Do you wish you had started earlier/younger?

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124

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  • DressedInDreams
    DressedInDreams Posts: 96 Member
    edited May 2015
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    I wish someone had taught me a child about nutrition and fitness. I've always been at least a little overweight. I've spent my twenties yo-yoing mostly between 140 and 190, and I wish I had realized a long time ago that CICO simply works. But I will be much more fit and healthy going into my thirties so that's a positive.
  • TiffanyR71
    TiffanyR71 Posts: 217 Member
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    I did start younger- again, and again, and again- since I was 15 with a few extra pounds, until this time at 44 and pretty much as many extra pounds as years. Each time gets harder and with more to lose. Time for me to learn how to maintain when I get to my goal this time. I think I'm finally ready...
  • SuperMelanie
    SuperMelanie Posts: 70 Member
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    DEFINITELY!!!
    Looking back I can remember how bloody miserable my twenties were. Examples that spring to mind..

    [/list]if we went out at the weekend all my friends had their choice of gorgeous men whilst I stood in the corner, trying to be invisible.
    [/list]Being huge caused a lack of confidence, meaning I avoided taking risks and never reached my true potential or achieved the career I feel I could have had.
    [*] /list] I have no photographs of me from the last 15 years :(
    [*] Lack of confidence led to feelings of worthlessness and feelings of hopelessness when I thought about the future. Yo-yo dieting just added to these. Life passed me by.

    Writing all this has made me feel so sad :'(

    BUT...I know I will never be that big again. One day something just clicked. I knew I couldn't be this unhappy forever. I found this site almost by accident and haven't looked back.
    I've lost 10kg and am on track to a better body and feel amazing :)
    If I keep up with the MFP plan, in about 5 months I want to be have the biggest birthday party ever.
    And this time I'll hire a professional photographer and will have to be dragged OFF the dance floor.

    My advice- don't waste your life being miserable. Do something about it sooner rather than later. Life is not a rehearsal :)
    Good luck everyone!!
  • icck
    icck Posts: 197 Member
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    I was 25 when I became serious about fitness. I've always been an avid walker, although overweight from childhood onwards, but I do wish that I had discovered strength training earlier. A good basis about nutrition would have been nice, that's something I have had to learn about myself.

    I am, however, very aware that pregnancy left me unable to walk long distances and with life long health problems. 5 years later I am strong and fit, and can do most things that I wish to, but would that have been any different if I were as strong pre-pregnancy as I am now? Or would I just have found myself in the same, dark place after having my daughter? Who knows.
  • SteveMFP123
    SteveMFP123 Posts: 298 Member
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    Every day, I wasted my youth being obese and miserable, plus my skin has no bounce left in it so I'm stuck with that as punishment for my greed.
  • californiagirl2012
    californiagirl2012 Posts: 2,625 Member
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    I do wish I would have learned earlier. But at the same time not learning it until my 50's and having tried but struggled for so long seems to be better for helping others have hope. It would have been nice to avoid all of the health issues being obese and overweight caused - that was needless suffering but I didn't know better. I'm just happy to know what to do now for the rest of my life. :smiley:
  • earlnabby
    earlnabby Posts: 8,171 Member
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    If wishes were horses then beggars would ride.

    Your choices are what they are and it does no good to wish things were different.
  • purplishblue
    purplishblue Posts: 135 Member
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    Actually I wish I hadn't felt bad about my body for so many years. I started feeling that I was fat at 14... now 35 and still feeling fat :/ The unfortunate thing is that I've been many different weights, including underweight, and there's never really been a point where I felt thin enough. Ah well.
  • SkinnyWannabeGal
    SkinnyWannabeGal Posts: 143 Member
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    [quote="Tubbs216;32344195"
    I'm sorry you went through that abusive situation. Glad that you moved on and sound happy and healthy now.
    [/quote]

    You are so very nice. Thank you Tubbs216 :smile:
  • almondbutterbay
    almondbutterbay Posts: 221 Member
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    purplishblue wrote: »
    The unfortunate thing is that I've been many different weights, including underweight, and there's never really been a point where I felt thin enough. Ah well.

    I understand this too well. I just have no idea how to change it
  • rod195
    rod195 Posts: 16 Member
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    Yes mainly wish I had looked after myself more when I was younger fitter healthier etc
  • gothchiq
    gothchiq Posts: 4,598 Member
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    I completely should have gotten on the ball back when I was 30 and the weight started creeping on. I was dealing with a lot of health problems and had sort of thrown in the towel on fitness. In retrospect, as soon as I got my medications figured out, I should have started some sort of light daily exercise and then slowly ramped up. Spending ten years sedentary except for dancing at night clubs was a mistake. Now I am prediabetic and have some loose skin from losing the weight back off after ten years of being too fat.
  • angelexperiment
    angelexperiment Posts: 1,917 Member
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    I do wish I knew then what I know now. But I think I wasn't ready til now.
  • auntyp147
    auntyp147 Posts: 38 Member
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    It would have been good to know, but I doubt I would've wanted to do it - let alone stick with it when I was younger. Had too many 'other' goals and things going on then and I wasn't too fussed about being overweight as I had always been overweight since I was a baby. As I'm more settled now, I have the time and energy to focus on what I'm eating as well as becoming alot more active. I'm at a healthy weight now. The past is just that - the past. :)
  • kickassbarbie
    kickassbarbie Posts: 286 Member
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    I was an overweight/obese kid and a morbidly obese teen so I wish I'd learnt about eating properly growing up, but that's neither here nor there as there's nothing I can do to change that now (and I probably wouldn't have listened!)

    I do seriously wish I'd learnt the value of health and fitness as well as how to lose weight earlier though, restrictive dieting and never exercising were not the way to go, I do seriously regret that if I'm honest.
  • Soopatt
    Soopatt Posts: 563 Member
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    I wish I had discovered earlier how easy weight loss could be.

    I wish I had not believed the rubbish I was told about how terrible and onerous counting calories was supposed to be, so much so, that I have avoided it like the plague until now. I heard that message everywhere - as if it was a torturous and restrictive way to live that could not possibly be sustainable.

    Listen to people who tell you that they are trying to lose weight, many of them start with "I REFUSE to count calories and weigh my food and all that crazy stuff, I just want to eat better", or something along those lines. Then, not allowing themselves proper portion control tools, those same people resort to crazy diets or are baffled when eating the wrong amounts of the right things do not result in weight loss.

    Even now I feel as though weighing my food down to the gram is something I have to keep private from most people because of the hostile reactions I get.

    The reality is that losing weight has never been so easy and comfortable. I feel as though I have been de-programmed and I wish I could help others to wake up too.

    They don't want to hear it though.
  • scb515
    scb515 Posts: 133 Member
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    I wish I'd started earlier, purely because of the impact on my skin. That's it. People assume if you're "young", it will magically adjust, but if you've been overweight for any significant period, you've already knackered the elasticity.
  • Cali_125
    Cali_125 Posts: 7 Member
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    Soopatt wrote: »
    I wish I had not believed the rubbish I was told about how terrible and onerous counting calories was supposed to be, so much so, that I have avoided it like the plague until now. I heard that message everywhere - as if it was a torturous and restrictive way to live that could not possibly be sustainable.

    Listen to people who tell you that they are trying to lose weight, many of them start with "I REFUSE to count calories and weigh my food and all that crazy stuff, I just want to eat better", or something along those lines. Then, not allowing themselves proper portion control tools, those same people resort to crazy diets or are baffled when eating the wrong amounts of the right things do not result in weight loss.

    That's my story, exactly, Soopatt. I've tried every crazy diet that exists because of the general opinion out there that counting calories equals an eating disorder. If I could go back in time, I would resist listening to that opinion.
  • PicoBoulevard
    PicoBoulevard Posts: 24 Member
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    I should have started revising my eating habits 15 years ago when my metabolism slowed (I'm 55). But I kept eating my same higher calories and gained a huge amount of weight. I've lost 50 pounds of it but I still have 40 to go. So if I had been proactive 15 years ago, I'd probably be normal weight now. But as they say, you can't go back.

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