Losing my partner

I have mentioned in previous columns how important it is to have somebody in your corner when you are trying to lose weight. To be successful, I need someone to go with me.

Unfortunately, my partner, a.k.a. my beautiful wife, has been slacking but I guess she has a pretty good excuse. For those who may not know, I am just a few short months away from becoming the proud father of a little baby girl. I am so excited to be a dad and we have been working so hard to get everything ready for her arrival, that I have let my dedication to my own health slack. But you know what, it happens to everyone and many people overcome it.

By no means am I blaming my lack of success on my wife, let me make that clear. I had come to rely too much on her support and motivation to keep working out that when that support was gone, I was lost. Having come to this realization, I now know what I need to do to overcome this challenge -- motivate from within.

I told myself a long time ago, before I was an expectant father, that my children would not have a fat, out-of-shape dad. I want to play catch and run around the park with my children without getting out of breath and sweating through my clothes. Now that my first child is on the way, I need to get it in gear.

Once it hit me that I was still well overweight and had a daughter on the way, I sort of went into a place where I thought, there is no way I am going to get into shape by the time the baby gets here. What I have just realized is that although I made the decision to make sure my daughter does not have a fat dad, I realized that I don't have to be all the way there by the time she is born. With each pound that I can lose, I will be that much closer to being healthy and being there for my daughter as long as possible. I don't think that she will look back on her life as an adult and say, "my father was great, with the exception of those first two years of my life when he was overweight."

She is expected to make her arrival at the end of December or beginning of January, so I better get started.