Ohio

02 02 06

I have been getting a lot of mail about whether I am Okay or not. My lack of a journal entry in 10 days has made a few people think that I was hit by a bus or something. Well I assure you I am fine. I have just been trying desperately to get things in order and dealing with a lot of things in my life that have frankly taken up too much time.

As I get closer to the end of this walk I am finding that I am having more and more trouble deciding what will constitute a success for me. Is it the actual arrival in New York or is it some arbitrary number on a scale. Lately, I have been wondering if I am actually ready to be done with this journey at all. Then I consider whether I actually have a choice in the matter. Well, whether I have done this walk perfectly or not, or if I have learned the proper lesson is becoming more and more distant for me and being replaced with thoughts of whether I am happy with where I am now. It is difficult to determine whether or not I am on the right track and only time will tell, but overall I am happy that I undertook this adventure and satisfied with my methods, efforts and determination during, but overall unhappy with the results.

What I mean by that is that I set out with some lofty, and as it turns out, unrealistic goals about weight loss, along the way I learned what it really means to be overweight and struggling to get it under control. I have learned that it is never as simple as it seems to regain control over your demons and more importantly that this effort is the most important in your life. All things start with the mind and neglecting its well being is the center of all things wrong in my life. I have learned to focus on what is important in my life and to walk away from the things that are detrimental to my well being. Along this journey I have had successes and failures but the one constant is that I never gave up and it is becoming clear to me that the most important thing is the fact that you make a commitment to yourself and that you never give up. Successes and failure are a part of everyday life and neither has to be a determining factor in your life as a whole; But giving up means that the fight and all hope are lost and that is where it ends.

So now I am facing the difficulty of determining what to do to continue this personal quest for better health and I am examining all of my options closely while trying to see how they are going to fit into my life after this walk, which is a life that I cannot see from here, But I know for sure that it won’t be the same as it was before.

Well onto what has been going on out here. Since the Today show appearance and several local media interviews things have gone nuts. I have never experienced such and outpouring of support and encouragement and it has been overwhelming at times but I guess that it is part of the overall experience so in the long run it can’t be a bad thing.

In Indianapolis I had an interesting experience that I wanted to tell you about. I was asked by a local reporter to come to an elementary school to speak to some of the kids with a local hometown hero. As it turns out this man is a Congressional Medal of Honor winner named Sammy L. Davis and he is the inspiration for the Forest Gump character. The award ceremony footage used in the movie Forest Gump was actually Sammy’s ceremony. Documentary Dave couldn’t help himself and dubbed the experience Gump meets Lump.

Sammy L. Davis has an interesting story and you really should check him out when you can.

I am afraid that this is all that I will be able to write about tonight. It is late and tomorrow is a big day but I will post another journal tomorrow, so be patient.

02 08 06

I know that everyone is waiting for a journal entry and I am ready to give one but I am afraid that it will be a brief one. There are tremendous things going on right now and they are very exciting for me and it will be an exciting read I assure you. But I am busier now that I have been ever before on this journey and finding the time to pull my thoughts into a journal entry has been difficult; but my supporters are very important to me and I really want to share all of these events with you because of that.

Some people are really going to be into what I am doing right now and some are going to hate it. But whichever side of the fence you find yourself it will be interesting. 

I am only going to go into the new developments here briefly tonight but I will make a more detailed journal entry with the help of Eric from www.ericthetrainer.com that promises to be very interesting.

I have decided to take a little time off from walking because I need to break this plateau that I have been at for several weeks. I am going to be focusing primarily on upper body development and nutrition education and practice. I know that some certain people are not going to be happy about this decision but this is now and will remain about my health first and foremost. I am not a character in a movie with a story that gets neatly resolved by the end of the show. I am a real human being with problems and challenges just like everyone else. I have undertaken this journey to figure out how I allowed myself to get into the position that I found myself and then to learn how to fix myself in a permanent and meaningful way.

It is because this has always has been about regaining my life, through behavioral modification, self introspection and discovery and then ultimately weightloss that I have stuck to the journey and made the decisions that I did. And because of that determination and those decisions I will be a better, healthier and happier man with this journeys successful conclusion in New York. Now along the way I have made mistakes, poor decisions and even worked against myself, but the thing that I have come to understand that all of these things; good and bad, are part of the overall process.

I left my home on this journey with the initial idea that weightloss was the goal and achieving it meant that I would find happiness. I discovered that I had to find the happiness in my life regardless of the weight to be able to affect the weightloss in a realistic and sustainable way.  What I am trying to say is that my initial motivation to walk across the country was naïve and ultimately doomed to fail because it is not a good way to lose all of the weight. It is however a great way to get started on the way to a healthier lifestyle which I have found is the only way to lose and keep the extra weight off. 

This walk has resulted in nearly a 100 lbs weightloss, made me stronger, healthier and wiser and brought me to a position where I am able to see the things that I need to do to get to the healthier new me.

So if it is unclear, I am not quitting the walk. I am adding to it by taking this time to introduce a fitness program that will capitalize on my success to date and bring me to a new level of fitness that will allow me to finish my walk strong, healthy and looking the part.

That is all that I can say about this tonight but I have more to tell you about tomorrow, so please be patient and I promise you that it will be worth the wait.

This journal entry is just a brief one to keep everyone up to date and the next one will be much more informative, plus I am keeping a daily journal of the program that I will post weekly so that you can closely follow the progress.

Until then...

02 10 06

Well this continues to be an interesting journey and I am amazed at what has happened since I started back in Oceanside. I never could have known about the almost magical affects that this would have on my life and the lives of so many others. If I were to end this journey today I would do so completely satisfied with the great things that have happened to me, the friends that I have made and the personal growth that I continue to go through everyday as a result of those things.

Since leaving on this walk of discovery I have learned a great deal about myself, inspired others to take control of their own lives and made a healthy leap towards regaining my health. This is all tremendously inspiring for me and I want to thank all of you for making this possible. I just went for a long walk; you made it something that millions of people tuning in to watch. Without you and your continued and overwhelming encouragement, I might have lost my way but because of you I continue on. Even if I never lost a pound through my effort there are a lot of folks out there that are changing things in their life and in some small way I was a catalyst for change in them. That alone is the greatest honor and success of the trip.

Now with that being said I need to clarify some of the things that I have posted here recently. First I am happy with the health results so far but I am not happy in the sense that when I left on this journey my expectations were somewhat unrealistic. I really thought that walking across the country would get me back to being in great shape, at the perfect weight and relieved of all demons. Along the way I discovered some things and have learned that weightloss is neither the problem nor the cure, instead it is the side affect of a much larger and deeper problem. In my case it stemmed from depression, anxiety and trust issues.

As I gained more weight over time these issues only deepened until they took on a life of their own. Regardless of what I did externally to fix the weight issue it would be doomed to fail because the underlying cause was still there. I was lucky enough to realize that the emotional basis for the physical problem needed addressing before there could be any long term solution to my weight issues. So this walk became less of a walk for weightloss and more of a journey for understanding, enlightenment and coming to terms with things that I otherwise suppressed with everyday responsibilities and obligations. I took a serious risk financially but that was never important to me because I knew that I needed to make serious changes to my life or these other things would not mean anything at all. So I have had to adapt this walk several times to accommodate the changes in myself as well as adopting new ideas and methods as I learned them.

I have made some decisions last weekend that has caused quite a stir with some of the folks involved with me and it has been interesting to see them have to adapt as well. I am changing my methods a bit and because of that I am making great progress. First I have accepted the help of a great personal trainer named Eric Fleishman, you can visit his website at http://www.Ericthetrainer.com and secondly, I am dedicating myself to better nutrition through education and practice with the help of a great company called Sunfare .

I want this journey to be successful for many reasons and I am going to do what ever is necessary to make that success happen. I am taking 21 days out of my walk to focus on upper body development, nutrition education and portion control and better physical conditioning overall.  Right now there are some amazing things going on and I really want to share them with you so I have asked Eric to contribute to my journal by explaining his knowledge about health and fitness.

FROM ERIC THE TRAINER

The work out routines with Eric has been very motivational, challenging and invigorating. I am already seeing changes in how I feel, my energy level and in my body. Some of the things that I have learned from Eric this week have been very interesting and enlightening. For example; whether I like it or not walking is only part of the overall equation for losing weight and getting healthier, it focus on a few of the major muscle groups of the body and helps burn a lot of the excess fat but ultimately it is only one part and there needs to be balance.

Fat cells are stored in various areas throughout the body and there is no direct connection between a particular exercise and a particular area of stored fat. So for example, sit-ups will affect the muscles in the abdomen but the fat there resides above that muscle. The body will draw upon the fat reserves as it sees fit not as you would like it to.

In my walking I lost almost 100 lbs but I have reached a plateau at 320 lbs. For the last couple of months the level of exercise through walking is in balance with the intake and I have been burning off what I have been taking in but not losing a pound. Reducing the intake even further is neither practical nor safe and I still need to understand more about the relationships of physical efforts, nutritional values and physical well being.

The middle of a man’s body is a huge storage area, not unlike a bag. The body will draw upon this reserve only once you have exceeded the calorific value of the food that you have ingested that day. So if the food is in balance with the exercise then body levels out and the weight loss slows down. To make the body start to use that reserve one must do a variety of physical exercises that exceed the current level of exercise or different exercises all together and of course focus more on eating properly, sleeping well and living more positively. So these things have helped me to decide to ask for help and learn to do things the right way.

There are going to be a few people who are not happy with this decision and I respect that they are entitled to their opinions. If I lose the book deal or if the media loses interest because this does not fit into what they think is the story then I guess that they must go. Because this is now and always has been about regaining my life, through behavioral modification, self introspection and discovery and then ultimately weightloss.

I will be a better, healthier and happier man and if I return to my life without all of these extra things I have still succeeded beyond my wildest dreams. But If I fail but retain these things will they ever mean as much as the life that I will lose?

So if how I work at my personal development does not fit into someone else’s idea of how it should be done then I suggest that they move one. Because I am the one who has to live with the end result and for me failure means failure in my life and certainly that is much more important than some temporary, arbitrary slings and arrows.

The people who are the true fans, the ones who understand what this is are not going to abandon me but instead will understand that this battle, one we share in common, is not a simple matter of walking across the country as I naively thought in the beginning. Instead this battle is one that is fought every minute of the day and at every turn. People who share my condition will understand that it is not about whether I finished this in terms set forth by someone one else but rather that I never gave up and I always endeavored to do the best I could regardless of where that choice took me or whether it was the popular thing to do. This is not a scripted movie that is nicely sewn up in an allotted time frame. This is my life and if I fail I die.

I have developed enormous strength and tone in my lower body, strength in my mid section and almost nothing in my upper body. My internal organs are operating perfectly and I am not feeling the ill effects of being overweight; lack of energy, muscle and skeletal pain, or simply tired and listless. I am feeling charged and invigorated, strong and capable and where I could not walk 2200 feet less than a year ago and was probably on my way to a heart attack I have walked 2200 miles and feel like a kid again. I am regaining my life and will not sacrifice the gains that I have made because some faceless “internet people” do not approve of my methodology.

I have plenty of people who were inspired by my efforts to go out and do something similar and a few have even taken on a huge challenge like crossing the country but I worry that they might be a little misguided in their efforts. I like the fact that they are trying to make a change but I would not recommend this course of action to them. Walking across the country to lose weight is not a good plan in and of itself. It is a good stepping stone but the results will not be enough. I have learned that there needs to be a wider variety of exercise and more importantly there need to be a concentrated effort on nutrition and health. Walking across the country is a good place to start but you must incorporate more to actually see the results desired. Eric has agreed to help me get more information about the proper way to get healthy and share it with you through my website.

02 14 06

Happy Valentines Day!

Things have been going great for the past week and I am really proud to report that I have made a lot of progress with Eric the trainer. There is a noticeable difference in my body and more importantly I have really made a lot of progress in nutrition and wellness. I am felling better than I have in years; it is almost like getting a surprise present. The thing that a lot of people are wondering about is am I losing weight again. And the answer is absolutely. Today I weighed in at 310.

The following description is a typical day from me this last week.

I awake after sleeping for 8 full hours refreshed and feeling strong. I eat a healthy breakfast of either oatmeal or an egg dish and I stretch a bit before taking care of any personal things like laundry or the website for example.

Then before 11am I walk a half mile to the gym where I spend and hour with Eric doing various weight lifting and functional exercises with plenty of stretching and most importantly plenty of water.

Immediately after the morning session I go for a backwards walk in a nearby park for an hour, which is a lot harder than it seems.

Now I am free until 5pm when I have to return to the gym for my afternoon workout which is a mixture of martial arts, yoga and cardio.

Then I rest until the next day. Sounds simple but I assure you that it is the most challenging thing that I have done since boot camp.

I would love to say more tonight but I am actually falling asleep sitting here typing so I will need to close. I will write again about the meals that I have been eating as well as some observations that I have made over the last few weeks. I think that they will be interesting so please check in again in a day or so.

02 16 06

Along the way on this trip I have discovered many things about addiction and self destructive behaviors, but chief among them is the desperation associated with being overweight. It is a hard life to be sure.

One of the most difficult things about being overweight is that your inner demons are obviously on display at all times. People judge you and act differently when you are around and this seems to be an attempt to keep you at arms length. As a result of this you act differently and become defensive, eventually you look for people to treat you poorly and as if on cue, they do. When I first started this walk I was not as happy as I had tried daily to convince myself I was and my unhappiness about being overweight was at the forefront, but not the only dilemma by far.

Some of the people who have been reading my journal all along know that I was involved in an accident in 1990 in which I was at fault for killing two pedestrians. But few know what the ramifications of those deaths were to me. For about the next five years emotionally I floated between severe depression, paranoia, sorrow, and especially guilt. In that time I had lost everything that I had gained for myself and at one point was briefly living in my car. I came from a tough background but nothing in my past experiences had prepared me for the devastating effects of depression. This is an overwhelming force that sometimes is so prevalent in a person’s life that they scarcely recognize that they are depressed because it becomes the normal way of thinking. Left untreated it can change a person completely. It is not uncommon for a person to go from being happy to a sulking frame of his former self, and the truth is that the difference between these two can be as little as one tragic accident.

If I had realized that I was on this slippery emotional slope maybe I would have sought help and saved myself a lot of misery and subsequently a lot of weight, but I did not know that I was depressed. I thought that I was just unlucky and later thought that I was destined for hardship.

Through the urging of my then new wife, I went to see a professional and at first there were amazing results through modern pharmacology. But the problem was never really addressed and instead this Doctor’s noble efforts only led to more time not addressing the core problems. I simply medicated my way through the next seven years and in doing so, made the problem worse in some ways.  It has been a rollercoaster ride for my family and I since that time and this then became a source of pain for me because I was not serving my family well as I had always wanted.  I became dependent on the medication, not physically but mentally, because without it, I was not able to function effectively. I lost control of a business, lost several good friends, and most importantly I was losing precious lifetime because of my dependence on medicine to keep me happy. All along this belief in a cure in a bottle was being reinforced by an onslaught of advertising telling me that all the worlds’ cures could be found in that bottle.

Well this walking idea came to me as a last ditch effort to save my life and in a misguided way it has done that very thing. Walking across the country is not a good way to lose weight permanently because it is simply not enough to just walk, there is much more to the problem than just the physicality of being overweight. Walking provides you with a steady exercise but the stresses of prolonged camping and traveling, separation from family and the terrible nutrition available to the traveler is actually working against long term weight loss. So what this walk has done for me is to give me the time to focus on the internal self and lose the emotional dependence on outside cures. What I am saying is that the only way to fix yourself physically is to fix yourself mentally. All addictions, be it food, alcohol or drugs are possible only through emotional weakness and all of the pills in the world cannot fix that sort of problem, only you can.

I have found that over time I slowly began to let go of some of the ideas about what constituted weightloss success, which led to letting go of unrealistic expectations, which led to less guilt and self loathing for never reaching those goals, which led to a happier state of being and then this all led to a healthier lifestyle and ultimately weightloss. Not weightloss in a can, bottle, or box but weightloss in the truest spiritual sense. Now that my excess weight is not the priority in my life I find that I enjoy life more and this in turn makes me a happier person. Cure the mind and the ass will follow.

Some may recall that there have been a few times along the way where I have not performed in a stellar fashion, to say the least. I royally screwed up a few times indeed. But one of these low points brought me to the point where I made a really poor choice that ultimately turned out to be good for me in the long run. In Amarillo, TX this walk was almost brought to a close because I had been overwhelmed by depression. There was so much going on that I was –forgetting- to take my medicine regularly and was almost refusing to walk at all. During this time the documentary crew was out there a lot and they really suffered the most because they had to be with me through this all.

Well the truth of the matter is that I had actually decided to stop taking the medicine way back in Albuquerque and was tapering it off from there to Amarillo. Anyone who has been on medication knows that this is generally not a good idea. But I didn’t care because it occurred to me along the way that I would never be able to address my real issues while medicated and I was not going to waste this opportunity by being afraid of my Mr. Hyde. So much to the dismay of the people around me, in Amarillo I stopped taking the medication all together and from there to probably Tulsa, OK was pure hell for me because I hated every step that I was taking. I hated the reporters, the documentary guys, the road and the freakin’ sky for that matter. It was only my sense of duty that kept me going.

Now if you know anything about depression you know that sometimes you wake up and just feel great and think that you are all better only to find the next day that the funk is back. This was the norm for the walk through the rest of Texas and most of Oklahoma. I had such a good sense of self in Elk City, Oklahoma in fact that I stayed for a week. Not that I was doing anything for the entire time. The first two days were great and then I was just terrified of walking anymore so I sat around making excuse after excuse about why I couldn’t leave and there I was in the middle of a depression that I couldn’t seem to break.

I ate poorly, sat around feeling sorry for myself and gained weight. But the one thing that I held onto was that I was going through this and I needed to make it all count for something, I needed to learn to live life without medication and to work through the depression and not around it. So I stayed the course even though people were really hammering away at me. I held on tightly to the belief that I was working at curing something that had held me for most of my life and was ultimately killing me, depression! I knew that no matter what I needed to find a way to be happy in my own skin and facing these things with my own intellect was the only way to get there.

Some people still think that I am doing this walk to lose weight but they are wrong. I am doing this walk to find myself. Once there I will lose weight not because I feel out of synch with the rest of the world or that I think that some number on a box is going to take away the unhappiness, but instead because it is what naturally happens when you are not trying to kill yourself with self destructive behavior.

Cure the mind and the ass will follow!

Today seemed to be a turning point for me in my workouts with Eric. I have been doing everything that I could to keep up over that last two weeks and this week I am surpassing even my own expectations. This with the documentary crew covering it closely and even the SD Union-Tribune got 24 hours of coverage.

It has been a challenge but I am in a much better place mentally and physically than I was before I started this journey. Today I am in a gym working out three hours a day and before the journey the thought of a gym caused me a great deal of anxiety.

I was always reluctant to get started because of the perceived difficulty and anxiety. I let this shape my personality and transform me to a person that despised gyms and people that went to gyms. Now I am seeing that all that it takes to get over this sort of thinking is the desire to change and a commitment to weather the emotional storm that is present until you reach a point where the storm is no longer important.  You begin to understand that the world around you is nothing but your perception of it. If it seems bleak and daunting that is because you are seeing it that way. There are ups and downs in life and the trick is not trying to smooth the world out, instead it is trying to see the good in all situations.

Eric has been great and I am making great progress in mind, body and spirit because of his help. Now the rest is up to me and because of my experiences on this journey I am in place where I accept the challenge and look forward to the adventure. Because at the end of the day that is all that life really is.

For the sake of my sanity I am going to dispel some rumors before they get started. There is an article about me in the San Diego Union-Tribune today and in it the reporter has given his opinion and then shared that my wife and I are getting divorced. It is unfortunate that he decided to write about this now because I didn’t want people to get confused into thinking that the walk has caused us to get divorced. The truth of the matter is that we have been having some relationship difficulties for some time; this journey of mine as well as April’s own journey has actually brought us to a better understanding and appreciation for one another.

April is still involved and is a big part of my life as she always will be. I have known her since I was 18 years old and her brother is one of my closest friends. She is an outstanding human being and a wonderful woman and mother. She has been there for me during some of the most difficult times of my life and I do love her.

This journey that we have taken on as a family has led us both to see that one of the problems that helps keep us tied to our demons is the fact that as a couple we are not all that compatible. In our marriage we have struggled from the beginning to find our places and that has been very difficult at times. During our marriage I have gained almost 150 lbs and because of that my emotional state has suffered greatly. This has taken a toll on the both of us both spiritually and physically. We have been talking a lot in the past few months about our expectations from one another and as a result have decided that we are better as friends than as a couple. So with that in mind and obviously with the utmost concern for the emotional well being of our children we decided to do what is best for all involved.

Since we decided to divorce and talked with our children about it there has been a dramatic change in circumstances and we are actually in a much better place now than we have been in a long time. Having removed the difficulties of our marriage we think that we will be better parents and better friends and this ultimately creates a better situation for us as a family. We are still very much a family and I speak with them everyday. 

I will be visiting them this weekend and as reported in the paper I will not be spending much time with April. What was not said is that April is sick right now and needs some time to herself so the kids and I are going on a two day adventure to a few of the attractions here in LA. April and I are getting along better than ever and she still remains committed to me and my journey and most importantly our family.

There are great discussions about weightloss, the fatmanwalking and a whole lot of other things at my Yahoo discussion group. Stop by and check it out!

Thefatmanwalking Yahoo group

The following is an example of things posted there.

Pete

Thanks for the message on my group. I thought that I might add my two cents in on this because your message seems to encompass a lot of the elements that I think are usually present in an overweight person’s life. I have come to understand a few things about my own weight problems and hopefully I can help others giving my opinion about the things in your message.

As I see it, the main contributing factor to being overweight is nutrition; most people think that being overweight is a settling place for the body and I think it is the opposite. Most people have to work at staying over weight through excessive consumption, and a lot do it though just poor quality excessive consumption. We give our bodies too much or poor quality food and then are surprised at how it reacts to it. The first thing that I think a person needs to do to regain their health is to learn what is good nutrition and how to BALANCE food and life. It is a necessity that we eat, but it is a weapon against ourselves that we overeat. But education and understanding about our relationship to food is the only true defense.

Diets usually are borne from the false belief that food is the culprit. We are blaming food and not ourselves for consuming it. This creates a situation with food that makes us think of it as an enemy when in fact the problem is that we are overindulging; ultimately this gives the notion of food as a powerful thing, when in truth, it has no power over you at all instead you have a weakness over it.

The second and most important thing about diets is that they are not sustainable in regular life and this is their critical flaw. Changing your behavior (eating habits and relationship to food) requires a long term plan and steady effort over time to get to the goal of eating food for live and not living for food. There is no shortcut to weightloss and losing weight requires working within a system where temptations are all around us everyday.

Your words:

I think that you are actually speaking words that most of us have. We talk in terms of things that our out of our control and then reinforce the difficulty of our own struggles by adding more elements to it;  I believe that this is an effort on a subconscious level to nullify our feelings of inadequacy in regard to our ability to control indulgence issues.

Your words again:

This is I think a profound statement on your part. You say that diets have worked for you in the past. But obviously they haven’t. They do accomplish short term goals but fail to address the underlying control issues which are at the root of weight. All diets are guaranteed to work but what is also guaranteed is that a diet is rarely successful permanently. They are really just a temporary respite from a battle that we are not willing to fully commit to. The only way to truly be successful in losing weight is to not sustain the behavior that helps you maintain the weight you have. Eat well, eat properly and eat to live – the body will naturally do the rest.

body will get the other 1000 calories from either your fat reserves or from your muscle tissue.  I can't see it any other way.”

This is something that I have just recently talked with a health professional about and was really amazed at how wrong the statement is.  One word fits here perfectly –Deficiency.

It seems logical that 2000 out and 1000 in means that you are burning the excess storage. If this was a daily routine then the body would adjust to it but most times these numbers are just a blip on the radar of calorific intake for an overweight person.

Secondly, in most cases the body is trying to survive and will hold onto fat stores for later consumption and when there is a intake drop from normal levels the body will be slow to react and the result is nutritional deficiency not stored fat use.

To create and maintain and intake/output balance we need to maintain the balanced intake/output patterns over a long period. The body will adjust to the new levels and start releasing the stored fat to bring itself into its new balance. So overtime consuming less calories, not starving oneself, will ultimately lead to a more balanced body and weightloss.

I think you will agree that it is not the diet that fails but your resolve to make it a long term change, we need to find balance in life and work out a long term plan to maintain that balance.

This is an interesting statement and I think indicative of your frustration with yourself and your battle with food. It is not uncommon to hear this sort of contradictory language in someone with our common problem. I get thousands of emails just like this.

In the first line you are asking for advice, because you feel like you do not have the answer, a notion that I completely disagree with by the way. But then in the second line you berate those whose opinion that you seek with the blanket statement that they “are all making excuses for themselves”. And the in the third and forth you are back to seeking understanding from those very same people.

I think the important thing to remember here is that you are on a quest to understand why your weight is beyond your control. I am saying that it isn’t your weight that is out of control. If you want to lose weight then you have to be prepared to fight with the sneakiest, most insidious enemy that you will ever face. You, specifically your weakness!

In short, forget dieting, forget empty diet food and embrace life and all that it has to offer including food. But just do it in reasonable moderation.

Eat well, eat properly and eat to live – the body will naturally do the rest. But most importantly, when you transgress, which we all do, learn to forgive yourself by understanding that fighting overeating is a long term commitment and transgressions do not mean failure, they are merely setbacks and then opportunities to succeed over them.

Just my opinion.

Ohio

03 03 06

Well as my time here with Eric the trainer is coming to a close I am finding that I am eager to get back on the road. In a way I miss it and that sort of worries me. Am I becoming a permanent wanderer, a vagabond?  I have learned a lot and am glad that I made the decision to seek help. There has been a significant change in my understanding of how the human body works and I am making great strides in being, looking and feeling healthier, and I have made a few good friends along the way. I want to thank Eric, Alysia and Steve for their support, friendship and overwhelming zeal for getting me healthy. They are maniacs about fitness.

This last weekend was a great one because I spent it with my family and we had a great time. More fun that we have had in quite a while and it went a long way to reinvigorating me and my motivation to be a better man than I had become. I sat with my children and we talked at length about the changes that we have gone through during this journey and then about what we were going to be doing next. My daughter is very excited about the changes in her Dad but she wants me to be finished with this walk and back home.

Remembering the promise that I made to her in the beginning that if she wanted me to quit and come home I would, I asked her if that is what she wanted me to do now. I was not surprised by her answer. She said that she wants me home but she wants me to finish what I had started. She is still my greatest fan and her support means the world to me.

So the week started out well but balance in life requires difficulty sometimes. As you might remember I have been having some trouble with my hip and feet for several months now and that problem became more intense after Christmas. Well only walking 4-5 miles a day while I have been here in LA, I thought that my feet had been given the time to rest and I thought that the pain would subside. But that is not the case.

So Tuesday I went to a podiatrist and had my feet checked out. I was surprised to find that I have stress fractures in each foot. The right being the fifth metatarsal from excessive pronation and supination– Basically that means I walk like a duck. The left foot has multiple fractures in one of the Talus bones. See pictures of the bone structure of the feet. I will post the x-rays when I get them. Right foot – Left foot.

There are more tests that they can do to isolate the actual fractures but what is the point really. The feet will heal with time and there is only a small chance of them breaking all the way through so I will continue on the walk. At first I was a little bummed but considering what I have been through already. But the importance of finishing what I have started is huge for me so the discomfort is a small price to pay.

When I first started this walk I weighed around 410 lbs and I was carrying an 85 lb backpack. Close to 500 lbs were on my feet and it had been a long time since my feet had seen the sort of exercise that I was subjecting them to all of the sudden. So it only stands to reason that there was going to be damage. But now I weight 296 lbs and I am carrying a pack that weighs only 30 lbs. That is an overall reduction of almost 175 lbs off of my feet. So it will only get easier from here. I will up my daily vitamin dosage and start taking some supplements for strengthening bones and joints and that will help speed the healing process.

I will be back in Ohio at the beginning of this next week and I plan to hit the ground walking. Getting to New York and then getting home is the sole focus for me now and I am eager to do both. There are a lot of interesting things coming up and I will try to keep you as informed as I can of when and where they will be happening. The one that everyone has been wondering about is the Oprah Show interview that I did back in Oklahoma. Well I was informed last week that it has been scheduled to air on March 28 at 4pm.

Finally, I was thinking that it would be a nice change and probably helpful to maintaining a good pace if I were to have people walk with me over the last 600 miles. Plenty of people have done this in the past and it usually proves to be very interesting. So I am tying to coordinate walking partners for sections of the walk through Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York, so if you are interested please email me through the site or at vaught2@gmail.com and let me know where and when you would like to walk.

Please remember that it is somewhat dangerous walking along the roadway so I have to ask that there be no small children or animals and will need to keep the number of walkers to less than three per day. When you reply let me know where and when you will be available for walking, how many miles that you think you will walk and at what pace you normally walk.

-A piece of wisdom that seems to fit me all too well. -

I am sorry for the delay in posting a journal. I have been going through a difficult adjustment period, getting back on the road. And I have had a lot of media attention this week which can be distracting. Luckily for me they have all been great people who are willing to interview while walking. This makes it a bit easier to accommodate them. 

Besides the media and the physical adjustment I am having considerable trouble with my foot, left one to be specific. The right is not giving me any trouble; it seems the time not walking much has helped. However, the left foot is really hurting and starting to concern me. The next drugstore I pass I am going to get a support of some type and see how that helps. I took today off instead of tomorrow so that I could rest it a bit

Well enough complaining, I wanted to let you know what has been going on in my head as well. While in LA with Eric I was able to contain my world and was very successful in eating well. However, being back on the road forces me to have to deal with my weakness in the real world; food.  It is amazing how hard it is to find good, healthy food while on the road. Most restaurants, fast food and sit-downs, offer limited choices and usually you are relegated to a small variety of beef products with potatoes. I now understand that I need to be very choosy about what I eat but as fate would have it; the best things for me are the things that I dislike the most.  It seems that there are several components to food addiction; sugar is not the only one. Among others there is comfort, familiarity and ease. Most of the things that we need to do for our health require effort on our parts and that, I find, is very difficult.

After walking for about 10 miles I arrived at a little country store with limited choices. I bought the best of the worst and ate. But really I should have prepared before hand to cope with this type of a situation; but I didn’t. Instead I went knowingly past the grocery store without stopping and opted instead for whatever I managed to find on the road. Was that by accident? No I doubt it. I think that we have become so accustomed to junk food at stores and gas stations that we come to rely on them for sustenance.

I was walking with a reporter the other day and she pointed out a puddle of oddly green water and it occurred to me that there are chips that color that I love. I wouldn’t drink green water but I would happily devour green potato chips. 

I am not sure when it happens but somewhere along the way we decided to stop eating food as it occurs naturally and opted for enhanced, modified food that is colored and flavored to taste better. After a while it all starts to taste the same but now we don’t notice. In fact apples with little brown spots somehow became bad and shiny ones covered in waxy, pesticide residue is good. My point here is that we all do this willingly and it seems with zealous conviction. We value ease and convenience over wholesomeness and patience, value over substance and we are doing it to ourselves.

They are not selling us anything that we are not willing to buy. I opted to not prepare and instead just accepted the easy way out. I allowed myself to indulge in a round about way. I decided not to choose the right way over the easy and that is how I get trapped inside my own weakness. I am trying desperately to understand and remind myself everyday about the responsibility of my actions. This I think might ultimately be the most difficult lesson to be learned. And I suspect it might also be the one that supports most of my demons.

Responsibility to oneself.

For the last several weeks I have been worried about the stress fractures in my feet because they seemed to be getting worse, not better. But this week I finally found the problem.  Right before I started training with Eric I switched from boots back to New Balance running shoes. The store did not have the type that I usually buy so I opted for a different one, less expensive too.

Well since I have been back on the road I have put 54 more miles behind me with those aching feet. I was looking at my new shoes two days ago and noticed that they were actually wearing out. The sole was separating and worn down on the edges, the body of the shoe was deforming and the insoles were flattened. I was surprised at their condition but was not convinced that this was my problem; boy was I wrong. I stopped at a chain sporting goods store and bought a different pair of New Balance running shoes, 791 to be exact. Instantly, yes instantly, my feet were feeling better. The next day I walked for almost ten solid miles without taking a break and without significant pain. Normally, after the first ½ mile or so my feet are sore and it takes two or three to a tolerable state of balance between pain and pace. So there you go a simple fix to a seemingly daunting problem. I thought about ankle braces, massage, different orthodics and a lot of other things when all along I had the wrong shoes. I guess I learned, again, that sometimes it is as simple as it seems. I still have the stress fractures obviously, but now, with the right shoes, it is more manageable.

Disregarding the shoe issues this still has been a crazy week. Lots of news media interest, lots of people staring as I walk by and being followed around by documentary Dave only makes them stare more. I made my way into and quickly out of Springfield, Ohio this week and I have to say that it was one of the weirder experiences of the trip. I walked through town, stopped a couple of times to eat or get supplies and no one asked me a single thing, not one thing. I had just been in the local paper and still no one said a word. This is unusual because no matter where I have been someone has noticed me. I could see that these folks recognized me but they were just not interested. That is OK with me, I am not looking for them to be in awe or anything; it is just that this has never happened before. A town of 65,000 people who don’t say hello, goodbye or just boo. Clerks, other pedestrians, waiters or waitress’ all just plain bored. Nothing interesting enough to even say hello about; it was just odd. Finally, on the outskirts of Springfield, I ran into a woman that worked at a grocery store who asked, “are you that guy!?” When I answered her inevitable questions, “what did you think of Springfield?” I told her about my experience and she said, “well I guess you are entitled to your opinion” and then she helped stuff the tuna fish into a pocket on my back pack, wished me luck and told me to try and stay out of the rain storm that was coming.

After leaving Springfield I made my way through Harmony, where I bought some apple juice for my lunch, which by the way does not go with tuna fish at all. Finally I made it to a small little place called South Vienna where someone called the police on me, the local gas station clerk asked “what the hell would you do that for” when I answered his question about what I was doing and the folks at the local church stared intently as I walked by; Ahhh, things are back to normal.

What is the deal with cities named Springfield anyway?

Motivation is the key to success and its biggest mystery. What is motivation? Where do I get some and more importantly how do I keep it when I do get some?

I have been getting a lot of emails about this very thing lately and it really got me started wondering. Why do we not get motivation simply from the knowledge that our good behaviors will lead to a healthy life? Shouldn’t this be enough? One would think, certainly, I want to be healthy and I am willing to do whatever it takes to achieve this. Then we hop in our car and head down to the local whatever and buy something that will make us healthy, the latest diet product, pill, powder or potion. Then one the way home we stop at the grocery store and buy some cheap pre-prepared meal to heat up for the family. I’ll get a burrito to hold me over until dinner then too; because tomorrow I am going to get healthy!

Life is why we cannot stay motivated. Motivation is not like buying a car where you can look out into the driveway every so often to reassure yourself that you still possess it. Motivation is an abstract emotional condition that is predicated on many different things and subject to whims, folly and weakness. I would be the most motivated man in the world if someone would just outlaw carne asada burritos already! But they won’t. Fast food is a part of our culture now and, let’s be honest, they are not feeding us anything that we don’t eagerly ask for. Usually with a menacing grim too.

The world that we live in is not perfect and our attempts to wish is so, futile. What is the point then? It seems by what I am saying that it is all hopeless and we are all doomed to be addicted for life. Lets got get a pizza then, right? If I am addicted anyway and there is no pill to change that then why try? 

That is why; because there is nothing else but your effort. If you quit, you lose. 

There is no elusive motivation that once possessed will whisk you into a supermodel body, there is only you and your desire to be happy. The fact that you want something to fix you is the best indication that what needs fixed is you.  Logically you know what the answer is, eat less, eat better and move around once in a while.

No expensive gym membership, not carb counting, no need for expensive machines or programs and certainly not the latest miracle plant from some remote corner of the world. These are all crutches that you use to convince yourself that you are powerless against this “disease” and therefore at its good humor. You are the problem! You overindulge and have done so for quite some time. Now you need to work to reverse that bad behavior which by now is probably habit. You need to get over yourself and simply go and do something.

Now with that all being said and the implicit understanding that this is dialogue that I have been going through this past year, here is the method that I have come to see as being sound, reasonable and sustainable.   Take it easy, relax, don’t get all worked up, you are going to fail time and time again but that understanding is where the strength is.  Not in these things themselves, but knowing that they are the reality. Once you realize that there is no quick fix, no short cut and no motivation to be had. Then you will find that you are the machine that operates your life, as well as you can, and that is good enough, you will see that your body craves being healthy, your mind craves being satisfied.

Once you stop setting yourself up for failure you will release yourself from the cycle of guilt, self-loathing and desire for comfort, then you will start to see that you have to take the good with the bad. In releasing the cycle of weightloss/weightgain and accept the successes with the failure as the big picture you will find that you have all the power and do not need to find motivation, it comes naturally. You are not trying to get happy by losing weight; you are trying to get healthy by losing weight. Happiness should be an element in your life regardless. Once you take the power away from the weight you will feel a burden lifted from you shoulders, start to feel happy and stop punishing yourself and ultimately losing weight will become natural. Cure the mind and the ass will follow.

Try your best everyday, make little reminders in your routine to point you in the right direction, It is not the weight that holds you captive or even the food, instead it is the inner conflict about failing to control oneself that keeps you from being successful.

You just need to trust in your inner-self and know that you will fail, you will lose motivation and you will be sad but it is not over until you quit. Each day, each meal and each snack is a new opportunity to do it better. Take away the pain and the inner dilemma and you take away the beast.

The details about how I am changing my behaviors.

I live in this world and that is where I eat. Just because there are more bad choices than good doesn’t mean that I need to take to bad. If you demand it they will provide it, if not then you should go out of your way to find it.

I eat less with each meal. I try to eat around 1400 to 1600 calories a day spaced between five meals. This is considering the amount of walking that I do. The amount of intake should be about 2/3 of the amount you burn for moderate weightloss and ½ for aggressive. I am not a Doctor and this is what I do. You need to make your own decisions about your health and certainly that should include medical advice.

I drink tons and tons of water; it is the fluid of change. Without it in proper levels your body simply does not operate properly.

If I happen to eat something bad then I try and remember to make up for it somewhere else. If I do not then I don’t kick myself around for it. I did not get fat with one meal and I am not going to get thin with one. This is a gradual process of developing self-control over food and self indulgence. A little bit everyday leads to the goal, slowly and with purpose. This is what will make the weight loss sustainable.

I think that for getting to a healthier body size and maintaining that size, a healthy diet is the most important element. To put it into perspective I want to list my behavioral modification steps in order of importance. I have committed myself to conquering these tasks one at a time, in order.

1. Portion control - It really doesn’t matter what you eat, good or bad, if you simply eat too much. People get fat from eating too much healthy food as well. Calories are calories. You need to consume less than you burn to lose weight and then consume what you burn to maintain it. It is really that simple.
2. Variety -- Even if it is bad food mix it up because our bodies need everything, sugar, salt, fat, all of it. But we need it in smaller amounts. Eating too much of one thing is bad but so is eating too little. Counting grams of this or ounces of that will only serve to make you more mental than being over weight already has. Concentrate on variety you will cover all of the bases. For this part of the effort you have to understand that you are expanding your habits to include multiple things, the value of those things is not as important at this stage as is breaking the same food everyday habit.
3. Nutrition – Once you eat less and learn to feel real hunger and then you have mixed it up and are not in food ruts, then you are ready to start choosing good food over bad. If it is modified, sugar or caffeine or whatever-free dump it. Now you want to eat natural whole foods over processed. If the food does not have a naturally occurring color – then pass.
4. Exercise – You will find that once you get the food – amount, variety and quality under control, the way that you feel inside will start to show on the inside. Once you are feeling better and losing weight you might just find yourself walking more than driving.
5. Your mind – This effort will fail miserably if you start to beat yourself up over transgressions. You will have good days and bad days. Individually they do not matter. Success is a lifetime thing not a daily. If you are not accepting your weakness then you are not accepting that you are human and that is why you are struggling in the first place.

I am posting this brief journal entry now to let you know what’s going on and will endeavor to have another one before this weekend talking about what is coming up. I am hoping that over these last weeks I will be able to post more frequently with the help of friends and my cell. But what I am really hoping for is to get back to just the open road and some of the great scenery offered up in this part of the country. There is more rain and fog to be had, I am sure, but it seems spring is coming to meet me and that is the stuff that I just love. Summer in the desert, winter in the Midwest and now springtime in the Appalachian Mountains; does it get any better than this?

In the last few weeks I have been contemplating where this road is taking me, literally and figuratively, and I have come to the conclusion that it really doesn’t matter. Just lately people have begun asking what I think is going to happen when I reach New York and they cannot seem to be happy with my answer of; well something I am sure!

Will there be people waiting for me or will I walk into Manhattan unnoticed. I am interested in finding out myself, to be sure but I am not going to speculate, but it would be interesting either way. Right now there are a ton of people who say they are going to be there to walk into NY with me. Whether that happens or not we will find out together.

To be honest, it is hard to believe that after all this time I am actually looking at the end of the journey but, as I have said before, it really has only just begun; when I get to New York I being the more important journey of the rest of my life. Now I do know how corny that might sound but for me it is the truth. Where I go from New York is truly going to be an adventure, one that I am eagerly looking forward to. The answer to the question of what I am going to do when I get there is: whatever presents itself next. The excitement of getting back to my family and the positive outlook on the future are two things that assure me that wherever the next road takes me will be a good place; because I will make it so.

Ohio

The last few weeks I have been watching winter transition into spring right in front of my eyes. It is amazing to start out in the morning and notice that by the afternoon grass appears to be greener, trees seems to have buds and wacky people are once again out looking for something to do. It would be nice not to be the only one.

In Old Washington, a small town with a great deal of historical significance we met some interesting people and I was struck by the oddity of standing in a checkout line of a grocery store behind someone who was reading about you in their daily newspaper, specially noticing that they have no idea that the guy they are reading about with such interest is standing right behind them. It was a very surreal moment.

Then I headed out of Old Washington the wrong way for a mile or so and realizing my mistake decided to camp out in this beautiful open field of rolling hills. After going over two or three of the peaks I found a nice place and set up camp. My walking buddy, KM, decided to start a fire and I went right to sleep. The next morning we went back into Old Washington to get back onto the main road. Through here Rt. 40 is not a priority it seems and signs, even less.

The next day I started walking from the park where they do a yearly event called the Jamboree in the hills. It started out a nice quiet walk until I got to Ohio University where I met Bob the Magician who happens to be a Dentist. He took me and my walking buddy, KM, to lunch and we had a great time. Then almost as soon as he dropped us off we met Jenny P. who had been waiting for me to come into her area. After a brief talk we were on the trot again but that lasted only a short while before a news crew from West Virginia who had been alerted by Jenny, cornered me at a local gas station, for an interview. DK Wright from Channel 7 was the journalist, she and her cameraman were exceptionally nice and timely, but it was becoming obvious that we were not going to be getting far today. At this point we have walked 2.3 miles and it has been three hours since we started.

Then once underway again we headed into St. Clairsville with a menacing looking rain storm fast approaching from the rear. 3 or 4 miles later, film crew number two caught up with us and this one wanted to stop me at the bottom of a rather serious looking hill to do an interview. I was strong, stood my ground and asked her to meet us at the top of the hill she didn’t look happy about that but she wasn’t the one walking up the hill. After the standard 30 minutes for 30 seconds interview, they followed me on into St. Clairsville, getting the standard video of my feet, which by the way they never use.

Before you know it we were atop the next big hill and there we met yet another supporter who wanted a picture. Click, click and we were moving again. Over the hill and there was Jenny once more with Gatorade and snacks, if I could only get this type of supporter spaced out along the route then this walk would have been . We sat in a grove of trees and talked until the storm finally caught up with us. Now it was time to get to a place to get shelter and the walking day was done. 7.5 miles in only 6 hours, yeah!

At this rate I should be in New York before I turn fifty-two.

I have been getting a lot of emails lately from people who want to more know about the details of the day to day while walking across America. I have not really gone into this much detail previously because, to be perfectly honest, I never thought that it would be that interesting to hear what I ate for breakfast, what roads I took and where I sleep. On a daily basis it is pretty boring to do something like this and that is where my time for introspection is but t recall it all seemed to boring.

Instead, I try to condense as much interesting information as I am able into journal entries but for the most part the journal has been a place where I can express my thoughts. This is what I think is important but I am becoming more aware everyday that there are other people in this with me now and I need to take them into consideration as well. So, because of that I am going to try and include more of what I consider the mundane, which others might find interesting.

I mentioned in the 03 31 06 journal that I met a lovely woman named Jenny P. on my way into St. Clairsville, well it seems as though she may have adopted me.  Saturday morning I met up with her and she was kind enough to give me a tour of the area. She even drove me into Wheeling to a huge outdoor store called Cabela’s. There I met the manager Kathy M. and a reporter from the local paper. Kathy was really eager to help me out in some way and ultimately we settled on fuel for my stove. It has been getting on my nerves for a week that I was carrying a Jetboil without fuel, pretty useless indeed; although, KM did use it to make a cup of hot chocolate with it, over a campfire.

After a tour of Wheeling notable sites and the Oglebay Mansion, I returned to St. Clairsville where I spent almost all of the rest of the day staring at a blank computer screen desperately trying to compose a journal entry, which by the way never materialized. These last four or five weeks there has been so much going on in the background with people preparing for my arriving in New York, the BBC, Yahoo and MSN all ran articles on the same day and the traffic spike from them was 40, 000 active sessions per minute and no one was expecting that at all. As a result the webmaster had to scramble to get the sites volume open enough to allow for all the traffic. Then the emails came in and within about four hours there were in excess of 1200 of them.

With writing the book, dealing with the publisher answering media requests for interviews, people wanting to walk and oh yeah, walking, I have been overwhelmed. I know what you are thinking, I am complaining about the publicity and I brought it on myself. You are correct that I brought it on myself but I am not complaining about it. I am complaining about how unprepared for it I was. I am in a position now where I am going to have to get someone to help deal with it all, so that I can focus on the things that have brought the publicity, walking and the journal.

The upside of getting someone to handle these things for me is that I will finally be able to say “Have your people call my people”. But the long and the short of it is that I have been so preoccupied with all the sideline stuff that I have not been able to focus on the important things like the journal. So I am trying to make it up to you guys by writing a more comprehensive one to catch up. Am I repeating myself now?

Well I guess my point is that I have not been able to concentrate and now you have to pay the price by reading me prattle on about the last few days. But I am downloading and hopefully that means that somewhere along the way I might actually get to a point or two....maybe.

Additionally on Saturday I was dealing with a very sore left foot. The stress fracture in the right foot feels almost completely healed but the left is being a little stubborn and still aches considerably after a day of walking. So, I started off the day with the hope of getting caught up; instead I did everything but. Jenny P. showed up again for dinner and then KM departed for home afterwards. By the way, KM thanks for walking with me. I failed to say that before you left.

Sunday morning and I really needed to get caught up. It started it in the normal way, with me promising to re-write the section in the book from Albuquerque to Elk City, OK, which is five weeks late now, and to write a journal entry. After hanging with Jenny and George, who it seems are bad influences on me; I did manage to get some of the book caught up. Re-read it and then deleted every word; it was complete junk, dare I say drivel. So once again things did not work out the way I expected. But I actually had a great time with the them and some of the local people that I met, rested my foot in the later part of the day and took a good nap, All in all a fine day.

 Once we got underway it was the usual follow me around while I pretend to not notice you blocking traffic, routine. But then after that it got interesting. We were walking along 40 in Tridelphia when a torrential down pour started. George P. who had joined the walk in town, made fast for the safety of the film crews vehicle, although to here him tell it, he got completely soaked. And I realized that not only was I getting soaked but that had I lost my 35 dollar, winter--really ugly--but keeps my melon warm--goofy hat. Damn!

So I said “oh well” and just started to walk. The Aussie’s offered up a ball cap and then followed me while I walked in a Noah’s Ark like rain. They loved it. Finally, after the rain calmed down for a bit we went to a great little diner called “The Liberty Street Cafe”. We had lunch and then the Aussie’s bought the place for an hour. The staff was really surprised with all the stuff going on Australians, Fatmanwalking and George & Jenny P. But once the filming started, they all had to go outside and stand guard on the door. I didn’t know this at the time; I thought that they were all in the kitchen. I felt sort of bad about it later but they didn’t seem to mind too much. I have never openly endorsed a place before but I am going to say that if you are traveling along I 70 in West Alexander, PA then take the time to stop there. Exit 1 and follow the signs to US 40. The food and the people are well worth the trip. Not on any map but it really should be. Tell Kristen and the gang “hi” for me.

After the take over of the café we went out and did more taping. Today would wind up being a three mile day and the storm will be turning from rain to snow apparently. So it seems that I might be here for a while. We walked and talked for a bit, Tara was turning blue from the cold and I was probably tormenting her because I kept trying to convince her to not dwell on the cold because that would only make it worse. She wasn’t buying it, plus it is the end of summer time in Australia so this must be really cold to them.

After they were done with me they interviewed Jenny for a while and then they were off as fast as they arrived. Now it was time to seek shelter, everyone kept telling me that there was a big snow storm coming.

Well by Wednesday morning there was no snow storm even though it was certainly cold enough. I have about 25 miles to go to Washington and there is not a whole lot between here and there. Now I am developing a nasty little head cold and falling further behind. The weather people insist that there is a storm coming but it has yet to materialize. One of the most difficult things about walking in the wintertime is judging when it is safe to walk. I am concerned that if this storm is as bad as they predict that I would be caught in the open when it hits. So I wait one more day. But tomorrow, Thursday, I am leaving no matter what. Oh yeah. Jenny and George found my hat. I had been run over repeatedly but the upside it that my head wasn't in it. I was happy to see it again.

So on Wednesday I focus on the most important things.....Ok you got me...the easiest things. I tried to get as much of my -- to do list done as I could so that I at least felt like I accomplished something. But the major things like the journal and the book were just not happening. I would rather write nothing than just nonsense, I am in a rut when it comes to writing so I contacted Teresa and asked her advice. She told me to just write it like a diary; what do you think so far? It is 1am and I need to get some sleep.

My weight and my diet plan

The last time I weighed myself was in Dayton and I was 292. I have been saying for a while that focusing on a number (Even if weightloss is your specific goal) is not a good idea. Becoming attached to the scale leads to disappointment and failure. Instead I focus on how I feel.

For example, today I can walk as far as I want, I sleep well, feel strong and have very few (overweight) aches and pains, I do not breathe heavy when walking a flight of stairs, my chest doesn’t tighten up when doing strenuous activity and my back doesn't hurt when I stand for more than 10 minutes.

In short I feel great because of my reduced food intake, better nutrition choices and daily exercise. As a result of all that, I am not clinging to my old comfort habits and as a result of that, losing weight.

It is all in your head, literally and figuratively, of course.

Finally, my new whiz-bang diet plan;

Simple; complication leads to complication.

1. Eat less—only what I need for that days activity,
2. Eat better—which simply means making the best choices you can. (But being realistic and not using society’s desire for fast food as an excuse to eat poorly. Even in the worst places there is a best choice.
3. Stop being a carbohydrate junkie—eliminating the excess sugars in my life. And this really applies to anything that you consume to excess, sugar, salt, caffeine or ?

Eating well balanced food in smaller proportions will lead to better health. The proof!? Well simply the last 40,000 years of human development. When, as a society, we eat better we live stronger more productive lives. When we don’t, we don’t.

Simple, all of the excess weight on your body came through your mouth, voluntarily. Whether you have a slow metabolism or some other problem that keeps you from processing it quickly, being overweigh is still a product of eating too much food or eating really bad food.

My understanding of this has helped to convince the part of me that gives into urges, to try and resist them for my own good. 120 lbs later it is working but it is an everyday struggle. To sum up what I am trying to say here; you are the only one that will cure your problem, you need to learn to focus on what is important over what is compulsive, and you need to rely on your desire to be happy to guide you to the right place. Your happiness is your best tool again excess weight and you will not find that happiness in the number of a scale. In fact, the opposite is usually true. 

Cure the mind and the ass will follow.

04 10 06

Today is one year since I started walking from San Diego and including today I have walked 2465 miles with 366 remaining to New York City. I have lost 130 hard fought pounds during these months and I have approximately 70 more to go before my ideal weight.

Obviously I will not lose that additional weight within the next 4 weeks but it is well within my reach from where I am today. I am healthier and stronger, mentally, as well as physically and all goals are within my reach from here. One year and I have completely changed my life!

As I am getting near the end of the walk I find myself uncertain about the future. I am not really concerned about what is going to happen next because I will deal with whatever it is, when it happens. But I am more concerned with returning to a regimented life. I feel like I have the wanderlust and that I am not ready to stop traveling quite yet. At the same time I have grown weary of walking, but only in the sense of heading towards a fixed destination. I would love more than anything to turn south here and head to Hagerstown, MD or Morgantown, WV, the places where my family comes from, and explore them for a while. Then maybe head for the coast and take off for Europe again. Although, the last time I just took off for Europe I wound up getting deported from England to Holland. But, I say now that if you are going to get deported, being deported to Amsterdam is the way to do it. But that is a whole different story.

I guess that this is just the panic phase for a wanderer, the time when you have to consider stopping is the worst part. But I have plenty to do at home as well. Although things there have changed considerably, it is still where my heart is and my daughter has just about run out of patience with my walk now. They have allowed me this time and for that I am eternally grateful. Maybe the next walk will be with them, there is no way of knowing what is next for certain but knowing what is right now is, for me, a great gift.

Finally I find myself at peace with the world instead of trying to force it to be something other than what it really is, the sum total of all human experience to date and perfectly balanced because of it. I have learned that accepting things for what they are is the only true way to inner peace. Fighting to change things or fighting to be something that you are not is the worst battle that you will ever experience because as long as you struggle, you lose. Balance with all things and live the experience of life, this is my outlook now.

So with that in mind the last few days have been interesting, Documentary Dave has been here for a few days and this time he brought along Documentary PJ. Between the two of them and me it has been a pretty entertaining visit. We have been traveling through rural Washington County and have come across some pretty interesting characters. For these two guys especially, Dave and PJ are California boys and the concept of having a bon fire in your front yard is very foreign to them, they were almost like moths to a flame.

People here are more reserved and almost no one has been willing to be interviewed by them apparently, except for the guy pulling the wagon with 9 flags, mud flaps, a PA license plate and tons of plastic junk inside. There was a farmer that chased them off of his property and then the lady at Raul’s in Bealesville who never once even cracked a smile the whole time we were there. But when I sneezed she yelled out a disembodied “God Bless you” from the back room; it caught everyone off guard.

Walking through Scenery Hill, PA I was struck by the incredible beauty of the area and undoubtedly, the best views of the latter half of this walk. And then the economic devastation of Brownsville was a stark reminder of what happens when an areas single resource goes away. It is actually reminiscent of my childhood home, once booming now abandoned. I was actually finding my self growing sad for times lost; I was moved by the notion that my childhood home is all but erased and how that can leave you with an altered sense of reality.

Now looking at this place I realize that I am not alone in that at all. In fact this might be the new hometown memory for a lot of people. A place where hometown used to be and now just a hole in someone’s memory taunted by remnants of buildings, roads and oddly placed empty lots with drive ways leading to no where.

It may seem that I am a bit melancholy but rest assured that even if true, it is an important part of the process. I ran from my hometown when I was young because I could see where it was all headed. I never thought for a second about returning to the area for any reason outside of my siblings. It has been very hard on me to live a live separate from the people that I grew up with but I know now that had I done otherwise, I probably would not have made it. Each experience in life has the potential for growth or regression and we are the culmination of all those experiences.

Where I am the result of all the choices I have made, good or bad, how I perceive them is what makes my reality and I think that everything is going to be alright. I think that I have been fortunate to have experienced all this things that I have and that those things are what has led me to this very day, this very journal entry and into your life. It is an amazing thing, this life stuff and to waste even a minute of it, tragic. So, I might be a little sad today but that is the rich experience of life and is to be savored just like any other.

A walk like this is more about the experience than the walk itself. It is not where you go as much as where you are and I am grateful that I have the opportunity and thankful to be able to share it with you.

Now I am off to Connellsville.....

Look out for those hills! Those hills are going to kill you, boy! These are some of the things that I have been hearing lately from the locals about the hills in western PA. Well yes, indeed they are hills, but overall they never have a climb of over 1000 feet on average. When I went through these little hills we have out west there were several that were a 6% grade over 12 miles. Now that’s a freakin’ hill. The Union pass, Cajon pass, the hill up to Flagstaff, those were brutal and I was about 70 lbs heavier then I am now. Since that time I have lost body weight and reduced my pack weight by more than half. So now I traverse these hills a lighter and fitter man. That doesn’t make them easy by any stretch but they aren’t going to “kill” me either.

The thing that is most difficult about these hills is that there are so many of them. You need to adjust your thinking to get over the idea of “once I crest this hill, I’ll be ok” because when you do crest the hill you can see the next. Sometimes you can even see a couple up ahead. The second difficulty is that the roads do not seem to be policed at all. I have not seen a copper in three or four days and as a result the speed limit seems to be whatever the hell you damn well please. There is a rock quarry up on the top of a hill near Connellsville, the trucks from that place go roaring by at 60 mph or so when the speed limit is 35. It is a bit frightening to see a person commanding a big sixty thousand pound truck full of rocks whizzing past, drinking a latte, chatting on the phone and picking the lotto numbers, all at the same time and with the other hand smoking a cigarette; which seems to be a legal requirement around here. And then there are the teens, oh the teens........why exactly aren’t we allowed to lock them up until they are 25? I had the same car go by me three times yesterday and the passenger, while hanging out of the window, yelled out. “Heyya-whosama-wotsa-callie-kaka. Meso-yabba-yabba kabootleburb! Yeah!” and was apparently quite proud of the achievement. Hey kid, it’s down hill from here for you. Oh yeah, apparently Darwin is looking for you too.  By the way, Are mutton chops making a comeback?

But the upside is that Pennsylvania is gorgeous, especially this time of year. Spring blooming and the trees, or at least the one that have not been clear-cut yet, are turning green. The rains over the last couple of days have made the streams and waterfalls especially scenic and the people, with the exception of those kids and an evil little store clerk in Champion, have been great.

Backing up a bit, when I walked into Brownsville I was being interviewed by a reporter from the Guardian newspaper (London) who walked several miles with me. Near the end of the our interview we had to walk across a long span bridge, while on it a couple of large trucks came past and she got to experience first hand what it is like to feel a large sturdy concrete bridge wobble. She wouldn’t admit it but I think that is freaked her out a little. Me... I love that stuff. To look at the bridge you would think that it is rigid, but from an engineering stand point it cannot be. In fact, I think that most people would be a little disconcerted to know that the bridge is not even connected to either side. They overlap but, technically, are not rigidly attached. It is just swaying around and it is almost imperceptible to someone in a car, but when walking, you need a good set of sea legs to keep from getting vertigo, especially on the long, high ones.

Over the hills and through the dales, Uniontown.  There really wasn’t much to talk about there and then north to Connellsville. While Connellsville is even smaller than Union town I managed to finally get a haircut from an interesting barber at Gray's barbershop.  The next time you are in Connellsville you should stop. He was very interesting.  After that town more hills... I spoke with some people who told me that the climb out of Connellsville was three miles almost straight up the side of the mountain....Well not really, it was a climb to 2300 feet from about 1200 over three miles and it did have some unreasonably steep sections but it was not nearly as bad as I was expecting. What those people did do was sufficiently freak me out about my impending struggle, which made me worried and that affects one's overall outlook. So when I crested the hill and found that it was not as bad as they had made it out to be I pledged, “That’s it, no more asking locals for information!”

Only kidding, I just need to remember that people love to think that their dilemma is always the worst. We got the worst hills, poverty, drug problem [insert dilemma] in the world. I can no longer count the number of times that a local has said to me “Don’t like the weather, just wait twenty minutes and it will be different. We have the craziest weather in the country”

Moving along, I met Linda and Duke in Normalville, which is on the other side of that hill, and they helped me get some things straightened out, and got me to a place to eat before the rains come on. It was looking like a nasty storm but instead turned out to be a nice spring rain. I camped there for the night and slept perfectly, hidden in the woods. In the morning I awoke to find that there was a man at the edge of the wood, about 15-20 feet away from me, who was just standing there enjoying his morning smoke. He was unaware of my camp and I had to resist the temptation to scare him. The thought of someone yelling out of an apparently abandoned wood is a tough one to suppress. But most of these folks carry guns so that made it a bit easier. Hey, I never said that I was without an evil streak.

After packing up and having breakfast I called Linda and Duke who allowed me to use their printer so that I could get some papers printed, signed and mailed off; something that I have been neglecting for about a month.

Now patting myself on the back for being so responsible, I headed out of Normalville north on 711. It was a rather long walk through the country but it was along a ridgeline so not very many steep hills. Along the way I met a man who was stealing shrubs from the side of the road. When I walked up he was pensive at first but after learning that I was not from the Agriculture Department he was great.

I passed through several small communities stopping only for lunch in Indian Head and water at a small country store. I walked well after dark trying to reach a seemingly illusive motel that I was planning on staying at. Well after some spiteful local misdirection, I finally made it here at 8:30 and was truly worn out. Sometimes the best part of this trip is just stopping. As I was headed to my room I heard the ground shaking roar of a bear, a spine tingling experience to be sure. Luckily, I had noticed that the motel was at the local zoo. But even with that, I still need to clean my shorts.

Time for the next chapter...

It's time for me to take a step back.

I have hit my apex of frustration regarding the weight loss (or lack thereof). If I don't stop and get off now, I am sure that the apex will only continue to soar until I drive myself certifiably insane. I know I probably don't come across as straddling that fine line between 'determined' and 'nuts', but I am. And I've been there for two months too long.

It's difficult to express where I'm at. One the one hand, I am happier than I've been in years. I'm healthy, feel better than ever, and for the most part, pretty much have everything else going for me. In fact, I always used to swear that once I lost the weight, I would be unequivocally happy (yes, I know it's a common misconception, but bare with me). And you know, for about 4-5 months, I was. I thought I was the poster child for being able to prove that the adage "If I only I lost weight, I would be happy!" could actually be true for some people.

But over the past two months, once my weight loss started to inevitably taper off and I gained back a pound or two, my near state of euphoria came to an abrupt, jarring end. And really, is that so surprising? When so much of your happiness/energy is based the scale and it stops...why wouldn't the happiness also dissipate? So once again, I'm forced to reconcile that I'm really not all that different or smarter than anybody else...

While daily weigh-ins might have been powerfully effective for a year, I have to accept that they are not any longer. In fact, though this is sad to admit, for the first time in my life, I think I understand why many women become consumed by their weight and develop eating disorders. I have seen firsthand that if the scale tells you you're heavier, your body and mind feel heavier. It doesn't even matter what other people think. When I look into a mirror, all I can see are the areas I am still fat. I have completely lost my ability to feel good about myself.

The best way to describe the frustration I feel each day as I continue to eat and exercise well is this- unlike the many years when I ate mindlessly and didn't take care of myself...I do now. And I'm doing it better than I ever have before. So what happens when it still doesn't work? How do you get past the helplessness, frustration and desperation that pounds in your heart?

You start to blame yourself, and then you start to think, okay...well what else can I do? Should I start eating only yogurt and fruit? Buy some weight loss supplements? Join Weight Watchers or Nutrisystem? Stop eating out forever? Go to fat camp?

Do you see what's happenned here? In a short period, I have somehow managed to completely 180 and start considering doing all the things I swore I never would! So if I, a nominally overweight, somewhat educated, somewhat sane person with a decent support network can be broken down so quickly and easily- who's to say I won't become a full-fledged depressed anorexic in the next 6 months? I certainly can't.

So I'm getting off the train, folks.

I have waffled with this decision for weeks. Months. I knew that it would be the best move for my emotional health, but I worried that in doing so- I was giving in new-age psychobabble like 'learning to embrace your imperfect body' and accepting mediocrity. Because I do still have some weight to lose. I want both my weight and BMI to be within the normal range. I want to eliminate that uncomfortable gut and chubby thighs.

But more than that, I want to be happy and feel in control again.

I'm choosing to live in the moment rather than putting my happiness 'on hold' until I lose those final, elusive 5-10 pounds that may or may not even make me feel better. Because even if I do, so what? What difference does it make if I'm a size 4 or an 8? Will my husband suddenly love me more? Will I suddenly be 'discovered' by Shape magazine and asked to write a monthly column? Will people suddenly hoist me up on their shoulders, chanting my name? Pro-bab-ly not, though really...it would be nice.

I've staged a self intervention and have spent the better part of two days deciding how/what I'm going to do.

1. No more daily weigh-ins.
The anal, Type A in me is bargaining for weekly weigh-ins, but since I've done such a bang up job in this area so far, I'm probably going to go with twice a month weigh-ins and focusing more on developing new fitness challenges and how my clothes fit as my measures of success.

2. Even less eating out.
75% of what railroads me emotionally are the after-effects of over-noshing at "special occasions." Restaurants, business trips and socializing. Until I am more confident at controlling my intake at them, I'm going to reduce these for now.

3. Less time to think.
Though my aim is not to avoid my problems by never having to think about them, I do realize I may have too much time on my hands to overanalyze and obsess. Got to stay busier.

As I'm looking at this list, I realize how simple my recovery can be. It's only three steps. Three simple little steps that by overlooking, had the capacity to make me feel miserable.

Taken from The Lost Hawaiian blog:

Springtime in Pennsylvania is incredible, more so than I could have imagined. Intense colors, smells and sounds with picturesque scenic mountains and valleys. I have entered a part of the country that we often forget exists. Natural beauty and sophistication, simple people and calm quiet lives, I crossed over the Appalachian Trail and finally understand its allure. This place is nothing short of magical to the senses and its tranquility is southing for the soul.

Backing up a few days, I want to mention the scenery in this area. Once I climbed over the Tuscarora summit I was surprised to find a breathtaking valley reminiscent of Ohio and its rolling hills. For the first time I had to share the road with the Amish in buggies and the Quakers on bikes. The roadside is wider here, seemingly to accommodate the buggies and they do exercise their right of way over pedestrians. I was surprised that, for a people so dependant on the courtesy of others, they exhibit little of their own. Maybe it is just the ones that I encountered or maybe it is a result of them having precious little right of way of their own in the first place. Either way, it was interesting to see them close up. I grew up in this part of the country and have seen Amish people before but never this close.

I have been having a lot of good luck with the weather recently with the exception of one day and between that, the cool temperatures and surprisingly flat terrain, I have been doing fairly well on mileage. A little few setbacks because of health issues but all in all the last two weeks have been great. I have been able to take a ton of pictures and will post them all as soon as I have a good enough connection.

Right now there is a lot of discussion going on about what I am going to do after this walk and when they figure it out maybe they will let me know. Only kidding, It is just that with the end of the walk drawing closer my family is getting very excited to see me. I am not sure where I will be headed after the walk but I am confident that I will make the best of wherever that may be.

Once I arrive in New York I will be doing media things regarding the walk and then afterwards I will be heading down to Washington D.C. for a couple of days to visit with a surprising new friend, Dr. Pamela Peeke. She is going to help me evaluate my current physical condition and general health. She has been advising me lately on some other issues and her help has proved invaluable. Today we were discussing the addition to sugar that most of seem to labor under and I was amazed at some of the things that I have learned. She is also on the board for Americaonthemove.org and is interested in what our group has been up to there.

I also wanted to hear from people that were interested in joining me as I walk into NYC. If you are planning on being there please let me know ahead of time if you can. Email me at Steve@thefatmanwalking.com .I know that this is a short journal but I am very worn out tonight and really not feeling all that creative right now. I promise to have a better one in a few days. Finally, I did not want to forget the generous help that Jon Benson of fitover40 provided this week. I had a chance to read his newsletter and it was very interesting and informative. So thank again Jon.