4 min read
Charles O’Byrne was a talented athlete who gained weight after he stopped playing football. In denial of how big he was getting, he reached an all-time high of over 500 pounds. Here, O’Byrne recounts the journey of rediscovering self-disciplinea transformation that started from a moment of brutal self-reflection.
I ALWAYS SAY there are two types of offensive linemen: the guy who has to eat 6,000 calories a day to stay big, and the guy who keeps a lid on weight gain by working out. I was the latter. I had always been the “big guy,”especially as I played sports through high school and D2 college football.
Once I stopped playing after college, I lost the routine structured workouts gave me. So I gained weight. The truth is, I never felt as big as I really was. I was never miserable, which is probably why I continued to gain weight. I kept telling myself that in terms of my size, I wasn’t that bad off.
By 2021, I weighed over 530 pounds. I’m not sure of the exact number, because I didn’t have a scale that measured above 500. Even at that weight, there was no dramatic moment that made me realize I needed to make a change. No doctor told me I was going to die if I didn’t lose weight. Nor did I have a health scare like a heart attack.
Charles O’Byrne was always a big guy but never thought it was a problem.
One day, I looked at myself in the mirror and thought, “Damn. You have been so lucky–you’re alive! But you’re killing yourself. Today is the day this ends.” I made myself a single promise: “I can do this for one day.” The next day, I made the same promise again to make an effort to lose weight. Here’s how I did it.
Lots of Number Crunching and Calorie Tracking
I started my weight loss process with crunching the numbers. A pound of fat is 3,500 calories. If I did a great workout and burned 350-400 calories, I calculated that I’d still have to do 9 or 10 more workouts to lose only that one pound of fat. So the best plan of attack was starting with a massive calorie deficit. I had no surgery and took no weight loss drugs–no shortcuts.
I tracked every single calorie I ate for almost three years. I mean EVERY calorie. If I had a sip of soup, I would estimate the calories in my teaspoon!
I stopped using oil when I cooked, ate lean meat, taught myself to love all vegetables. One of my favorite meals was a bed of spinach with 12 shrimps, taco powder, onions, 4 tablespoons of salsa, and a scoop of non-fat Greek yogurt. That little 220 calorie meal actually made headway with my hunger!
As I lost weight, I transitioned into eating higher amounts of protein plus healthy fats. I also kept eating tons of veggies. Once I got the calorie deficit under control, I started hitting the gym again to rebuild my body.
Rebuilding Discipline
I started doing two workouts a day on a stationary bike along with upper body exercises like curls, military presses, and bent rows. It was so tough. When I played football in college, I could squat 650 and bench press 350—but I was no longer that guy. It was a hard truth to swallow. Still, I accepted who I was and didn’t let it stop me from working to build muscle. Now I can say, hey, I’m a muscular guy!
The majority of my weight loss took about two and a half years. I lost a total of around 310 pounds in three years.
After his weight loss journey, Charles O’Byrne feels he “can accomplish anything now.”
I feel like I can accomplish anything now! The discipline it took to lose the weight meant showing up when no one’s watching, choosing hard over easy, and stacking up small, invisible decisions to make visible change. It taught me so much about myself.
All It Takes is a One Day Mantra
Today, I’m 40 years old and I live in Charleston, South Carolina, where I’m head of partnerships for a logistics AI company. I met my wife near the end of my weight loss journey. She is the love of my life, and my biggest motivation to keep going. I’d kept my experience private for years, because it was too personal to share with the world. But my wife and others close to me pushed me to share my story. Not for attention—but to give others hope.
For folks who are overwhelmed in their lives and feel that things will never improve, all you need to do is commit to changing for one day. If you can do something for one day, chances are you can do it for a second day. No matter how impossible something seems, all you have to do is start.
Lisa is an internationally established health writer whose credits include Good Housekeeping, Prevention, Men’s Health, Oprah Daily, Woman’s Day, Elle, Cosmopolitan, Harper’s Bazaar, Esquire, Glamour, The Washington Post, WebMD, Medscape, The Los Angeles Times, Parade, Health, Self, Family Circle and Seventeen. She is the author of eight best-selling books, including The Essentials of Theater.
