Why was I overweight?

Despite what you might remember, or WHAT you were eating, you must've been eating more calories than your body needed to sustain a healthy weight.

And it would be beneficial to pick nutrition and exercise goals that you can maintain after you reach your goal weight.

Have you tried inputting what you used to eat on a typical day into MFP to see what calories you were consuming? You need to be completely honest with yourself.
Perhaps your portion sizes are too big? Perhaps you've been eating something that is high in calories without realising. Honest logging of food can be a real eye opener!

It's great that you are trying to do something to get healthier but please be careful not to restrict yourself too much. What you'll learn from being on here is that you don't need to 'diet'. You can just make changes to your current diet to lose weight. I don't know about you but if I was only eating fruit, veg and nuts I'd get fed up of that really quickly (as well as possibly making myself ill?) and go back to old habits.

You can eat 'normal' food and still lose weight as long as you are eating less calories than you burn. I've lost 75lbs since January and not given up any of the foods I love! I've eaten less of them, and I plan when I'm going to have them, but I've still been drinking wine, eating curry/fish and chips/pizza/chocolate. Today I ate an amazing chocolate eclair and enjoyed every bite of it. I still expect to lose at the end of the week. The difference is, I used to eat all those things too often without thinking about them!

Exercise is important for a healthy body, but try to focus mainly on your food. As far as exercise goes, try to find something that you enjoy and that you can easily incorporate into your life so you can continue it even when you do reach your weight goal.

Good luck with your weight loss - you'll get lots of helpful advice here!

Just picking healthier foods does not guarantee you will be at a healthy weight. You can still end up eating too much. Not all fruits and veggies are low calorie. Nuts tend to also be calorie dense.

Unless you have a medical condition like PCOS or hypothyroidism, my guess is that even though you were making healthy choices you were still eating slightly more than your body needs.

If you like what you are doing then keep going. It isn't necessary to cut out food groups but if you don't have a problem with it and think it will be sustainable, then go for it.

You mentioned that at one point you were 5'3 and 156 lbs. In some cases, that is okay, depending on your body type, shape, frame, bone/muscle size. For me, I'm 5'2ish and my goal weight is 165 lbs. I have big legs, big arms and big bones but at 165 lbs, I can easily fit into a size 6-8. My point is, consider your body type, as everyone who is 5'3 is not meant to weigh 115-120 pounds.

Also, it sounds like you're doing the Daniel Diet (eating nothing but fruits, vegetables and grains) which is a totally unrealistic way to lose weight. Trust me, I've done it twice and each time the weight came back. I'd suggest a more realistic weight loss plan that allows you to incorporate some of your favorite foods.

Unless you have a legit medical reason, you were overweight because you ate too many calories over maintenance.

motivatedgirljess wrote: »

I don't know if this is the right place to ask this question but here it is...
I have always been chubby since I was little. I rarely over ate or even had junk food very often. I don't even like pop and I always drink tons of water. Never really cared for sweets or candies much. The thing is... as long as I can remember I have always been insecure about my weight. At one point I was about 156pounds and only 5'3". I know that's not too terrible or a good weight either but the thing is I was never eating badly. I never did sports but I was always moderetly active. I've changed my diet completely (eating ONLY fruit and vegetables, nuts ect...(NO oils) and have been doing a lot of excersize and the weight is coming off! My question is why was I ever overweight? When I start lowering my excersizes (when I reach my goal weight) will I start gaining weight again? Do I naturally just have a slow metabolism..? Will I forever have to be deiting to maintein my weight..?
Has anyone else had a similar expirience?

For clarification:
I make sure that I get proteins, carbs, and fats I just make sure that they only come from foods that naturally have them. What I mean is that I eat foods that are natural e.g. oatmeal for carbs (without adding sugar (fruits naturally have them). Nuts (protein)... so on... I'm just not eating things like pasta ect... I make sure that I am eating healthy not just a crazy diet. I feel great and have much more energy.

Can I ask you why you would reduce your exercise once you reach your goal weight, whatever that is? This, plus relaxing on tracking food or paying attention to what we are eating is some of the reason why we gain back/become overweight again.

I'm confused, you say you rarely ate junk food in the past but are now only eating healthy. Those seem to contradict each other since usually people think "junk" food is unhealthy food.

You obviously were overeating in the past. Maybe not a massive amounts every day, but enough to keep you gaining weight over time, especially if 156 was your highest weight. Doesn't matter the source of calories, how "natural" or "healthy" the food may be, you eat too many and you will gain weight.

ETA: I was overweight as a child as long as I can remember. My mom doesn't eat red meat so we always ate lean meat (turkey, chicken and some seafood) at home, we didn't keep cookies, sweets, etc in the house, always had veggies as part of the meal, only had diet soda in the house but I still was overweight. I overate though to gain weight even though on the surface I was eating what you would think of as "healthy".

motivatedgirljess wrote: »

adowe wrote: »

motivatedgirljess wrote: »

brower47 wrote: »

motivatedgirljess wrote: »

I don't know if this is the right place to ask this question but here it is...
I have always been chubby since I was little. I never over ate or even had junk food very often. I don't even like pop and I always drink tons of water. Never really cared for sweets or candies much. The thing is... as long as I can remember I have always been insecure about my weight. At one point I was about 156pounds and only 5'3". I know that's not too terrible or a good weight either but the thing is I was never eating badly. I never did sports but I was always moderetly active. I've changed my diet completely (eating ONLY fruit and vegetables, nuts ect...(NO oils) and have been doing a lot of excersize and the weight is coming off! My question is why was I ever overweight? When I start lowering my excersizes (when I reach my goal weight) will I start gaining weight again? Do I naturally just have a slow metabolism..? Will I forever have to be deiting to maintein my weight..?
Has anyone else had a similar expirience?

For clarification:
I make sure that I get proteins, carbs, and fats I just make sure that they only come from foods that naturally have them. What I mean is that I eat foods that are natural e.g. oatmeal for carbs (without adding sugar (fruits naturally have them). Nuts (protein)... so on... I'm just not eating things like pasta ect... I make sure that I am eating healthy not just a crazy diet. I feel great and have much more energy.

In the absence of a medical condition, the bolded portion is patently false. You've consistently eaten enough calories to maintain or gain your weight. Eat fewer calories than your body uses and you will lose weight.

Uuups! Sorry I meant to say "I almost never over ate". Sorry about the confusion... editing that right now...

How do you know? did you weigh and measure everything you ate?
Only way to put on weight, get fat, become overweight is by overeating, eating too much. Pending medical conditions.

I guess I really can't be sure because I did not measure it but I ate relatively little compared to the rest of my family/friends. To the point people would comment on it.

They didn't see what you ate 100% of the time. What they saw you eat was not all of what you ate.

Also, the calories you eat care not what family and friends eat themselves or see you eat. If you eat more than your body can use, it will store it for use later, even if it's only 50 calories over, it will store it. 50 calories is a bite of candy bar/burger/enter small amount of many foods here. That won't look like much to family and friends but it's what will tip the scales.

jessyjordan567 wrote: »

To have a completely healthy lifestyle, you should begin with cutting out on all unhealthy foods. These include: fried food, chocolates, alcohol, aerated drinks, processed foods, packaged foods (like potato chips, etc.), sherbets, jams, pickles, butter, cheese, sugar, jaggery, ghee, smoking, ice cream, cakes, biscuits – with or without cream, packaged fruit juice. Here are some unhealthy foods which you thought were healthy, but are not.

Why would you need to cut these out when you can enjoy them in moderation and still lead a healthy lifestyle? I have ice cream at least three times a week and cheese all the time and I've lost 50 pounds.

OP, when you aren't paying attention to what you're eating, you don't realize that you're eating more than you need. You can still overeat and gain on those foods.

motivatedgirljess wrote: »

I make sure that I get proteins, carbs, and fats I just make sure that they only come from foods that naturally have them.

Naturally, smaturally, big poop.

It does not matter much WHERE the calories come from. You can eat lots of stone ground organic oatmeal and look like a Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade balloon.

Calculate your TDEE (search for it, not difficult to calculate)
Track all input for a week, then open your diary and see if the daily intake is above or below the daily TDEE.

Then come back and post the result.