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Joe Marro, 38, knew he had to make some changes in 2017. That’s when his doctor told him he was on track to become diabetic. “It wasn’t a good feeling to know my life could be cut short. I was too young. I have many goals, passions and dreams,” he says.
“I reached the point where the scale was almost 300 pounds, and I had to do something. I didn’t want to die. I felt like I was given an ultimatum.”
Along with his risk for diabetes, Marro also had issues with his thyroid, low energy levels and problems with breathing. “I was a music teacher for 14 years, and my students would see me coughing and not breathing properly,” he says. “I love my career. I have the ability to impact kids’ futures. But without my health, I wasn’t able to give 100%.”
Marro, of Deer Park, NY, had struggled with his weight for his entire life. “I always had this vision of being fit. I tried so hard. I participated in sports when I was younger, and I was always overweight. My weight was always something that bothered me. I felt it held me back, and people looked at me differently,” he says.
Marro had tried lots of different diets, but he would always lose a little and gain it back: “I felt like I was destined to be overweight, like it was my genetics. But the reality is, I didn’t understand how to eat properly, and I didn’t understand how to develop a workout routine.”
Once he learned how to eat and exercise in ways that supported his health, he lost 130 pounds. Here’s how he did it.
He made fitness and diet changes on his own at first
Marro joined group exercise classes with focuses on high-intensity interval training (HIIT), kickboxing and weightlifting workouts.
Those classes helped him start to enjoy exercising and feel like he was part of a community. “Before that, I would go to the gym but feel lost…
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