AT his heaviest, Stephen Campolo from New York, weighed 305lbs and was struggling as an obese teenager.
Aged 13, and Stephen was 100lbs overweight with zero confidence and got bullied by other children.
Stephen told Truly: “Being overweight was a death sentence.
When you're young, you're a teenager, people judge you on your appearance.
I got bullied a lot, I got called fat boy.
My last name is Campolo, so kids would call me fat Polo”.
Stephen was fed up, no girls wanted to talk to him and he was even rejected by his crush.
When Stephen broke his finger at 14, the doctor delivered some life changing news.
“The doctor told my dad 'your son is clinically obese, he has to make some type of lifestyle changes or he's going to have some serious health complications'.
So if I hadn't broken my finger and had to go to the doctor, I would have never known that I was clinically obese." In order to make a difference, Stephen made lifestyle changes, stuck to a strict new diet and ran every night.
“I lost a bunch of weight, I wanted to build my body, be confident with myself, feel strong, feel sexy and feel confident!" Today, Stephen is helping others with similar body transformations and is a successful online coach.
He continued: "I don't think the fat high school version of Stephen would have believed that 10 years later, I would be a successful online coach helping people transform their bodies because back then I was the absolute opposite of where I am now." And Stephen has words of wisdom to others who are wanting to follow a similar journey.
“If you never start, you're never going to build enough traction to get ultimately to where you want to be.
So, take the first step, jump in, start and then you'll figure it out as you go!” Social: https://www.instagram.com/stephencampolo/