What was your wake-up call to lose weight?

My wake up call happened a few years ago when i was wearing a tank top and some shorts and i thought i looked good. The my cousin asked me " Are you going to have a baby?" So then i had to explain that at 15 i was not pregnant. I was just fat. But then i didnt do anything and stayed fat until 2 things happened in the same day. I got the wii fit and it told me i was obese. Not over weight or even chunky. But obese. I was not happy. Then my 6 year old cousin told me the my belly jiggles an awful lot. " My belly doesnt jiggle. See sam? But yours does whenever you move" Thanks kid. So now i am eating better and moving more.

I knew roughly how much I weighed, and it didn't bother me before. I thought I looked okay; not terribly sexy, but not monstrous either. I didn't think being overweight by 50-60lbs was a big deal for someone my height (5' 1.5"). When I looked at photos of myself, I noticed I looked much bigger in photos than I do in the mirror... I figured it was just a bad angle. Didn't think I looked as bad in real life.

Oh, how wrong I was.

This is almost exactly how I realized it too! Also, I carried my extra weight surprisingly well (curves in the best places possible, but still not very healthy looking), and my husband loved me so much, he didn't really notice either.

p.s. I love your Alaskan Malamute picture! My family used to raise them It's always humbling to own a dog that's bigger and smarter than you!

Grew up in a diabetic family and vowed to always control what I eat so I would never have to stick a needle in to my stomach to live. Ended up living most of my life in an anorexic state, my fear of needles is so bad. At one point, something in my body changed and I began to gain some healthy weight. Felt better, clothes fit better and my husband loved that he had something to hold on to that wasn't so bony.

This year, it changed again. I began to get extremely tired and the weight that I had maintained so nicely began to become an issue. I could go two days with low, low calorie intake and yet gain 2 lbs. Finally ended up in emerg one night when we thought I had pnemonia. Tests showed no but that something was completely out of wack in my body. My thyroid had shut down and was hypo. I've been on meds now for two months, switched from hypo to hyper and stopped gaining. I was also diagnosed as "pre-diabetic". Put on a high fiber, low sugar diet and I've lost 4 pounds in the last two weeks so far. My goal is to lose 18 pounds (now 14). My doctor only wanted me to get my sugar under control and to eat a more balanced diet. I also have extreme food allergies and don't eat red meat, so a balanced diet was a bit of a challenge. I also have to eat at set intervals, instead of when I'm hungry.

Determined to not have to become diabetic. I'll do anything to avoid the needles!

I'm not sure if I'd call them 'wake up calls'....but here's a couple of serious OUCH moments....

-being picked very last for P.E.
-freshman year of highschool we had a blood pressure monitor in Health class, and I was pretty much the only one with mildly high blood pressure
-catching myself being hostile/jealous towards every skinny person I see, or obsessively attempting to find out what exactly their 'secret' is for being that way
-being too lazy to do things I use to love
-being almost kicked off the soccer team since I was too lazy to go to practices
-seeing a video of me at the beach looking fat in my shorts and tank top because I'm way too humiliated to go in a bikini
-me working out a little bit, then being closely scrutinized by my mom and having her say, "well, at least you look better than you had in Mexico' (a few months earlier on vacation...I didn't know I looked THAT bad)
-grandmother asking me if I did any sports, and when I said 'no' she was like 'well that explains it! Exercise!'
-my best friend telling me I'm squishy and constantly using me as a pillow
-my mom saying it hurts her to look at me
-realizing that the reason there's hardly any pictures of me smiling is because I'm too busy sucking in my cheeks so my face doesn't look so round
-a friend telling me that none of my Facebook pictures actually show my face without them being brightened beyond recognition
-showering without the bathroom light on
-walking by the reflective mall windows
-realizing that sucking in my gut 24/7 has been completely normal for me
-avoiding well lit mirrors or even freaking windows at all cost
-going emo just so because the dark clothes are 'slimming'
-running a straight mile is impossible for me, and people at my school laughed at other people who could only manage an 8 minute mile

At only 10-15 pounds "overweight" I thought I looked *OKAY* but not great, and wasn't super motivated to get into shape, but I joined a gym. A trainer took my measurements, weighed me, and determined my body fat (which was 32%) and told me that I was carrying around 60 pounds of fat on my frame. That's almost one-third of my entire body. And, sad to say, that was when I was 187.5 over the summer. School during the summer kicked my *kitten* and I gained 9.5 pounds (mostly water/booze weight), but I'm almost down to where I should have started in June.

That really motivated me to focus less on the *weight* aspect of my health and more on the *fitness* part. I'd rather be 170 pounds and super muscular than weigh less with no muscle at all.

My wake up call was the fact that I was almost 183 lbs and I felt disgusting. I was depressed, sad, unmotivated, angry. My 'fat' pants were getting too tight. I could go on. I watched a documentary called Sick, Fat and Nearly Dead about doing a juicing fast and the message of the movie just really motivated me to make a change. I felt like Phil from the documentary (although 250 lbs lighter then him). He committed to a changes in his lifestyle, lost 200lbs and was a completely different person. He was happy, proud, motivated, whereas before his committment he was waiting to die. His turnaround mentally and physically moved me to change my ways. I am not juice fasting but I am eating all raw foods and juicing 2/3 of what I consume. I have lost 30 lbs and I feel like myself again. I am happy.

p.s. I love your Alaskan Malamute picture! My family used to raise them It's always humbling to own a dog that's bigger and smarter than you!

Hehe! This particular malamute is actually pretty simple (has VERY good memory, but not particularly analytical or creative). My previous malamutes were definitely super smart and cunning, however. It's what I love the most about this breed... They're smart, but more like "dumb humans" than "intelligent dogs." :laugh:

I was always big and wanted to lose weight but never had someone holding me accountable and keeping track of it. I got married in 2009 and I look so huge in that white dress in my photos, best day of my life and I was 140 lbs. Not too long after that I got pregnant and ended up miscarrying. I was devastated and the next year I was determined to lose weight and I started 2010 off great then I receded back into old habits and then August of last year I went to the doctor over a condition that I was having and walked out finding out I have type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and if I want to ever have children, I have to get off the medications and lose about 60 lbs. That was my wake up call. I want children so badly, but not if I am going to put their lives at risk. Before beginning MFP I lost about 10 lbs, and decided to crack down harder and my friend mentioned this app/site. I started and have lost another 10 since July and I am going to keep it off for good! I don't think I am ever going to retire the help and support of the site.

It was a few nudges in the right direction. I got married in July and seeing the wedding pictures and my double chin made me want to vomit. When we went on our honeymoon, we had signed up for zip lining in Belize City as one of our excursions. The weight limit was 250 lbs and I told myself, "There is no way you weigh that much so don't worry about it." The day before, I got cold feet so I hopped on the scale at the gym on the ship and it said 270. I wanted to cry. I slunk over to my new husband and told him to go without me. He said he wouldn't leave me because it was our honeymoon. I felt like such a tool. The shame and embarrassment were just too much. Of course, when we got home, we got back into our routine and I pushed the shame as far back as it would go. I went to the doctor a week later and watching the nurse push the little gauge thing past 200, past 250 was too much. Worrying about fitting in the airplane seat, seeing pictures of myself with my fat gut hanging over my pants, being winded going up a few flights of stairs. I want to have children at some point and being this overweight is not OK with me. My entire family is/was fat (though I had no weight issues in high school, was 140 and 5'4) and I am so DONE with it. Being fat sucks. Nothing tastes as good as being a healthy weight feels. I am so ready to shop in normal people stores again. None of the boho clothes that I adore come in tent size. :sad:

Turning 40! I have a lot of unhealthy family members and I refuse to be that way in 20 years. I just realized this year that it is now or never. If I still want to to be healthy in 20 years, I have to make a change now! I can either continue to eat too much and not exercise or I can do what I can to change my future. There are so many health issues in my family including cancer, diabetes and heart problems! I am so afraid if I don't do something now that I will end up with one of them.
I am so thankful that I found this site a few weeks ago! I feel that this is what is helping me make the change!

Having to wear PJ bottoms or "yoga" pants everyday because I had no clothes that fit me. My bras didn't even fit me anymore! My 4 year old daughter always would ask me why I never got dressed.

and the finally wake up call was getting tagged in photos at the end of June. Couldn't believe it was me!

Waking one morning and realized I was 355 pounds. I lost down to 300 but then I packed half of it back on. (started this yr at 321) I looked at my beautiful family and told myself...they are more important than EVERYTHING else...started working out and eating right and so far 57 pounds lighter this year and a total of 91 pounds from my highest.

For me, it was when my doctor told me that I had Diabetes Type ll. I knew that it was very important to lose some weight and then he sent me to this pharmacist friend of his for her and three 3rd year pharmacy students to help with my dietary requirements. I think that going to that meeting, and knowing that my doctor was concerned about my weight to the point that he would go the extra mile to get me additional help. I didn't eat much before and the weight kept coming on due to steroids and not being able to do too much physically with my spine issues and also arthritis and torn meniscus in my knees. They jump started me on 2300 calories a day for the first week, but yesterday I was started on 1200 calories and I lost an entire pound between yesterday's scale and today's.
I am happy to be here because I know that I am not the only obese person that needs to lose some weight. Going to the gym is harder because the in-shape ones outnumber the ones that are overweight and way outnumber those that are obese.

Couldn't see my weiner anymore.

I feel odd because I'm so lightweight compare to you but here's my story:
I always was in the skinniest. At my highest weight of 120 pounds I felt bigger than average. Girls here are pretty thin, and feeling bigger than others made me felt bad. I had a septic choc, went to the hospital and lost 5 pounds during hospitalization. It felt so good to be ligher than I continued and I'm now 104 pounds and happy. By the way I'm 5"3 and only 18 years old.