I asked the lovely Jon to do a little introduction about himself for all you lovely lot
Here is what he had to say
“So the lovely Gemma picked me to be her BOTM for July and has kindly asked me to do an introduction of who i am, what i’m about etc. Here it goes, just fyi, i suck at writing about me, so bear with me and my ramblings ha. Hey i’m Jon, short for Jonathan. I’m from the UK, currently the ripe old age of 24 😂. I currently live in the North West of the UK but i’ve lived all over really, even spent 4 years living in London while studying at University. I dream of being a pro photographer and slowly working on my confidence/anxiety to make that dream a reality. Talking about Uni, i spent 2 years before that at college studying media and then spent those 4 years in London studying Editing and Post Production in TV and Film. It was a good 4 years even dealing with my physical and mental struggles…. I think that brings me nicely onto where i was before this journey and what made me start it. I’ve always been the biggest guy in my life. I was chubby as a kid but when i lost my dad at 7 i think i turned to food for the comfort and shit spiralled from there. Who knows. So during high school, college and uni i was the fat guy. In high school i was picked on, laughed at, bullied in general for my size. I got into plenty of fights because of it but that’s kids for you. I tried to lose weight and failed numerous times. I secretly dealt with depression, self harm and suicidal thoughts during that time as well. I never told my mum, she had enough to worry about being a single mother raising two kids. That stuff went on periodically during high school and college. Anyway, fast forward to uni and living away from home, things (especially my eating) spun out of control. I started uni being sociable and by the 4th year i was a different person. Instead of being the loveable drunk fat dude (yeah a girl called me that once) at the student union events/house parties, i became an anxiety riddled, depressive obese dude too ashamed to leave his house. Living in London and being overweight wasn’t easy or fun anyway, i couldn’t walk far without being out of breath, i’d take up 2 seats on the bus, i’d sweat like a mad man on the tube. Yeah it wasn’t nice being a 28-30 stone guy living in the capital ha. I ended up living on takeaways, sweets and junk food, spending days in my room binging Netflix and playing marathon sessions on my xbox or Minecraft ha. People stopped asking me to things and i got to stop making terrible excuses thanks to my anxiety. This went on for a while and it was only on my graduation day i realised how bad i’d got, especially thanks to the part where they couldn’t find a gown to fit me. Rather awkward ha. So anyway after that graduation it still took time for me to get my head around the fact i was killing myself with my lifestyle. It wasn’t easy to tell myself to undo what i’d been doing for most my life. I graduated July 2013, I ended up staying in London till November 2013, that’s when the money ran out, the two friends i was setting up a business with bailed on me and i had nothing to keep me in London. I made the move back up North mid November and by December 1st 2013 i joined the local gym. The battle to gain back control of my life had begun and i’ve been going ever since. It’s not been easy at all. It’s been a struggle, i’ve relapsed twice into a depressive mental state, i’ve binged a lot and i’ve fought my demons but i’m stronger and better for it all. Simply put, i will not give up on myself this time! I will beat this version of me and i will attain my dreams!!! So my current goals, well while losing the jiggly bits on me is still up there at the top of my list i have other goals in mind. Things like getting strong and building muscle, motivating and helping others through my journey, not looking like the fat family member anymore, just things like that really. I think somewhere in me is the goal to have bigger muscles then my brother, just so i can say i’m musclier haha. Brotherly competition =P. Seriously tho, all joking aside there is one goal that is most important to me, more important then losing my jiggly bits. Heck i could stay fat if it meant achieving this goal, which is simply to just be happy. To be happy within myself, to be happy with how and where my life is. Everyone feels sadness, it’s inevitable in life but i think if i find that one thing or multiple things that make me happy, well when the sadness hits it’ll hurt that little bit less. Least that’s what i hope. I hope this is a good introduction everyone and i look forward to being Gemma’s BOTM. Keep smiling =]”
I think Jon was super brave to share his story with us, and I hope you’ll all join me in welcoming him as my July BOTM!