Is YOUR “slow metabolism” keeping YOU from being Healthy and Fit? If so, I strongly suggest that YOU read this!

As many of you have probably figured out by now, I am a bit of an “obsessive compulsive”.  And, as such, I cannot help but burn a lot of energy on things for which I can find no explanation.  One such thing that has been literally “turning me inside out” for many years is why it is so darn hard to get folks to make the commitment to change their eating and lifestyle behavior in such a way that will better their chances at future health and/or increased longevity.  Isn’t survival supposed to be “human nature”.

Why won’t my mother, my “near-obese” friends, my sister, my cousins…..good gracious, I could go on forever….. why won’t they quit making up excuses and just start eating and exercising like sane individuals who want to truly be fit and healthy at age 100?   I have literally begged these dying horses to come over to my pond of “Kool-Aid” and  take a drink…..but, there is always one more reason why they will not!

One of my many favorites is the age-old, “I am just too busy.”  And, “I just cannot work it into my schedule.”  I am not going to dignify that one with a long narrative tonight. As a parent of 4 children….(3 who happen to be 3 year old toddlers), hearing that increbily worn out excuse is actually an offense to my intelligence.  In truth, that statement should just be changed to what it really is in truth:  “I don’t WANT to fit it into my schedule.”

Another of my favorites comes from the mouth of my dear….nearly perfect…. mother.  One of her many favorite manners in which to defray the attention from her…(so, she can put the idea of  personal fitness and health improvements off for another day)…….is to ask me (for the 9 millionth time) if , in actuality, I am exercising TOO much.  (Although I don’t like it, I must begrudgingly accept that my dear mother would prefer to direct her energies at this thought……more than at the thought of her ever adhering to a consistent exercise and eating program of her own.)  And, in fact, although I have re-asked my cardiologist the “overexerciser” question in every way it can possibly be asked….(not only to placate her but also because I have actually wondered if the concept is actually possible for someone who is a heart patient to “overexercise”)….. she likes to ask me to ask it again each time I run into a health care professional.   Assumedly, she does this just in case there might be some quack out there that truly would say that “exercising vigorously”….(as I have asked her to do)….really is a BAD thing…. and sitting about on one’s sofa is actually what God intended we do if we wished to live a long and healthy life!  (Note:  In my wonderful mother’s defense, please be advised that she has been eating “Low Glycemic” for about 6 weeks now.  And, she sent me a picture of her exercising just this morning!)

Folks, excuses to not do what you know you need to do to become healthy and fit are like a rear end (your bum, that is.)  Yes.  It is true.  EVERYONE HAS ONE.

But, one of them that I have heard for the better part of my life…and, with almost as much consistency as the “I don’t have time” soundbite…….is the one I am going to discuss (and disprove) with you tonight.

And, that excuse is the one that goes something like this:  “But, people that are fit and healthy have better metabolisms than I do.  I barely eat anything at all.  And, I gain 20 pounds.”  Or, I also often hear:  “People that are fit are genetically superior to me!  No matter how hard I exercised and no matter how diligent I was about my nutrition, I would still never look like that…. or be that fit….. or live that long anyway.”  This line of thinking baffles me perhaps more than all the rest.  For an incredible percent of the people who need to make a change in their eating/lifestyle plan, there is a belief/supposition that folks who are fit have special metabolisms (or genetic makeups) that allow them to be more fit and more healthy than their less fortunate unfit and unhealthy peers.  What is even more amazing is the fact that that belief is literally acting as their final barrier to taking the step to adopting a healthy and fit life plan.

We have all seen the “before” and “after” pictures from the purveyors of this exercise plan or that new trendy diet.  What is funny is that I think the average american couch potato truly believes in their head that those pictures are ALL retouched photos.  No one could make such a change.  It simply is not possible.  So, it must have been faked.

Well, that notion is what is fake……in actuality, it is absurd.  I truly wish you to divorce yourself of it.  And, as such, I am going to have to share a photo with you that doesn’t get trotted out very often during photo sharing sessions at the Curry House.  This photo was taken approximately in 1997.  (My beautiful wife has given me permission to leave her in the picture so that you can compare her 1997 photo with the one you see right next to it taken 15 years later.  Please “click on them both and enlarge them so you can actually see what we looked like in 1997…. and in 2010.)  Although you would NEVER guess it by looking at this photo, I had actually very successfully competed in the Missouri BodyBuilding Championships less than 36 months prior to this picture being snapped!  At the time of the bodybuilding show, I was freakishly lean…probably in the 4 to 5% range….and, it wasn’t because I am some sort of genetic freak.  It was because I was exercising as many as 14 times per week and eating less fat in a month than the average person intakes in a day!  (I don’t do that anymore.  And, my current pictures 16 years later  (see inset) are within shooting distance of the Missouri pics.  So, don’t start worrying that you are ever going to be asked by me to exercise 14 times per week.  And, you already know that I currently eat more “healthy” fat in a day’s time than the average person probably does in two weeks.  So, no starvation low fat diets will be suggested by me on this blog either.  I, for one, hate them.  We’ll come back to that another time.)  Anyhow, the fact of that matter is that, for the 12 months preceding the photo, I had pretty much decided to eat what the rest of the world was eating……eating low fat for most of a lifetime had pretty much started to become a bit “old”.  And, for yet another time in my lifespan…….with no knowledge of eating Low Glycemic anywhere in sight for at least another 16 years of my life….I “fell off the Low Fat Eater Wagon” and proved how “genetically ungifted” I was by going from “Mr. Buff” to “Mr. Buffed”……….in a matter of less than one single calendar year!

Folks, all of us humans are pretty much the same in our makeup.  I am no exception.  When I eat like my co-humans, the first thing that happens to me is that my face balloons up to the size of an enormous Chipmunk’s……..imagine a 6 foot tall Chipmunk with a store of winter nuts in each cheek….(or, just reference the photo of me provided above.)   The rest of me….Thank God….follows a little more slowly in its fat accumulation.  Thankfully, within weeks of seeing this photo of me for the very first time….in late 1997, I think….I made some serious changes to my eating and lifestyle choices which made it possible for me to be back to my fit and healthy looking self by the middle of 1998.

Thanks to not knowing about the concept of eating Low Glycemic….and, how much easier it was for me to do than trying to eat insanely low fat quantities to maintain my fitness level….I have yo-yoed just a bit in the interim 15 years.  But, I assure you that, going forward, I will never again have a picture that even closely approximates the one offered above.  I know…without hesitation….that I can eat Low Glycemic for the rest of my life and that I love the food I eat when I am doing so!

Now, I am not the only one that has done the same thing.  And, you know what, I am going to have to share a few more photos of people who were not any “genetically different” than you are….but, who made the decision to live healthy and fit….after years of not living healthy and fit….and, who now have to listen to their friends telling them that THEY “must have incredible metabolisms”…..or, that “they are genetically different than them” as well…..even friends who have known the “before” and “after” versions.  Is this insanity, or what?

Let’s start by taking a look at the very first Age Management Doctor I ever met.  I met him at the very beginning of my Low Glycemic Eating Journey.  And, thankfully, he was willing to share with me a series of his photos.  Each one is a 9 month jump from the one previous to it.  And, they definitely tell a story.  The doctor looked just about like every other middle aged man out there trying to make a living and forgetting to live along the way.  After 5 years of eating Low Glycemic, he looks the same as he did in his 18th month of doing
so……..and, he walks with a spring in his step that my brother equated to a high school quarterback who has just won the Friday night football game.  And, as I explained to my lunch buddy (and anyone else who asked), the guy is happier (almost goofy happy) then a pig in poop.  Wouldn’t you be if you had taken that first pic and turned yourself into the last pic?  Now, does this guy have a “better metabolism” than you do?  No.  This guy is making a consistent effort to be healthy and fit…………Oh.  And, he Eats What David Eats along the way.

Now, Let’s take a look at the second doctor that I met along my Low Glycemic life 

changing journey.  I just have the Before and After picture of this fellow.  But, I think they speak for themselves.  If I had not met the man in person….and, seen the old photos of him that he still has framed upon his desk in his office….I would have a real hard time believing myself that these two photos are of the very same man.  (The shocking part is the the first photo is of this doc when he was about 39 years old………..the second was taken at age 44……..He evidently did NOT have a “better metabolism” or “better genetics” than any of you.  Good gracious.  What he did have…..and/or what he “found”…..was a desire to permanently change his health and fitness level.  And, he did it…..and, he has been the “after” picture for almost 5 years now. Wow.

The last photos I want to share with you…..until my wife gives me permission to share 
her incredible photos…….are the photos of the Doc that first got me interested in this whole concept of Age and Health Management.  His name is Dr. Jeffrey Life.  Yes.   You have heard of him…….of course you have.  Anyone that has ever been on an Airline to anywhere has seen the “Before” and “After” pictures of Dr. Life on the back cover of the
Airline magazine in the seatback in front of you.  And, I would guess that almost every single one of you has looked at his age 57 photos……compared them to his age 74 photos…..and, chuckled quietly to yourself as you reassure yourself (for the zillionth) time that there is no way for those photos to be real.
There is obviously NO WAY for a man who looked like THAT at age 57 to look like THAT at any age……let alone 74 years of age!  Well, folks.  Those photos are real.  And, if you doubt them, you can google videos of Dr. Life at his current age and see for yourself.  In fact, at the end of 2012, Men’s Fitness Magazine selected Dr. Life and 24 others as the top 25 fittest men of the year. The other 24 honorees were men in their 20’s and 30’s.  And, most of the men were professional athletes.  Dr. Life is on morning TV and 20/20 and Dr. Phil……and, you get the picture……..more than any 74 year old man in the country today.  Why?  Because we want to SEE with our own eyes what we know to be impossible.  And, amazingly, I truly think that we probably even doubt his existence and fitness level within about 5 minutes of seeing the last few seconds of footage die away on our TV screen.

In general, we ALL HAVE ROUGHLY THE SAME INNATE ABILITY TO METABOLIZE.  We ALL HAVE GOOD ENOUGH GENETICS TO LOOK LIKE DR. LIFE.

The only thing that is missing in most of us is a willingness to do what Dr. Life and the rest of your fit friends and family members have made a conscious decision to do …..and, you have not…….that is to say, live a fit and healthy lifestyle……consistently and forever.