W.A.C.O (Wrestlers Against Childhood Obesity)
Published October 22, 2010 at 4:52 am
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MISSION STATEMENT:
To educate the general public about the dangers of childhood obesity, in a forum of sports entertainment.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
In the following, we will educate the general public with knowledge about childhood obesity. We also will provide information regarding the sports entertainment industry’s participation with these events.
OBJECTIVE
W. A.C.O is a nonprofit foundation of professional sports entertainers that focus on the education, awareness and help with the epidemic facing the world known as Childhood Obesity. With the help of sports entertainers from all over the world, we would put on live sporting events, and the use of other forums to establish a way of education, donations, and hope for stopping childhood obesity.
Born in Clifton, Texas in the year 1984 Travis Wayne Howard, was a beautiful baby boy. He started his life as an only child only to welcome his brother when he was two and his sister when he was three. You could often see Travis snacking on Lil Debbie snack cakes, or carrots, or celery, or chips, or cheese, anything except peas. This is where his problem began. It was not that Travis was constantly eating junk, it was that he was constantly eating. As a young boy, it was fine, he was always very active and the constant eating was never a problem, it was the natural slowing down of his metabolism that caught up to him around the age of ten, when it was begging to show in his weight gain. Although he was still a very active boy, constantly running around with his friends, the weight gain still continued to progress. In high school that was never a problem, being a defensive tackle for the Texas City Sting Rays, it was a blessing. It was still concerning.
Travis was blessed to have many caring people in his life, one of which was his step mom who herself was in the medical field as a registered nurse, noticing Travis’ weight gain at such a young age, she began taking him to doctors. The first doctor ignored the situation, telling Patty, no worries its just the pains of being a young child. Unsatisfied, Patty then started to portion control what Travis ate, three square meals a day, and healthy snack of carrots twice a day. Still no difference, Travis always found a way to eat when he felt hungry, and that was all the time.
High school days were amazing for Travis, great football career , plenty of friends, family life was amazing with both a father and mother who loved him dearly, a step mom who cared, and two siblings who looked up to him. Football was grueling with two a day practices, and long workouts, but Travis loved to remain active. Even during the off season, Travis took it upon himself to start weight training, here is where the problem of his weight gain started taking effect on Travis. During his workouts Travis started to get chronic headaches, and finally Patty took him to the doctor and expressed her concern. The doctor ran some lab work and noticed that Travis had extremely high blood pressure causing him to have the headaches, the doctor than provided Travis with a prescription and sent him on his way. Travis was then on blood pressure pills at the age of sixteen. Travis was also self medicating, with diet pills, and constant crash dieting.
After high school, Travis then lost his only outlet of football. He then started to eat to fill the void, an extra large pizza, twenty wings, and four liters of coke, just for dinner, followed by a gallon of ice cream. This started posing more issues, with the onset of sleep apnea, driving became dangerous with constant falling asleep, the inability to carry on long conversations without falling asleep. He was still taking his blood pressure medicine, still self medicating, and suffering with the inability to tell if he needed to use the restroom, due to the constant pressure on his bladder.
Those are only the medical issues, Travis’ psychological issue were greater than anyone could ever imagine. While Patty was taking Travis to the doctor, for anything, a sprained ankle, pink eye, broken finger, or even a cold, the only thing they ever told him was he needed to lose weight. Then Travis would go to school and be teased, yes he was well liked, but he knew to make the fat joke before the other kids could, constant from the age of ten until high school graduation. With the implementation of the new desks at school Travis could no longer fit at the desk and special provisions had to be made, another joke around school. Travis was the punch line to every joke. He then had the best blessing ever come into his life, his son Sion, who he was terrified to hold for fear of falling asleep and dropping him. The constant disappointment of having to watch his son play and not being able to join him on the floor, for the fear he could not get up. The loss of his wife, do to Travis not being able to sleep with his wife, or was to uncomfortable to take her to the movies, or on dates in public, for the fear of ridicule. Going to family functions became a chore, because the number one topic of conversation was his weight, and being teased by his younger siblings.
Travis then found an outlet of professional wrestling, something he thought he could be good at because of his size only to be let down. The talk of the locker room was the size of Travis Howard, and they began to make fun of him by using him as the go to guy for the guy who was always eating sweets, and came out of the curtain with a piece of fried chicken and a lollipop, never being taken seriously for his talent, but always the joke for his size. Once again something that Travis had felt passionately about was a joke, and something that Travis could hate about himself.
Travis then started to realize that he was unhappy with himself and there had to be a way to fix it. He then began his research, starting with insurance, he looked into many plans and was shocked to know they were unavailable to him because of his obesity, so then he looked at other avenues, going to seminar after seminar, studying up on the lap band procedure, gastric bypass, and the sleeve procedure. Finally the last straw, in February of 2009 Travis and his father were having lunch and Travis passed out. His father then spoke in a grave tone with Travis and told him that his love for Travis was unconditional but they needed to find a way to control this weight gain. Travis then found Dr. Vuong. Dr. Vuong explained to Travis that the lap band surgery was not a quick fix or something to be entered into lightly, that this had to be a lifestyle. Travis then began to take the time to really think about what a lifestyle change meant to him. After his first meeting with Dr. Vuong, he then picked up his son and went home, only to once again be disappointed when he couldn’t play wrestling with Sion, or that night when Sion had a bad dream he could not hold him in bed until he stopped crying, that is what made Travis realized that a lifestyle change is what he needed.
Travis then went to his second meeting with Dr. Vuong, cash in hand, hoping for the lifestyle change he so desperately wanted, only to once again be met, not with disappointment, but with hard work. Dr. Vuong, then enrolled Travis in constant support groups, and cooking classes, constant education on not only how to eat right, but what he was doing wrong in the first place. Travis then realized that he was not dealing with a doctor, but a mentor into starting a new life with a million possibilities. Dr. Vuong, then made Travis lose fifty pounds before even considering letting Travis go under the knife. With high hopes and a new lifestyle waiting, Travis began dieting with the right education, and quickly lost the fifty pounds and ten more to prove a point. Finally he had his surgery, on that morning a limo came to pick Travis up and took him to the hospital, and after the surgery took him home. Now the painful part, recovery. Travis will tell you that it was a painful surgery, he was laying in bed for about two weeks, and was not cleared for work for two months. Then the hard work started, learning how to eat again, and what to eat. It was a long road but Travis made sure he made it work.
Now after a weight loss of one hundred fifty pounds, Travis holds his son with pride, and wrestling with him is a constant activity. His professional wrestling career has taken of, with people focusing more on his talent, then his size, he is now known as one of the sexiest men in Texas independent professional wrestling. Travis could not be happier with his life and he credits this to Dr. Vuong, and his education on the weight issues surrounding weight gain and unhealthy life styles.
Definition
Childhood obesity is a serious medical condition that affects children and adolescents. It occurs when a child is well above the normal weight for his or her age and height. Childhood obesity is particularly troubling because the extra pounds often start children on the path to health problems that were once confined to adults, such as diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Childhood obesity can also lead to poor self-esteem and depression.
One of the best strategies to reduce childhood obesity is to improve the diet and exercise habits of your entire family. Treating and preventing childhood obesity helps protect the health of your child now and in the future.
Symptoms
Not all children carrying extra pounds are overweight or obese. Some children have larger than average body frames. And children normally carry different amounts of body fat at the various stages of development. So you might not know just by looking at your child if his or her weight is a health concern.
Your child's doctor can help you figure out if your child's weight could pose health problems. To do this, your child's doctor will calculate your child's body mass index (BMI). The BMI indicates if your child is overweight for his or her age and height.
Using a growth chart, your doctor determines your child's percentile, meaning how your child compares with other children of the same sex and age. So, for example, you might be told that your child is in the 80th percentile. This means that compared with other children of the same sex and age, 80 percent have a lower BMI.
Cutoff points on these growth charts, established by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), help identify overweight and obese children:
· BMI-for-age between 85th and 94th percentiles — overweight
· BMI-for-age 95th percentile or above — obesity
Because BMI doesn't consider things like being muscular or having a larger than average body frame and because growth patterns vary greatly among children, your doctor also factors your child's growth and development into consideration. This helps determine whether your child's weight is a health concern.
This article was provided by © 1998-2010 Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research (MFMER).
What is W.A.C.O.?
Wrestlers Against Childhood Obesity, is a non profit organization to educate the general public of the epidemic of childhood obesity, by bringing sports entertainment as an outlet of education. The main goal of W.A.C.O., is to provide families with the right education to stop the problem of childhood obesity, with not only entertainment but also other outlets, starting with camps, video game fitness, fun new exciting games, anything to keep children and parents educated and active.
What does W.A.C.O. provide?
Wrestlers Against Childhood Obesity, provides live sporting events in the hopes of educating families against the dangers of childhood obesity.
How does W.A.C.O. provide?
Wrestlers Against Childhood Obesity provides education on childhood obesity by utilizing a live platform to provide the facts, and constant education involving literature and fun physical activities to keep the interest of children.
