Besides yourself and a mirror, who gave you a wake-up call?

BHKLEIN

Pictures do not lie..... that's when I realized how much I had gained. I barely recognized myself. That and my sister-in-law told me I wasn't that much overweight.

Jerijoh

I was at a coffee morning and there was a little girl about four years old handing out cupcakes that she'd made. When she got to me she said 'You're not getting a cake because you look like you've eaten five already'. I laughed and then she asked me 'Why are you so fatty?' Haha! That was my wake-up call!!! Haha!!!

Hahahaha this is funny and sad at the same time.. Kids just don't know any better.. =P

bcattoes

For me it was the printout from my blood work. I carry weight pretty well, and while I can't honestly say I didn't care about the extra weight, I didn't care enough until I got that printout showing my triglycerides were only a few points from leaving the "normal" range. THAT I cared about. This year they were so low they couldn't be measured with the finger prick test (< 45). :happy:

krystalraven

I was at a coffee morning and there was a little girl about four years old handing out cupcakes that she'd made. When she got to me she said 'You're not getting a cake because you look like you've eaten five already'. I laughed and then she asked me 'Why are you so fatty?' Haha! That was my wake-up call!!! Haha!!!

Hahahaha this is funny and sad at the same time.. Kids just don't know any better.. =P

If you want an honest opinion...ask a four year old! Haha!

DebbieLyn63

For me it was the printout from my blood work. I carry weight pretty well, and while I can't honestly say I didn't care about the extra weight, I didn't care enough until I got that printout showing my triglycerides were only a few points from leaving the "normal" range. THAT I cared about. This year they were so low they couldn't be measured with the finger prick test (< 45). :happy:

My highest Triglyceride number was 685 a few years ago. How's that for a wake up call. I lowered my carb level and managed to get it below 200. Looking forward to next bloodwork after my weight loss to see what the number is now.

xxhawk68xx

The nurses in the ER room while the were treating me for a blood clots in both lungs.

icimani

The endocrinologist doctor I was seeing for metabolic syndrome (high BP/cholesterol/blood sugar) flippantly gave me a weight loss surgery pamphlet as I was going out the door.

I showed him! My BP and blood sugar are now normal and cholesterol is barely high, and I've lost close to 100 pounds.

I'll give him credit though - instead of Metformin he put me on Byetta. It slows down your digestion and helps your body use its own insulin more effectively. What it did was help me to not snack in the evenings and started me on the path to eating better.

czechwolf52

When I had a body composition screening and it said I had an extras 40 pounds of fat on me. That was a huge wake-up call. Now 7 months later I am 5 pounds away from being at a "normal weight". Hopefully I can reach it by the end of this semester.

suziepoo1984

Pics, relatives i was meeting after a long time, shopping(XL was starting to get tighter-now i can fit into a M) and mainly looking at myself dance in a stuido mirror. I just hated how i looked/danced. I knew i had to do something to feel more confident about myself

hannamarie88

For me it was the "before" in my profile picture. I utterly hate that picture. It was taken exactly one year after my wedding and I had gained over 25 pounds in that time. It blows my mind that I gained that much in one year! I feel like I just look pregnant (I am not) and terrible in that photo and it was the final kick in the pants for me. Now I'm less than 10 pounds from my wedding weight! And I am NOT stopping there

Ivey05131980

My son. I declined a pool party for him for fear of me having to put on a swimsuit.

FerretBuellerr

I think what really made me consider getting into it was a picture my (future) sister-in-law posted on Facebook of me. I THOUGHT I looked super cute in these high-waisted shorts, but the cut of the shorts just accentuated the belly that I knew I had - but I didn't think it looked THAT big! That, and my boyfriend - he always has told me I'm beautiful, but when the bomb dropped (in a respectable manner) that I had was in better shape when we started dating 2 years ago....it really make me feel like a big steaming pile of unattractive and unwanted poo.

I didn't start using MFP or getting into a more active lifestyle until I had an awkward run-in with a guy that claimed to be a personal trainer who would train me for free. I was really excited to kick-start everything, but I was getting creepy vibes from this guy (I may have been overreacting) so when a friend asked if I wanted to join her at Zumba, everything kind of just fell into place then!

And I'm never looking back!

JonfromIndiana

After being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure my 2 boys told me they were worried that one day when they were married and had kids, they their kids wouldn't have a grandfather.

tequila09

My boyfriend is a huge reason why I put my big girl pants on and started doing what I need to do to be healthy and reach the goal body I've always wanted. I was too lazy to do it on my own.

histora

It wasn't my labwork. That came back beautifully, much to my Dr and my surprise.

It wasn't my clothes. I hate shopping anyways.

It was seeing my mother on 12 different medications. She has Type II Diabetes, and her lipid profile looks like sheer hell. She can't walk a mile without dying, her joints are falling apart, and she's just given up.

That will never be me. Ever. I don't want to give up on my grandkids early like she is. I will see them graduate!

missyahall2

What I affectionately call the picture of me in the "Sweaty Pit Purple Dress."I looked like Barney and I was sweating profusely. You could see it all in the picture. I thought I looked good but that picture was a wake up call.

spectralmoon

First (though I completely dismissed it), my mother made a comment around Halloween. I was going to wear a costume for the second time around and had taken her with me to find makeup for it, and it came up in convo, "Are you sure you're built for that anymore?" Ouch, Mom. But I was blind and deaf to how right she was. That Halloween came and went, and the photos were horrid... and I blamed the angle.

Come that December, I had another photo taken, at a GOOD angle for me, with out-of-town visiting family. My "good" angle gave me a moon face and made me look like a linebacker with these HUGE shoulders and thick thighs. I was shocked, almost cried, stared at the mirror after for hours trying to figure out how I hadn't seen the extra weight piling on... and joined MFP about three weeks later.

HacheraTsarine

that's when I realized I ripped every single one of my jeans because of the friction caused by my thighs rubbing.... even my big girl jeans were ruined....

Fitnin6280

This is kind of funny, one of my friends and I were talking about this earlier. Before I started, one night my oldest son woke up crying his little eyes out. I asked him what was wrong, and he said he had a dream that I died (creepy right...). But anyhow, I thought if he was this upset at a dream, I could not leave him before my time because I was fat. It suddenly became about more than just me. From that moment on, I was determined to be healthy.

es513

Went to a football game (GO TEXANS), which we had done for many seasons.. and I didn't fit in the chair :brokenheart:

mrsduke2924

My husband and my son (currently 2), honestly. Not going into deep details but the hubby sat me down and told me he's scared I won't live to see my son graduate high school the way I am now.

pretty much this... wake up call from loving hubby x

BattleTaxi

To be honest, I receive more NEGATIVE comments now than ever! People say some pretty discouraging and rude things; comments about my food choices, poor advice about things I do for strength training or exercise, etc.

The thing that was a wake up call, was myself. Looking at the scale, pushing 300lbs, and feeling like a giant pile of garbage. All I could think was, "How could I let myself get this far???" So I bought a huge lunch box, I started participating on the forums, reading everything I possibly could about TDEE, BMR, caloric in take, etc... I found a healthy way to lose the fat that I gained. I plan my meals, plan for meals if I'm going out, etc. I pack everything I am going to eat today in my lunchbox and am not interested in anything else!

People see the change in my attitude and my body; the fact that most of them only have rude belittling things to say to me now shows me that they were never truly "there" for me to begin with.

I definitely think that this journey to better my lifestyle and live healthier has not only made me feel better, but it has also unfortunately shown me who my true friends are!

Without the support of the MFP community, I wouldn't have made it through the first day, the first week, the first month, etc.

You guys ROCK!!!

AllonsYtotheTardis

No one ever told me I was unhealthy, or overweight. That's OK - I already knew.

My wake up call was realizing I was the same weight I had been at 9 months pregnant.

ritchiedrama

Dad kept callin' me fat when i went downstairs haha so i was like right, ur doing my head in matey..

then booM

leahgoldgirl

My doctor, my older sister and my grandmother. I was never overweight, but growing up, I had always been fit and active. I was also late to mature. After high school, I went from 95 lbs, to 125 lbs by the time I was 21. Some of it was things like boobs, hips and a broadened frame, but much of it was fat. Combined with a loss in muscle tone, though I may have looked fine to people who didn't know me, I didn't look fine to my family and doctor. I didn't feel good either.

My sister first noted that I looked bloated and unhealthy. She saw me over a holiday and asked if I was doing okay. She didn't realize it was weight... she really thought I was retaining water and had some sort of health issue they had put me on steroids for and I hadn't told her about.

I made an offhanded comment to my very blunt, tactless grandmother about my weight (she is about my size) and she commented that it was way too much for my smallish, 5 foot tall frame to carry. It hurt to hear, but my pinching jeans, hurting knees and lack of confidence confirmed her suspicion. Still, I put off making a change.

A month later, I had to go to the doctor for something, and she warned me that I had gone from about 19% body fat and an ideal weight (around 110-115), to borderline overweight in a matter of a year (the last time I had seen her) and that I needed to get it under control before it was a big deal, because that is why my knees hurt, I had no energy and my blood pressure was elevated.

The warnings, combined with hating how I felt and missing being active/ having energy, made me join a sports team, go back to the gym and start paying attention to the healthy eating habits that my parents worked hard to teach me growing up. I have been progressively in the best shape of my adult life for 6 years running now. It didn't take giant changes to get started either. I just subbed for healthier snacks, cut out soda and started moving a bit more at first.

Nikoruo

I don't know exactly what it was. It was like a switch in my brain. I had many things inform me of my imminent disaster if i kept living the way i was....

Doctors finding me terribly unhealthy and suggesting i lose weight saying i likely can only live a few more years if i dont lose weight.... Didn't do anything

Family members calling me fat consistently and making jokes of me... Didn't do anything

Couldn't run anymore... Didn't do anything

Could barely go up and down steps... Didn't do anything

Threw out my back likely due to the strain on it... Didn't do anything

Became so in pain sometimes that after a bit of work or whatever i would sit down or lay down and i could not get back up due to pain in my back.... Didn't do anything.

So end of story, i have no idea what really did it and kicked me to accomplish my goals. I had sorta tried to diet and workout before but would quit very quickly because i was bored with the foods or didn't know enough or too much calculating.... and i'd quit the workout because it was too hard to run and i couldn't, and still cant so much do sit ups, jumping jacks, push ups...

I rarely looked in the mirror and it's not that i didn't like what i saw, some days i didn't care, some days i thought i looked fine and some days i was grossed out but still did nothing.

If anything, i'd say this site and making new friends on here is what drove me to keep going to learn more and try harder because i'm very competitive in a sense. Competitive on my own terms but still competitive no less. I wanted to do better than anyone i met on here/still do. I want to achieve my goal and be fit. Now i finally have a reason to keep going, I want to inspire others to have that drive to push forward and be what we were truly meant to be.

es513

No one ever told me I was unhealthy, or overweight. That's OK - I already knew.

My wake up call was realizing I was the same weight I had been at 9 months pregnant.

^^^this too! Worst feeling ever. I realized the same difficulty I had putting on my shoes and getting dressed at 9mo preggo, I was having now.

DenyseMarieL

I was famous for the 'by the time I'm (insert age)' comment. Then I turned 40. And I was running out of time. I want to be fit, strong and lean. I'm not going to give in to the inevitable weight gain they say happens to women our age. I'm fighting it every step of the way!

mollyya90

In the mirror I thought I looked good! Seeing myself in pictures I was like who the heck is that fat girl? I went to my boyfriends families house sat in a plastic chair broke it. Went to his uncles house stepped on their back porch broke a tile! I was mortified! I had always been the skinny person it seemed like everywhere I went! Then I was suddenly 218 and was breaking stuff! I would ask people if I looked bad and no one would tell me the truth! They would say yeah you've gained weight but you're not fat... I would sit down to eat at a restaurant and ask when is my due date? I wait tables people would ask me if I had my baby yet. Seriously? It was horrifying. I've lost 28 pounds so far and it's the best thing I've done for myself!


Oh and my heart dr. Told me I need to find my way to subway...not the best thing you want to hear

MB_Positif

No one, and it actually makes me a little mad. I know it's not typical for people to tell someone they are gaining weight, but I wish someone would have slapped me and said, "Dude, STOP it!"