This might sound weird to you, but when I lost weight I lost it by accident.  When I say ‘by accident’ I really just mean that I wasn’t even trying to lose weight… it just happened.

Did I need to lose weight?  Yes.  Am I glad I lost it?  Of course!

So how did I lose it?

Well, again, I wasn’t trying to.  I’ve noticed something when it comes to trying to lose weight, it gets harder for some, if not most, people.  I am one of those people.  For years I tried to lose weight by exercising and trying to eat better, and yeah, I lost two or three pounds, but nothing that put me into a healthy weight range.

A few years ago I started to take control of my health by changing my eating habits to try and help the stomach issues I had been dealing with since I was a kid.  I started to cut down my portions, eat slower and not snack as much.  Just those three things not only aided the healing of my stomach, but I also lost about 10-15lbs!  So not only was my stomach feeling better and I wasn’t getting sick as often, but I was feeling better because I had lost some excess weight.  However, I still needed to drop a bit more considering my height.

Very recently I started to become more aware of keeping my heart healthy and preventing myself from getting diabetes, as heart diseases and diabetes both run in my family.  I knew I had to start doing something now to prevent either of these from onsetting in my body.  So, the easiest way to prevent these… eat right, drink a lot of water and exercise.

Exercising was the easy part.  I started walking at least 1 mile 5-7 days a week depending on weather and how busy my days are.  However, considering I can walk a mile in 20-22 minutes, it’s not that hard to do this.  Plus, when I started exercising I started drinking more water regularly and drink at least 4 bottles of water a day now.  Eating right… well, I’m working on that (I’ve always had issues with vegetables), but for the most part I don’t eat terribly.  I mean, I cut out a lot of fast food; pretty much all but Dunkin’.

America runs on Dunkin’ after all.

I started this new routine in May and since then I am feeling even better about my health.  In fact, I just had my physical at the doctor’s earlier this week and he said my blood test results were perfect, and mind you it wasn’t a fasting blood test.  As a bonus to feeling better and actually being healthier, I have lost another 9-10lbs and am now within a normal BMI (Body Mass Index) for my age, gender and height.

My point here is that because of other health concerns I started to change my eating habits and became more active and for this reason I was not focused on losing weight to feel better about myself.  The weight loss just came with it and boosted my health because I am now at a healthier weight than I was 2-3 years ago.

Maybe we need to start trying to lose weight for the right reasons, such as prevention of certain diseases, instead of losing weight just so we can look like models and boost our egos.