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Hello. My name is Lew, and I was morbidly obese. Beer and food nearly killed me. But I’ve lost 60 pounds in the last four months and I’m still drinking good beer and eating real food. I didn’t even exercise. Here’s how it happened.
I realized that I was dying on a trip to the Czech Republic last year. My friend Jack Curtin noticed it: "…a tour of the Castle of Ceske Krumlov involved a strenuous walk up a very long and very steep hill, during which it appeared that we might kill Bryson. I was very worried…if he went down, he was likely to take me with him."
I quote Jack because that’s how I dealt with being fat. I joked about it, I told myself that I was living the way I wanted to, and people would have to put up with me the way I was. I was fat, sure, but life was good!
Then one night my wife, who is a more sensitive person than Jack on her worst day, asked me why I was so unhappy. And I blurted out "Because I’m getting fatter, I’m going to die real soon because of it, and I can’t seem to stop even though I know that I have to."
Three days later we started Weight Watchers. I hated it. We clapped all the time, like being on Oprah. They talked about diet foods and substitutes and meals that sounded hopelessly grim. There was constant paperwork, recording everything I ate and figuring out how many "points" I had consumed. It was like doing taxes every day.
But it beat dying. So I counted my "points," I refused to eat crappy diet food, and I clapped. And the first week I lost five pounds. I could stay in the rules and still eat well. Breakfast on yogurt and oatmeal? Like hell! I had Canadian bacon and a fried egg on an English muffin with a big wad of fresh spinach and a stiff dose of hot sauce…and Weight Watchers said it was good. I ate seafood and lean pork, made my own, leaner sausages (a fun hobby, homebrewers), and learned new ways to eat vegetables. And I kept losing weight.
Best of all, I could keep drinking. It’s only food, after all, and I made room for it in my diet. "Weight Watchers is designed to be a liveable weight loss program," said Jennifer Mitchell, with Weight Watchers. "Many ‘diets’ eliminate particular food groups or indulgences. Weight Watchers encourages members to change their lifestyle so they see long term results. The program has factored in indulgences like beer, or chocolate."
I’d argue about "indulgence," but the theory was sound. Weight Watchers runs on a weekly allotment of points, and I fit booze into my daily total, saving some extras for the weekend. Best of all, there was no difference between light beer, dry stout, and a shot of whiskey. God bless Sly Fox O’Reilly’s Stout!
The only week I gained weight in the first three months was when I got a sixtel of Stegmaier bock beer for my birthday. It tasted so good I just kept drinking it, and I gained a pound and a half. I wasn’t drinking to get drunk, but I was drinking good-tasting beer the same way I ate good-tasting food: mindlessly, without savoring each mouthful. That’s when I finally started thinking about why I was drinking, and realizing that it had a lot to do with why I was eating. I wasn’t an alcoholic; beer was food that came in a glass.
"The process of addiction is similar over many appetites and activities," said Stanton Peele, an alcoholism and addiction expert, author of "7 Tools to Beat Addiction." I asked him whether there was a connection between my tendency to over-eat and over-drink. "It’s common for people to have more than one of these addictions," he said, "drinking and smoking, for example, or drinking and gambling, smoking and over-eating. They have learned to use the substance, food or booze, to provide essential emotional needs: a feeling of control or of being wanted. They often begin to eat or drink or smoke without a set plan, and end up binging." Bingo, Dr. Peele.
"People change when they want it badly enough and when they feel strong enough to face the challenge, not when they’re humiliated or coerced," Peele said in an article in Psychology Today. "People succeed when they recognize that the addiction interferes with something they value — and when they develop the confidence that they can change." Ceske Krumlov made me want change; Weight Watchers and my wife helped give me the confidence to know I could do it.
Now I’m five months into my new life. I’ve dropped six inches off my pants size and said good-bye to XXL. I’m eating like I drink: less, but much better. We signed up for a farm co-op service and get a box of delicious organic vegetables every week. I bought a new bike and my son and I have hit the trails along the Delaware. Airline seats fit better and I can ride roller coasters again. I even like going to Weight Watchers meetings now, and sometimes I’m the first guy to clap.
I’m not saying "You should do it the way I did!" You may not have climbed your Ceske Krumlov yet, and Weight Watchers may not be for you. But if you’re fat like I was — and still am, just not as fat — I just want you to know…you can do it. And you don’t have to walk away from beer at all.
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