In 2018, Nick Bricker's health was in a bad place. He was a heavy drinker and smoker — drinking 35 to 40 beers a night and smoking two packs of cigarettes every day. His weight had climbed to 437 pounds, and he needed a rescue inhaler to help him breathe, medicine to control acid reflux and two different medicines to lower his blood pressure. "My breathing was so bad I had to live in the guest room on the first floor because I couldn't walk up the stairs to my bedroom," he says.
For years, he said he would make changes "tomorrow," but tomorrow never came. Until one day in 2020, it did. He started up a treadmill he had never used and walked for ten minutes at 1 mile per hour. "I felt like I had finished a triathlon," he says. He stuck with it, and after a couple of months he could walk for 20 minutes at 1.5 miles per hour.
Today, the 52-year-old's breathing problems are gone, his acid reflux has cleared, and he expects to get off his blood pressure medication soon. His pulmonologist told him his lung function was back to 100%, up from 30%. And not only can he climb the stairs in his house, but he also walks about 12 miles, or 25,000 to 30,000 steps, a day.
"When I was young, I was skinny as a rail. I was an avid surfer, skateboarder, BMXer, snowboarder and skier. That was my life," he says. "The drinking is what changed it all. Instead of going surfing, I'd go to the bar. Now I'm doing it all again, and I can do it with my son."
Read Nick's story here.
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