Hello. My name is Jason Noble. I'm 38 years old. I'm a HS Spanish teacher in Iowa. I am trying to get into shape for pretty much the first time in my adult life.
Growing up, I was kind of husky as a kid. I wouldn't consider myself fat, maybe just a bit "doughy." I was also fairly tall for my age so I don't think I was ever really teased for my weight. I loved junk food whenever I could get it. I was never really big into candy and sweets. I tended to overdo it on salty and fried foods as well as any type of meat. I always liked sports and was usually ok at them; not great, but respectable.
In middle school, I kind of hit my growth spurt. I lost most of the baby fat. I reached my current height of 6'1" in 8th grade. I was able to run faster and was better in athletics than before. I was still no star athlete, but I was pretty good at most sports. It was this time that I accidentally found out that I was pretty good at distance running. I went out for track my 8th grade year. In my first mile race, I finished 3rd. After that, I never lost again for the rest of the season. I decided to go out for cross country instead of football as a Freshman. I was pretty good. My high school 5K PR was 17:01 (I never could quite get below 17:00). My best mile was 4:59. I wasn't the best in the state or even on my team, but I was pretty good.
During high school I ate whatever I wanted. I had developed some pretty bad habits with food and the newfound freedom of having a car and some spending money; this combined with my job as a cook/waiter at a restaurant only compounded these bad habits. And yet, I never really had to worry about getting fat.
In February of my Junior year (1996) I joined the Iowa Army National Guard. I went to Basic Training in the summer of '96. I entered Fort Leonard Wood at 170 lbs and left at 150. This is the skinniest I can ever remember being at 6'1". I even had family members worried I was too skinny and possibly having an eating disorder. After I got back from Basic, I ate the same as always, but my activity level and higher metabolism seemed to make up for it.
After high school, my weight slowly crept up. I ate as I had always eaten; or perhaps a bit worse since I was now responsible for all of my own meals. I crept up to 200 lbs. The National Guard flagged me for my weight. By the time my contract was up in 2001, I was somewhere in the low 200's. But I just kept eating the way that I always had.
I got married in 2004. At the time I weighed around 250 lbs. I would try to start up running here and there, sometimes keeping it up for months at a time. But I would always have something that would get me off track and I would stop completely for a few years.
The last time I was running regularly was after my second son, Asher was born in March of 2011. I weighed around 280. Despite that, I managed to run and finish the 20k race Dam to Dam in June in around 2 hours. Despite logging a lot of miles, I still ate like crap and never saw much weight loss. In July, we moved to Pella and my training stopped again. I would start it up every so often, but it never lasted much past a month or so. All the while, I continued to overeat and avoid nutritious foods.
I've finally had enough. I weigh 311 lbs. I have low energy. I'm almost 40 years old. In the back of my mind I am thinking that even though I don't have health problems now, if I don't change something, I soon will. This blog is where I will share my plan and progress.
June 5th, 2017
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