What age did you start struggling with weight?

6. I owe it to my older brother being a taunting douche-canoe.

Probably around 10. I started gaining weight and was obese in middle and early high school. Lost the weight after that

I didn't gain weight out of my normal weight range until I was 20. I was diagnosed with PCOS after many hormonal issues and gained 30 lbs over a short period of time. Before I could lose that 30 lbs, I ended up getting pregnant that next year and gained almost 50 lbs in that pregnancy. I lost about 30 lbs after that pregnancy, but gained it back over the course of a few years. I then got pregnant with my 2nd child in 2012 and at that point was still 80 lbs overweight. I got my butt in gear in 2013 and lost 30lbs, but ended up in the hospital with bad pneumonia. That kind of killed my motivation because of the long recovery I had from that. I got all the way to 120lbs over weight by this past May. That is the heaviest I have ever been and was the point where I chose to change. I have lost 20lbs so far

I started gaining weight at age 39-40, I don't know what the F happened! I was slim through childhood and all through adult hood and was blissfully unaware of calories and portion control, I gained over 50lbs with my first pregnancy which fell off in a few months with zero change or effort on my part.
I'm now being punished for all those years of eating whatever i wanted with no consequence lol jk..

At around the age of fourteen. I don't know what happened. I don't recall suddenly eating more food. I was never a skinny kid but I wasn't fat either. Just normal. My parents weren't overweight. Meals were home cooked rather than convenience or processed food. Over a year, perhaps even less, I put on a lot of weight. Then the diets started and then I did start to secretly eat because I felt hungry but didn't feel I could eat more food openly. I relaxed about food when I got to college and didn't try any more faddy diets. During my adult life I've tended to stay at about 190 pounds, whether watching my intake or not. It seems to be my natural resting point. I was worried about gaining more weight when I quit smoking last year, which is why I joined MFP.

I don't think I "struggled". I slowly gained weight from birth until I was in my 30s. One day the scale showed a number I didn't like and I thought: I'd better learn to eat in a way that makes it easier to get to and then maintain a healthy weight. So I overhauled how I approached eating. I've been maintaining +-5 for 14 or so years.

Not until 50 or so. I've never been overweight by the chart standards, but coming from a family of overweight women I was always careful of my diet and exercise and managed to stay in the mid range of my BMI at about 140-145 at 5'9" my entire adult life. Maybe not in the healthiest ways as I'm trying to do now, but that's another story.
At around 50, building a business had me sitting at a computer 12 hours a day for about 2 years causing me to put on 15-20 lbs. I became sedentary plus stress ate those 2 years. Now I'm struggling a bit to take it off. That plus maybe menopause has it made it harder than it was in the past to lose the weight. But I know I'll get there. 10 lbs to go!!

Mid 30s... I was always skinny before that. I went from not eating because of stress to eating when I became stressed.

When and since I was 2 years old, I have weighed more than my brother. He's always been trim. I've always, since I was 2, been heavier than he. Most of those years, I weighed 100 or more lb than he. Right now, it's maybe a 40 lb difference.

At the end of 8th grade, which is when I stupidly decided to starve myself for the entire summer.

Edit: 8th grade is when I thought I looked fat, but I wasn't actually overweight. I didn't get into the overweight category until 18, but that was only by 10 pounds. Lots of body image issues before than though

When i was 10. Looking back at pictures, I was never over weight, I wasnt skinny though. My mom made sure I knew I wasn't skinny because everyone else in our family was skinny. That started my life long battle relationship with food and my distorted body image.

When I was 23, I had a major surgery and couldn't exercise for a couple months ... and then we started packing up to move 2 provinces away. As soon as I could, after the surgery, I was back in the gym training with my bodybuilding coach and also cycling ... but it just wasn't quite enough, what with all the time spent packing + convenience food.

When we arrived in our new home, 5 months after the surgery, one of the first things we did was to sign up with a local gym. I stepped on the scale ... and discovered I had just stepped into the overweight category for the first time in my life.

I immediately dropped about 25 lbs and stayed there for several years, and then increased my cycling and dropped another 20-25 lbs and stayed there for years. There were some minor ups and downs, of course, but nothing significant.


When I was 42, I moved to Australia, developed DVT on the flight over (ended up in hospital for 2 weeks), and had to adjust to living in a cabin completely off the grid for a year ... as well as dealing with energy-draining warfarin. I was exercising and trying to eat a decent diet, but just couldn't get up the energy to do as much as I would have liked. For the second time in my life, I stepped over the border into the overweight category.

Then another move into a small town at the end of the year, off the warfarin, and I started increasing my exercise again. When I was 44, I lost the weight and dropped back to normal. I also took on the 7 Peaks Challenge ... a cycling challenge in Victoria where you do 7 climbing events. I needed to be lighter for that!

When I was 45, my husband and I packed everything into storage and set off for an 8-month RTW tour. Lots of cycling and walking, but so much good food! And yeah, some weight gain ... back into the overweight category. We ended up in Canada with my family for a month over Christmas, joined a gym, and lost the weight ... back to normal. The 2 weeks cycling and swimming in Western Australia after that helped too.

Then we had an unsettled couple years ... several moves, some health issues ... and back into the overweight category. This time, I hit the highest weight I've ever been after a pair of surgeries in January 2015.

February 2015, I joined MFP ... and 8 months later I had dropped 25 kg/55 lbs into the lower half my normal BMI range. I'm right back down to the weight I was in about 2004 and also my high school weight!


So in answer to the question ... what age did I start to struggle with my weight? It's never really been a struggle, but it was at about mid-42 when I started hovering around the high normal/low overweight range.

I was always an average sized child growing up. My weight issues began after I had my first child. I gained about 40 lbs during my pregnancy and probably lost maybe 10 lbs. Then my second pregnancy I gained another 20. The first couple of years in my house, I added on more weight. All I know is when I thought about it, I had put on about 100 lbs since having my first son. I knew I needed to lose weight and I began working out but that lasted a week or two. Starting then stopping. I didn't like what I've become but at the same time, I became comfortable in my own skin. I finally got to the point of being sick and tired of looking and feeling like this and made up in my mind that I need to do this before I let anymore time slip by. 60 lbs down and I'm more than halfway there.

Around 10ish? My parents always bought junk food from the store and rarely cooked healthy food, we mostly ordered out or got pizza. I'd been overweight pretty much my entire life, and it was only a few years ago that I finally got down to a healthy weight for me. I'm 25 now, heaviest was 161 lbs and current weight is 106. c:

I was 32 when I started having weight issues. I was trying to get pregnant and had to take a lot of fertility medication. The medication messed with my hormones and did a number on me. I had gained 60 lbs. and it has been a struggle to get the weight off. 5 years later I am still working at it. It has brought on a lot of depression and self struggle. I have never been this overweight. I am over 200 lbs now and I just want to drop the weight. I want to be comfortable again. I can't even bring myself to wear a bathing suit to enjoy time with my daughter in our pool. I feel like breaking down every time I look in the mirror.