About Us

  Jesse

I'm a twenty-something college English instructor. I have a bachelor's degree in English from The University of Louisiana at Monroe (a point of contention with Stephen, but I'll let him tell you about it). I also have a master's degree in English (with a concentration in Renaissance Studies) from The University of Alabama (a point of contention with everyone I know; we are big LSU fans around these parts).

As for my weight-loss journey, I don't really have much to say just now. I've been overweight since I was a teenager (except for about a year where I dropped fifty or so pounds in high school thanks to a low-carb diet... but I was extremely unhealthy). My "tipping point" came in September 2012--I had gone through a break-up a few months before and my best friend (who lived next door) moved back to her hometown. I was extremely lonely and would cry at just about anything. I thought to myself, "You can't do this; you can't be this person. You aren't this person, Jesse. You've always been happy, and you need to make yourself happy again." That night, I signed up to volunteer with a local non-profit organization that rescues cats from the local shelter. The following week, I joined Anytime Fitness.

When I met Stephen, I had already decided to live a healthier lifestyle on my own--I joined a gym, made a concerted effort to cook at home, and read blogs and books about healthy living. I've always been interested in food (I mean, I didn't become overweight by being indifferent to food), so reading about healthy eating and living really struck a chord. When I learned Stephen was interested in living the same healthy lifestyle I was, everything just clicked. We've made this lifestyle choice individually, but together I feel we can make this a permanent change.

  Stephen

I'm what you would call a person who took the road less traveled. I'm in my later twenties and have just re-enrolled in college. For explanation on the road less traveled part, I started college the semester after high school graduation and then left college after some health issues, two quarters into the first year. I got those under control and worked to earn some money to pay for college. I went back to college starting at a community college and graduated with two associates degrees. I transferred while finishing those up to the university where I earned my bachelor's degree, THE University of Louisiana............... at Lafayette (Sorry, but Jesse hates the fact I always leave off the "at Lafayette" part of the name. Geaux Cajuns!) I have a bachelor's degree in Marketing with a minor in International Business. Unfortunately, I did not want a career in sales but rather a career in product/brand marketing, so I decided, after a semester off and a trial run in a professional sales job, to go back to school at Southeastern Louisiana University and finish up a second bachelor's degree in Supply Chain Management. Hopefully I'll have a better time with job possibilities when I finish up.

As for my weight-loss journey, it has been up and down for basically my whole life. Don't get me wrong, in the picture above I look horribly overweight, but growing up I was big, but not really huge. A little background for you to understand: I grew up playing sports year round starting at age 4. I started with soccer from 4 until I was 16. I added basketball in 3rd-8th grade. Baseball was from age 5 until 13. I was on the track & field team as well as the football team in high school. I'm a 6'1, broad-shouldered, big-boned kinda guy. I've always been a little overweight medically because of my build. When I hit high school, I was 190 lbs. Starting June 1st of my freshman year of high school, I was in weight lifting year round for sports. Because I did shot put and discus for track and played football as an offensive lineman, I needed to bulk up. I graduated high school weighing roughly 245 lb. My health issues in college were genetic, but the medicines to help the issues caused me to gain massive amounts of weight, even when I'd watch what I was eating and exercising. So I finally topped out at 328 lbs. when I said enough was enough.

I've had many situations where I've looked at myself and said enough is enough and get on the health kick, but two jump out at me. The first was when I was looking at Father's Day photos back in 2010, a few weeks after taking them; I  said to myself, "Damn, I need to do something. I really do look like two of my dad put together. I need to get in shape so that I can have these types of days with my kids when I get older." The second time was in May 2011. I had already lost some of the 328 lbs., but I'm not exactly sure how much. That May, I was on a Study Aboard trip in Costa Rica with UL-Lafayette, Southeastern Louisiana University, and Nichols State University. I was having a great trip while I was there and then came the last five days of the trip when it became free time to do whatever we wanted. We traveled to a beach side resort and relaxed. It was then that I noticed that literally out of a group of 80 people, myself and one other male on the trip were the only ones that looked like we had never stepped foot in a gym, played a sport, or knew what the word exercise meant. We were all down at the beach, and we decided to rent surfboards and give it a try. Although some of the people had prior experience, I saw how me being overweight was an issue when I was attempting to surf for three hours and only rode in three waves because I was too heavy to gain balance on the board in open water. I knew I wasn't in the best shape of my life, but I realized then that I needed to make a decision to either settle with where I was with my body or to do something about it. I don't need 6-pack abs like others, but I do want to be down around 190-210, not my current 260 lb.

When I met Jesse, I had already made the decision that getting healthy for myself and my future was important to me. Since being at my highest weight, I've already shed over 60 lbs. I made a commitment to myself and to Jesse that I want to be in better shape so that we can go out and enjoy fun outdoor exercise activities and so that our future together will be bright. I was so happy when Jesse told me about her health commitment she had made as well. Granted, we might not always agree on dinner as I'm more of a lean-meat-and-fruit kind of guy while Jesse wants vegetables, but we find a way to make it work for us. I think things have a way of working themselves out through series of chain events, and the event that clicked for me was when I found Jesse and her healthy lifestyle to help keep me focused on my goals as well as me keeping her focused on hers. We might make individual commitments, but we work as a team to reach our goals together and a lifetime of goals are still yet to be set, but we'll achieve them one after another.