In 2011, Cameron Summerson modified careers. He went from working an lively job at a college district, which allowed him to stroll as much as 7 miles a day, to being a full-time author. His lively work life shifted to sitting behind a pc for hours day by day, forcing him to basically turn out to be utterly sedentary. He knew he was gaining weight — standing 5-foot-6-inch with a small body, it was simple to placed on kilos. He had weighed about 150 kilos for many of his grownup life. By 2013, nonetheless, he hit 210 kilos.
On the finish of that yr, Summerson determined to get critical about losing a few pounds. He and his spouse considerably haphazardly walked into a motorcycle store, and, an hour later, he walked out proudly owning a Specialised Sirrus bike, by far the fanciest two-wheeled contraption he’d ever owned.
Summerson began coaching straight away, due to the gentle winters in his dwelling state of Texas. At first, he couldn’t trip for greater than 5 miles with no relaxation, and he misplaced solely 5 kilos his first month on the bike. “Frustration crept in,” he says. “And I virtually gave up.”
Maybe not coincidentally, he stumbled onto an article in regards to the idea of “energy in, energy out” (CICO), a easy and helpful metric for weight reduction. It dawned on him his food regimen may be the rationale his weight-loss progress was so gradual. That is when Summerson downloaded MyFitnessPal and turned his consideration to monitoring his caloric consumption day by day. This, and monitoring his energy burned on the bike, was a game-changer. By the tip of 2014, he’d misplaced 45 kilos, weighing in at 165. Nonetheless, he wasn’t at his optimum weight in BMI phrases.
What occurred subsequent would change Summerson’s life extra dramatically than his weight-loss success. In December 2014, his youngest son, Ax, was identified with Nephrotic Syndrome, a life-threatening kidney situation. Ax was two years previous on the time. Quickly after the preliminary analysis, the docs delivered the information that the situation was persistent and Ax would wish a kidney transplant. Summerson determined instantly he could be first on the listing to be Ax’s donor.
Whereas Ax went on common dialysis till he weighed sufficient to be eligible for the transplant, Summerson turned his consideration to entering into the perfect form of his life in preparation for donating his kidney. To say he was motivated is an understatement.
Using varied applied sciences allowed Summerson to drag collectively all his good intentions and manage his efforts round health and continued weight reduction. Along with MyFitnessPal, he used a lot of good instruments and apps to trace his biking miles, file and share his progress and information his work on the indoor bike.
On October 9, 2017, Summerson walked into the hospital for surgical procedure at a lean 136 kilos, stronger than he’d ever been, each bodily and psychologically. He was a person on a mission. “My son was my motivation for coaching,” he says. “Each time I wished to again off, I considered him. I considered all the pieces he had been by means of, how exhausting he fought each single day simply to be regular. The emotional response was all the pieces I wanted to get by means of the hardest of exercises.”
Whereas surgeons eliminated Summerson’s kidney, one other crew was prepping Ax to obtain his dad’s kidney only a mile down the road at Youngsters’s Medical Heart in Dallas. After a lot restoration time and lots of remedy changes, the transplant was deemed a hit.
Summerson’s dedication to higher well being began as a purely private pursuit, but it surely was a way more necessary endeavor. Fortunately, the end result was a double profit: It catapulted him to glorious well being and saved his younger son’s life. Quickly, he hopes they’ll be using bikes collectively, having fun with their renewed well being.