Determined To Succeed

Day sixty-seven.

I am thinking about mortality today. No, not because of anything actually going on in my life but because of a link I was sent, a link to a “life expectancy calculator.” While I have never been the type of guy who wants to know too much (particularly the whens and hows of life ending) but I took this little quiz just for kicks and goggles but came away with something fascinating, both scary and wonderful at the same time. Check this out…

When you go to this “life expectancy calculator” on MSN.com’s website it asks you for several rounds of key information, everything from height and weight to history of diseases in family and your current habits. You guys know the drill. So I took a few moments to enter this information. When I got to the weight part I was very proud to enter a number that began with a 2 (for the record, I may be back down to 238 officially but I entered 240 just to be safe). Also, I had to guess on cholesterol levels but at least had my latest blood pressure readings from recent doctors visits (a healthy 120 over 80). Anyhow, I plugged in this info, all seven pages of it, and out came my result. According to this calculator I am gonna live until I am about 80, which is good (I think). That puts me at about half-life, if this calculator is to be believed and makes me very much like our own sun which, at about five-billion years old, is at half-life itself.

PS: I like being sunny.

Now for the scary yet exciting part. Again, for kicks and giggles, I entered information about my “former” self. The guy who started this weight loss journey back in 2005 at 400 pounds, had high blood pressure and was well on his way to – let’s just say an unhealthy life with poor quality of life. Shit! I couldn’t believe my eyes. When I entered in all my stats (again, taking my best guesses about blood pressure and cholesterol stats) my life expectancy was only 61 years! 61!!!!!

It seems, according to this calculator, I extended my life almost 20 years by losing all that weight. Woohoo!!!

Then I became sad. What if I had stayed 400 pounds? There is certainly no guarantee that I would have lived to even 61 at that weight and health level and you can’t convince me that I wasn’t well on my way to not being on this earth for very long past 40 eating and living the way I was.

Then I became excited. I thought, “I did put years, and good ones, back on my life by losing weight!” I thought about having almost 20 more years to do the things I’ve always wanted to do in life and became instantly grateful to God for the chances to do them in a healthier, leaner body – some of which I couldn’t physcially do because people wouldn’t let me.

I know that things like this “life expectancy calculator” are very subjective, non-scientific ways to tell you a story they do serve one purpose – they can help show you that losing weight, eating right, having good habits (like not smoking) and exercising DO ABSOLUTELY play a part in your longevity. And if you are anything like me you want as much time on this planet as possible to do those wonderful amazing things before we really and truly have to think about mortality.

So go ahead, ANSWER THE QUESTIONS AND USE THE CALCULATOR. What could it hurt? You have nothing to lose but almost everything to learn and gain…