What behaviour/attitude led you down the fat path?

Amberonamission

I have only just rooted out the true cause of why I do this. Thank goodness for my therapist. When I was 9 (and getting a lil chubby, or more accurately growing bewbs and hips early) my Dad looked me in my eyes and said that "no man would ever love me fat". I spent the next 30 years proving him wrong.

Every time I lost weight I'd get to a point where people would start being very weirdly nice to me and I'd get so mad (or freaked) that I'd fail.

I have set up a support system so solid this time that if those feelings should overwhelm me again, I have people to catch me.

GuruOnAMountain

I've always been a bit chubby, even as a kid. My mum is one of those women that believes the way to express love is by feeding her loved ones big portions and often, so I ate far more than I needed as a kid and of course, being a kid, you don't realise. Also, I was the academic sort rather than the sporty sort. I did enjoy kicking a ball around or going out on a bike but my mum was quite protective and would only let me play in my garden and I wasn't allowed to go out cycling without my dad and since he worked shifts, that wasn't very often.

Plus I'm in Scotland so getting outdoors from about September until April isn't very likely as you're more likely to get drenched in rain or up to your knees in snow, so instead I was encouraged to stay in, read, colour in, play musical instruments. I was never a FAT kid, though, but was certainly not a skinny kid.

I'd say that I piled most of the weight on when I was in my final year of my Undergrad. I was doing a lot of work at home in the final few months when classes were over but dissertation hand in was looming and exams were coming up, so I was sedentary, at a desk working and my mum tended to come into my room with food, sweets etc. thinking that she was helping because I was working so hard. Of course, while you're stressed and concentrating on revising or writing, you aren't focussing on how many times your hand goes into the bag of sweets next to you.

My mum also never let us have scales in our house as she was worried my sister and I would become anorexic (little chance of that with me! Lol), so I don't even know what weight I was at that point but I reckon I was probably about 13 and a half stones, or thereabouts. I then joined the Officer Training Corps the next year while doing a Postgrad and was being a lot more active so a lot of that weight started to come off and I got down to about 12 stones before I got seriously into fitness and got down to 11.

I stayed there for a few years until I met my boyfriend and started my PhD. Suddenly I didn't have as much time on my hands between doing the PhD full-time, working two part-time jobs, doing a lot of volunteering at youth projects and at museums and trying to make time for my boyfriend and friends. The gym time fell by the wayside a little bit while I tried to prioritise other things and I crept back up to 12 stones. I started to feel uncomfortable there, though, so I had to take control again.

It has meant giving up a lot of the volunteering I was doing in order to fit in gym time which I feel bad about but there just isn't enough hours in the day to do the PhD, work, volunteer and see my friends and family now and again if I want to fit in gym time as well, so something had to give.

RhonndaJ

I can't speak to why I was fat as a child, but why I regained after losing so much in my early twenties? Mental illness and flat out denial.

The depression/anxiety had me comfort eating every evening and the best food was high fat, for both it was all about that fleeting good feeling that came with the taste. But it was fleeting, so I had to have more and more and more. Part of me knew I was doing this. The other part of me determinedly ignored the awareness.

Which takes me to denial. It's not that I didn't know that I was getting fatter and fatter. I did. But I could still do all the things I wanted to do, mostly, and I convinced myself that I didn't want to do those things I thought that I probably couldn't do with the added weight. And since I didn't see myself as being limited by my weight in any way, why stop?

Except I knew where I was headed. I can remember going for my yearly with my GP and actually wanting them to find something wrong because I thought that somehow that would be what it took to convince me to get my act together. But nothing. Good cholesterol, good BP, no sign of diabetes, nothing except my own usual quirky blood results. Not even the fact that when I took the stress test I couldn't manage even three minutes on the darned treadmill was effective. I was healthy as a horse, just fat.

Even now, the health risks involved with obesity don't click as a viable concern for me. I know they are. Maybe not the BP or the cholesterol or diabetes. But the other ones are there. They just don't seem 'real' to me.

What turned the tide for me if all this didn't? I'm not really certain, but I think it has to do with an unconscious realisation that if I kept going the way I was, it wasn't going to be long before there would be things I'd really want to do, and couldn't.

Edited to add: And I just don't like anyone saying that I can't do something, even if it's my own body.

lacroyx

I was fat all my life. Because I didn't understand even the basics. I never knew anything about BMR, TDEE, calories, sodium, carbs, exercise calories etc.

I'd happily consume coke, sandwiches sit on my *kitten* playing video games for years on end with no exercise.

I actually hated people that ate fruits and vegetables and went to gym and worried about their weight. Non smokers, non drinkers. Non gamers. They were noobs, idiots. Sheeple. People that were vain stuck up fools that only cared about their looks because of propaganda fashion on TV. That was how I actually thought. That was how I got to 300lb. Apathy, ignorance and denial.

If I knew then what I know now. I never would have got that big. Now that I understand this stuff, sure I binge sometimes. But generally I'm trending toward massive weight loss. And I know in 4-8 months I will reach my goal and go beyond that.

I got on my old mountain bike and vowed to ride that b*tch out until the wheels fall off ❤ lol

I wish I was that mountain bike.

Same for me just minus the "I hate people that go to the gym/eat veggies/etc etc." part. I messed up my back in my early 20's and it was pretty much down hill from there. PC/Video games all day, everyday along with fast food and soda pop for all of my meals. No physical activity at all. I avoided it completely since it hurt my back. I did a 180 and changed when I found out I had diabetes type II Dec. 2009.

Alma_Sana

Emotional binge eating and fast food. Now I'm starting to feel my feelings instead of eat them lol

drusilla126

I worked morning radio. That and emotional eating. Eating when I was bored. Yup it was a never ending cycle of bad...until I got fired and then life got better.

Griannee

I ate unhealthy things when I felt like ****, which was a lot of the time. With my mental illness I had a bad relationship with food too. I've always been heavier, but not overweight like I am now. A lot of the weight I put on was cause of meds or the meds that made me hungry like mad.

I'm finally losing weight cause I want to be healthy. I want to have children in a few years and am scared that I won't be able to if I don't take better care of my body.

rml_16

I've never been that heavy. At my highest, I was a size 12. For me, it was a matter of having been naturally thin my entire life. I never had to worry about what I ate and I never had to exercise and I was a size 3. As I aged, though, my metabolic rate slowed down and I started gaining and it was a matter of having to figure out HOW to lose weight and keep it off. If you never had to do it, you don't know what to change.

Thankfully, I figured it out.

steadk

I knew i was bigger than most my age, but i was happy. Then, being fat was a shield so that i wouldnt be hurt any more. Now, its about being here for my little girl and my hubby. I don't want to be this way anymore, but I have to accept where I'm at, if that makes sense. I know it's not going to happen overnight, so why be upset with the progress i've made?
I hope your brother sees that he can be happy and enjoy life without being big.

alpine1994

I was a really skinny kid until my brother was born when I was 9. I noticed that I didn't have to ask for snacks anymore. I could just take them because my mom and stepdad were busy with the baby. A second brother came 3 years later and the trend continued. Also, I would have 2 dinners!! One at the babysitter, and one when I got home. Continue through high school eating pizza and fries for lunch every day, and of course college...and here we are. Looking back, it's crazy that I let myself get that way, and that my mom wasn't trying to teach me better eating habits. She is really tiny and never had a weight problem. I don't blame her at all for anything, but I know good nutrition is something I need to focus on with my future kids.

cpaman87

I was always skinny as a young person. I thought that this could never happen to me. Even as my clothes size became larger I always saw myself as skinny.

sullykat

well, for me, I really like food… a lot. I think I have some emotional eating issues, because even now, when I have a bad day, all I want to do is eat crap; although, I do eat much better during the day, so I have calories left over for those nights. I also know how to limit myself these days. Also, I never really took the time to learn about why things are bad (I knew they were "bad", but didn't care to understand it), so I ate lots of carbs and fried things, but would throw in healthy food on top of it, so my calories were out of control! (like, I would have a burger and fries, but think, "oh I need something more healthy" so I would have a salad, too). It started out with, "oh, I havent had any fried things this week, so its, ok to have today", then it was "I havent had any fried things today", and at my highest weight, it was "I had fries earlier, but I dont really care…"

mrtoaster

bump