Matt's UNREAL Weight Loss Story..

what is up you guys welcome back to the channel thank you so much for clicking on today's video so today we have a very special edition of heavy talk this is the first in-person interview that we are doing I interview my friend Matt Bickle who you guys will see in a second a very interesting story and we actually ended up talking a lot about you know his weight loss journey but also a lot about the reason I'm here in Kauai right now as you can tell I'm not home and I really hope that you guys are able to listen to the whole thing and hopefully get something out of it because I think that it's a really interesting story definitely different than a lot of the people that we've talked to already and I think that it can be really impactful for some of you guys so without further ado let's play the intro what's up you guys welcome to the video I'm here with my friend Matt Bickle and we are going to do the first this is the first ever heavy talk that we're doing live oh cool all the other ones will live with the person the other ones have been Skype interviews this is exciting for me so Matt is someone that I've met here in Kauai we've we've kind of known of each other for a little bit but we've never met and so we saw each other at the gym we started talking and I was like dude I need to get you on the show so super stoked daddy bro man so happy to be here dude it's always cool to be someone with such a similar story at such a different background and to see how we never get it to where we are today and got to meet in such a great place because of it I know it's crazy like yeah just hearing again we have similar stories but I think that they we got to maybe like our heaviest point completely different ways yeah so you know just saying that let's like kind of hear your story like what was your heaviest weight and like how did you kind of get to that point yeah so grew up in Missouri and grew up pretty poor and lived a tough life as far as just didn't have a lot going for me it was it was a poor kid that mm-hmm that you know was always getting attention through through outward actions because I didn't have much else to offer I felt like in my heart and that never really got accepted for that and always had food there backing me up and so growing up you always used food as a crutch and got myself to a pretty heavy weight but was able to hide it with football I played football most of my life and so being a bigger guy I had the excuse of an offensive lineman and being a big tall guy I started to try to use that to my advantage lifted a bunch of weights was sat around like 350 360 all through college but was an earthmover played football at Baylor University and it was something that I was rewarded for for being so big so it didn't bother me and was definitely worn by everyone like hey man this is gonna slip really fast when you stop doing this and you the way you eat in the way you would say stuff oh absolutely and I'd been fighting my my weight my whole life overweight little kid overweight high schooler and and football and offensive line was the first thing where it was like you were loved for being fat and so everyone was like celebrated for it and we had a group of people that we felt secure with and that that worked for a long time and got done playing football and lo and behold in ten years I put on a hundred pounds and I was already fairing 60 pounds yeah I was ever did about like a pound a month and it was something that I you know had friends go through a lot of weight loss stuff and talked about like the psychology of food and how many cheat meals you've eaten this was eating 21 cheat meals if not 28 cheat meals a week like you know for 3 to 4 big huge meals eating competitively worrying about more of my next by the food was coming from after I took my last it was psychologically taken over me and I didn't realize that I didn't realize it was a problem I was just trying to be the best at living a good life and eating was kind of what got me there it's what my my drug is so it's been something that I've always battled and didn't really realize that was happening and then at about 450 pounds finally had my own aha moment I had some friends who one friend who got gastric bypass surgery another friend who who had just started losing a bunch of weight and I was kind of losing my fraternity of big boys and all of a sudden like felt alone on I it was also at the peak of my size and the peak of my own healthiness and stayed active all the way up to 450 pounds and when hiked 14,000 foot mountains would go skiing my blood pressure would pound so hard in my head that I felt like I was gonna pass out I never once went to a doctor I never had a health issue and I was like a sprained ankle away from from letting it all go downhill yo you know was I do it when you're that big you bought your knee and you're done it's like it's almost a death sentence it can be yeah obviously you end up just like becoming especially for you like how active you still were yeah becoming sedentary and probably you probably wouldn't have changed your eating habits it would have just you went from we probably would have went from a pound a month to like 10 or 20 pounds a month yes because that's yeah it's scary and eating thousands thousands of calories as you know but got to a point where I had an aha moment it was a terrible aha moment everyone's always like you know what was it to change mine is a funny when I was eating kotoba my wife had brought me over and my normal kotoba meal was like a steak burrito with queso and guacamole chips and guacamole and queso and a steak quesadilla or something like that and so I would you know I it was eating all that and I had been at the peak of my decadence of that eating bad evening like eating for decadence and and like trying to competitively eat in my head not knowing that's what I was doing but just wanting to be the you know live a great life and so I realized at that moment I was like man this nothing sounds good pizza doesn't sound good doesn't sound good and I was like maybe I should try vegetables and got on Whole Foods websites the only thing I knew that was healthy then and and obviously there's plenty of sugar at Whole Foods but it was a direction and they had to eat right common now category link on the top of their website clicked on it I showed me the Andy scale which is the aggregate nutritional density index skills skills food one through a thousand one being a coca-cola a thousand being like bok choy or collard greens I started I had no clue you know I'm sure you didn't either it just was absolutely clueless what was healthy what wasn't so I started eating off of that scale because I could at least take these and things that were high in those numbers an ate a lot of them but from 450 down to 325 by simply chopping vegetables and hiking the trail with my dogs every day just walking and got competitive with the hiking of the trail what time myself was trying to take time off it was like about three and a half miles couldn't run it ever there was like there was a time where I got to 432 pounds and I thought like it's the first time I've ever seen a movement downward in a scale and my whole life I've always gone up and I I realized that I had it like a major breakthrough and so I would we don't pass on this show but I would just say Fu 432 over and over in my head every single step and I didn't weigh myself for like six months because I was just just determined to see a lower number and got on it was like 370 or something like that and was like oh my gosh I'm almost back to like my fighting weight hmm got down to 325 thought I'd conquered all my demons thought I was rocking and rolling and figured it all out and then actually like started to kind of like you know get back into my old habits and which obviously a lot of big guys do got back up to 375 and this was in 2015 2010 when I started trying to lose weight 2015 is when I started gaining weight again and got up to 375 soft Froning when his last games on TV it was like I gotta do that that's how I get in shape took me a year to get the nerve up to go to across that gym and walked in the first day and they were doing burpees in a free class workout I almost ran I was like - I was like I can't to get on and off the ground that fast and certainly not more than one or two times and after you know going through a couple of private training sessions my mighty coach was like hey man you got you know you're athletic enough just jump in an old football player was still at me started moving my body and have all my measurements and body weight and photos and before-and-afters and I'll share it all with you fort you can show it to everyone else but from the day I started which is January of 2016 or basically November 2015 I tracked everything all my body because my blood pressure my blood tests and I have some really cool information on how I from 375 Tillich I've gotten down to 275 I'm sitting like 285 right now 290 and it's just a more comfortable way for me I if I was like training for something or wanted to really get vain with myself and try and see as many muscles sticking out as I can I can get down and be really strict with my food and it happens seasonally I'll do it probably three months out of the year just what I'm tired of being a fluffy and want to just make it go extra hard but my love for training is what really drives me and I've my why is was health as wealth and fitness is freedom and it still is but I also now just genuinely truly love the the the rigors and the pain that comes along with training and being in this lifestyle and it's taken a long time to get to that point and I you know it's sounds crazy when you tell people that are just starting their journey but it's it's something that people just one of my favorite quotes is people don't realize how good feeling good really feels and when you start feeling good it's it's just as addictive as the pattern of feeling bad and it's something that's led me to some amazing things in my life because I just did cross it out of the love of fitness with no intention of anything III I knew I'd be anything I've ever done I've tried to be great at but it's like man I'm 375 pounds and I'm joining this sport that like physically and age-wise I'm 39 right now I would never be able to go to the games and if I could go as a masters that's like I was kind of in the back of my head for a while but as I started to realize like my body type of my strengths like you know I'm stronger than any masters my age for for my maxes but I can't do gymnastics at all like I you know kill myself yeah so the reality came to me that that that's not what my my life wouldn't cross it was but that was still gonna train as hard as I could and see where it took me and where it's taking me is to some really really crazy places like where we're sitting right now in quiet and and it's it's been from nothing more than going to gyms and dropping in and and being enthusiastic about fitness and meeting connecting with people and sharing my story and people always welcomed me in CrossFit with open arms and like three years ago I came out to Kauai where we are now where we met and was dropped into a class and this coach Juan was the coach and we did max unbroken pull-ups which I've never tried before my line had only did a pull-up like two years ago for the first time I still am not good at a man I like horrible you probably saw me today push-ups and so did ten and it was like a huge overcoming moment for me and I felt really good and I felt the energy here and I wanted to come back and the next day I came back and another guy named Eric who's one of my dearest friends and lives in Denver now he was coaching that day and we were doing a memorial workout for a friend who had passed away it was a partner workout and we celebrated this woman's life I've still never met I think is Jaime Silva I guess she worked for CrossFit HQ and she passed away of cancer as a mother and a wife and just a horrible story and we did a workout for her and I never met her and he just it's still so much passion in me that next workout about how much you know how grateful we should be for our lives and our legs and our lungs and all these things that we haven't so he and I had another of just explosion moment of energy and it made me start to feel the energy here and quiet and wanting to come back and they they started telling me about this to run that they were having every year and if you know me you know I'm not around and I had met him three years ago but just after at the run so basically knew him for 11 months and they told about this run but in the meanwhile they were showing me they're taking me these kids classes and letting me volunteer to coach and telling me about the epidemic and the problems that were going on here on the island and all the things that that you know the people here are suffering from because all you see is like the ocean and the big waves and the cool you know cool hanging out here but there's actually a lot of suffering and these poor kids are just so impoverished and you know to live in a place where everyone in the world competes to live yeah is it's such a beautiful place it leaves the people that are here stuck here and without a lot of options and I became very attracted to the energy here that the people were just relentlessly pouring into their community and it was something that I i'd never participated in in my life and felt guilty honestly going home was like man what what more can I do because these guys are just like selflessly dumping themselves into these people and have you know gotten me to be much more active in my community at home but also got me to put a microscope under what they're doing here in kawaii which is now turn into from a run into the kiala Foundation and this is your first runner in my second or my third I'm sorry and you know three years ago I could have never have imagined that it was gonna change and impact my life this run and I ran at the last three years and and it's you know it's the most insignificant part of a week that is the most life-changing thing I've ever been a part of and this is where I would like be stoked to turn it over to you and hear your experience being a first-time yeah participate here and just explaining to me like how this went through your eyes you know yeah I mean I have so much that I they definitely want to say about about what you were talking about like I mean I can relate so much to the feeling like the big guy persona is who you are you know like I had shirts that said born to be big on it yeah you know and it is it truly is scary for a lot of people I get messages every day of people like I want to lose weight but like I'm afraid because I am the funny fat guy or I am a big guy and that's like my that's my thing you know and it is it can be scary but I mean I always encourage people like I'm telling you it's like you were saying it's so worth it to lose the weight to feel good you know and like that's that's my message to people as always like the reason I'm so passionate about what I do and passionate about how I truly do believe that losing weight can be so beneficial for so many people you know it can get to a point where it's unhealthy and you you can absolutely gets way too focused on it and that's definitely true or you can do something that's too dramatic and you end up gaining the weight back you don't I mean like it's it's a very that happens to a lot of people but it is not it doesn't have to be the the only way right like I really think that there's a way to find something that's sustainable for you it's very clear that it's the love of fitness and the love of moving and being able to do things that keep you from not wanting to go back to that you know that heavy weight and then when it comes to you know being here and quiet doing what we're doing it's like I know that the people that are probably watching the video haven't like if you're not following me on Instagram or you haven't listened to the podcast you might not know exact we're talking about but the Caliph and a ssin the reason that we're here is they take kids after school and they bring them to the gym they work them out they give them a healthy meal and they basically instill really good morals into the kids because a lot of the kids here sadly on the island are without parents or their parents are into drugs into alcohol and it's it's hard for the foundation to explain that to people because again it's literally this is the most beautiful place I've ever been to you know and like it's it's beautiful on the surface but look under the rug right and it's dirty and it's there's a lot of issues so I didn't know much about the run I knew that there was a run that raised money for kids like that's kind of what I knew before I got here but being here I mean I've been here for about a week I was actually supposed to be gone yesterday but we extended our stay it's really shown me just like it's an incredible foundation I'm so thankful to be here and like the fact that we were kind of talking before we started the video of like just being able to actually do the run you know like I was thinking when we were doing it like this Run 1 it's not really a run it's like a crazy hike yeah it's it's not even it's supposed to be a 10k it was actually 12.7 yes it this year but it was incredible and a lot of those kids were running the run without shoes and like I was asking why it's because they don't have them they don't have shoes and I mean a lot of them are just more comfortable without shoes because they get used to walking on barefoot but that that's like what people are dealing with here and so it's been an incredible just week that that I've been able and I'm so thankful for the fact that my journey and like being my heaviest weight and losing the weight and doing what I do now filming these videos gave me the opportunity to be here you know like so I truly do think that things as cheesy as it sounds like things happen for a reason and there's a reason I've been through everything that I've been through and I think it's for literally what we're doing right now is to share that with other people and because I think one of the the hardest things is when you are obese and you truly feel like you're stuck like you were saying seeing the weight go down for the first time like you were blown away I was the same way like I I truly thought that I just I was incapable of losing weight like I had tried so many times and and now looking back I realized I tried way too har and silly as that sounds it was like I was like okay eat whatever you want and then okay I need to lose weight I'm gonna cut out everything that I enjoy and so like yeah I would you know I would be able to do that for a few days than I'd fall off the wagon so it's I mean it's incredible and I mean I just I think that that your story is really interesting because you it was like in your mind you probably were like I'm big for a reason yeah you know and the fact that you like decided that you know longer so it was it like when you decided to like lose the weight was was it just because you didn't feel good like you know what I mean like as silly as it sounds it was like a dirty closet or garage that I always knew I was gonna get to I kept a bunch of clothes that like we're so far from fitting me because I was like oh I'll fit in those clothes again someday like I'm gonna take care of this like I'm a very extreme person and so in my head I knew when I made up my mind that I was going to go head over heels and I almost like didn't want the party to end and that's why I was letting it slip and to say that out loud is like it's so like what the heck is wrong with me well I was like why didn't I just get it started earlier and now obviously being older and being so far into this journey I'm like man if I could have done it two years before that four years before that I ought to give anything because the I touched on it earlier but I was talking and a lot was coming out but to your point about the running the running the miraculous miracle of us even being able to go out and run this run is that Fitness is freedom and like the things that I said no to when I was my own healthiest because I was afraid it was gonna be too hard I was afraid I was gonna sweat through my clothes which I still sweat through you know I was afraid I was gonna be breathing too heavy and not be able to have a conversation I was in Colorado for four ten years before I ever did a hike you know I was this like horrified of it was it was my biggest arch nemesis was walking up a hill and feeling my heart rate go up and feeling self-conscious about it and the freedom that we've gained in our lives is is something that if nothing else wouldn't motivate you or you know make you angry enough to want to start that journey like think of the amount of freedom you're giving up and you're basically have become a prisoner to you know the things that are the easy comforts of life that you don't have to move around much foreign and hard work is absolutely required to achieve the freedom but it went done the right way went done your way it can be a lot of fun and and and a whole lot easier than any other you know then some regimen you might have stuck in your head that it's going to be like it's not like that and like you were saying like you found like with Fitness now it's just like you enjoy it and I think that the reason I mean I don't want to put words in your mouth but I know for me the reason maybe I didn't start was because I felt like it was gonna be so much work and always be so much work yeah and I think that you definitely at the start it is a lot of work like I'm not gonna say Phase II and oh it's it's like rainbows and butterflies from the start but now it doesn't feel like a lot of work it's just oh this is what I enjoy doing now you went to the gym together this morning and it wasn't like I have to get up and go to the gym it was like cool we're going to the gym like that's just that's what I do now yeah you know and we all did we did a very long workout today it was it was pretty tough but it was like nice to get it out of the way in the morning and now we're gonna we might be going on a hike after this you know like just you end up it for me at least there was this like sweet sweet spot where it ended up switching from a necessary evil almost right to being like oh this is what I enjoy that's why I always encourage people to find what you enjoy if you can right like I don't tell people you have to go to the gym because you don't like you said you lost most away before even going into the gym yeah it's that's so normal for a lot of people especially if you have like a hundred something pounds to lose or more you don't need like fix your diet and then find something you enjoy if that's walking that's fine it's all I needs me it's all like exactly like it's it doesn't have to be going to the gym six days a week and if that sounds like the worst thing in the world you may be that is and that's not something you need to do but hey maybe once you start walking you'll be like wow I kind of want to check out the gym because I feel like I can get something out of it yeah and it's up to you yeah I mean one thing I would say also to your point is that there is a pendulum swing that I think about that I think it's good for people to understand and it's that yes when you start the work it's absolutely much much harder but that's also when you get the most dramatic results like as you stop getting these you know I was losing 30 pounds a month when I first started and and and I wasn't going crazy I was just not training to be that big anymore instead I was training to not be that big and when you're that big you're almost in training for being that big your meals everything is focused around supporting how much you need to be that out of shape and you don't realize that that's what you're doing but that's absolutely what you're doing and as the as it gets easier you stop losing so much weight unfortunately but that's the pendulum and so like now I haven't lost weight in probably four or five years but I've changed you know body size immense having gained a significant amount either exactly exactly so I just want to encourage people like hey the the hardest time is also the most dramatic results you can start walking a mile a day and lose like 30 pounds so I'm drinking so people or even just calories I always say just don't drink how much that's like if you want to lose a ton of weight first thing you do is just cut out calories and then that's a pretty easy way to like you know it's not a total shock to yourself you can still eat all the candy you want it's not you know a good thing to you can but it's a great way to start your process and water is you know it's an amazing thing so I I love that that's what I always say like when it's it's obviously if you have 200 or more pounds lose that's a lot of weight and that's kind of daunting but I'm like I'm telling you at the start you all you have to do is make such simple changes and you'll see these crazy results and results I think can help you push forward too right so like that's why I love that pendulum analogy like yeah it's hard here but it's also you're gonna get a lot of results but then once you get down here it's gonna be a little bit harder but you're gonna it's not gonna be it's gonna the results are gonna come slower but it's not gonna be as difficult like physically to get into the gym and to do these you know these workouts so I I want like a hundred percent agree with that and I think that that your story again it's just I mean I hope that there's people out there that can kind of relate to that because you know you were someone that you know you gained weight you're your whole life but again you were still athletic and like for me I was the first thing that gained weight and lost everything you know I was I was 360 and I had I was barely mobile right like I was it was getting to a point where I I couldn't even stand for a significant amount of time you know and it just became normal though like you were saying you were gaining a month like for me it was just normal to go up a shirt size every every year like every school year you know they mean like oh I'm wearing a large I wear an extra-large next year and then like my pant size is the same thing it would just slowly get bigger and bigger and I think that it's like when you like you said when you really don't know how good it feels how good it is to feel good like I'm telling you it's like when you're morbidly obese you miss out on so much stuff not be in it you might not even be thinking that you're missing out but you subconsciously don't do things because you're afraid your size might impede you and you know it's not like just society not making big enough chairs for people or whatever I think that it's like literally like we're gonna go on this hike and I probably would've been like damn good or even literally even coming here being in Kauai I probably would have been like nah that's outside all the time I'm not gonna be on the beach at sandy and it just I would I guarantee I wouldn't have I would have said no yeah um so it's like you you start to make these excuses and start to not do these things and you don't even realize that you're missing out on all this life yeah and like that's my biggest thing is I want people to understand that like weight loss can especially massive weight loss can improve the quality of your life so immensely not just like your blood pressure like or anything like that it's like what are you able to do the amount of fun you can pack into it Barry yeah yeah exactly and it's it's so worth it it's like that's why I always want people to see that like it's so worth the the suffering and the struggling you know and I think it's almost like a dirty word now like oh it shouldn't be hard it should be easy but I think it's gonna be hard yeah and that's okay like it's okay for for you to feel like it's okay to mess up it's okay to feel like you're not doing the right thing it's okay to feel like you know to have that trial and error I think that's very important for anyone that's gonna lose weight and keep it off is like figure it out for yourself at some capacity you know figure out what works for you some people like to do keto some people like to do this like find out what works for you and it's so worth it in the end like I can't even I can't even express but just just to kind of wrap up the video I mean that story was incredible I do want to talk a little bit more about the foundation just because I think that it's awesome and I would love to you know for people to know more about it so like how did you when you like first started to kind of get into finding out about the foundation like what was that kind of like for you so I've been here since the inception of the foundation and before it was ever a foundation Aaron HOF owned crossfit Poipu with his friend Jamie and they were they were doing the run and it was the run would raise enough money that they could buy a couple vans which which was what they transport the kids around the island with because they the the island is huge when it comes to how slow the speed limits are and how a country the roads are kids are pretty spread out all over the place here especially the locals there the none of those guys are down here by the beach they're all up and all around the island so they were just raising money to buy a couple of vans and to pay for like a bag of chips and not actually it wasn't chips they do like watermelon and it makes sandwiches or something like that and that was like the extent of how how big it was then and the run started gathering the attention of CrossFit and CrossFitters and also Greg Glassman bought a home over here in Hawaii and and he brought his kids to the Kids program and if you've ever been to the kids program which you have now yeah it's truly magical um Rory sandbars the head coach of the kids and she's a games F of retired games athlete and she's got these kids moving better than I mean every single kid and on a whole front squat are better than I can front squad every day at least prettier you know like III I'm constantly blown away by how these kids move so well and it's it's a it's a basis that like that Glassman saw and was like man this is really cool this is special and then just sat around and listened to Aaron if you can get here and if you can get Aaron to tell you the story then your heart is going to be compelled to help out and so Greg being an amazing just awesome guy for the sport and for this island help them start CrossFit cake haha and CrossFit Anahola which are two gyms that are in places like it'd be like you know I'm from st. Louis and I'd be like if they started a gym in East st. Louis yeah it's like that the rough part in the neighbor exactly and there's nothing I mean there's not even a grow shoe store in either town there's just a gas station where these kids go to most people buy all their stuff from a gas station and and that most of these kids are completely unsupervised and so in these two places and the Greg basically affiliated and and got these gyms up and started and got a bunch of equipment for them and at this point this lot of people in CrossFit had started to kind of want to help out out here because you come out here and you have such magical experience which you also get it's so exposed to what is going on and as soon as you work with the kids in the program you're just like your heart wants to explode and everyone wants to help and so over the last three years a lot of like big-name athletes have come out Matt Fraser was out last year you know froning's been out like a lot of these guys that that just people pay attention to it's what honestly got me to want to come to the Run in the first place even though these guys are my friends I was like man how cool is this that all these great amazing athletes are gonna be out here and put them out of their element running in these trails and muddy Kauai and so a lot of it as as it grew the sponsorships crew the the attention grew and and it became such a big thing that they could no longer just make it a fundraiser they had to start a foundation and actually hire a board of directors and and become actual business people and it's so beautiful because these are my like my beautiful island family that like that's not their strong woman and Rory it is her strong point and and Sara who they've now brought on over from barbells for boobs these these are some really really smart business people that are helping drive this thing to be actually sustainable and also repeatable and I think that's what's most important is they I don't think they realize their their reach that if you can do it here in this remote place where the resources are limited and the poverty is so overwhelming then it's very possible to do across the country where where there is much more resources and much more availability for funds and people to participate even just you know people there's there's so many more people on mainland so I you know I as they've started the foundation it's funny to see like my friends all grown up and and especially in business because I knew that there was never going to be a problem in training these kids and making their futures better but I I always wondered like how are they going to evolve this and how can we get this to where it can happen in Denver can happen in San Diego because it needs to just as bad as it needs to happen here and so I'm just watching these guys grow the attention that coming over here I think that we're to a point now where you know in the next few years we'll start to see that roll out around the country yeah it'd be make this such a huge difference for us all yeah I think that'll that'll be really cool like seeing it at different you know different towns different cities different states maybe even different countries like I think that that could be that could be really cool well I I do want to say like if you're watching this like consider donating if you want to to the McHale foundation like literally every cent that gets donated goes straight to the kids I've seen it and the kids are there's there's so many more kids that could be reached if the funds were there you know so I'll put a link down in the description it'll be the only link that's on the video and consider you know consider donating but I just want to say thanks for thanks for coming on and sharing your story man appreciate it all right cool see you guys there all day the warning signs and when there are flashing lights or wig legs don't attempt to cross until they come to a complete stop [Music]

Channel: ObesetoBeast

Views: 70,962

Rating: 4.9323077 out of 5

Keywords: weight loss, heavy talk, matt bickel, john glaude, obesetobeast

Id: 7bmP86Fb-k8

Length: 31min 36sec (1896 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 20 2019