Weight loss success stories - how we love to read them. How sceptical we are - look, another marketing guy's hype - do they think I'm so stupid to believe in losing 30 pounds in two weeks? Simply i m p o s s i b l e. Well, we are sceptical only until we have our own success story to tell. And that is when we start to believe that everything is possible!

A few words as pre-history to my weight loss success story. Out of all known causes of obesity - improper diet, sedentary lifestyle, genetics, medical and psychiatric illness, early malnutrition, gut flora - I had the first three. By the time the story is about I had over 66 extra pounds. Out of all the complications the extra weight brought into my life the most unpleasant ones were: hypertension (some days I felt like my eyes were going to pop out of my head); apnea (some days I thought that steps and stairways were the most cruel and sadistic human invention); limited mobility (the most irritating one - just due to the size of my belly I had difficulties with lacing my own shoes).

I never tried weight loss medications - I believe this is due to my grandfathers utter disbelief and disgust towards anything in the form of pills or tablets, which disbelief he managed to pass through to me. As for the diets, I won't say I tried many of them but I definately spent some of time gathering the info. I've tried Atkins diet for something over a month and it gave rather pleasant result but mostly in reducing the circumerence but not the weight itself. Also, it was becoming kind of hard to maintain the diet as it was not really positively influencing my overall feeling.

Now - my weight loss success story:

My best weight loss experience was in Truskavets - mineral water spa in western Ukraine (got a Ukrainian wife and we were visiting her relatives). Firstly, my diet consisted of juice and nuts only (different kinds of nuts and juice, but no regulations as to the quantity - I never felt unhappy or unsaturated). Secondly, 3 miles run three times a day. Thirdly, unique natural mineral water spring which washes your kidneys and gallbladder clean of stones and crystallized salts.

I shed 33 pounds over a period of 3 weeks. Just a small detail to describe my surprise - the first time I noticed I got slimmer was when my watch started jumping up and down my wrist while running - and before it was holding my wrist too tight.

I still believe that though the diet and physical exercise contributed much, the very important parts of my weight loss success were: no stress, spending time walking through the Carpathian forests, not thinking about my job and not having anything with me which can be plugged in or switched on - no laptop or palm or iPhone or whatever.

To conclude it all, here's my weight loss recipe:

* Don't torture yourself with some restrictive diet - you ought to feel happy while managing your weight

* Leave all the worrying and anxiety behind, concentrate on what you are doing

* Plenty of movement - which is not so hard, after you succeeded with the previous point

* Plenty of water

* If possible, the crispy clean atmosphere of the Carpathians :)

This helped me, and I don't see the reason why it won't help you lose weight and become happier.