First and foremost I am a husband to my beautiful wife, L’Ray, and father of two crazy kids, Kye (5) and Haygen Reese (4). I received my first bachelor’s degree in 2006 with a degree in Biblical Studies. I couldn’t find a job working for a church upon completion of my degree so I took a job teaching in Texas at my High School alma mater. I taught high school math for a year and a half before I was offered a job as a college Pastor. For the next 2 years I worked as college and 20 Something’s Pastor at a church in the Dallas Metroplex. After we had our daughter we decided to move back to Lubbock to be closer to family. While back in Lubbock, I started my own wedding photography business, Rustin Klafka Photography. I also decided to go back to teaching and my wife began to look for a job in ministry. Eventually in 2011 my wife was offered a job at New Community Church in Muskogee, so we packed up the U-Haul and headed to Oklahoma. We had been in Muskogee for over a year and the entire time I had been trying to decide what I wanted to do. The reality was that I didn’t want to go back into teaching or ministry work and I wanted to do more than photograph weddings on the weekends like I had been doing for a year. Then it hit me; I should become a Registered Dietitian. I called NSU and enrolled the next week.
I was once the kid who couldn’t play basketball without an inhaler nearby, but after a shift in my nutrition and conditioning I feel better than I ever have. There is so much of my life that has been changed through my 3-year journey with food and my journey with fitness over the past year.
Over 3 years ago I was living the typical American lifestyle. I ate what I wanted, in the quantity I wanted, whenever I desired to do so. This had led me to be, what I would call, “soft around the edges”. Asthma played a crucial role in my daily life. I was on a daily preventative inhaler and I could notice when I didn’t take it in the morning to begin my day because shortness of breath wasn’t uncommon going up stairs or walking long distances.
Before my major nutrition shift I had tried popular diet plans. You know the ones guys like to follow – high protein, low-fat, low carb coupled with weight lifting. None of them lasted much longer than six weeks. The most success I had was with P90X, although by week three I was skipping two of the workouts I didn’t “enjoy” and I never really followed their diet plan. Post P90X I decided to do what many other people do who want to get into shape – run a 1/2 marathon! I started the training but never made it past 6-mile runs.
After doing a great deal of research about nutrition and how it relates to asthma and allergies, I decided to start eating a vegetarian diet for an unset length of time. In the back of my mind it was never something I wanted to do forever. It was simply something I felt like I needed to do as an experiment. Around two years into eating as a Vegetarian I was impacted to take things a step further after seeing Jamie Oliver’s first season of “Food Revolution”. I was incredibly blown away by people’s lack of knowledge (and my own lack of knowledge) about nutrition and health overall. As my best friend Jesse once told me, “Eating right and working out is preventative medicine.” I was challenged to begin to not put food down my mouth if I couldn’t pronounce the ingredients on the label. This took out much of the food I was still eating as a “healthy” vegetarian.
About a year ago I decided to move to an even healthier alternative. I began eating a Whole Foods Plant Based Diet. Nothing processed, nothing from animals. It’s that simple. I have never felt better. Around the same time I began training for a Tough Mudder Race, which is a 12+ mile obstacle course race. This was my jump-start to fitness. In the last year I’ve discovered Cross Fit style training and endurance training. These two fitness elements have begun a revolution for myself. Because of all of this I’m currently training for a 25K trail running race and considering a 50K in the next year.
Within the next year I will be finished with my second degree and heading off to do my Dietetics internship somewhere near our home here in Eastern Oklahoma or back in our home town of Lubbock, Texas at Texas Tech University. I want to focus my work in dietetics on working with athletes. I’m fascinated at how nutrition can alter a person’s athletic performance. After my internship is complete I will take the RD exam and upon passing I will find a position as a Registered Dietitian. I hope to work back in Texas near my parents and my wife’s parents so that our kids can grow up close to their grandparents. My dream job is to work with college and professional athletes as their Dietitian and Personal Trainer. I plan on getting my CrossFit Training Certificate before graduation in December. I believe this coupled with my knowledge for nutrition and how it impacts an athlete’s body will play a crucial role in my work with athletes.
This is one of the most exciting times in my life and I can’t wait to see what lies ahead for my family and myself in the next 5 years.
WHOLLY FIT 