- Fat Joe has detailed his incredible weight loss journey after the death of his friend, Big Pun.
- Pun, who weighed nearly 700 pounds, died in 2000.
Fat Joe has detailed his incredible 200-pound weight-loss transformation after reaching 470 pounds at his heaviest while experiencing depression.
In an interview with Men's Health published last week, Joe, 52, said he fell into depression after the unexpected death of his fellow rapper, Big Pun, in 2000.
Joe said he began excessively drinking and gaining weight, eventually reaching 470 pounds.
"When you're fighting yourself, there isn't a wall high enough that you can build," said the rapper. "There isn't an island you can go to. There isn't a place you can go to where you get away from it, because you're fighting your mind."
"You wake up, and then the minute you think about it, your brain sends you a message to say, 'We're not supposed to be happy," he added. "And then you fall right back into depression."
Pun, Joe's best friend and mentee, died unexpectedly at 28, at which point he weighed nearly 700 pounds.
Joe said that after attending Pun's funeral and seeing the late star's young daughter, he decided he needed to change his lifestyle.
"She was the same age as my daughter," he recalled. "I said, 'You gotta lose weight; otherwise you outta here.'"
Due to his depression, Joe said he was unable to initiate those changes until two years later, in 2002. When he did, he tried everything from running on treadmills in a plastic suit to switching up his diet.
"Your body's just a computer," he said. "It reads stuff you eat in different ways."
Joe said he now regularly checks his blood pressure, cholesterol, and blood sugar levels to make sure he's at his healthiest.
"It gets really, really scary when you think you're doing everything right and your numbers are higher than you want," he said. "I could do the same thing now that I did 10 years ago, and now my numbers are a bit higher because I'm older, and my metabolism and body are getting older. So you gotta try new ways to figure out how to keep your stuff under control."
Talking about his favorite ways to keep fit these days, Joe said he prefers doing cardio to lifting weights.
"Everybody is different, because I got some friends that love the gym, and these guys spend hours lifting weights," he explained. "And they the ones that got the back problems."
"You gotta do whatever keeps you healthy," Joe added. "You start off exercising ten minutes a day, doing some cardio. Then 15 minutes. Then 20. And before you know it, you're at 45, an hour. It's a gradual thing."
Experts say the best kind of exercise is one you can stick to
Both cardio and strength training have health benefits.
Cardiovascular exercise, like running, is important for heart health and provides benefits such as llowering blood pressure, cholesterol, and resting heart rate.
However, strength training is important for building and maintaining bone density, and building muscle and strengthening joints to reduce the risk of injury.
Resistance training — whether using just your body or equipment — is also important for people trying to lose weight as it helps you hold on to muscle while losing fat. Having more muscle on your body slightly raises your basal metabolic rate, meaning the number of calories your body burns at rest.
While a combination of both cardiovascular and strength training is considered optimal, ultimately the best exercise for you is the one you can stick to, experts say.
You don't need to exercise to lose weight
Weight loss happens from being in a calorie deficit, and exercise actually only plays a small role in this — formal exercise accounts for about 5-10% of our daily calorie burn, the rest is through our bodies functioning.
For this reason, nutrition and fitness experts generally don't recommend exercising to burn as many calories as possible, but rather to improve your health and strength.
Instead, focus on your diet. You don't need to count calories to lose weight, but you do need to be in a calorie deficit.