Special Feature: How I Lost 40kgs in 8 Months

Recently, I got in touch with a childhood friend of mine. Suffice to say, he wasn't half the man he used to be.

Now, this isn't going to be your bite-sized chunk of information you're used to receiving on Straight Eye for the Straight Guy. So I suggest you grab a cup of coff.. I mean, a bowl of fruit, sit back, relax and brace yourself for an awe-inspiring story of hope, courage, determination and desire.

How I Lost 40kgs in 8 Months

by Kynan Tiong Sawan

I’m going to go straight to the point and I’m not going to talk about my feelings. I’m writing this with the hope of helping people. Because we all need help when it comes to something as important as our health.

Exercise

I’ll begin with exercise. First of all, we need to admit that we are a product of our environment and that the way we are at present is the result of the circumstances that we were placed in whilst growing up. I grew up in a home that rarely encouraged me to go out and play, and thus, I never really understood or realized the true value of exercise, or playing hard for that matter.

My previous weight loss efforts were always futile, and the only reason behind my failure was the fact that I never tried. People tend to start an exercise routine one day, get sore the next, then decide to take a week off to let the muscles heal.

This isn’t wise, and is actually a hindrance to developing a habit of exercise, because let’s face it, once a week is not exercise. The bare minimum is at least 20 minutes a day depending on your age and weight. Ignore the soreness and try to repeat what you did, and when you do the exercise – try your best. You’re meant to feel a burn, and you’re meant to sweat and look terrible. Exercise is not pretty and the only reason the people on television look good doing it is because they’re either not doing it with full intensity, or perhaps the studio that they’re filming in is air conditioned. Taebo videos however, are an exception. Do you see how sweaty those guys get? Now that’s exercise.

My exercise routine started off as a run through a wild forest reserve area behind my university. I didn’t time myself, and I didn’t care about my form. What I cared about was how tired I made myself feel, and how wet my shirt became from being soaked in sweat. This went on for about 3-4 months until I hurt myself by attempting a 3km run on an extremely uneven path (damn you Northlake). The injury has been the best learning experience I have had so far.

My injury lead to me signing up to a gym, and I haven’t looked back since because I am now on my way to achieving 8% body fat if I keep up whatever it is I’m doing.

The gym itself is another hurdle that you have to get through. A lot of over weight people tend to be embarrassed about how they look when they are in the gym. This was true especially for me. I was terribly self conscious at first and could never focus whilst I was working out at the gym. But with time, I eventually got used to it, and the gym is now one of my favourite places to go to in the university. People are friendly, and people do want to help. And I can tell you that each time I see an overweight person huffing and puffing in the gym, I smile not because it’s funny, but because I know that this person will achieve their goal based on the effort that they are making.

Lifestyle

I remember watching an episode of “The Cleveland Show” and in it, the little son of the main character tells his father “If I walk any further in this heat, I’ll develop sweat stains under my breasts”.

I was that kid, sweat stains under my breasts and all. The unwillingness to sweat or walk is an example of the bad lifestyle that many overweight people lead. What we need to remember is that nothing is wrong with sweating. It’s perfectly natural and it just means that your body can’t cope with the temperature of your environment. If sweat is a problem for you – wear deodorant and bring a spare shirt around. There’s always a solution to every problem.

The idea of living a healthy lifestyle makes perfect sense. If you want to have the body of the triathlete, you need to live the life of a triathlete. This means train like a triathlete, eat like a triathlete, and think like a triathlete.

However, living the life of another person you aspire to be does not mean that you need to do exactly what they’re doing. After all, not everybody can run, swim, and cycle 42km. The secret is to think of the types of decisions and choices that these people will make, and to live your life by these decisions.

My lifestyle changes were very subtle, and I hope that they will be permanent. Making simple choices like walking to the store, instead of driving or taking the bus can make a great difference in your life. Taking the stairs instead of the escalator is also a great example of a lifestyle change that one can make. Whatever it is, it has to relate directly to you and your life, and no one else can make the decision to change your lifestyle except you.

I think that many overweight people have a problem leading a healthy lifestyle because being overweight truly and severely limits your body movement. And when the movement of our body is limited, it is definitely harder to be active. In a nutshell, my best advice would be to have it hard and suck it up – at least till the weight drops off and you feel the new movements that your body can make.

Diet

My diet was and still is the most challenging aspect of losing weight. But the 2 most important things that I kept in mind throughout the year was that I had to eat like my grandfather, and that “I had to put in less than what I put out.

Living like my grandfather was important because I realized that many of the foods that I was consuming were not good for me because they were foreign to my natural diet, and not required by my dietary needs.

Putting in less than what you get out means that you need a calorie deficit that goes along with burning calories through exercise. The hardest bit – accepting the fact that I couldn’t enjoy the little things I used to enjoy anymore.

Further into my weight loss, I did more research and cut out sugar to prevent the storage of fat, and increased my protein intake to build and maintain muscle mass. By this time I was on what I call ‘Semi-Atkins’ – a diet based on the inverted food pyramid with a substantial amount of complex carbohydrates from fruit and vegetable as part of my diet.

With diets however, one must remember that not all diets can work for everybody. The initial part of my dieting phase saw me crashing in the middle of the afternoon – and I was never one to take afternoon naps. I took my body’s reaction seriously and then tweaked my diet to suit my personal energy and dietary needs.

One other thing to remember – diets are diets, and the weight comes back with a vengeance the moment you stop. And this is why it is so important to choose a diet that you think you could live with for the rest of your life. This is all part of the change in lifestyle, and if it’s not something that you can apply to your life permanently, then it’s not going to work out for you.

I now live like a diabetic, and hope to continue living like this. I cook all my own food, and am constantly researching foods that will suit my new diet and lifestyle. All this is done in fear of gaining the weight back because I know for a fact that I can definitely go back to what I used to be if the proper precautions are not taken.

However, the solution to the problem of gaining back the weight after stopping a diet lies in our bodies’ natural ability to adapt. As of now, I am slowly incorporating different types of carbohydrates into my diet so that my body adapt to my consumption of refined carbohydrates.

But the fact remains that I will try my best to abstain from all refined carbohydrates and sugars, and also high glycaemic foods. Whatever it is, I’ll take the healthier option. Because we have the rest of our lives to eat cake and be fat. But why do it now? Because now is the time to be free and live the dream. And my dream was to grow up to be what I am now – the best that I can be.