I still struggle with body image issues occasionally- I wish I could be better at it because my brain knows better- but my emotions they lie to me. But for the most part- I'm wildly happy with what I'm doing with my body.

June 8th will be my first power lifting meet.

Great story! (And everyone's stories are great!) Yes, I also struggle with body image issues and emotions. It's difficult when your emotions (and brain sometimes) can play tricks on you. I try to just keep moving in the same positive direction and commit to goals that I know are good for me.

And good luck with your first power lifting meet!

My story still feels pretty near its beginning to me, but I’ll give it a go anyway.

As a young child in California, I was pretty active and happy. I lived with my grandparents & my eating habits were good, since I wasn’t terribly responsible for what I consumed & when. Later in elementary school, I moved north to Washington with my mom. Totally different climate (cold & rainy! Yuck!) & different living environment than what I had been used to (I was suddenly stuck in a small apt. living w/ my single mother). I stopped playing outside & without anyone really making sure that I ate healthily, I became a fat kid.

This continued through middle school & most of high school. I hated my body, but didn’t know how to change it. I had no muscle mass & it was really hard for me to complete basic physical tasks that required any sort of strength. I lost a little weight at the end of high school, but still wasn’t happy with my body.

My sophomore year of college (I’m now a senior, graduating next month!), I got really consumed by the idea of “thinspo” & did a lot of severe calorie restriction & liquid fasting. I went from ~145 lbs (at about 5’4) to 105 lbs, but still wasn’t happy. At this point, my now long-term boyfriend did an intervention & I started back on the road to recovery. Starting with a lot of body weight strength training, I gradually built muscle mass & discovered what it was like to be able to open a bottle for myself, or unscrew something without having to ask for help. Eventually, I started lifting, & I’ve been at it for about 6 months & am really enjoying the challenge. I’ve gained over 10 lbs since my lowest ED weight. I feel stronger & healthier now than ever before & I look forward to improving even more.

I love reading these! And what I love even more is that even though all of our stories are different, the common thread is that lifting rocks! For some it helps keep a balance in life, or an outlet, or confidence. It's really cool to get under a barbell and do something more than you did yesterday or last week and I just wish more women would give it a try so they could learn for themselves how much it not only improves your body but your mind too.

I love reading these stories as well and hearing about the positive impacts lifting has had on everyone's lives. I wish someone did an intervention for me a long time ago, instead of me intervening on myself after pretty much all my muscle was gone. But I look at it as better late than never. I think being underweight (although maybe not as detrimental as being overweight) can still have negative health consequences that are often overlooked in today's society.

Yes, that's totally true. I also think that the concept of "thin privilege" can hugely disadvantage people who are not overweight, but have very legitimate health issues, as well as body image issues. Not that thin privilege doesn't exist, but that it perpetuates a mindset that makes it okay to dismiss someone's concerns because they don't fit the "image" of someone who should be allowed to have a problem with their body, whether mental or physical.

These are great! My story isn't too interesting, but here it is nonetheless:

Since high school, I've maintained a weight at the high-ish end of normal for my 5'5" frame. I was 130-135 in HS. I was fairly active, but not with traditional exercise. I was an avid equestrian. Gained pregnancy weight at 20 but lost it. I was working at a horse ranch teaching, training, and taking care of the barn, so it wasn't hard to maintain that 130 lbs. When I decided that lifestyle wasn't for me and quit the horse business and went to college, I gained at least 30 lbs. Working at the horse ranch I was able to eat whatever, whenever I wanted. I didn't change my eating habits, but my exercise sure changed.

I was able to lose the weight by changing a few habits. For many years after that I maintained around 137-143 lbs. Not overweight, but a tad "fluffy". I was never completely unhappy with my figure, but I certainly wasn't happy. I had some brief stints with working out, but always lets them fall to the wayside. I was still active. I belly danced, spun fire, did hooping, some mountain biking, a little running, rode horses, but never counted calories.

It wasn't until I was 35 that I decided I needed to make a conscious, lifelong changes. I found pole and then aerial silks, and made some nice physical changes. It still wasn't enough. I was always trying to lose that last 5 lbs.

I found MFP about a year ago and with it and a change in diet (kicked grain to the curb), I was able to drop to about 127 lbs. I was skinny, but seriously lacking shape in my lower body. So last fall, I started with the weights and haven't looked back.

Currently I'm maintaining around 130 lbs but my body looks better than ever. I'd still like to lose that 5 lbs (125 sounds like such a nice number), and can't seem to shake that mentality. Nor can I shake those lbs.

TBH, I'm not sure how to change the mentality. I'd like to focus on simply improving my strength and physique, but I'm afraid if I let myself maintain, I'll jump back into being "fluffy". I've been pretty happy at this weight--happier than I ever have been anyway.

I don't think my story is all that interesting and/or inspiring but here goes..

I've always been a couch potato my entire life, and I LOVE to eat. As a kid I was normal weight, and in high school I wasn't fat but I wasn't thin either, I had some "chunk" on me you could say lol at 5' 3" and in the 130s. I started taking concerta for my ADD and very quickly dropped down to 117. I felt awesome and I looked so much better, although still sorta soft.

When I was 18 I started playing World of Warcraft (uh oh..lol). In college I did a LOT of that, so much that I would skip class to sleep because I was up all night playing. The first semester of college I stayed around the same weight and I don't remember being significantly heavier until I was about 19 and back in the 130s.

Fast forward a little to when I was around 22 and living with a bad, controlling, and also World of Warcraft addicted boyfriend (who could eat anything and not gain weight). I would easily spend 12-14 hours a day on the computer, an entire bag of cheetos was a great snack and lots of chinese food and pizza with half a liter of soda was common for dinner. I was told to stop wearing makeup (because other guys noticing me was a no-no) and I spent most of the time in sweats as jeans were uncomfortable for me now that I was up to 149 lbs. (Just as a side note, I was later asked if I would please start wearing makeup again - that made me feel real nice.) Basically at that point I didn't care that much what I looked like as long as my WoW character looked good, not to mention I felt like a badass being the leader of a raiding guild..hah.

After really looking at myself in the mirror I decided it was time to change. I stopped drinking sugary stuff and only drank water. I bought fruits and veggies to snack on instead of cheetos (which are amazing, btw) and I started walking every day and using the Wii Fit. In about 6 months I dropped 30 lbs and felt great.

When that relationship ended (thank god!) I moved to florida and was still a couch potato eating mostly what I wanted, but I was more careful and hung around 125. I met my current boyfriend who is an AMAZING person, he is really supportive of whatever my goals are, and he always makes me feel beautiful.

Last year my friend told me about MFP and I started using it to get rid of the last few lbs I didn't like. I set my activity as sedentary because I work a desk job and then literally spend the rest of my time sitting on my *kitten*. It set my calories pretty low, 1310, and I usually didn't eat up to that number. I lost weight pretty fast, going down to about 103. It took me a while to discover the forums, and this group, and I learned so much that I didn't know while losing the weight (like protein, lift heavy, etc.), all I focused on was the calories.

I do think losing that weight has improved my appearance and confidence A LOT, but I wish I had known about retaining LBM sooner, as I still was sorta flabby at that weight.

The past couple of months I've been lifting heavy and I increased my calories (unintentionally - I lost a lot of self control for a while but I'm hoping maybe I gained a teeny bit of muscle in there lol). I'm around 108 right now, and I really am wanting to lower my BF% a little over the summer so that I can try for a REAL bulk in the fall. Ultimately I'm trying to build the booty and have some definition in my stomach that I've never had in my life.

Still have a ton of work to do, but now I feel like I have the information I need to make progress. I get discouraged a lot, most recently because I haven't been to the gym in 2 weeks due to being sick, but I just have to keep telling myself to keep going, don't quit just because of a bump in the road.

Ladies, ladies, ladies…

ALL OF YOUR STORIES ARE INTERESTING!!!

For real. I'm serious. I loved reading about how we all got to this point! Every. Single. One. of you are inspiring. Thank you for sharing! :flowerforyou:

Until age 11: I was a fat kid. Not unhealthy, I ate well and enjoyed physical activity but the quantities of food were just too much.

Age 11: I developed some kind of issue whereby I refused to swallow any solids. Possibly an early sign of my dairy and gluten issues (I complained of my throat closing up), possibly a psychological issue. I lost a ton of weight extremely quickly, while continuing to play hockey, lacrosse and tennis. I was underweight - the skinny kid - although I didn't realise it. Once I started eating again, I bounced up to a weight of around 56kg, which was perfect for my 5'1 muscular frame. Took up crew, and was always self-conscious of being weighed as the cox.

Age 14-16: Two big knee operations stopped me from exercising, but I didn't change the way I ate, and I gained weight.

Age 16: I went to boarding school and was deeply unhappy. The school was designed around a pro-sport mentality, and with my botched knee I couldn't participate in anything. I ate more than anyone else though, and ended up around 70kg.

Age 19: Taking a year out after school to live at home helped my weight slowly go back to a more acceptable level, and when I started university I was around 60kg. Up to this point I had never weighed myself, counted a calorie, or made an association between weight, calories, food and exercise.

Age 21: In my 2nd year of university as a violin performance major, I developed a wrist injury which stopped me from practicing for 6 weeks. Violin was my world, and having it taken away was awful since I had nothing to take its place. My life was empty. I decided to lose weight, since I'd never in my life felt at an acceptably low-enough weight. Bought 30 day shred and an elliptical, started eating 1200 calories as per MFP recommendations, and my starting weight of 64kg began to drop quickly. Too quickly.

Age 22: I developed anorexia as my weight loss spiralled out of control. I could blame a bad relationship, issues in my past, whatever...it doesn't matter for the purpose of this post. I lost on average 3lb/week for a good long while. I wont describe my disease here, but it was fairly typical in many ways. I got into treatment, but ended up at 42kg. My heart stopped. I got osteoporosis. I dropped out of college. I decided to recover...

Age 23-24: Slow and steady weight gain which became a bulk. Every time I set a new 'maximum' weight for my recovery/bulk, I hit it and just carried on. Mostly done without counting calories. So far I am up 16kg. I've maintained a body fat % below 20% the whole time, and lifted 5+ days per week (with running occasionally featuring too). Right now I am trying to keep between 55-60kg. I still don't completely feel at home in my body, but I do like it, and it's very good at doing things I want it to do. I treat it well. I started weighing myself occasionally, usually once a month, and sometimes counting calories, to try and keep in my weight class for powerlifting and explore the idea that the scale and calories are not always a route to anorexia. I'm still nervous about weighing 'so much', and scared that I wont ever stop gaining weight. I'm scared to turn back into the fat kid that I spent most of my life being, and that I can't lose weight because I have a fear of hunger due to anorexia. But basically, things are good, and I'm learning all the time. I will never try to do anything unsustainable to my body, including going on stage, getting 6 pack abs etc, because I value having my health and fertility back way too much