Well, hello ladies and gents. Robert Sykes, Keto, savage.com.
And today I've got special guest Rome on the podcast Rome and I
got connected through a mutual friend.
He's got a very inspiring story. He was diagnosed with type 2
diabetes, he gained a bunch of weight early on in high school
for playing college ball, and he just totally transformed his
health. He adopted A ketogenic
lifestyle. He's lost.
He's lost that weight. He's gotten off all of his
medications, saved a ton of money not having to pay for
those medications. He has better quality time with
his daughter. He's totally turned his health
around and adopted a new lens of which to look through life.
And that's what I'm all about, bringing people on with
inspiring stories that have made the switch, that have taken the
initiative and then are putting in the work.
So that's what this conversation is all about, a little back
story on Rome and how he's made a change for the better.
I've got no doubt that you will take something from it.
So that further ado, sit back, relax and enjoy the podcast
and we are live Rome. How are you brother?
I'm doing very well. How are you?
I'm good man. I'm good.
So just to give the listeners some context here, this is the
first time you and I have actually spoken.
We have a mutual friend, Michael Dennehy, who is a client and
hunting partner of mine. And he was singing his singing
Your Praises on his way back from his last hunting trip,
talking about how you've totally turned your life around, getting
your nutrition dialed in. So I'm just excited to chat with
you, man. Excited to learn more about your
story. Yes, this is the first time we
were talking. And yeah, I'm excited to share
and get into this experience. Out of curiosity, how?
How did you and Michael get connected?
We, he was the communication director at the National
Infantry Museum and I was working freelance, doing the
Army, live streaming the graduations.
And then I was in the market for a job and from there I applied
and then I talked to Michael and he hired me on to do their
social media management and the graduations from the Infantry
Museum side. So that's how our relationship
really started. Very cool.
Yeah. I'm I'm super impressed by
Michael he, I've had them on the podcast before but I'm really
appreciative towards his involvement in the infantry
Museum and just what he's trying to do in the space too.
I mean like he's he's brought a lot of people to Keto.
He he did a an internship with White Oak Pastures, Will Harris
and he connected me to them. So he's kind of one of those
connector guys, which I really appreciate.
Oh yeah, he definitely is. Cuz once he he's already an
impressive specimen himself when you first meet him.
But then when I got to know him and he took me and taught me
about his keto journey, then you know, I was even that more
intrigued about it. A. 100% man.
So give me some back story. You were playing football and
and you were overweight in your prior life, right?
Yes. I'm born and raised in the
South, so Southern cuisine, home cooking is not a stranger to me.
It was comfort food and I took a lot of comfort in it.
And in high school I played football, football.
I'm 65 and I was that size in high school.
I was like a sophomore. So I attracted the football team
and wanted to play and my weight was always in the three hundreds
and it started to slip out of control up until the the lower
three 50s. And I knew I had to make a
change. And by senior year of high
school I was actually diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.
So back then my doctor told me the most important sentence that
I think a doctor can ever tell you.
It scared the bejesus out of me. He was like lose weight or die.
So I took that information and I let my mom control my dad at the
time because, you know, teenagers don't really have a
way to get out and get your food and anything like that.
But I was just sneaking food and eating it.
So I stuck with what she wanted me to eat and it was kind of
like I was doing keto before I even knew what keto was.
Back then I was only 17 and this was 2000, the year the year
2000, 2001, and I lost 100 lbs. But since then I had balloon
back up, back and forth like many people's stories and we
Fast forward until about October of 2022.
Yes. And as you said earlier a a
friend of ours for both of us share Michael Denning.
He he was doing his keto journey and I was intrigued by what he
was doing in the nutritional facts that he was talking about
and the lifestyle. So I said I'm going to give this
a try. So since October of 2022, I
started not I wasn't going by a rule book, so to speak, so I
wasn't like precise on kilo. I was just trying to cut out any
carbs. I limited my carbs as much as
possible because that what raises your blood sugar,
especially in my case being a type 2 diabetic.
So I was trying to eat mostly lean protein sources and
vegetables, and I would walk at work at least two to five miles
a day. Nice, nice.
When you were kind of rewinding the clock back when you were in
high school, when you were gaining this weight, did you
know that it was because the amount of food you were eating,
the types of food you were eating?
Like, where was your headspace at at that point?
My headspace was like, I think many of people who are
overweight. And I was just seeking comfort.
I was eating not because I was hungry, not for nutrition, not
to gain strength and be able to, you know, lift heavy weights in
the weight room. I was eating because it was
convenient. It made me feel good.
It was the place where I wasn't judged.
You know, you go through all your social problems as a
teenager and, you know, you might go through a bout of
depression. So the food was there to comfort
me. That was my one vice that I've
had pretty much my whole life. The food, the comfort that food
gives you. So I was eating out of habit,
out of emotional need, and that what led me to way so much.
Even though I was going to football practice, I was lifting
weights. I was doing everything that
people do and you attribute to a healthy lifestyle.
I was just completely eating more food than a single
individual needed. And I I didn't know anything
about watching my calories or thinking about serving sizes.
I was just eating everything. It's like.
So like all kinds of foods, I was mostly fast food or home
cooked foods or what was the the main main ticket at them?
All of it. Wherever I can get my hands on.
I was eating lunch. I was eating them because my
grandma lived not too far from my mom's house.
So I would eat at grandma's house and grandma would give you
whatever you want because you're grandma's baby.
And then I would go home and eat.
So I was eating 2 dinners sometime 2 lunches or two
breakfasts. I would also eat fast food.
Once I got a license and I had a small job, so I had some money.
I would sometimes I would just to be full clarity you.
I would go to Burger King and I would buy two or three double
walkers with extra cheese and I would go somewhere and eat it.
Not and I wasn't even hungry. It was just impulse.
Just I was out of control. I I just wanted to.
Any pain I felt, I covered it up with food.
So I was eating everything and saying I can eat a whole pan of
Turkey and dressing by myself. It's just I was, I was a monster
when it come to food. And at that point in your life,
I mean, how old do you know, if you don't mind me asking?
I'm 40. I just turned 40 in spring of
this year. OK, so at that point, high
school years, I mean, you're you're not probably well versed
in macros and how carbohydrates impact your blood sugar versus
that of proteins and dietary fats.
So like when you're eating these foods, do you like think to
yourself, man, this is an unhealthy food choice or it's
just totally food? There's not really a health or
unhealth to it. I'm just eating too much of it.
I didn't know anything about. I mean, we were teaching, they
were teaching it to us in school, but I wasn't really
paying attention to it, especially not to the level I am
now. I was, I knew what carbs and fat
and everything was, but I was just eating to enjoy it.
So I wasn't really thinking about what I was putting in my
body. I was just enjoying the food.
Were you beating yourself up at all four year weight or was that
kind of just a an afterthought? Yeah, it was kind of the the
vicious cycle that people talk about is you get depressed.
So, you know in your social life, things happening or, you
know, being a teenager, you have emotions.
And so you I was eating to try to make me feel better and then
you get overweight and then you feel bad for being overweight,
so then you eat more because that's what you go to for
comfort. So it just becomes the vicious
cycle that we all always talk about.
So it was just constantly, my life was constantly revolving
around eating. Yeah.
And then when your mom took over the reins and was kind of
mitigating what you were and we're not eating, and you lost
100 lbs and you gained it back, had that kind of shift your
mentality. Well, I was trying to get into
playing college football. I was.
My school wasn't known for football, but with my size I was
attracting attention. And when I lost that much weight
my senior year, you know, coaches telling you you're going
to scare off all the people who are interested in you playing
college football because y'all think something's wrong with
you. And I mean, I was, I didn't have
like a illness where I couldn't play football, but I did need to
look after my health better. And so my mom took over.
She was it was mostly portion size because I would not go back
in the kitchen and eat anything after she gave it to me.
She'll make my plate and then so I will eat it.
I was still eating Southern foods, but my portions and
calories were dropped significantly based from when I
was controlling my own diet. And to cope with that, if I was
drinking mostly water, I stopped drinking sodas.
I didn't even drink sweet tea, so I tried.
I was drinking a gallon of water at least a day and let my mom
control my foods. I was unhealthily skipping lunch
at school because I was obsessed at that point with trying to
lose weight. And so if I got hungry, I would
go to sleep. And I learned that that helped
me kind of reprogram myself because I had to break the
habits. I didn't know what I was doing
at the time, but I had to break my mental habits and the way my
body was working to get a new lifestyle because my body's
telling y'all, you're starving, we need to eat.
And that's because I was programmed to overeat.
So once I got adjusted to eating health more healthy and the
football practice and weight lifting kind of like took his
natural course with me dropping the weight so fast because I was
doing that stuff. But now I had nutrition behind
it. And so when I went off to
college, before I went to college, I tried to gain some of
the weight back. So I stopped eating the way I
was eating. I started trying to put back on
pounds and that's I hurt my neck the end of the season in my high
school career and that affected me into college.
I couldn't get cleared by the doctors to get on the field.
And so that story goes, you know, I just went back slowly to
my old lifestyle and I stayed that way pretty much ever since
when I gave up my football dream until recently.
And I got back up to probably I was in anywhere between 295 and
3:15 from that point until now. And what were you doing to
manage the diabetes throughout those years?
I mean, were you still going to like a diabetes clinic?
Were you were you taking any type of dietary precautions for
the diabetes or were you using insulin like how?
How did that shape up? I was initially.
Since it's type 2 and my body makes the insulin, it just
doesn't use it properly. I was on the pill, so I was
managing it that way, but I was, I was not at all paying
attention and trying to keep what was going into my mouth.
I was just taking the pill and using that and checking my blood
sugars to basically allow me to eat what I wanted to eat, within
reason. And as it progressed, my health,
I had high blood pressure. They were watching for
cholesterol. You know, all of the things that
come with overeating that are also complicated by diabetes.
So within the last five years, if my diabetes and my health
progressed to the point where I had to take more medication,
they put me on the insulin shot, a long term insulin shot and the
short term insulin shot that you take with meals to keep your
blood sugar down. And with the medication I was
taking, realistically, I mean, I could eat what I wanted to eat
and keep my blood sugar down, which I took advantage of for a
long time. But I was not happy with myself.
I looked in the mirror. I didn't like what I what I saw.
But at the time, I was in a relationship, so I was kind of
comfortable in the relationship. We accepted each other.
So I really had nothing in my life that made me say you need
to change now. Like nothing new or, you know, I
I had a daughter. I have a daughter and you know
your kids are going to love you regardless.
So I was, it really came to a gut check moment when I was
hired at National Infantry Museum by Michael.
And I saw him in his lifestyle. And I was, you know, it's time
for a change. I got fed up with myself.
I saw myself in some pictures that I had just taken.
I met a Medal of Honor recipient, and I was like stoked
to take a picture with him. This the, this hero I'm taking a
picture with. And then I looked at the picture
and I said, I don't even recognize myself anymore.
Like, who is this person? I don't want to look like this.
And so I made the decision to change for the better.
And that's when I started adopting A keto style nutrition
program that I was doing myself. I wasn't like following any
coaching or technically the doctor's rule that I was doing
it on my own to try to make my life better.
And so here we are now. When you were going to the
doctors for the diabetes, were they talking to you about
nutrition or was it pretty much just a conversation around the
medication? They were talking to me about
nutrition. I mean the medication allows
just like I think it's I don't want to call it epidemic, but
you see those epic shots and everything that people are
taking. It allows you to eat what you
want and it doesn't hardcore affect your health at in the
short term. I mean, you have long term
effects, but you are allowed to eat what you want and take the
medication and the medication kind of helps you.
And so they were talking about that.
I was taking all the different medicines and different
cocktails of diabetes medications and they always tell
you warn you you need to just lay off the red meat for my
cholesterol. You need to lay off of this.
But it wasn't as strict as it was when I was 17 and I had that
first doctor and he was told me he was a little bit more.
He didn't have the bedside manners doctors have nowadays.
He was like, lose weight or die. I really need to hear that
again. But the doctors I had were more
kind of like just saying warnings, you know, you, you
need to do this. You need to do that.
But it wasn't anybody stopped me because I was grown man, you
know, at this point. So I really do what I wanted.
And getting much push back from your extended family like that
they they use being unhealthy and trying to get you to change
course or were they pretty pretty low key on that as well?
Pretty low key. I had nobody.
I didn't have that person that was willing to hurt feelings or
technically put the the friendship in rough terms to
say, hey, you need to change. I can't keep watching you do
this. You're killing yourself.
I didn't have anybody to really say that to me.
So it was all up to me because my doctors weren't being that
hardcore. Me either.
But the the medication, how I was feeling, the inspiration I
got from Michael and also how it was affecting my pocket because
the medicine is not cheap even on insurance.
And I was getting tired of paying for this medication.
And I took kind of an extreme take when I started the keto
style lifestyle that I have now. I I made my own prescription
drug rules. I wasn't taking it like they
prescribed because I didn't think I needed that much.
Because as soon as I changed my eating habits, I'd no longer
needed as much medication I was taking.
Because when you eat less and you take diabetes medication, it
can really mess up your stomach if you don't have enough food.
The medicine is that strong. So I was having stomach issues
because I wasn't. I was eating regular food, like
the regular amount, and the medicine was too strong.
So I was getting sick. So I was like, I need to stop
taking so much medication. So I made that decision on my
own. And when I finally went back to
the doctor, you know, they look at the results and they're like,
oh, you, you're looking great. What are you doing?
Doing like, well, you, what changes have you made?
So they were interested in it because I was also part of a
diabetic study that they would send me the supplies for free
and I would just have to answer questions like in the three
months, six months, nine month interval and they were studying
me in the the new medications that I was taking.
Gotcha, Gotcha. So when you started doing Keto
in 2022, I mean, Keto's been pretty well popularized for
several years now. When you jumped into the space
and started digging into information to figure out how to
go about it, were you overwhelmed?
And there's a lot of conflicting information now.
Like what? What did you find as a good
resource and kind of how did you structure that dietary program?
I based it. I asked questions of Michael a
lot and then I just kind of tried to look on the Internet
but not take the first couple sources you find.
I was trying to deeper. Once one publication or online
resource said this, I would try to cross reference it with
another one to try to see if they said the similar things to
say OK. Since multiple people are saying
the same thing, then it's probably more the general
direction I want to go into is not just an offshoot influencer
or somebody trying to say something to get attention.
But as I said, I didn't read, I didn't read a book or follow a
coaching program. I really just stopped eating
fast food. I stopped eating out at all.
I went to the grocery stores and made my meals.
I was eating almonds to snack on and I was eating vegetables and
meat, so it was just out for lunch.
I would make chicken salad or tuna salad and do that for the
week and bringing that to work. And I would eat lettuce with it
to make sandwiches so sweet with lettuce leaves.
So I dropped all bread. I dropped all my carb sauces.
I wasn't. I didn't eat French fries,
potatoes, any of that type of things.
It was just meat and vegetables and then nuts, Variety of nuts.
And you were trying to get mostly lean meats?
Or were you throwing in some fatty cuts there too?
Mostly lean meats. Because I was so focused on I
just wanted to lose weight, so I didn't really.
So I probably not have. I haven't eaten as much fat as
the keto diet probably calls for for your energy source.
So I was eating chicken and fish and hence the chicken salad and
tuna salad that I was rotating in every week.
Every once in a while I would have steak, but it wasn't the
fatty meats like I probably should have had with following
the trying to follow a keto diet.
What about now? You eating pretty much the same
thing. Now you mix it up a little bit.
I'm mixing up a little bit. I'm eating.
I have more of a balance of beef and chicken and fish and I've
even tried some of the keto sources of carbs like the bread,
but I try to make sure it is at least whole grain is not the the
white bread versions and I've started taking more supplements.
Sometimes I put in protein powder to try to keep my
calories because I try to eat keep around 2000 calories a day.
When I started this lifestyle, I was about 3:15 in October 2022
and then by end of January 2023 I had lost like 6570 lbs just
from changing what I was eating and The Walking every day I was
trying to get at least 10,000 steps a day.
Nice. Very nice.
What about medication?
I'm assuming you're off pretty much all the majority of the
medication that you were on. Oh yeah, I just dropped all of
that. I mean, they probably the
doctors probably wanted to wean me off of it, but I took kind of
a hardcore take and I just stopped taking it because I
didn't want to pay for it anymore and I felt great.
I mean I went off of what my body was saying.
That's what made me keep going because the IT it was hard at
first. Just I tell anybody I have a
friend who has been way more weight than I have my whole life
as family friend and he's probably stayed in the five or
six hundreds since I've known him.
And I told him that all you got to do is start that's I didn't
when I started I didn't do it for anybody else that did it for
myself. So if I didn't have so quote UN
quote, great day working out or walking.
If I only did 1 1/2 miles instead of two miles, at least I
like. Or at least I did something.
The next day is another opportunity to try to do better.
So I was only doing it for myself.
I didn't have anybody I was trying to impress or anything
like that. So I took it at my own speed
until my body got used to it. So then when I did it more
consistently and my body got used to and mine's like, OK,
this is what we're going to aim for every day, then it became
like a routine. It's just fitting to my
lifestyle, naturally. Progress over perfection, man.
It's what trying to tell everybody.
What about your your friend? Is he starting to move in the
right direction as well? It's hard to say with him.
He a yo-yo up and down and he's older than me, so I I tell him
and I use myself an example. I try to walk with him.
I'm trying to prod without being too hard, cold with him because
he gets more upset when you try to change his ways than I would
if somebody was trying to help me.
So I'm trying to take it day by day and I'm telling them it.
He gets depressed because I guess he saw, he sees my
progress because he watched me do it and I'm where I am now,
still trying to hit my goals. I actually hit my goal.
I want to be 225, and I hit 223 in early summer of this year.
But then I have a friend who's like, oh, you losing too much
muscle, you doing all this. So I was like, OK, maybe you're
right. So I started trying to put back
on more muscle and I get I'm back up to like the high two
40s. But I want to get back leaner.
I want to be as lean as possible.
I've been big most of my life. I want to see how the other half
lives. No, for sure, man.
Yeah. Let me ask you this, if you
don't mind me, Prime here. So you and I are both from the
South, man. I'm, I'm in Arkansas, You're in
Georgia. There's definitely a widespread
epidemic of people that are overweight in the South for that
Southern cooking that we're known so well for.
But like, I go to all these conferences, all these nutrition
conferences, and I don't see that many black people, man, I
don't understand why, 'cause like when you look at it from a
biological standpoint, I mean, skin cut doesn't mean a darn
thing, especially when you look at it from a nutritional
standpoint. Like, what works well for me is
going to work well for you, and vice versa with most things.
Why do you think there's so much more?
I don't know if a version is the right word, but why is it that
there seems to be this prevalence of overweight,
obesity, type 2 diabetes in the black community down South
relative to the white community? Any ideas on that at all?
Think it's just based off of just the environment because
growing up you know if everybody in your family because a lot of
cases I have I've seen on TV and then the 600 LB life stories,
it's it's everybody around them either not encourages but it's
kind of like a support system and they might have other people
in their family that also overeat.
And I don't know. I think it it might be more on
an individual basis, even though I mean, you can clearly see that
the difference of people who show up for support and changes
in their lifestyle. But it also might be kind of
like not believing, not having faith that they can change, not
believe in the new information or not that lifestyle is not
going to work. Like just not having the
confidence to try to make a change.
Because I go back to my friend who was my closest study.
I can see he's, he's seen me lose the weight and for whatever
reason, he just hasn't taken the steps to do the same thing I'm
doing. I offered to walk with him.
He claims he didn't know about serving sizes and things of that
nature. And this.
He's almost 50 and I I can't believe that.
I think it's just he's saying that because he just wants to do
what he wants to do and he goes to the doctor he has because I'm
not going to say his identity, but he has.
He was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes.
Later on in life I thought he had it much sooner, but he also
has lymphedema with his legs swell at the bottom.
So he has all this stuff going on.
He has lost some toes. He has a friend who has passed
away from who was on dialysis and also had diabetes.
So he sees all of these things around him.
But I don't know what his aversion is to changing for the
better. I I honestly can't answer that
question, but I think just some people get so stuck in their
lifestyle that they don't think things are going to change.
And also we're in a microwave society, so people want it to
change within a week. You want, if you've been
overweight all your life, you want to look bikini ready in a
week. They're not willing to put the
work in like other people are. So I think a mentality has a lot
to do with the environment as well.
Yeah, 100%, man. I feel like we we hanging around
people that make us feel comfortable because it's not
easy to be around people that make us feel uncomfortable and
push us to be better. But that's what we need and
we're you know around friends and family and people in our
society on a day-to-day basis that just act more as enablers.
And I don't know it just it it's it's tough.
I mean you have to like seek out these hardships and moments of
discomfort. But like, once you start going
on that path and benefiting from it, it's hard to hard to turn
back around because like you just start seeing the fruits of
your labor compound over time. Yeah.
And you also think it might be the price difference people
going to when you go to grocery store.
I mean grocery store used to be cheaper than eating out, but
it's kind of even now with all the different taxes and stuff
after COVID happened. So it's it's kind of expensive,
still go to go to grocery store, but going to the dollar menu is
just so convenient. And I think we've built a
lifestyle on convenience so much that people just rather do that
than mindlessly do that, rather than like think out meals and
try to look at certain sizes and relabels and things like that.
Yeah, no, 100% man, 100%. What's your what's your training
like now? Is your next step bothering you?
You do much training now. I'll weight lift.
I try to do at least two to three times a week and I try to
walk every day and stay on my drink sodas from time to time
whenever I have the taste for something.
But I try to stick to water at least a gallon of water a day
and also with the keto food selections that I make.
I also do intermittent fasting. So and my I also eat on a one
time a day so I intermittent fast.
So I probably not even really intermittent fasting at this
point because I've gone to eating one meal a day and I eat
it around lunchtime. So around 11 o'clock 12:00
Eastern and I try to eat all of my calories at that one time and
I don't eat again until the next day.
Do you find that that's better for you, like scheduling wise or
just from a Satani standpoint? Or is the main driver there just
simply to have that longer fasting window?
The longer fasting window, because I was doing intermittent
fasting on the regular way and I was eating between 11 and my
window was like 11 to 6. And so I was eating two or three
meals in that window and I decided to try to see if I can
kick it up a notch. And I was.
I have a book, I do have a book from Michael.
He gave me about fasting and they said that your body is
naturally more forget exactly how they call it, but you can
burn the most your your metabolism is the most active
like 11 to two or something like that might be the best window
based off circadian rhythm. And so I try to eat all my
calories during that part of the day in an effort to have even
more a bigger window to burn calories throughout the day are.
You tracking macros at all now? Are you pretty much just eating
intuitively, but during that window?
I look, I tried to. Everything I read online has
been trying to say to eat a gram of protein per body weight or
somewhere around there. So for a long time.
My goal for the last six months has been to eat at least 200
grams of protein. I've tried to limit my carbs to,
I want to say to 0 because, you know, vegetables have carbs in
it, so I haven't really counted them.
But I tried not to eat any kind of significant carb source.
So it's kind of like trace carbs, whatever.
It comes in the vegetables and you know, things like that.
And I haven't really been tracking fat.
It's mostly been protein. And then trying to make sure I
choose lean protein sources and vegetables.
I haven't really been counting fats.
So that's why I say for the keto lifestyle, I don't think I've
been eating enough fat that it calls for for the energy.
But I haven't been doing too bad as far as energy production, I
don't think. Good, good, good, good.
And what did you say your your current weight is?
Our current weight is I think this morning I weigh 245.
Nice. Nice.
That's awesome, man, You've been saving a ton of money off
medication. Your weight's trimming up.
You feel better. You look better.
Life's good. Yeah, it's it's amazing.
I I don't want to go back. I've had days when, you know,
during the Thanksgiving at work we had some little parts and
stuff. So I might have got off my
eating regimen for a little bit, but I did enjoy the food.
But I couldn't eat like I used to eat because my body just
wouldn't let me. I've been so focused on this, on
this journey that I'm on right now, that my body was like, all
right, you enjoyed it, but that's enough.
You don't need to eat anymore. So I think that's encouraging
for me to feel that within myself.
I try to stress it to my friend that the habits that you have
right now, your body is used to. But once you start dedicating
yourself to a more healthy journey, your body will go in
the other direction and it won't allow you to go back because you
will feel sick if you try to eat like you used to.
Your body just will not let you go down that path.
So I'm trying to to live what I speak so he can see it and we'll
see how it goes, but I feel amazing.
And yeah, no medication. That's awesome, man.
Do you like when you go back, like to Thanksgiving, for
instance, like you were talking about earlier, and, you know,
you get your friends, you get your family, they're all eating
those foods that you grew up on? Like, is it pretty tempting
mentally? Or do you feel like, hey, you
know what? The success I'm seeing outweighs
that momentary temptation. The The success I'm seeing
outweighs the momentary temptation.
I ate. I allowed myself to do it.
I didn't feel out of control like I was before, like when I
was eating. Most of my life I ate because I
saw it. I wasn't even that hungry.
You just eat and clean your plate, and if there's anything
leftover, you eat that. Like, I rarely had seconds.
But nowadays I have to go plates when I go somewhere.
If I do go to a restaurant, I try to make sure I keep an eye
on all my servings and my portion sizes.
And while I did eat some, I ate some dressing.
I haven't eaten carbs that went around Thanksgiving.
I hadn't eaten carbs in like I wouldn't say a year, but close
to probably eight or nine months.
And I enjoyed it. I allowed myself to enjoy it for
that day. But then the the next day I went
right back to my keto based lifestyle that didn't.
It wasn't lingering feeling like I need to do this more.
I need to eat my feelings like I was before.
Yeah, that's the key, man. Like if if you're gonna, you
know, deviate, that's that's one thing.
But when you deviate, it just becomes a negative spiral that
keeps going further and further out of control.
That's where you get in trouble. So like the fact that you're
able to moderate against that is, is, is so, so important,
man, so huge. And I think seeing the success
you've seen, recognizing all the progress you've made like
there's no, there's no incentive to throw that away in the
moment. Yeah, and I I felt good.
I mean, it's it it the food brought back feelings because
it's all those tasty things. I love Thanksgiving.
Those are my favorite holiday other than, you know, Christmas
when you're a kid. But I love Thanksgiving.
Not just because family was around just but because of the
foods that you got eat. I could have ate Thanksgiving
food all year long and so I allowed myself to enjoy it.
But I've got to the point where I'm mentally able and strong
enough to to not over indulge and keep going down the path.
Like I said, oh, I ate it yesterday.
I'm already breaking my diet. Let me try it again today.
I'm able to withstand that kind of temptation.
That's the key, man. That's the key what?
What's in the pipeline for you? What are you excited about?
I know you're wanting to get leaned out and see what all the
muscle looks like underneath, but what else you're working on?
Well, the the controlling my nutrition and what I put in my
body has led to so many other things.
I'm able to think clearly. I just feel better day by day,
emotionally, mentally, physically, with my energy
level. I have more energy for my
daughter. I'm able to.
I'm was never a morning person and Michael helped me do this
because I'm more of a night owl and he had a rule he wants to be
in the office, I think at 8815. And that doesn't seem early to
probably a lot of people and a lot of your listeners.
But 8:15 is early for me when you're not in school.
So when you had to go to high school.
And so that was part of me changing for the better.
But now, since I've been doing it and being consistent with it,
and I had to take my daughter to school, I'm up at 6:00 or even
sooner than that every morning, and it doesn't affect me.
I've been able to adapt. My body is is more healthy.
So I think that I'm not resistant to any kind of change
in behaviors or anything like I was before.
I just have such a positive outlook on life and I'm just
trying to get to what I want to look like physically seeing
maybe if I can get a six pack for the first time in my life.
I mean, 40 is not too late about for that, is it?
No. Heck no, man.
Not too late at all. I mean, you still got the best
years ahead of you. And I bet your daughter's like,
super proud of like she's seen this whole journey unfold.
I mean, you get more quality time with her now that you're
able to move better, feel better, act better.
So I bet that's just totally made Joe's relationship thrive.
Yes, because before you know you have the jump houses and places
around and there's AI think it's a £250 weight limit.
So I was never able to go to those places and actually run
around on the the the bounce mats or what do you call it to
actually have fun with her. But I can now I can sign the
waiver and I can actually jump around instead of just sitting
on the sideline. So it's opened up a whole new
window of opportunity for me. That's awesome, man.
How? How old is she?
She's 6, so she's all about she. She has high energy, so I try to
match it. Yeah, that's that's the way to
be, man. Like I I get I I'm saddened when
I see parents and grandparents that are there with their kids
at the park and they're just confined to the bench because
they they don't have the energy. They don't have to drive.
They don't have the mobility to get up and interact with the
kids. I want to be.
I want to be that guy that's 97 years old freaking rocking and
rolling with my great, great grandkids at the park someday.
And I think, you know, making the right decisions throughout
your entire life nutritionally and and training wise, I mean
that's that's the way to do it man.
Absolutely is. It has been amazing and I can't
wait to to continue this lifestyle.
This. Most people like say this
probably like a diet. I don't call it a diet to call
it my my lifestyle. This is how I choose I'm going
to eat like this for the rest of my life.
I enjoy it. I enjoy eating meat and the the
lean protein sources. I like vegetables.
Anything else I add as far as like pistachios or almonds, just
I eat those because they taste good even though they are good
for you. But I never get tired of eating
like this, you know, most people would say they get bored just
eating the same. I can eat the same thing over
and over again because it's not about, it's not about just going
on this food journey and exciting my palate anymore.
It's eating the foods that I enjoyed that are good for me and
that's my focus. Yeah, 100% man, 100%.
So Michael knew that we were going to have this conversation.
He wanted me to ask you how many eggs and pieces of bacon he's
been known to eat at a Waffle House.
Oh man, I didn't even know that you can order at Waffle House
the way that he orders. I I don't know what the record
is, but I could say easy. I think about eating 30 eggs and
30 pieces of bacon. He might have eaten more than
that, but it's at least 25 to 30 of each.
See him? Yes, he at one time.
He eats it fast. Not as fast as Major Payne did
on the movie, but he's not too far behind.
Yeah, he's a beast, man. Michael's a cool dude.
I'm glad that he connect this man.
Like, I love just connecting with people that are seeing
positive changes in their life by adopting this lifestyle.
And then, I mean, that's what it's all about, man.
Like, this is totally a grassroots movement.
It's not going to come from the doctors or the to the people
above us. It's going to come from people
that are changing their life on a day-to-day basis and it's
making a positive impact on those around them.
So the more I can interact with people like yourself, man, the
happier I am and I'm super proud of you.
What you've accomplished and just keep fighting the good
fight, man. Keep being an inspiration to
others. Keep doing what you're doing and
keep getting healthier every day.
I appreciate it and I really appreciate the keto bricks
samples that you sent. They are amazing.
And so I was when I looked at the side of them and they the
amount of fat they had in them, I was like, yeah, I don't think
I've hit that much fat in a day. So I was like, I'm behind on the
amount of fats that I need day-to-day.
But when I ate the kilo brick and there's 1000 calories and
had I had, I had so much energy I saw like so my body is needing
more fat to produce energy for me to to experience day by day.
So I think I'm going to start trying to up my fat intake.
Yeah, man. I mean, I would, I would
definitely recommend that, especially as big as much muscle
as you have, man. I mean, I'm 57, you're, you said
6-7, you're foot taller than me, 65, you're pretty much a foot
taller than me. You know, like I eat, I eat
probably right now I'm coming out of a competition prep, so
it's a little bit different. But generally speaking, I'm
eating 200, three, 100 grams of fat a day and you've got higher
energy demands than me. So you're going to want to ramp
that up so you can feel better. Yeah, that's definitely you show
me the how the other side lives on that part.
So I'm definitely going to take a up tick in my the amount of
facts that I'm eating there by there because I've seen my
energy spike even more than it has been since I changed my
lifestyle for the better. So I really appreciate the keto
bricks you sent and and showing me what I really need.
My pleasure, ma'am. If there's everything I can do
to help with any in anything with regards to nutrition, by
all means don't don't hesitate to reach out, man.
I'm happy to do it. Absolutely.
I will definitely take you up on the offer and I hope I didn't
ramble too much for anybody who's listening to my brain.
My my brain kind of like goes on autopilot so I can go from one
one side to another and I just hope everybody can follow along
and I didn't get to be too far off the path.
No, no, not at all ma'am. I bring all types of people on
this podcast and I think it's good for people to hear all
types of different, different back story, different walks of
life. And that's what that's what this
is all about, man. So I freaking love the story.
I appreciate you taking the time to share it and being
transparent with it. Do you have any like social
profiles you want to point people to or are you online
much? I'm online, but it's mostly work
based. I don't have like I don't.
I haven't documented my lifestyle online really, so my
socials are kind of like just for work basically.
So I don't have anything at this time.
Well, shoot me a picture like a before and after picture, man.
I'll put that in the show notes so people can see what you kind
of what what you've gone through in the journey on phone.
Oh, absolutely. I have one of those that I made
that I did share with on my Facebook page to show people the
changes that I made and even people on my Facebook friends
that I've haven't seen me probably since maybe college.
They were like, Dang man, you like a whole new person.
Some people like, did you take this picture from high school
like well now y'all just blowing smoke.
Now I know I don't look like I'm eighteen, yeah, but but I do
appreciate the, the, the comments that they made.
Yeah man, night and day difference.
So shoot that over to me in an e-mail for sure, and I'll put
that in the show notes, and that'll be an inspiration in and
of itself. Oh, absolutely.
Well, Rome, keep killing her brother.
Happy holidays to you. Merry Christmas.
And like I said, man, if there's everything I can do, you just
let me know, brother. All right.
Thank you so much. I appreciate the time talking to
you, Michael. Want me to tell you hello and we
already covered that. We both know Michael, so I just
wanted to make sure I put that in there because he texted me
before the show. And happy holidays to you and
yours. Awesome man.
See you, brother. All right.