I
wanted to share my story here, please bear with me if you find this
boring. I wanted to one tell the story, most importantly wanted to
let people know that if I can run then anybody can run. If I can
influence at least one person to take up running for their good then
my goal will be achieved.
Roll
back to December last year, I was like most of us working in IT,
carrying a Tyre around my tummy (I still have one :0). I always
thought that my priority is not health and work. I can and will focus
on health when time permits and it's easy to get back to shape. Also,
I can easily reduce weight by playing cricket / badminton during
weekends for few hours.
While
playing badminton in UK, I experienced severe breathlessness after
playing casually for 10 mins and had to drink water to bring myself
back to normal condition. I wasn't able to continue even after that
and had to call it a day. This repeated after couple of months and
was a wake up call. I consider myself a decent player and was capable
of playing hours together without needing a break. I still don't know
what happened that day but one thing was sure, my lifestyle was
taking a toll on my health and I can no longer take my health and
fitness lightly. I had gained eight kilos in 10 years, not a very
drastic increase one would say and my BMI was telling me what I was
overweight not obese.
Roll
back to March this year, I decided to do small things to remain
active and started walking for 30 mins in the morning. I also started
reading lot of articles on benefits of walking, running and what
needs to be done to reduce overall weight. Also, how much can one
achieve by way of losing weight and what actually being fit means. My
eyes were wide opened once I realised that even walking isn't
sufficient and running is the best exercise (if one can do) to remain
in shape and lose that extra pounds. Also, that one size doesn't fit
all and one should carefully consider his / her condition before
deciding any form of exercise.
I
haven't run in my life at all so this was a difficult decision to
take. Most of all, I was questioning the sustainability of such an
idea. I made a reluctant start in July and started to run for 10 –
15 mins daily. I will go out of breath after that and was content
with what I was doing. I also realised that I was able to remain
fresh throughout the day but the weight remained same. I again
reached out to online websites to know more and realised that I have
to increase the running time without worrying about the pace. This is
the time I also learnt about Fit4Life and started running 5 – 7 KMs
daily and logging the same as well. Wonder happened, I lost my first
two kilos in a month and everyone around me started noticing the
lighter me. Yay, what a feeling, can't be expressed in words.
