Personal Story
Crohn’s disease sufferer recovering from burst bowel is now a champion weightlifter
Manny Singh Tura lost nearly half of his body weight during a crippling bout of Crohn's disease and transformed himself into a bodybuilder in just eight months.
Manny Singh Tura, 27, weighing only seven-and-a-half stone (48kg) to begin with, shed three stone (19kg) in just two months after his bowel burst in December 2016.
He had a foot-long (30cm) section of his bowel removed and needed an ileostomy bag for months, but has since returned to health and broken a regional weightlifting record.
‘It was sad looking at my body because I had never been this thin. I’ve always been small but this was completely different.’
Formerly a fan of fizzy drinks, hot dogs and processed foods, Mr Tura realised he needed to make big changes to his diet to become healthy again. Thanks to a friend who snuck meals into the hospital for him, he managed to recover from being ‘like a skeleton’ and claims he gained a kilogram per day before being discharged.
In May 2017, he had surgery to repair his small intestine and get rid of the bag, and began his journey to becoming a champion bodybuilder.
In January 2018, eight months after the life-changing operation, he broke the Yorkshire and Northeast dead-lift record for his weight class.
Weighing 53.6kg he lifted 180kg – nearly three times his own bodyweight.
‘I admired bodybuilders so I made a promise to myself I would gain weight and be strong again,’ Mr Tura said. ‘I did it in less than a year.
‘Winning and breaking a record made me feel like I had independence over my body again.’
Mr Tura credits the diet change for his incredible transformation.
‘I went from having three meals a day to five,’ he said. ‘My new strict diet helped me gain weight – I gained like 1kg a day.
‘One friend would make me mackerel, sardines and prawns every single night and each morning he would visit me in the hospital to drop off the food.
‘I had a hotplate for me to warm food a friend snuck in, I’d use it when doctors and nurses weren’t around, and had a can of air freshener to hide the smell of fish.
‘When I got home, I still had to tube-feed but I was more aware of what I was putting in my body.’
He still suffers from Crohn’s disease but says his new lifestyle helps him keep it under control – he goes to the gym at least five times a week and always eats healthily.
Read full article at https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-6639919/Crohns-disease-sufferer-champion-weightlifter.html
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