Guest Blog

Today, I thought I might surprise you with a guest blog from Manic, my jogging buddy. I would introduce him further, but he kind of does that himself. :P



My name is Adan Hinojosa. I am 25 years old and 275 pounds.

One month ago I was 285.

I am driven.

I’d like nothing more than to see if the grass genuinely is greener on the other side.

My whole life I’ve been the big guy. Up until I was 12 I was typically the tallest. However, I’ve always been the most massive. I’ve carried around a gut for as long as I can remember. Naturally when you’re young you have a thin skin and it might bring you to tears when someone called you fat.

Over time it became a mixture of apathy and acceptance. Somewhere around high school I stopped just thinking of myself as fat and started thinking of me as me. There was still the pseudo-self-consciousness about taking off my shirt in public, among other things.

I graduated high school, became an adult, started taking on some of life’s burdens. A year or two ago I looked at myself in the mirror and finally stepped on a scale for the first time in a long time. Back in high school I was 230-ish and I thought I was large. Come to find out I had gotten myself up to the upper 280’s.

It was strange. Somewhere all along I kept explaining it away. Even from the move from size 36 to size 42 pants. Even through the shirts changing from XL to XXL. I realized that I wasn’t about to let myself get any bigger than this. It wasn’t going to be this way. Something had to change.

Both of my grandfathers died of diabetes-related complications. Both were missing at least one leg. I have two uncles on my father’s side who are now missing body parts below the knee. I have an uncle on my mother’s side who has been fighting heart problems for at least 10-15 years. I see what they allowed themselves to become and resolved that I wasn’t going to make that mistake.

From the outside observer it’s quite the paradox. How can someone with a mind like mine be so “dumb” enough to just let his body go like that? I can play a musical instrument, I can write comedy, I can fix computers, I can fix cars, I have more than rudimentary knowledge about most subjects that people promptly forget about. What the hell was keeping me from taking the next step and getting my shit together?

I guess you could say I love food. I’d consider my palate wide. Not extreme like some foodies, but I can drop $50 on sushi without flinching. Big steaks with baked potato. Carne Asada Burritos. Cheeseburgers. The really bad stuff has a certain richness to it that can’t often be found elsewhere I became accustomed to it. In the end it was detrimental to my appearance.

It was a slow progression to get me to realize it. But I’d look in the mirror, remember my old weight, and study my features. I’d visualize what I’d look like without 10-20-30-60 pounds. I end up saying to myself in the end, “there’s one very good-looking dude hiding under that fat, and I’m going to go find him.”

So that’s where I started 7 weeks ago going for jogs and cutting the bad stuff out of my diet. No more breakfast fast food sandwiches. No more Jack in the Box tacos & cheeseburgers. No more KFC bowls. No more Sonic Chicken Dinners or shakes. No more Western Bacon Cheeseburgers from Carls Jr. No more fried shrimp. Down with potatoes. No more biscuits & gravy.

Fat had to be minimized. Carbs had to be minimized. Lean meats are in. My old favorite Mushrooms are upped. Breakfasts consisting of nothing but a big lump of scrambled eggs are in. Low-cal protein shakes will help to replenish me. Start slowly kicking that soda addiction, if only during my transformation. I have loved Dr Pepper for over 20 years, and will continue to do so. However, now is the time for us to take a break. It’s been good to me but not good for me.

More water, more iced tea, and sports drink no higher in calories than Gatorade G2. It’s a lifestyle adjustment that forces you to go left where you’d go right. Go up where you’d go down. It takes commitment. It takes effort. Count those calories, count those carbs, count those sugars. Stare at the nutrition label and plug every single thing on it into Wikipedia. Education is key.

Seven weeks and I’m down ten pounds. It’s not enough. It’s never enough. I’ve only broken a chunk off the iceberg. I’ve got another fifty to go. I’m always going to be a thick guy, but I can look lean at the very least. I want my XL shirts back. I want size 36 jeans. I want to look good in a plain white t-shirt again.

Part of my jogging just came down to finding my stamina again, and slowly working up to it. Starting out I could barely do a mild jog for 30 yards before feeling like I got the crap kicked out of me. Now I’m jogging faster over five times the distance before needing a little break. I can power my way up hills. I can recover faster. I’m nowhere near where I used to be. I want to be able to jog a quarter mile. I want to be flexible. I want my 18-year old body back. It’s not some impossible goal. It’s something within reach. If you feel like something’s within reach you’ll always feel like you’re making progress.

Part of my training in the jogging was Couch-to-5K. My friend Christie had me do a couple days with her. It’s structured nicely and actually helped bulk my stamina up more than I thought it would. My training has moved onto other things, but I thank portions of Couch-to-5K for being able to get me there. I hope that by the end of winter I can look in the mirror and what’s staring back is not the same as the guy from a year ago. That mirror will show a person who feels the power coming from his body, and that power will drive everything else forward in life.