Man loses weight of two people after mistaking chest pain for heart attack - but keeps excess skin

"My fiancée accepts me for who and what I am."

(Humansharpei/Reddit)

A man who lost the weight of two people has revealed that he will not be getting his excess skin removed because he wants to work on accepting his body with the help of his fiancée.

Adam, from the US state of Kentucky, reached a weight of over 500lbs (227kg) by eating around 5,000 calories a day, he told The Independent.

“I had wanted to lose weight all my life. But what finally pushed me over the edge was having a chest pain that I feared was a heart attack,” he said. “I realised even if it wasn't within the next few years I would have another pain that would be.

(Humansharpei/Reddit)

(Humansharpei/Reddit)

(Humansharpei/Reddit (Humansharpei/Reddit)

“That scared me bad enough to change how I was eating long enough for it to become habit. And that is all it took because I am a creature of habit. It became just 'what I did'.

Since 2010, he has lost over 300lbs - around the weight of two people.

But he did not lose the weight healthily at first, as he relied on processed diet meals, which did not contain enough calories to sustain his body and caused him to plateau.

“It was really only after I got near my goal weight that I began eating a much more healthy, balanced, ‘real food’ diet,” he said.

Now at his goal weight, he does not believe he will have the excess skin on his body removed due to the health risk and the financial cost. Such procedures are not widely available on US health insurance plans, and the major surgery can cause infections.

“The underneath is all very hard and muscular even bony but then I have these folds of skin on my arms, stomach, thighs, that still hang and feel flabby,” he said, adding that the skin presents “many complications with daily life” and makes physical exercise or movement “totally different to what a normal person experiences.”

He is now learning to adapt to his new physique, and has the support of his partner. To mark his weight loss, he has tattoo a 500lb weight, while he and his partner have matching avocado tattoos.

“I have a fiancée, who has lost 100 pounds herself since meeting me, who I will marry in less than a month who accepts me for who and what I am. I try to make strides in accepting myself as time goes on.”