{"id":280999,"date":"2018-07-30T06:00:23","date_gmt":"2018-07-29T22:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=280999"},"modified":"2018-07-30T06:00:23","modified_gmt":"2018-07-29T22:00:23","slug":"taking-care-of-yourself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/taking-care-of-yourself\/","title":{"rendered":"Taking care of yourself"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-280999 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon '>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/taking-care-of-yourself\/pelagio\/'>PELAGIO<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-281003'>\n\t\t\t\tRoldan Pelagio has regained his ideal weight by maintaining a plant based diet. (Contributed Photo)\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon '>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/taking-care-of-yourself\/adamwalshbefore\/'>ADAMWALSHBEFORE<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-281001'>\n\t\t\t\tAdam Walsh in 2010 before the decision to turn his life around and live a healthier life. (Contributed Photo)\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon '>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/taking-care-of-yourself\/adamwalshafter\/'>ADAMWALSHAFTER<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-281000'>\n\t\t\t\tAdam Wash at present. Maintaining an exercise routine and healthy diet gives him renewed energy every single day. (Contributed Photo)\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>Taking care of one\u2019s self on the road to a fit and healthy life is no small step, temporary stage or anything short-term. One must be in it for the long haul. It may mean changing one\u2019s lifestyle, doing more physical activities, and intentionally having a mindset that eating responsibly is a commitment and results will come\u2014just wait and see.<\/p>\n<p>This is a familiar path to Adam Walsh. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI started this fitness journey in 2010 at the age of 24. I was 205 lbs due to my job as a telemarketer and a five-year engagement that went south. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was taking prescription medications for acid reflux, high blood pressure, cholesterol, and depression. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cMoving to Saipan was the first step to changing my health and lifestyle,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt took me about one year to lose 55 lbs. The hardest thing was changing my eating habits. When I was overweight, I trained religiously, but paid no attention to my food intake. Once I started counting calories, I found out I was eating around 6,000 calories a day. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI changed my diet to 2,500 calories per day and the excess weight just melted away. To keep myself on track, I tracked my workouts, meals, and calories in a workout journal,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>The road to fitness may put up challenges along the way. But motivation, focus and a strong will set these monkey wrenches aside.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo far, I haven\u2019t relapsed. I have gained weight and lost it again because of vacationing, travel, visiting family\u2026<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe biggest hurdle for me is diet. I have always been physically active and dedicate one hour or more a day to fitness [but] for me, diet is more important than exercise\u2026 These things [vacationing, travel, visiting family] complicate my diet and exercise routines but I haven\u2019t exceeded 170 lbs since 2010,\u201d Walsh said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTo stay disciplined and motivated, I keep a workout and eating journal. I also changed my workouts every three months. I started on all the Beachbody workouts like P90X, P90X2, Insanity, etc. I\u2019ve since changed to resistance bands and have a year\u2019s worth of weight training workouts to keep me busy,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Walsh is currently a teacher at the Northern Marianas College, a father of two toddlers and a husband and he does not take anything for granted especially when it come to taking care of his health. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cCurrently, I range from 150 to 170 lbs depending on the time of year. I\u2019m an educator by trade and have some significant time off. During the winter, I visit family in Japan and summers are spent in Idaho with family,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI gain 10 to 15 lbs when I am off island. When I get back to Saipan, it takes about three to four months to get back down to my desired weight of 150-155 lbs\u2026 <\/p>\n<p>\u201cTo reiterate, focus on a healthy balanced diet. Don\u2019t starve yourself or spending a ton of money on a fad diet,\u201d he added. \u201cWe all should find time to exercise. That may be the most difficult thing to do. Diet is more important and an easier thing to alter since it won\u2019t require a time-commitment. Focus on eating right before taking on an exercise regime.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Walsh recounts reading somewhere that one lengthens one\u2019s lifespan by two hours for every hour one exercises. \u201cThat\u2019s the only fact I need to continue my journey to be the fitness me I can be,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Roldan Pelagio, who won the Lose Big, Win Big in the CNMI in 2017, did not have plans to enter a weight loss challenge. He only realized that he had to do something to lose even just a little weight when he noted that his clothes wouldn\u2019t fit him anymore. He joined the weight loss challenge with a partner, Bryan Belenton.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe struggles I faced when trying to lose weight was my addiction to food, especially at the beginning of the training program, because the fitness program that you want to embark on is the hardest to start. Food is our satisfaction and sometimes we call it a  stress reliever but we forget that we tend to eat more calories than we need every day. Alcohol consumption also a big factor in gaining weight.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>In embarking on his fitness journey, change had to be done. \u201cI focused my diet on 100 percent plant-based way of eating. This means no meat, dairy, eggs, milk, and no oil,\u201d he said. \u201cThis helped me a lot in melting all the fats.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy exercises involved running, skipping rope, calisthenics and some weight lifting. Just moving my body regularly meant a lot.  Rest is also important and I always have a rest day after a workout day.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pelagio said that losing weight can be automatic, as long as you eat the right amount of calories at the right time. \u201cNo overeating and being consistent with the fitness program that you started with are the most important factors to have in mind all the time. Being disciplined means you want to achieve a goal.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy goal during that time was to win and see the best version of myself. The prize money would be the last of the motivation. It is easy to gain all of the weight back but for me, I stayed on my plant-based way of eating and it help me not gain any weight,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>In retrospect, Pelagio believes that starting his fitness journey was worth it. \u201cI learned a lot about my body, the importance of food and an active lifestyle. I started learning more about plant-based eating and there are actually a lot of varieties and vegan options. Nobody can take care of ourselves but ourselves only and we cannot rely on others to tell us what to do because it should start from one\u2019s self,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cChanging your lifestyle means changing your outlook about your health and the experiences that you will have in a lifetime\u2026move your body more, walk longer, get sunshine, live a stress- free life. I also share my experiences with my family, friends and coworkers and seeing others improve and start their own fitness journey makes me really happy,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Taking care of one\u2019s self on the road to a fit and healthy life is&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":281000,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[16616,42,55,21],"class_list":["post-280999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-supplement","tag-adam-walsh","tag-food","tag-health-2","tag-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}