A Few Easy Diet Tweaks Helped This Guy Lose 75 Pounds

Dylan Thomas figured that putting on weight was just part of being a dad. Thats why its called a dad bod, after all, he reasoned. The 47-year-old vice principal from Calgary, Canada, saw the extra pounds hed put on and rationalized them away as what happened after a certain age. He cringed at photos of himself, but as a dad and a teacher, he thought he was not really a man anymore, and wearing this layer of fat was just the way of things.

That philosophically resigned perspective came after a lifetime of fluctuating weight . As a kid, hed had a heart defect that left him chronically underweight. At age 10, an open-heart surgery corrected the problem, and he started to gain weight. I never really thought about it, he says, and didnt recognize that I was becoming chubby until I was in Jr. High and other students started to tease me about it. When puberty hit, he slimmed down again; an active lifestyle kept him slender throughout his twenties.

In his thirties, though, a desk job and what he calls the creature comforts of adulthood had him putting on weight again. He crested 200 pounds, up 30-40 from his twentysomething figure. I thought to myself, This is normal, a man at this stage of life200 pounds must be the norm, he says. The weight kept creeping up, and Thomas noticed it. I saw some family photos, and thought to myself, Oh god, do I really look like that? he says.

He even avoided weighing himself, until one day he just had to know. He stepped on the scales and there it was230 pounds. He tweaked his diet a little and dropped some weight, easy. But he was still sedentary. And then it struck me, he says, probably a part of a midlife crisis, but I thought to myself, Why the hell cant I live like the person I was in my 20s?

He jumped into earning back his old body, with a daily home regimen of free weights , push-ups, and planking. Cutting back on calories, he consumed about 1200 a day; in about four months hed dropped to 180 pounds. He started shopping for new clothes, and as he got even skinnier, started consulting a dietician and working to build lean muscle mass. Hes looking to stay around 155 pounds75 pounds less than his peak.

Reclaiming his body has given him a new confidence. Hes not afraid of selfies anymore. I feel more like a man than I have in years, he says, and, as bad as this sounds, people treat me better (which I am still mildly resentful of). Hes able to hike up a mountain the way he did at 22.

For anyone looking to follow in his footsteps, he says its about committing fully. There are no cheat days because there is nothing to cheat on, he says. Either you are doing it or you are not. While every day is a new day, all of those days when put together make a significant impact.