Cameron's Weight Loss Story

This blog post is written by my brother Cameron. I hope it inspires you as much as it has me.


The year was 1999. Clinton was president, the dot com boom was in full effect, and nobody had a cell phone yet. I had my dream job of sitting in the clubhouse at Show Low County Club checking in golfers, with access to a short order cook who would cook me anything I wanted all day long. I had always been over weight and had a love of food, but looking back I think this is when things got out of control. Then I got well fed for 2 years while on a LDS mission in Cleveland, Ohio. Had to buy a bigger suit half way through. Came home and started training in the appraisal business during the refinance boom. Working 50+ hours a week and going to school at night, combined with my food addiction, resulted in my weight ballooning up to 315 pounds, size 44 pants and way too many x's on my shirt tags. Turns out starting your day with a steak and egg burrito, chased down with a 44 oz Mtn. Dew is bad for you. I was depressed inside and hated the way I looked. The wake up call came when we went to six flag's with some friends and I was too fat to ride all the fun rides. They couldn't lock in the bar on the roller coasters. All day I waited in line with everybody, tried to get on the ride, and then was told to get off because they couldn't strap my fat @$$ in. Not long after, Bethany and I went to Las Vegas for the weekend. They had an out door ice skating rink outside Ceasars Palace. I broke one of the ice skates because of my weight. This ends the sad part of my story. Life wasn't all bad. Awesome wife, great job, and played a lot of golf.
I tried many diets in mid 2000's. Atkins, weight watchers, personal trainer, lemonade cleanse, and so on. I had a hard time sticking to any of those. I had a personal trainer for 4 months and lost a whopping 11 pounds. I had a major food addiction. After some research we decided the best option for me was lap band surgery. I had lap band surgery performed in Tijuana, Mexico by Dr. Pedro Kuri. It went really well and I started losing weight fast. I didn't really change what I ate, but the band forces you to eat less and there are some things you can't really eat when the band is tight. When I started losing weight I really got into weight lifting and running. Then I got into triathlons and distance running. I got to around 250 pounds and had the band loosened all the way. I was not able to take in the amount of liquids and calories during training that is necessary to stay energized and hydrated when it was tightened. After that I kept training hard and tried to eat what I thought was healthy and was able to maintain 225-230 pounds. As hard as I tried I couldn't get below this weight.
Skip ahead three years and Bethany was pregnant with Jori, our second child. Even though I was still training hard and doing triathlons, I started gaining weight again because of how I was eating. Bethany wanted help losing the baby weight and I wanted to take control before things got out of hand. We started with our nutritionist on October 5th. At our first weigh in, I weighed 245, 25% body fat. Back to a 38 waist and an xl shirt. The last 4 1/2 months have been hard but rewarding. My diet is now based on lean protein, lots of the right fruits and veggies, complex carbs (sweet potatoes, brown rice, etc), good fats, oatmeal with flax seed, egg whites, the right nuts, and lots of water. We weigh and measure all of our food and eat at certain times of day. I workout six times a week- lots of running and weight-lifting. Getting back into the triathlon training. As of our last weigh in Monday I'm now 187 lbs and 15% body fat. I donated all my old clothes and now wear a 32-34 waist, medium shirt. I'm not saying this to brag, I just want people to see what you can do. 58 pounds in 4 1/2 months. You can do it! No crash diet, no starvation. I eat full plates of food all day long. I won't lie, its been hard. Real hard. No salt, sugar, dairy, or Buffalo Wild Wings! We've had grumpy times and fallen off the wagon here and there. That's one key to keeping it going- if you have a bad day or a bad meal, wake up the next morning, eat your oatmeal and apple, go to the gym and get back on track. Don't ever give up. No excuses. You can do it. Tomorrow is always a new day. Shut up, I said no excuses!
I don't regret having lap band surgery and I'm not ashamed to admit I have had it. It is a useful tool that helped get me on the right track. Looking back, my food addiction was so severe, I needed something that drastic for it to work. I don't think I had the will power to do it on my own in the beginning. For anybody who judges me for having weight loss surgery as an "easy fix"- I'm happy to challenge you to a pull up competition or 10k. Dr. Kuri didn't do that for me. The last 50 pounds has been all me without the help of the band. It doesn't matter either way. Less weight is less weight no matter how you do it, you feel a million times better. Anybody who has had any type of weight loss surgery has still done the majority of the work on their own and should be proud. Again, I don't write this to brag. I hope this motivates someone to start eating right and exercising. You can do it!
I also have to brag about my wife. She is back to where she was when we were married and looks amazing! I'm so proud of her!









Cameron now at 187









Cameron at 245, 4 1/2 months ago