OnePhatMan

I maintained my weight with no problems. I worked out six days a week, and spent a good amount of my spare time hiking, riding my bike, and kayaking. Sometimes my weight crept up a little, a few pounds, but then it crept back down with all my physical activity. Minor fluctuations are a part of life.

In April 2005 I had a vasectomy. There weren’t any complications, or anything like that, but it knocked me off working out as regularly for a few weeks. Couple that with comfort foods during the first week—my balls hurt, cut me a little slack—and I picked up 3 or 4 extra pounds. Not really a problem, definitely nothing to get bent out of shape or worry about, but still a blip on the radar.

I’m the studly one in the front

Then in early June I went whitewater rafting on the Ocoee River with some friends from work. About 15 minutes into the 90 minute trip, our guide took our raft back into a rapid we’d just come through and disaster struck. Another boatful of people crested the wave and came down onto our raft. Onto me. As they raced at me, I did the only thing my instincts allowed: I held my hands out in a vain attempt to stop them.

I failed.

When they rode up over me, something in my right shoulder twisted and gave, and I found myself under the other boat, my shoulder throbbing with the beats of my heart. I rowed over an hour after that, my shoulder screaming the whole time.

Doctors initially thought it was a bruised rotator cuff, and told me time would heal it. For several days I couldn’t even move my arm, but it gradually healed to some extent. During that time I missed a good number of workouts, and ate more of that food that seems to comfort so well in times of pain: Oreos.

Six weeks after the accident, I still couldn’t use the shoulder well. It ached most of the time, and really hurt when I tried to lift weights or use it for anything. The orthopedist sent me to have an MRI, and discovered that the cartilage around the end of my humerus—the labrum, it’s called—was torn.

And it wasn’t going to heal on its own.

In mid-August, I had surgery on my right shoulder to repair the torn labrum and hopefully get my shoulder back somewhere close to where it had been before the rafting trip.

Surgery knocked my workouts off even more. I got back to regular cardio within a couple of weeks, and though my shoulder got better in the first couple of months after the operation, serious weightlifting was still a no-no. As I did after the initial injury, I medicated the pain of surgery with more comfort foods. Literally—after the surgery I only took about 4 of the pain pills the doctor gave me. I hate the way narcotic painkillers make me feel.

All this talk of comfort foods and eating is not to imply that I was ever out of control. I wasn’t. Mostly it was just excuses, the chief of which was my shoulder hurts, but I’ll bet McDonald’s would help me forget. But those days of a little here, a little there, coupled with not being able to work out as much, exacted a price from me:

I gained more weight. All in all, 15 pounds between April and late September.

I stopped with the comfort food in September, so that’s definitely not a problem, but the weight remained and something needed to be done about it. I talked about that 15 pounds for weeks, but talking was all I did.

And talking doesn’t cut it.

In early October, I had a minor epiphany while I tried to get to sleep. All the times I joked about the people who “only had to lose fifteen pounds”, all the times I’ve said, “I could shit off fifteen pounds,” those all came back to me. I realized that, despite the fact that I was still working out 6 days a week, the fifteen pounds wasn’t going anywhere unless I did something a little more radical. That’s when the idea sparked.

I decided to resurrect the phat man.

The time had come to focus on what needed doing, and get it done. And that brings us to now. I expect it to be more challenging now because of two things: I already eat healthy and am in good shape, and I have to watch what I do in the weight room because of my shoulder.

Fortunately, the phat man loves a challenge.

I brought the site back online on October 7, 2005. Better, stronger, and faster.

Full disclosure: There are some small ads on the site to offset the costs of running our server. Please don’t assume that I endorse whatever the ads are showing. Google controls those.

I’m going to put up some of the old content, and I’m going to write regularly until the 15 pounds is straightened out. I’ll post regular food and exercise updates, and as much as it pains me to focus on the number, I’m even going to count the pounds down in that little box you see up in the upper left corner.

I’ll probably be cocky again, and I’ll probably make some people mad.

They’ll live.

Once I get this site going, I have an even bigger plan: I’m working to get the Chunk to Hunk domain back from the squatter who grabbed it when it expired, and when I do, I’m putting my book online, a piece at a time, for free.

I hope to re-create some of the magic from the last time: the friends I made online, the camaraderie, the feeling of community. So with that, I leave you with a few questions:

Are you happy with your weight and health? Would you like to improve them? Are you being the best you can possibly be right now?

Will you join me?