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Rated: 18+ · Non-fiction · Biographical · #1888757
Measuring my accomplishments from Olympiad to Olympiad...
Now that the 2012 Olympics are here, it got me to thinking how my life was during the 2008 Olympics, and how much my life has changed over the past four years, and the four years before that:

2004 Olympiad:

I was locked up in Atascadero State Hospital, and I was about to get transferred to Gateways, a program in downtown L.A. that would help me transition from life in the hospital to life out in the real world. I was on a psychiatric medication called Zyprexa that made me gain weight at the rate of about ten to fifteen pounds a month, and initially, the doctor refused to take me off of it; I found out that in order to get into the Conditional Release Program, or Conrep, I had to be on the same medication for one full year, so I was afraid to get off of it because I might have to stay in the hospital for a lot longer than I would otherwise.

2008 Olympiad:

I was in Conrep, a program in San Luis Obispo, California for mentally disabled offenders, and chances are in that program, unlike probation or parole, you might never get released from the program. To this day there are several people in that program who have been in it for over 20 years. I couldn't leave the county without notifying them in advance, and even then, they had to vote on it as a team to decide whether or not I could go. When I did get permission to go, I could only be gone for a week. They claimed I owed them $8000, actually starting out, it was closer to $9000, but during the five and a half years I was in that program I paid about a thousand of it off. I had my own bedroom in the Conrep house, but I always felt lonely, like I wanted to be with my family. I finally got off Zyprexa and got switched to Risperdal, a medication that is prone to cause weight gain, but it hasn't made my weight shoot up as bad as Zyprexa did.

I had a medical condition that caused my heart to race whenever I went walking; just walking two blocks was enough to force me to sit down for five minutes and let my heart rate return to normal. No doctors I talked to could figure out what the problem was. I had to drop out of college because of this problem.

I weighed around 268 pounds, down from 286 a year earlier. I had no clue how to lose the weight, and didn't own a scale to measure my weight. I wanted a gym membership, but couldn't afford it because all my finances went to paying my debt to Conrep.

2012 Olympiad:

I graduated from the Conrep program in 2010, and the money I owed them was squashed, so I didn't have to pay them. I now live with my Cousin Vangie and her family, and I share a room with my 21-year-old Cousin Anthony. Now that I live with my Cousins, I am free to leave the county whenever I want, and I can stay gone for as long as I want. I live in Artesia, in southern California, and I have been staying at my sister's on vacation near Sacramento for the past two months. I was even able to go to Lake Tahoe this Summer with my sister, something I couldn't have done while in the Conrep program because I wasn't allowed to leave the state.

I kicked that medical condition, I still can't really run yet, but I can walk long distances or bicycle without any problems. I have a gym membership at 24-Hour Fitness, and I go there regularly. For cardio I ride the stationary bikes, and for muscular strength I lift weights three times a week. I signed up for a weight training class for the Fall 2012 semester at Cerritos college, so I can keep making gains and continue to lose weight.

I've gone to college for the past 2 years, and in the Fall of 2011 I made the Dean's list because I had a 3.75 GPA. I had gotten three A's and a B in the four classes I took that semester. In just two more years of school I should graduate with an AA degree in Art & Design.

I've lost a good deal of weight since 2008, this morning after I woke up I weighed myself (I bought a scale in 2009) and I was 235 pounds. In the evening after dinner tonight when I weighed myself I weigh 240, so that's a lot of progress for someone who weighed nearly 300 pounds in 2007.

What I hope to accomplish by the 2016 Olympiad:

I want to get down to below 180 pounds and between 5-10% bodyfat, then bulk and add about 8-10 pounds of muscle mass per year.

I want to have graduated from college with an AA degree in Art & design.

I want to have started doing paid commissions for people on the Internet to supplement my income.

I want to have published my first comic book, and for my comic book company to be trademarked and for me to have a business license so everything is legit.

I want to have a girlfriend, I've always been told by girls that I'm cute, but being so fat has prevented me from having the courage to approach attractive women.

How has your life improved since the 2008 Olympiad? How is your life different now during the 2012 Olympiad?

What do you hope to accomplish in your life by the 2016 Olympiad?
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