how did you get so big?

yoshi91610

Well to be completely honest, food was really my "safe haven" I wasn't eating because I was hungry I was eating because I was bored, sad, scared, worried whatever emotion I was feeling I carried it. Then I realized that and became obsessed with losing weight, then nothing I did was fun because I was always obsessed with eating or not eating (it didn't help that the people around me were obsessed with it too) Then I got away from all of that and exercised and ate healthy for about a year.

Then I got married and comfortable, then pregnant. So now, although tracking my food and trying to stay in my calorie range is important, my goal is to not make food so important. I don't want to go to extremes and get back into that zone where I was exercising and eating good. I didn't over eat often and when I did I didn't punish myself. I think thats a safe place to be.

sorry I went over board here explaining things huh?

klewis81

Easy reasons: Stopped being on sports teams, really enjoyed food, really enjoyed drinking, didn't so much like exercising.

The psychological side of it is that when I was younger, my mom (who is tiny) would constantly monitor our food intake and give us hell about bad food choices. When I went away to college, a lot of eating poorly was because for the first time, I *could* do it! I would also overeat as kind of a backlash. I didn't want to try to be skinny because then she would win. This is only something that I have resolved internally in the last year or so. It has taken a long time and a lot of soul searching to realize that I make the food choices and the I have control over what goes into my body, nobody else.

AshDHart

Very active child and teen. Got married and put on a few pounds but nothing major. Had a hormone issue after the 2nd one and put on 90lbs in 4 months. Realized men didn't look so much at that weight and stayed at it using it a "fat shield". Got divorced and remarried. I guess someone was still looking. :bigsmile: Put on even more until I was 377 lbs and couldn't breath well. A 2nd bout with pneumonia landed me in the hospital and I left on oxygen. Still on it now. The doctor told me I had to lose the weight to get back off. Luckily, I have dealt with the emotional issues and have learned to deal with men without needing my "fat shield" anymore.

Working on getting back to my previously active life without needing oxygen tanks.

BrunetteRunner87

Stress from college and also being depressed a lot... Made me eat all the time. Then I got a job with lots of money so I ate and drank a lot! But now I'm more positive and stress from grad school still gets to me but now I recognize why I'm eating. And now I'm too broke to go out!

xSophia19

from the age of 12 i started getting bullied in high school, for different reasons! (i wasnt even fat at the time) people were always nasty to me, make really mean comments about my family, my mum is a single mother to 2 kids who both have different fathers, soo all the lads used to call my mum really harsh names and everything! I did nothing about this, i didnt go to the teachers because i was scared of what the bullies may do to me. So i just kept it between myself, my mum didnt even know!! i then started going home and slouching on the sofa all night infront of the tv, with lots of food, fizzy pop and not doing an excercise what so ever! this was a way for me to relax from the bullies in school.. 6 years down the line i had gained over 7 stone! I had gone from childrens clothes size 11-12years, to an adult size 18 UK!! the weight was slowly creeping on me in those years..

2011 came, i was free from high school, i finished a 2 year course in college. so i thought right, im going to put a stop to this!! i dont want to be a size 18 anymore! its uncomfotable and embarassing!!! soo i joined this website, as i found the app on my ipod, and ive just been watching what im eating, cutting my portions down and excercising everyday, and in 11 months ive lost 39lbs, and ive come down 2 dress sizes! im now a size 14 (UK)..

soo all those bullies out there that bullied me all through high schoool F.UCK YOU!!!! :bigsmile:

_Ben

Have you ever tried double stacks at wendys? Or Cheese Ritz Bitz Crackers? Or my fav, Red Baron Personal Pizzas? Some of those are major reasons why I was as large as I was

Yakisoba

I thought it was "normal" to be overweight since everyone on my mother's side was. o.o

yesiamaduck

I liked binge eating

In that I'd get stoned, watch films/tv series/ youtube clips and eat for hours straight... it was really unhealthy & a habit I had picked up after having an incredibly active job but maintained when I became a dude in an office. I think I gained roughly 100lbs in 2 years. Haven't done that for like a month though & nor do I miss it... my stomach is already a lot better for it I can trust you

wellbert

caloried drinks and convenience food mixed with a high stress job and stress eating.
No more stressful job, much easier to eat better now. Though I still make bad decisions when I'm pressed for time - at least I eat less of them.

capriciousmoon

I always thought it had to do with messing up my metabolism from going long periods of time without eating, then gaining when I did eat even though I didn't really overeat at all. I had someone call me a liar on that though...

Ant_M76

Dominos Pizza addiction :ohwell:

Meghan0116

I started gaining a little bit in college, probably 15 lbs or so. Then I worked desk jobs after college, stopped playing sports, and continued consuming the same amount of calories as I had before. I also developed some weird bladder thing which turned out to actually be a kidney thing and my nephrologist has said that it could have led to the weight gain and difficulty getting the weight off. Also, I was a vegetarian and gained quite a bit during those 9 years. Add all that to a rocky relationship and BAM! 254 lbs. Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

prettyfitchick

My weight gain started when I was about 17 working at Mcdoanlds I really loved the food proably ate 2 meals a day from there and I was also on birthcontrol help be get 188 pounds I began eating salads for lunch and dinner and silmfast for breakfast and the weight still wouldnt come off So i got off the birthconttol and got down to 150 then life happen to busy to eat right plus when 20 you are you dont think about later slowly began to creep back in the 160s Then after barely making the weight requirements for the navy I knew I need to make a change before basic know one wants to be the fat kid in Basic

quigonnjae

Started out in the automotive field. Working in a tire shop doing large truck / tractor service...Got all the exercise I needed and ate anything I wanted to .. Got injured on the job and started dabbling in PCs. Never went back to the automotive field and continued to eat the way I was. On top of that I started seeing my now wife ... THAT WOMAN CAN COOK!! Put sitting on my butt all day + eating REALLY good = 50+ lbs .. Add a car accident that left me wheel chair bound into the mx and you get to where I WAS 10 weeks ago..

krist3ng

it's awful, but if I don't check myself, I eat like a crazy person. Like, pizza AND chips AND a cupcake AND ice cream as one meal. Or like 4 bowls of cereal for breakfast.
I think my body reacts in such a way that if I restrict calories, my stomach adjusts and I don't get hungry as often, but if I constantly overindulge I then get hungry more quickly.
Also I have this weird aversion to hunger: weird in that I'll preemptively stuff myself to avoid being hungry.
Luckily I have free will and can control this awfulness. And also luckily I end up dieting every few months, which means I'm not as overweight as I easily could be. Not that yoyoing is good, but it's better than NEVER eating healthy.

Also, not to pull the metabolism card but I have the slowest metabolism ever. I can tell because it takes me like 2 and a half hours for medication to hit me.

jonbobfrog

I was bipolar but didn't know it . . . when *kitten* finally hit the fan and I was hospitalized, I left the hospital with a psychiatrist and a prescription for some meds. What I DIDN'T know was that SSRIs and similar anti-depressant/anti-psychotic/mood stabilizers can make you gain weight. And it took over a year to find a combination that kept me on an even keel versus rapid-cycling. I also went through bouts of serious depression during which I ate my feelings.

Hate to blame medication, but go read the side effects of psychotropic meds . . . it's true.

Vaanja

I was always a chubby kid...when I was born, I was 10lbs3oz. When I was growing up, my extremely emotionally-distant (and also quite overweight) parent only knew two ways to show affection - her amazing meals and shopping. When she wanted to make amends for a particularly stressful week, she either prepared one of her awesome dishes or took my sister and I out for a sumptuous lunch and then out for some good ol' retail therapy. Indulgence food = love.

When I got together with my now-husband, I lost 40 lbs the first year without even trying. Lots of walking every day (we couldn't afford a car), lots of 'herb-induced' raiding of the nearby farmer's market for the best fruits and veggies, lots and lots of awesome...togetherness exercises, heh.

In 2003, I was caught in a housefire where I took 3rd degree burns to 30% of my body - my arms and face took the worst of it. My husband stayed right by my side through all of it - the 5 weeks in the burn unit (2 of those in an induced coma), the months of weakness and recovery. He was awesome, and always loving...but internally I just couldn't accept that a sexy beast like him would stay happy with a scarred up little bullfrog like me. I never showed it (bravado has always been a strong-point), but my self esteem went to *kitten*.

So, I started making myself worthy the only way I knew how - food. I turned to the kitchen to get my esteem back. The way I saw myself, I might be *kitten*-ugly, but I was a kick-*kitten* wife and a helluva cook. Mornings meant super-indulgent migas, or made-from-scratch buttermilk biscuits and sausage gravy, or trays of bacon and eggs and homemade hashbrowns, or kartoffelkuchen. Dinners were from-scratch chicken and dumplings, chicken-fried-steak and mashed potatoes with gravy...and on and on.

My days were spent totally escaping reality, I became a WoW addict for four years....every day was spent sitting on my *kitten*, stressing about raids and mindlessly snacking on whatever was available, topped with tons and tons of flavoured coffee-creamers.

After having a random epiphany in the beginning of September, I quit the game cold turkey and sought psychatric help. As it turns out, I'm not actually manic depressive or bi-polar (as I had been misdiagnosed since my teens). I've got attention deficit disorder - primarily inattentive. After starting my meds, food made me nauseous the first week so I started keeping a food journal just to make sure I was getting a decent base-minimum of food. Seeing a physical log of everything I put in my body made me want to start cleaning up my diet, and my current weight loss (about 28 lbs now) is really a side-effect of adopting a sense of accountability towards towards how I nourish and care for myself.

^ and Jonbobfrog is correct, weight gain is a well-known side effect of many antidepressants.

MJ7910

grad school, then prego... then breastfeeding... then i kept eating the same amount of calories i was when breastfeeding. i think a woman gains a little higher % body fat when pregnant and i hadn't worked it off. i didn't exercise during my pregnancy at all. i was at a stable weight in grad school but it was 10 lb heavier than i liked to be. then after being prego i got back down to that weight while breastfeeding. however, i kept eating horrible stuff when i was done breastfeeding. i would eat like 3 filled donuts for breakfast... 4 kit kats just at night because i wanted to... heavy peanut butter sandwiches, heavy egg salad sandwhiches, lots of regular sodas. on top of that, no exercise.
also i saw what i looked like and for a mintue i resolved myself to "well, this is just what i look like now"
but then in august of this year i said no more. i wanted to look good again. and here i am. 20 lb lighter.

Secret_Agent_007

I got preggo again, and again, and again, and again and again again

I could draw you a picture to demonstrate exactly whats causing that.

Secret_Agent_007

I went from living a travel swim team life style and riding my bike EVERYWHERE to quit swimming, buy a car, chase girls and continue to eat whatever whenever. I got away with it for years when I was super active. Once I stopped, I blew up.