Richard has been working on loosing weight, as all our friends and family know he had managed to increase in size until he was well over the 300 pound mark. One of the side effects of having sleep apnea is weight gain. Having finally being diagnosed with the condition Richard's health has been steadily improved. Many of the things that had been put down to stress and depression are actually side effects of having sleep apnea (http://www.sleepapnea.org/info/index.html).
Sleep apnea is a condition that stops a person going into a deep sleep because they stop breathing for a few moments in the night. Richard's index was 60, that is 60 times per hour he would stop breathing. We believe that he has had this condition from the late 1980's to early 1990's. After we were married in one year he put on 100 pounds. Now for a guy who is 6ft three that really isn't that much especially as he was under 200 pounds when we were married. As the sleep apnea progressed be became more tired and eventually never felt as if he had slept so was constantly having to take naps. At it's worst he was going back to bed withing a couple of hours of getting up in the morning, then again in the afternoon, he was always tired. His brain was not having time to rest to produce the necessary hormone that tells us when we have had enough to eat, so he would eat almost constantly. He could not concentrate for very long, was anxious and of course could not cope with even the smallest of problems to say nothing of the big ones that come with being a Pastor.
Richard was diagnosed finally in November 2006, and began to feel better withing weeks of buying the Cpap machine (http://www.sleepapneastore.ca/index.html). He was like a different person. As we all know extra weight is hard to loose and it was going to be a struggle for him to loose all the excess that he had gained.
In September 2007 I spent time with Evette in England and she passed on to me her old Slimming World Books ( http://www.slimmingworld.com/). You would never believe how quickly following this eating program made the pounds drop away. On September 6th (Saturdays Richard weighs himself) he announced that he had officially lost 100 pounds. That is just under a year from when he began the diet.
One of the hardest things for me to get him to eat was fruit, he now eats fruit like it's his new junk food. We have a hard time keeping enough fruit in the house. I also could never get him to try vegetables other than corn, peas and beans; he now will eat broccoli and often uses it in his cooking. He no longer eats everything that has been cooked so now we often have left overs that I can take to work for lunches. He has done amazingly well.
You are probably wondering about his sleeping during the day, very rarely does he need to take a nap other than on Sundays, but then all Pastors that I know take a nap on Sunday afternoons. He deals with stress so much better. It is like having a new man about the house.
A big thank you to my daughter who passed me those books and to Pastor Edmund Mielke for recognizing that Richard probably suffered from sleep apnea and to all those who have encouraged him on this road to new health.
This is Richard taken in 2007 not quite his largest but pretty big non-the-less.
This was taken in July this year while we were on vacation he had lost about 90 pounds at this point in time. I will add another picture of how he looks today so remember to check this blog again.
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