Inspire! Day 23- Joel & Sandra

From Madelynn: Today we have a couple tag teamming on WSWE! I am so happy to have Sandra and Joel sharing their story. It’s even nicer to have a gentlemen joining us. There are men who love WSWE we just don’t hear from them as often. This story has challenged me and I hope it challenges you. They are a great couple and have a wonderful story to share! Meet Joel and Sandra…

Sandra: Hector Joel and I are high school sweethearts. We do everything together, especially eating. One year after we were married, Joel had gained a whopping 50lbs. I take full blame for it.

Joel:I disagree you taking the blame for my weight gain. I remember the many times driving from work and stopping at Dairy Queen to get a Blizzard which I still love.

Sandra: I love to cook. It’s therapy for me. We are both comfort food eaters whether it is for a joyous occasion or a sad one. We tried weight loss dieting in 2004 (at the mark of our 10th wedding anniversary). Although we saw some results, (Joel lost 30lbs and I lost 15lbs) we fell back into the same habit. The weight slowly crept back. He was able to keep 10lbs of the 30lbs he lost off, and I just found all of the 15lbs I had lost + more. In 2012, just one year shy of his 40th birthday, Joel decided that he was going to work at transforming his lifestyle along with his image. Being a father to a son, he knew that he needed to be able to keep up with his boy. At the current weight, he knew it was not possible. He started to look into workout regimens. He found Insanity and started doing the workouts. With Insanity he lost 10lbs in about 3 weeks. But soon enough, he just didn’t have the drive to continue. I tried being his accountability partner, but it just wasn’t working. I knew that he wanted to change this area about himself, but just didn’t have the motivation. Then the light bulb lit. I called his brother. I told his brother Sam, that Joel needed an accountability partner outside of his house. I needed someone that could push him to reach great goals. And Sam took the challenge. They found a plan (BodyBuilding.com) for both of them to do. They decided to start this plan in October 2012. On top of this, they both decided to sign up for one of the toughest, hard-core events one can do. They signed up for “Tough Mudder”. This is a 21 obstacle 10-12 mile event. It’s crazy. They had 6 months to train. But they were determined. I honestly thought it was outrageous. The holidays were coming. How could you be on a diet and training for something like this during the holidays? In all honesty, I was a bit upset.

Joel: Funny how you were a bit upset about something you helped to set in motion.

Sandra: This was imposing on my eating habits now (can I say food idol?). But, I pushed through it with him. Joel told me that he would start eating 6 small healthy meals a day. Do you know what that means? Lots of kitchen time.

Joel: You did say that cooking is therapeutic for you.

Sandra: Even though I enjoy being in the kitchen, cooking healthy meals and vegetables all the time wasn’t therapy for me. It has been challenging. But being healthy is important for my husband. And therefore, it is important for me. It takes great sacrifice. It’s a sacrifice I’m willing to do for him and for myself. The verse that came to mind was 1 Corinthians 6:19-20: “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” Joel started working out 5 days a week. He kept to his 6 small meals a day, which entailed more protein, more veggies and less sugar. The pounds started to drop. I was amazed at the transformation. Six months later he was 60lbs lighter and going strong. In May of 2013, he along with his brother, cousin and some other men in their team finished the Tough Mudder obstacle. I was his biggest cheerleader. Even with his great transformation I can’t say I have fully jumped in with him in this endeavor. But he is my greatest motivator. I’m getting my act straight now. I want to glorify God through my body. I need to take care of what He’s given me. I need to eat to live, and not live to eat!!!

Joel: When I started this journey in October 2012 I remember taking a walk around the park in my neighborhood and praying and pleading with the Lord to please help me do this. Which to this day He has been answering that prayer. I am not going to say that it has been easy, that all of a sudden the weight just came down. It has not! I love food and comfort food at that like Sandra said. But let me just say I really got tired of feeling the way I was feeling. Always lethargic, my knees hurting, difficult to take the stairs at work because by the time I would hit the third flight of stairs I was huffing and puffing and could barely breath. I thought I was going to keel over and die. Like Sandra mentioned my brother turned me on to a 12 week program from the Bodybuilding.com website, which is exactly what I needed. The main thing about the program for me was the structure and discipline that it gave me. The pounds started dropping once I really started doing the plan. Both my brother and I hit it hard in the gym. We would get out of work and hit the gym almost on a daily basis. Now we have changed it up and we do the gym early in the morning before work. The more I see the weight go down the more motivated I get. Let me just say that at this point the weight is not coming down as fast as it was in the beginning but persistence is key. What really helps here is the way we would push each other. We just love to compete against each other on who can go the heaviest.

The other side and probably the most important part of this journey was changing my eating habits. The program taught me the importance of eating healthy. I have to say that Sandra really helped in getting the nutrition part down. There is an endless sea of free resources to pick from. We search for recipes and ideas to eat better, some of the recipes pay off and some not so much. It is a matter of trying what will work for you and your lifestyle. I don’t know when the Lord will call me home but I have vowed to live the healthiest I can live for the rest of my life. I want to experience things that I was not able to experience before because I was too big or too heavy to do those things. Tough Mudder was one of those things that pushed me to limits I thought I never would have reached. Another was when my daughter invited me to be part of her Adventure Ed class where they are climbing walls, swinging across the gym, and jumping from 30ft ceilings. Wow that was awesome! I also found a new passion and that is rock climbing and boulder jumping with my son out on Devils Lake in Wisconsin. Those are things that I would never have been able to experience if I would not have lost the 60+ pounds. My journey continues and to be real this is a life long journey. I cannot expect to undo all the damage that I did to my body in the 20 years of carelessness in 1 year. Slow and steady wins the race. I will have my victories and I will have my failures but my failures will not keep me down. And just so everyone knows I believe that at my heaviest I was at around 286 or so. Today I am below 220 and going down. My goal is to be at 180 and healthy.