At school, we all learned from Isaac Newton that no object can change its speed unless an external force acts upon it. For the most part he’s right—but now a team of physicists has demonstrated that sub-atomic particles could, in fact, accelerate themselves, without any force applied whatsoever.
Virtual currency bitcoin is starting to get its act together. A startup funded with $106 million from the New York Stock Exchange as well as banks and venture capital firms, is set to launch the first licensed US bitcoin exchange. Coinbase reckons it…
I was besieged in an instant. The moment President Obama announced to the world the momentous change he’s implementing regarding normalizing relations between the United States and Cuba, my phone went nuts — texts, calls, emails, Facebook messages, Google alerts — all of it, all at once.
For those who know me even a little, you know two things to be true: I’m pretty damn proud of being Cuban; and I’m pretty damn obsessed with U.S. politics. So it only stands to reason when the biggest news in more than half a century involving Cuba and American politics is happening in real time, a lot of people would automatically reach out to me. The thing was, I wasn’t quite ready to discuss it. I am now.
First, a little context: I was born in Boston to trailblazing Cuban parents who fled the atrocities Fidel Castro inflicted on their homeland. Thanks to my parents, grandmothers and other relatives, I grew up speaking Spanish, listening to Cuba’s salsa queen, Celia Cruz, on the stereo, memorizing the Cuban national anthem, and learning about José Martí, Cuba’s answer to George Washington. I also ate Cuban food (lechón, yuca), spoke rapid-fire Spanish (as all Cubans seem to do), immersed myself in Cuban culture (dominoes) and — though I am undeniably and proudly American — even today, when I close my eyes, I smile, kiss, love and dream in Cuban. I. Am. Cuban.
Here’s the shocker: I’ve never actually set foot on the island because of the unspeakable horrors Castro has been carrying out with a ferocious relentlessness that somehow seems to be largely lost on my otherwise educated, politically-savvy American friends. They all have a way of making me feel petty or overly dramatic when they ask me, half-smirking, “Has Castro really been that bad?” Yes. A million times, yes. And if at a minimum you don’t recognize that undeniable fact, you might as well stop reading this right now. Let me be unequivocally clear: Fidel Castro is a despot, a dictator, a fraud who sacrificed the well-being and freedom of his people for his own grab at power — the oldest story in world politics. Fidel Castro is a liar. Fidel Castro is a coward. Fidel Castro is a monster.
But, here’s the rub — the joy I felt in my heart when President Obama said that the United States and Cuba were working towards establishing diplomatic relations after more than 55 years of geopolitical paralysis was — and remains — real inside of me. So very real. I do believe that the time has come for the Cuban people to get to know us. This wasn’t a conclusion I reached easily or without considerable painful introspection. How Castro impacted my family — and so many thousands of other families unwillingly driven from their homes in search of opportunities formerly available to all Cubans — is tangible and heartbreaking every single day in most Cubans’ lives.
When I lived in Los Angeles, many of my successful Persian friends told me how completely they related to my family’s experience as they, too, fled their beloved Iran when the religious extremist Ayatollah Khomeini seized power. Useful tip: If you haven’t lived through something like this — the displacing of your entire family to a foreign land — take extra care before declaring your opinions to those of us who have.
Over the years, and as an editor in chief of numerous magazines, I’ve been given several opportunities to visit Cuba in an official “cultural exchange” capacity. Out of respect for my parents, aunts/uncles and friends’ relatives and the gargantuan hardships they’ve endured because of Castro, I always flatly said, “No.” When I was the top editor at Time Inc.’s People en Español, the largest magazine for Hispanics in the United States, I again was offered a week-long trip to the mysterious nation I longed to see. Though I was extremely tempted to accept, I sadly declined once again. I would always joke that I’d surely cause “an international incident” if Castro came within earshot of me.
The other issue, as the editor of an important magazine and a semi-public figure in the Hispanic community working at the country’s largest magazine company that was then owned by the nation’s largest entertainment conglomerate (Time Warner), if I actually had gone to Cuba the reaction by many (mostly) older Cubans in Miami would’ve been explosive and toxic, with threats of boycotts for Time Warner and even the real possibility of violence for “promoting Castro’s propaganda” by me visiting Cuba. This was potentially a highly charged situation and I wasn’t interested in lighting the fuse.
When I told my mother, Addy, a former university professor and longtime pharmacist, about the offer to visit Cuba and how I, once again, turned it down in part respecting her wishes, she sat straight up in her chair and said a most unexpected thing: “My wishes? Oh no, sweetie! You must go to Cuba and soon — before the Holiday Inn gets there! You have to experience Havana when it’s bathed in its beautiful pink light right before the fading sun washes over the city. You have to go and breathe the air from the Cuba I remember, the Cuba you were taught to love.” I sat there speechless — and sad.
Can you imagine never setting foot in the country you’re from? What if Bruce Springsteen sang so passionately about New Jersey only as an idea in his head and heart as my dear friend Gloria Estefan has had to do about Cuba for so many decades? This issue is a tough one for all Cubans, but I have concluded that what I believe is best for the Cuban people and for everyone in the United States is more openness, not less; more dialogue, not less; more contact, not less.
Cubans — both there and here — are an ambitious, gregarious, happy people. We love to tell fantastical stories with exaggerated embellishments that enthrall and mystify our friends and foes alike. We love, laugh and play hard, but also take pride in our unrivaled ambition and work ethic. It’s about time to bridge the genuinely tragic 90-mile divide that exists between all Cubans. Imagine how powerful, how epic the coming together of one culture in two lands would be.
I’m not a Pollyanna, and I’m quite aware of the strength and certain logic in the opposing viewpoint, particularly among older Cubans. But here’s my question to them: How much longer are you willing to wait the Castros out? This nonsensical policy has been the law of the land longer than I’ve been alive. It’s time to stop. And it’s time to come together. Not for Castro — to hell with him and his brother — but for my amazing homeland I have never seen but have wept for the entirety of my life, and for the country in which I was born, a place I’m so proud to hail from.
So, here’s my hope today: The time has come to tell a new fantastical story, one that begins in a magical place called Havana bathed in a mystical pink light. Make no mistake, I will breathe that Cuban air and I will proudly return to my home in America to regale my friends with the stories I experienced. How could I not?
The Cuba of my dreams will soon become my reality. Only then will I be free. Cuba libre — how sweet, indeed.
Earlier on Huff/Post50:
Not only is she running, but we have a very good idea of what it will look like.
Hillary Clinton is in the final stages of planning a presidential campaign that is likely to launch in early April, and has made decisions on most top posts, according to numerous Democrats in close contact with the Clintons and their aides.
Reaganomics, the plot to appease the rich and condemn the rest, got its comeuppance last week in President Obama’s State of the Union speech.
The president asked: “Will we accept an economy where only a few of us do spectacularly well?”
That’s the trickle down economy he’s talking about. And when he said, “spectacularly well,” that understated the great fortune of the very few. Oxfam, the international federation working to end poverty, reported just before the speech that if nothing changes over the next two years, the top 1 percent will hoard more wealth than that held by the entire remaining 99 percent of humans on earth.
President Obama made it clear he has no intention of accepting such economic damnation for the vast majority of Americans. He proposed an alternative to Ronnie’s scheme. President Obama called it middle class economics. Though its intent is to create opportunity, prosperity and security for the working poor and middle class, it’ll be a hard sell. That’s because Americans have been force fed that voodoo, greed-is-good, grovel-before-the-rich financial philosophy for so very long.
Share of global wealth of the top 1% and bottom 99% respectively; the dashed lines project the 2010–2014 trend. By 2016, the top 1% will have more than 50% of total global wealth. Graph by Oxfam.
Middle class economics turns trickle down on its head. Instead of focusing on the whims of the wealthy, middle class economics meets the needs of the majority. It raises taxes on the rich, often by eliminating their lobbyist-purchased loopholes. And it uses that revenue to pay for programs that would broaden opportunity for the 99 percent, including two free years of community college, assistance for child care and help with retirement savings.
This is no killer tax increase on the wealthy. It’s hardly the 90 percent marginal income tax rate charged to the nation’s richest at times in the 1940s and 1950s. This would be an increase from 23.8 percent to 28 percent on capital gains and dividends, the same rate Reagan charged, so it could hardly be gawd-awful.
And, by the way, they can afford it. Oxfam found that for the past five years, the top 1 percent has been grabbing a greater and greater portion of global wealth, while the bottom 99 percent has been stuck with a smaller and smaller share. In fact, the world’s richest 80 people now have stashed away the same wealth as the entire accumulated assets of half of the world’s population.
The system’s dammed when 80 fat cats have as much as everything scrimped together by 3.5 billion people.
The tale that trickle-downers like to tell about billionaires is that they are rags-to-riches success superheroes. Trickle-downers assert that any American can pull himself up by his bootstraps and through dint of hard work become a billionaire.
Oxfam’s research suggests otherwise. It found that more than a third – 34 percent – of the 1,645 billionaires on the Forbes richest list started out wealthy, having inherited some or all of their money. It’s just so much easier to tug on those bootstraps when born with a silver shoehorn in the mouth. Think of those Walmart heirs, for example.
Middle class economics proposes a partial solution for that: ending the trust fund tax loophole. For those with incomes above $2 million who bequeath to their children stock that has increased in value, taxes on those capital gains would no longer be waived. Seems fair. Taxes shouldn’t be forgiven just because Richie Rich is inheriting.
Meanwhile, the tax rate on those capital gains would increase because, frankly, there’s no reason that a lower rate should be levied on money accrued from sitting on stocks than on wages earned from sweat of the brow.
The revenue raised would be used to pay for programs assisting the working poor and middle class, like tripling the tax credit for young children to $3,000, creating a $500 credit for families with two working spouses and broadening eligibility for the earned income tax credit.
This plan levels the playing field ever so slightly for the children of tenant farmers and Walmart workers because while those kids will inherit fond memories, there won’t be any stock-stuffed trust funds for them.
Raising taxes on the rich and increasing opportunity for the rest conforms with Oxfam’s recommendations to decrease debilitating global income inequality. Oxfam suggests “shifting the tax burden away from labor and consumption and towards wealth, capital and income from these assets.”
Its report, “Wealth: Having It All and Wanting More,” makes clear the reason for its recommendation that the fabulously wealthy pay more. It notes that the wealth gap has widened so quickly over the past few years that it now takes far fewer billionaires to equal the wealth of the entire bottom half of the world’s population.
In 2010, it took 388 billionaires. Now it’s 80. That’s because billionaires doubled their wealth between 2009 and 2014, and the valuables accrued by the bottom 50 percent declined over that time to a figure below what it was in 2009.
Most people would say that’s just not right. But not Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner. He says he has no intention of raising taxes on billionaires to help pay for opportunity for the working poor and middle class. He says middle class economics is all wrong – the wrong policies, the wrong priorities.
In fact, on of the first day of this legislative session, the House he presides over passed a bill that would cut Social Security disability benefits by 20 percent in 2016 for 11 million people, including veterans disabled in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It would be against his economic religion, that being Trickle-Downism, to lift the cap on Social Security so that the rich pay on every penny they make, just like the working poor and middle class do. If the wealthy paid Social Security taxes on their earnings above the $120,000 cap, no one would be talking about cutting Social Security payments to disabled veterans.
Boehner and his followers claim the American people are on his side. He’s just wrong. The polling numbers on President Obama’s State of the Union Speech outlining middle class economics illustrate that.
In a CNN poll, 72 percent said Obama’s policies would move the country in the right direction. In an MSNBC poll, 68 percent said Obama focused on the right things, while only 32 percent said they believed Republicans care about the right things.
Americans believe trickle down economics have condemned them to flat wages and foreclosed futures. They want a new morning in America where middle class economics places them, the vast majority, first.
In his State of the Union address last week, President Barack Obama cheered rising wages. What he didn’t mention is that much of the income gained since the recession has gone into the pockets of the richest Americans.
In 39 U.S. states, the top 1 percent of earners gobbled up at least half of all of the income gains between 2009 and 2012. And in 17 of those states, the top earners got every bit of the income growth in those years. That’s according to a new paper released Monday by the Economic Policy Institute, a think tank focused on labor issues.
In all states, the rebound in income in the three years after the recession pretty much all went to the richest of the rich, the EPI found.
“Over this period, the average income of the bottom 99 percent in the United States actually fell (by 0.4 percent),” the paper states. “In contrast, the average income of the top 1 percent climbed 36.8 percent.”
The EPI paper, using state-level tax data from the IRS, builds on older research by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, who analyzed income gains captured by the top 1 percent to illustrate broader trends in economic inequality. The French economist Piketty got famous last year for his book, Capital In The Twenty-First Century, which warned that inequality was only going to get worse without government intervention.
The map below shows where the richest 1 percent captured the greatest percentage of the overall income gained between 2009 and 2012. The darker orange and red shades show where the largest share of income growth went to the 1 percent.
Among the states where the 1 percent got the biggest share of the income gains were Delaware — where they got 301 percent of income growth — and Florida, where they got about 260 percent.
Nevada was arguably one of the most-unequal states in the country during that stretch: The income of the top 1 percent jumped nearly 40 percent, while the income of the rest fell 16 percent. But because total state income fell — the only state in which this happened — it doesn’t register on the map, which measures the 1 percent’s share of income gains.
West Virginia was the least-unequal state in the country during that stretch: It’s the only state in which the 1 percent suffered falling income while the 99 percent enjoyed rising income.
Since the recession ended more than five years ago, wages have been one of the slowest parts of the economy to recover. In his speech last week, Obama applauded the 11 million new private-sector jobs created since 2009 and claimed that “Wages are finally starting to rise again.”
But wage growth is still a lot slower than it was before the recession. And it’s still too slow to keep up with the growth enjoyed by the 1 percent, who typically don’t have to beg employers for raises.
Infographic by Alissa Scheller
One of the most mind-bending far future predictions you’ll hear from some futurists is this: Eventually, the technology will exist to copy your brain (every bit of data that makes you, you) onto a computer.
Technical details and exact predictions aside (the concept is still firmly science fiction) mind uploading makes for a fascinating and disturbing thought experiment. If you had the power to upload yourself, would you?
Many of us have that friend, the one who is always rushing off to the gym, heading out for a run, just getting home from yoga — and always inviting you to come along.
Before you begrudge her for trying, let’s give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she’s not trying to make you feel lazy, but instead genuinely excited to share her passion for fitness with a friend.
It’s not unheard of, after all. Working out with a pal is essentially multi-tasking: You get to fit in your fitness while catching up, and for many, it’s a source of motivation and a built-in accountability method.
But — like any relationship you’d like to last — finding the perfect exercise partner can take some work. That’s why we asked Jessica Matthews, senior health and fitness expert for the American Council on Exercise and assistant professor of health and exercise science at Miramar College in San Diego, Calif. for her best advice for finding a match made in fitness heaven.
The very first thing you need to do is figure out why you want to work out with someone else, she says, because there are different types of gym buddies. You might be looking for someone who can act like a cheerleader on a long run when the course gets hilly. Or you might be looking for someone who can meet you at the gym at 6 a.m. so you won’t hit snooze when the alarm goes off. Or you might want someone who knows his or her way around the weight room and can show you a thing or two. Any of those options, and plenty more, is fine, but you won’t find what you’re looking for if you don’t know what you want.
Simply knowing what you want won’t exactly deliver that perfect person to your doorstep, but it’s a step in the right direction. From there, many of the most common challenges are entirely (thankfully) within your control. Here are a few of those struggles — and what to do about ’em.
When one of you is faster…
No one wants to be left in the dust on a bike ride or lapped on the track, so you may feel most comfortable starting out in certain activities with someone of a similar fitness ability. However, research suggests that working out with someone at a slightly higher fitness level might help you push yourself harder, says Matthews, which could be just the motivation you need.
Inspiring as it might be, if your exercise bud is too much more advanced than you, you might feel a little overconfident in trying some of the tougher stuff. Matthews cautions that in some instances, this could even be unsafe and lead to injuries for the under-prepared.
But that doesn’t mean your fitlationship is doomed. “You don’t have to be mirror images,” she says. Exercise is scaleable, meaning there is a way to make just about every movement “more suitable to a wider variety of fitness levels,” she says. In fact, that’s the basic premise of group exercise classes. You’re all doing the same workout, but with options to choose from to accommodate the entire group. “You can still work out with a partner and get those motivational benefits, but you don’t have to necessarily do the same identical movement,” says Matthews.
When you have different goals…
And not just weight loss or racing goals. Each individual workout session can have a different motive, and that can determine whether you’re going to chat on side-by-side ellipticals or put in your headphones and pump up the jams.
Varying goals for a workout are only problematic if you haven’t come clean about what those expectations are. “Having those [expectations] clear and up front makes a big difference,” says Matthews. You’ll probably have to have “The Talk” of sorts, in which you lay out what you’re looking for and discuss with your potential partner if those stipulations align with his or her own.
Don’t be surprised, says Matthews, if your workout personality doesn’t perfectly match that of your significant other or best friend. You can still have wonderful relationships with these people outside of exercise, we promise! But in some instances, your exercise goals may align better with someone you don’t know as well, which may actually strengthen some of those bonds and expand your social circles, says Matthews.
When you have different schedules…
You might be the most compatible of workout personalities and yet completely unable to find a free hour you both share. Don’t forget to cover the logistics in The Talk: What time of day and which days of the week do you want to work out? What do you like to do for exercise? How long is your workout going to last? The latter is especially important if you’re planning on carpooling (or walking together) to your exercise destination. If your workouts aren’t the same, explain to your partner what you have planned for the day, says Matthews. Not only will that hold you additionally accountable to doing what you said you would, it also solidifies a plan before anyone has time to loiter by the water fountain.
When you’re feeling like you don’t measure up…
There may be days when your workout partner’s performance feels less like motivation and more like showing off. Maybe you’re not running as fast or lifting as much weight or you don’t look like she does in your skivvies. But keep in mind, says Matthews, that these judgments all begin in your own mind. “There isn’t a quintessential picture of what a ‘good workout’ looks like,” or how fast a “fit” person can run or the “ideal” weight, she says. “We have to stop in our own minds comparing our experiences to other people’s experiences. We do a lot of judging in our lives on a day-to-day basis, and exercise … doesn’t have to be another place to compare yourself to others.”
Rather than push yourself to the brink of injury to match her, put your own performance in perspective. “At one point in time, [every] person was at the same place you are, they had to progress through the same phases,” says Matthews. “Pushing yourself to a place that’s not safe or appropriate, at the end of the day, is not going to get you faster to your goals,” she says. Listen to your body to help you identify where you feel comfortable, and be proud of being exactly there.
Maryann Flasch, a 32-year-old office manager from Austin, Colorado, used to suffer from vaginal itching, dryness and infections when she got her period, which she attributed to using tampons and pads. She had resigned herself to buying tube after tube of topical painkillers — until she discovered the menstrual cup.
“I suffered for years with the side effects of using tampons/pads because I didn’t know there was another option,” Flasch wrote in an email to The Huffington Post. “Not only do [menstrual cups] reduce garbage and mess, but they are a lifesaver for women that find tampons and pads to be highly irritating.”
Sara Austin, a 25-year-old occupational therapist from Gainesville, Florida, also says that cups are easier to use than tampons and pads. She cited relief from vaginal dryness — as well as a more pleasant olfactory experience.
“Tampons/pads tend to cause an unpleasant odor after a while, and I have yet to experience that with my menstrual cup,” Austin wrote in an email to HuffPost.
While most women in the U.S. and Europe use sanitary pads or tampons when they’re on their period, a small but vocal minority of women are sounding a cri de coeur for their beloved menstrual cups.
For the uninitiated, menstrual cups are goblet-shaped receptacles made out of non-toxic, non-absorbent and flexible materials such as silicone. They are inserted in the vagina to collect period blood. Cups can be reused for up to 10 years, and at around $30 to $40 apiece, they’re more affordable and eco-friendly than cotton or synthetic single-use products.
Beth Croft, a 38-year-old photographer and yoga teacher who splits her time between London and San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua, says she loves her menstrual cup because it can be left in place for up to 12 hours at a time, which is especially helpful when she visits places where access to public restrooms can be dicey. Croft began using a menstrual cup eight years ago, when she traveled around India for a month. After her trip, she continued to use it and says that the cup’s environmental impact (or rather, lack thereof) is one of the biggest arguments for using one.
“Being very eco-conscious, I had always been bothered by the amount of sanitary products that must be used throughout the world, so it really felt like a revelation,” Croft wrote in an email to HuffPost. “It took a little getting used to, but it is without a doubt one of the best inventions, and I have since encouraged many family and friends to make the switch.”
The device also improves the lives of women in developing countries. In a recent HuffPost blog post, international women’s rights advocate Sabrina Rubli described how the silicone receptacle is helping poor girls in East Africa and elsewhere deal with their periods. Without menstrual cups, they often have to resort to using newspapers, rags, leaves and even mud to absorb the blood, which puts them at risk of infection and makes attending school difficult, if not impossible.
Menstrual cups come with other benefits as well. Some women say they help relieve cramping. Kelly Bailey from Newport, Rhode Island, experienced extremely painful cramps before she bought her Diva Cup.
“I used to have terrible, terrible cramps,” Bailey told HuffPost. “The first time I used a menstrual cup, the cramps were much less severe … I felt so much better.”
Others ditch tampons over concerns about toxic shock syndrome, a rare but serious disease that can occur when the bacteria Staphylococcus aureus become concentrated in the body and that has in the past been linked to tampons.
Because they are made of materials like silicone and create airtight seals inside the vagina, menstrual cups don’t encourage bacterial growth, says Dr. Philip M. Tierno Jr., a microbiology professor at New York University and author of the book The Secret Life of Germs.
Tampons are no longer made with the synthetic fibers that were thought to increase the risk of TSS, and tampon safety is regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. In fact, the risk of contracting TSS is so small these days that the Centers for Disease Control and Preventionno longer even tracks it. But for some women, peace of mind can be an important motivator: Janaye Murphy, a 29-year-old doula from San Francisco, says she loves her cup because she can leave it in longer than a tampon “without worrying about TSS.”
While menstrual cups have clear benefits, not everyone’s a fan. Some women who try them out never manage to adjust to them. Rev. Kimberly-Ann Talbert, 60, of Los Angeles, tried the Tassaway, a type of menstrual cup that is no longer manufactured. She says she found the cup “difficult to insert and a bit uncomfortable.”
“Taking them out was difficult as they were apt to spill their contents, making for a mess,” Talbert said. She’s sticking with pads for now.
She’s not the only woman who admitted to experiencing a few leaks before learning how to insert and remove a menstrual cup properly. When it’s time to empty a cup, a woman pours the collected blood into the toilet, washes the cup in the sink with warm soapy water, and then reinserts it into her vagina. If she happens to be somewhere where she can’t wash the cup, she can just empty it out, wipe it off with some toilet paper and then reinsert.
That airtight seal Tierno mentioned can also get users in trouble: In a single-patient case published in the International Journal of STD & AIDS, a researcher writes about a 20-year-old patient whose Mooncup was stuck so far up her vagina that even the doctor had trouble prying it away.
But most of the research comparing cups to other menstrual products find that women either like them as much as tampons and pads or prefer them over other options.
Name: John Compton
Age: 46
Height: 5’10”
Before Weight: 487 pounds
How I Gained It: I ate anything and everything. Nutritional values or portion control were never things I thought about. I could eat two-thirds of a large pizza or a pint of ice cream in one sitting. But 2004 was really the year it spiraled out of control for me. I was going through numerous personal problems, and I turned to food as a way to cope with my emotions. With a steady diet of junk food and increased lack of exercise, it was easy to put on the pounds.
Breaking Point: In September 2011 I went to the doctor for a routine checkup and found out that I tipped the scale at around 487 pounds. I was then admitted to the hospital and diagnosed with atrial fibrillation and atrial flutter. They recommended a procedure to correct these problems, but they couldn’t put me on the operating table until I lost about 150 pounds. I didn’t want my heart issues to cause permanent damage, so I decided I needed to make a drastic change.
How I Lost It: I took baby steps. Being so overweight, it was hard to find the right place to start. I worked with my doctor and nutritionists. I was so heavy I couldn’t really do anything physically active, so they suggested I start journaling my meals. Journaling was eye opening because I had never given any thought to what kind of food I was putting into my body or even how much I was eating. I used MyFitnessPal to help me track my daily food consumption, including my caloric intake for the day. For the first time in my life I was reading nutritional labels. In the first 7 months I was down 50 pounds.
At that point I began to have the courage to join a gym. I chose my local Planet Fitness with the hope that their motto of a “Judgement Free Zone” was true, because I had never worked out and I needed an environment that would be safe and welcoming. I started by walking on the treadmill for three 10-minute intervals at 1.2 miles per hour, six days a week. After three months, I added strength training, which helped further accelerate my weight loss. I really began to see and feel the difference when a fellow Planet Fitness member came up to me and let me know how great I looked. That really energized me to continue on this journey.
I’m now able to breathe and sleep better, and I can do more physical activities than I ever thought. I’ve created a “Fat-Free Bucket List” which includes activities that I’m going to try now that I’ve lost the weight. I started to really jog on the treadmill and have plans of running my first 5K sometime this spring.
My new diet consists of high-protein, low-calorie foods. If I have a snack, I cap it at about 100 to 200 calories, and I make sure to stay away from starches like pasta and breads. When I do get those cravings, I found it helps to keep healthier options on hand. I portion treats into smaller baggies or containers so I don’t mindlessly snack away. I’ve told myself to slow down while I eat, which allows my stomach to feel full and prevent overeating. This took the most practice, as I was always taught to never waste food.
The biggest fear I have is that I will slip, but knowing how good I feel and just remembering how miserable I was three years ago is the motivation that keeps me going every day. My message to anyone looking to lose weight is that you need to have support. This change doesn’t come overnight, and you need to have realistic expectations. There will be hiccups along the way. Take a step beyond your fear, then take another step and then one more. My world has changed and I could not be more excited about the future.
After Weight:180 pounds. (Note: Approximately. John recently had excess skin removal surgery and is not sure what he’ll weigh after healing fully.)
Got a success story of your own? Send it to us at success.stories@huffingtonpost.com and you could be featured in our I Lost Weight series!
The Huffington Post publishes photographs as they are submitted to us by our readers. As told to Sarah Klein.
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