunities to share my testimony and be used strategically by God in
the lives of others. I have also had my first inquiry from a
book publisher and will soon begin discussions about the possibility of
publishing my story. I would sincerely request your prayer in these
matters that my motives would be pure, that if things do develop that it
would be to God's glory and that it would not be a source of distraction
or temptation towards the wrong things. There are several other
inquires that I have recently received including from the Los Angeles
Times and a couple Christian Publications and Magazines as well. Obesity
is certainly a relevant public health issue in both the United States and
in many other developed nations so how my story could be used as a
testimony to others is something that is quite exciting to me.
As for how I currently spend my time, as already mentioned exercise is a
very important part of my daily routine and schedule. I am enjoying
the time that I have on a daily basis to be able to focus on my personal
fitness and am excited with the slow but steady improvement with my body's
shape and composition. My brother Paul recently joined the same gym
and so its been fun to spend the time working out with him and other
friends who join me or who I have gotten to know at the YMCA. My
sister Pauline has become quite the fitness goddess herself as she too
spends time almost daily at the gym and has been doing lots of running and
is preparing to run in the Chicago Marathon later this month. Work
wise, I have been so blessed to continue serving in several key consulting
and clinical positions. My main job has been as Medical Consultant
with North County Collaboratives which is a non profit local agency
involved with all kinds of strategic community initiatives. My
friend and boss Brad Wiscons and I have been fortunate in improving the
services received by local foster kids, with victims of domestic violence,
with the health care needs of some of our rural communities, and with the
housing needs for the local homeless population just to name a few.
I am also very excited about the possibility of serving as a liaison
between local government and social service agencies with some of the
larger churches and faith communities in the area. I still
enjoy seeing patients a couple days a week back at the network of clinics
where I use to serve as medical director. Its quite the change to be
a medical mercenary who comes in to do a job and then leaves without all
the administrative responsibilities which were such a time consuming
commitment in the past. My brother Phil is still caring for a majority of
the patients I use to have and its great to still be able to see some of
them on occasion. Its funny how many of them claim to miss the big
old jolly Dr. Nick!!! A few have jokingly accused me of being an
impostor!!
I have become very involved with the Christian medical students at UCSD
serving as their advisor as they strive to integrate their faith in the
context of the intensities of their medical education. Its a very
strategic opportunity for me to be able to serve as a role model, mentor
and source of encouragement and accountability to them as the proceed in
the process of going from being students to doctors. Finally, I
spend a lot of time giving lectures about my weight loss or with emailing
or visiting with folks who have struggles with their own weight and poor
health. Not only is it a joy to be able to encourage others but also
a source of accountability and encouragement back to me as I make the
daily decisions that are necessary to maintain my current state of health.
All the healthy habits have not yet become a "natural way of
life" and I am not sure that they ever will. The challenge and
responsibility I have been given to encourage others in turn is something
that encourages and challenges me. Here is part of an email that
just came in literally as I was typing this paragraph:
"Also, I really liked what you had to say about your faith and the
role that God played in your journey. I know that I go with God as I do
this and I hope that I can make the same connection that you did to bring
clarity to my life. I would like to be able to keep in contact if that is
alright with you. I think it would be good for me to have somebody who has
"walked the walk" to have in my corner. You really have inspired
me and I hope to have some little "steps" to be able to
share soon."
This gentleman whom I have never met, I feel so blessed to be able to
share what I can with and to pray for him at the same time.
Ultimately it helps me to stay accountable and if my experience can be an
encouragement to others, I thank God for that as well.
Thank you for your willingness to spend the time to have read this.
I close with a BIG favor. Please pray for my father George as this
coming Monday, October 7th he is scheduled to have his knees replaced
because of severe degenerative arthritis. He will be having
BOTH done at the same time which will be quite a challenging and
physically painful experience. Ultimately, the pain he has struggled with
on a daily basis with his arthritis will hopefully be gone but he will
have quite the valley of surgical pain to deal with before reaching the
mountain top of pain free knees!!!! Thank you so very much for your
consideration.
I do not know if I will do another update. As the Lord leads and as
the requests come in, I will then make the decision. I pray you are richly
blessed and I would love to hear from you. Thank you yet again for
all the prayer, support, encouragement and cheers!!! They have been a
vital part of my success to this point and I sincerely appreciate them
all.
Respectfully,
Less than half the man I once was,
dr. Nick
"I rejoice greatly in the Lord that at last you have renewed your
concern for me....I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have
learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is
to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned
the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed
or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything
through Him who gives me strength." --Philippians
4: 10a, 11-13.
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Taking a Swing at Weight Loss! 