I just retired recently from the army. I broke my spine from a nasty parachute accident with the 82nd. Never deployed, gave up hope believing I was a failure for not being able to continue my infantry mission. I had gained 80 pounds over the course of 3 years from the drinking and binge eating. I weighed 280 at my peak and through the help of my family, I managed to get my motivation back to start moving again. My sister is a vegitarian, loves yoga. My mother was excelling in her balroom dancing. My brother took up a crossfit regime. Just seeing all of them happy and motivated really reinforced in me my original self, the fit me that was active before my accident. I had been sitting on a membership to a gym for over a year, and I hadnt made one use of it. So after a year of being out of the Army I decided I should make a dent in this. I started to go to the gym. It was hard at first. Felt like everyone was staring at me, my anxiety really got the best of me. My sister kept going with me though, and it was good to have her familiar face around in times like those. She helped push me through and I am forever grateful for her for doing that. I would look around constantly feeling that everyone was staring and I just told myself "You cant give up, that's what they want to see happen. Come on push harder!". I made sure I left there the sweatiest person; for how can you prove to yourself that your not at least trying unless your giving more than everyone around you who didn't have to go through my struggles. Plus that kinda put the anxiety at bay for the times my sister wasnt there to keep me going. I started small at first, with simple cardio. I had surgery on my ankle where I have plates and screws, and running/jogging just doesnt feel like the bone can really support it. I can go a couple feet and than feels like the ankle crumples in. So what I did was the elliptical. It took me a while to get used too. I did 30 minutes and started at very low, but challenging to me resistances. It was hard and embarrassing. I felt like the people on treadmills behind me were all staring at me and judging me. Before long though to fight that off, I had realized I naturally just zoned off into the subtitles of the TV. I just kept telling myself to "Don't get so stuck in your head. Your head is what got you here in the first place". I would just pick a spot on the TV or on the wall and just zone out staring at it, I found out the better I do that, the easier the workout was. After 2 months I had dropped 20 pounds from just the half hour of cardio 3-4 times a week. I would see the calorie count at the end of my work out and that instilled into me to watch calories more around me. I stopped drinking soda, which for the life of me I have never done in my life no matter how hard I have tried in the past. Well after around 2 months of cardio, I decided I should start hitting the weights so that way by the time the next 2 months of cardio is done, ill have some muscle there for definition. What really shocked me was that I was trained to be a soldier, wrestled in high school, have some other extreme sports in my background. I have trained with free weights in every single incident and had no idea how I would be able to use the machines to work out. I was embarrassed to be sitting there on the weight machines, watching all these fit guys walking by. I remember telling myself "You may not be able to pull that off, but your going to get damn close!" I had to start on low weights, I just kept telling myself "Its not a numbers game, lets just keep it small till we can get form down. So that's what I did. Kept the weights small, which wasnt me doing my max just to get proper form. once I felt the muscle was actually ready I began to work it out harder and harder. It was just the peak of summer, and I found myself going to the pool every day with some of my friends, they would just tan. I would be treading water as often as possible and not necessarily be swimming laps, but every couple of minutes when I feel like I could be doing something better with my time than hanging on to the wall I would go do a quick lap trying to push myself as hard as I can and than relax for a bit. It wasnt even a freestyle swim or anything fancy. I would just swim under the water just moving in general. My friends didn't even notice me doing it for a work out, they just thought I enjoyed swimming. I think what made my work outs more enjoyable was that I would go straight to the pool right after and cool off. It felt so amazing! Well anyways its 6 months later and I still go to the gym 3 times a week, I am more motivated than ever! I also am struggling with how I ever let myself get that bad to begin with. The anxiety is gone from the gym. Now when I go, I feel like all eyes are on me for their own motivation. It was tough but I had family that helped push me through and couldn't of been anymore happier in my life right now! I lost 60 pounds, and there is another 20 I am looking to lose, but I am not worried. I have gotten back into such great shape that I am now the talk of the town and I feel pretty damn proud of myself for pulling it off! I have people at the gym who come up to me all the time and tell me they have seen me when I first started and they are simply amazed and shocked to see how I have transformed over these last 7 months. I hope this story really helps someone out there who is struggling with physical disabilities. You are not alone, you can do it! Sorry for the bad webcam picture, it was taken just now :)