South Salt Lake Man’s Difficult Diagnosis Leads To Weight Loss, Race Of His Life
Sep 27, 2019, 6:54 PM
SOUTH SALT LAKE, Utah – A Utah husband and father faced an uphill climb – literally; he needed to lose weight not to just fit into his favorite jeans, but to save his life.
His fight was a family affair.
When he hoped to cross the finish line at the Logan Marathon on Sept. 21, Dallin Craven’s family was there.
Dallin Craven, his wife Kellie and their daughter Lilly after Dallin finished the Logan Marathon.
“I kept losing rings because I was losing weight,” Craven said, pointing to a tattoo on his ring finger. “It’s just a crown, basically. Just like a queen’s crown.”
He said his wife, Kellie, and daughter, Lilly, are everything to him, and Kellie is his “queen.”
“She would hate it if I said that,” Craven said, laughing. “I kind of hate myself for saying it.”
But there was much more at stake the day of the race.
“I was in the morbidly obese range,” he said. “When the doctor takes a while to come back in, you know you’re like sitting there thinking the worse-case scenario.”
The bad news came two years ago.
“‘You have type 2 diabetes, I’m sorry,’” Craven said, recalling the doctor’s words. “They gave me insulin. My numbers were high. They said, ‘Had you waited another day or two, you probably would’ve gone into a coma.’”
To lose weight, Dallin started training for a marathon. He said his wife has been instrumental in his success.
“I’ll wake up super early, and that kind of means that she has to take the parental duties,” he said.
There were ups and downs.
“It never felt easy,” he said, but he kept going and thinking about his daughter. “I didn’t want her to be the kid that has a dad that has Type 2 or that died early.”
He’s lost 90 pounds.
Dallin Craven lost 90 pounds after he was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. He just completed the Logan Marathon.
“Now I’m in the normal range, which was a crazy day when that happened,” he said.
This marathon wasn’t his first, but his third. With another daughter on the way, finishing was critical.
“Between mile 20 and 22, I can just tell I’m going to cry. (I) start thinking about how far I’ve come, and you start thinking about how much has gone into this training,” Craven said. “I get emotional.”
But he did it: for Kellie, for the baby to be, and for Lilly, he said.
