Recently my son’s video announcing our pregnancy went viral. It inspired me to start writing blog/journal entries about my quest to lose weight and get healthy before the baby arrives. This is my first entry. Please let me know what you think.

443.6? Four hundred forty three point flipping six. That’s what the bright blue LED display said as I stepped on the digital scale. Today, on my 29th birthday, I’m hit with the realization that I weigh more than virtually every single player in the NFL. My weight has only grown since high school but it wasn’t until this week that the severity of it actually came full on. That’s because this week we found out that after years of unsuccessfully trying, my wife is pregnant.

Some of you may be asking, “How does someone let themselves get to nearly four hundred fifty pounds?” Let’s flash back to 11 years ago as I was a senior graduating high school and Logan, our only son, was ready to be born in July. At the time I weighed just over 300 pounds. I’ve always been a large guy but I’ve always been active. As a three sport athlete in high school my ballooning weight just seemed like a fact of life.

Age, like weight, creeps up on you. Before you know it you’re over four hundred pounds, a year away from thirty and finding yourself out of breath just from walking around the block. It’s not something you plan for or typically even pay attention too. Life is funny like that. Things can get so busy and so hectic that taking care of yourself falls to the wayside. That was me. That is until now.

At this point in our lives my wife and I didn’t even think we would be able to have another child. Logan is almost eleven years old and it was one of those things that fell into the “if it was going to happen it would’ve already happened” category. It didn’t stop me from trying; from tracking menstruation and ovulation to planning things down to the day; I never gave up. There were negative tests over the past six years. Lots of negative tests. I never gave up.

This week came and I had been telling my wife that she was late (such a strange thing for a man to be insisting to his wife about her body.) So we bought a test and without any patience took the it right inside the gas station bathroom. I waited outside the door for what seemed like an hour. The door cracked open and she asked “How many lines means pregnant?” I knew and the joy washed over me.

That joy comes with a figurative and literal weight. I need to lose weight. Nay! I HAVE to lost weight. I HAVE to get in shape. I have to utilize the gym membership that I’ve been paying for but haven’t used in over 5 months. I have to watch our diets, plan our meals and for once stick to taking this seriously. I have to make a change.

This is my journey and my quest. The proverbial one ring to rule them all is my body and the wicked destination of Mordor is a healthy three hundred pounds. I don’t do this for myself for I am far too weak to make such dramatic changes based on myself alone. Rather I do this for the poppy seed that resides in my wife’s belly. The future little sister or little brother of Logan who will need me to be around much longer than four hundred pounds will allow me. Today is March 22nd, 2014, I am twenty nine years old and this is my mission, Three Hundred By Thirty.