What caused you to become overweight (apart from eating)

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  • samantha1242
    samantha1242 Posts: 816 Member
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    Partying like a rockstar everynight and working at a pub/nightclub for years. Depression. Me, I caused myself to be come overweight.
  • tndejong
    tndejong Posts: 463
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    mine was all eating. think of everyday life. we "treat" ourselves with food. when were happy we eat. depressed we eat. you go to a party, birthday party, wedding reception, etc. food is everywhere! when you dont feel like cooking, you get fast food and take out. when you and your spouse want to celebrate, well, they take you to dinner. we focus life on food!

    most of my weight was working second shift at a machine shop. i did not pack lunches. i would stop and get fast food before work or at lunch during my shifts. our pop machine at work had no diet pop. so i would chug mountain dew like crazy. they guys ordered pizza and other high calorie items. i would make and bring in cookies and things cause i felt bad for them. then i would eat that stuff too.

    after that, my fiance got cancer. when he would get cravings, i would get or make anything he wanted. when he was in the hospital, i would stop a lot and get stuff. i would try to juggle him and work. so i would also get high calorie energy drinks and eat a couple cheese burgers from mcdonalds and places like that. i would easy eat 1000 calories or more a meal. but the burgers were a dollar and i did not have to make them.

    i had to quit my job and take care of him a few months. so i did cook a lot at home. but i would not watch what i was making. i thought cause i cut out the fast food that i would lose a little. so wrong! i would make breakfast, lunch, and dinner. and not the most healthy choices. bus quits and gravy and then sandwiches and chips.. then dinner.. desserts too sometimes.. so well well over 2000-3000 calories a day. and doing all this with no extra exercise and not working.

    its so easy to lose track of that stuff until you come on here and see just how much damage you can do!
  • JOYOUS62
    JOYOUS62 Posts: 104 Member
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    Comfort eating when I stopped smoking
  • nokanjaijo
    nokanjaijo Posts: 466 Member
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    Comfort eating when I stopped smoking

    You and me, both.
  • redman1740
    redman1740 Posts: 13 Member
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    I come from a eating family. Everything we do revolves around eating unhealthy foods. Early last year as part of a 40 day challenge I went on a vegan diet, lost weight and my cholestrol levels were great. Slowly my family tempted me with their numerous family eat togethers and within 3 months I was back to my old ways of eating. My family likes to have eat togethers at least once a week and will become angry if I don't participate. On 1/1/2013 I decided to do something about my weight, back pain, shortness of breath and eat right. I'm down about 20lbs so far and let's just say I haven't seen my family a lot this year. They think its "stupid" because I'm making healthy eating choices but the more I'm not around them, the better I eat and feel. I have some friends that support me and a great deal of others that don't. Same with co-workers. People were my cause of my being overweight but I have learned to take responsibility for my weight and do something about it. If someone doesn't support my cause, then I don't need to be around that person, be it family, close friend, neighbor, etc. That's my story
  • pkw58
    pkw58 Posts: 2,038 Member
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    I think I came into this world in the late 50's and grew up in a time when all the modern conveniences were just starting to come into our lifes. TV, TV Dinners, foods from space that have long storage lifes, you name it, it was the rage.

    I think the main contributor to my lifestyle before I adopted my new one in December 2011 was that you were either an athelete or a "non exerciser" in junior high/high school. I even wrote a letter to Michelle Obama about it. Yoga, Barre, walking, light weight lifting, ---those are the things that should be part of junior high and high school phys ed in the USA. Maybe fun runs like 1k and 5ks every friday - nutrition diaries and monitoring stress tests. Not sure why we all got thrown into yucky games of dodge ball and relays where there was always a "loser".

    Even line dancing would be better than Dodge Ball. I was a band person so I got out of phys ed in in High School - sadly, a little conditioning would have helped my music playing!
  • delonda1
    delonda1 Posts: 525 Member
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    no one telling me I was getting bigger. so i never realized it until one day the mirror looked back and almost broke hahaha
  • tanyaslosingit
    tanyaslosingit Posts: 178 Member
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    My weight gain can be attributed to: depression (which created a vicious Catch-22 with weight), ignorance (I did not know/understand the nature of the foods I was putting into my body or the physical impact it was having on me), a highly sedentary lifestyle, stubbornness (a false sense that I could carry the weight well) and a changing/slowing metabolism owing to motherhood and middle age. I also had a warped sense of time and immortality: that my weight issue wasn't immediate and that I could take care of it later!
  • lozla86
    lozla86 Posts: 77
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    Having a really bad relationship with food when i was in my teens and when i got married i ate the same portions as my husband but then i the past 14 months i had 3 miscarrages so eat out of comfort to cope with the losses and the pain. Still strugerling now but hoping that with time it will get better. Please feel free to add me i log every day x
  • triciab79
    triciab79 Posts: 1,713 Member
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    My own inability to distinguish food from happiness. I saw food as more than it was. To me it was comfort in sad times, courage when I was nervous in a crowd, distraction when I was bored, reward when I needed to celebrate, a friend when I was alone. In reality it is none of those things, it is only fuel. I had to fill those gaps with other things.
  • DarrelBirkett
    DarrelBirkett Posts: 221 Member
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    Beer
    Love of danish pastries & full fat milky coffee
    Desk job
    Being lazy
    Chocolates
    More beer.

    I still have the odd pint, drink black coffee, still sit on my *kitten* all day at work but now go to the gym most mornings beforehand, still have the odd chocolate or odd danish but these things are infrequent instead of the norm. Was really just about breaking habits and creating new ones.
  • mygrl4meee
    mygrl4meee Posts: 943 Member
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    I ate out of boredom and a lot of emotional eating to feel better when I was sad or mad about something. Also just not a lot of planning meals when I went to work. Way too much fast food.
  • _SABOTEUR_
    _SABOTEUR_ Posts: 6,833 Member
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    My love affair with takeout food and inability to apply moderation.
  • CFAITH_WARD
    CFAITH_WARD Posts: 281 Member
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    Well I moved back home to WV from CA where the way of life is very different...Don't get me I love WV but we are just not outside as much as I was in CA and I think I need non-lazy friends. I lost 40 lbs a couple years ago but through change in job schedule and also depression from a miscarriage.... I gained it all back and then some....I am now ready to FIGHT FOR MY SELF!
  • Azexas
    Azexas Posts: 4,334 Member
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    I played a lot of sports in high school and stayed very active. I got to college and stopped sports because I couldn't find balance between practice and studying. I also found nursing school to be extremely stressful. So my weight shot up... instead of the freshamn 15 I gained the freshman 30.:grumble:
  • HotrodsGirl0107
    HotrodsGirl0107 Posts: 243 Member
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    Apart from eating I would say I became obese because I was a lazy couch potato with a rather inactive lifestyle. There were no medical reasons or prescriptions that would have caused it.
  • patty1138
    patty1138 Posts: 196 Member
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    Bump
  • jrbb03092
    jrbb03092 Posts: 198 Member
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    Dieting.

    I had such a messed up opinion of my weight and body when I was in my teens/early 20s that I thought I was fat when I wasn't (5'8" and 120 pounds) and every time I dieted to get lower, I'd end up binging and gaining a few pounds when I went off the diet. Add to that, going from being a fairly active athlete to a desk job in a office and a few pounds each year became 90 (from that original weight) over 20 years.

    Gah. I look back now and I could just kick myself. That said, I never had a very healthy relationship with food - my mum was always dieting - and although I'm still heavy and working on working out my own issues, at least I have managed not to pass this on to my daughter. She's a normal weight with a very good sense of self. She's vegetarian, very adventurous food-wise and has no problems with portion control. Yay!
  • llkilgore
    llkilgore Posts: 1,169 Member
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    I think I came into this world in the late 50's and grew up in a time when all the modern conveniences were just starting to come into our lifes. TV, TV Dinners, foods from space that have long storage lifes, you name it, it was the rage.

    You missed the big one for those of us who grew up in the South: air conditioning. When I was a young child we spent a lot of time outside during the summer, even in the hottest of weather. But it was a time when air conditioning was still rare enough that local businesses that had it thought that fact was worth featuring in their advertising. For some reason, my parents quickly got out of the habit of taking us to the swimming pool just about every afternoon after having central air installed when I was around 12. By the time I reached adulthood it had well and truly crossed the line between luxury and necessity and you din't see a lot of kids playing outside anymore.

    About the TV dinners: I can date the beginning of my weight gain in part to the day I realized that some of the modern equivalents to the TV dinners we baby boomers ate as kids now contain grown up things like artichoke hearts.
  • afia233
    afia233 Posts: 47 Member
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    Ive never been overweight (thank god) although its fascinating reading this thread....

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