How and why did you gain weight?

puzzles

Full Member
This is a really difficult post for me; please bear with me and I'd love to hear your stories too :grouphugg:

Right from being a little girl I struggled with eating and food. I always enjoyed eating, to be honest – I spent a lot of time with my nan because my parents worked full time when I was very young, and there were never many toys or games or books at her house but there was chocolate and biscuits and I suppose I ate to help alleviate the boredom. I’ve also always been inclined towards a more sedentary lifestyle than others – I love reading and would spend hours with a book when I was young; I also liked to paint and most of the games I played were with dolls. I just wasn’t into charging around as much as other kids and this was heavily criticised by both parents, but especially my mum.
Despite this I wasn’t a fat child – I wasn’t a “straight up and down” kid but I certainly blended roughly into the playground just fine. The problem was, I was constantly being told I was fat by my parents and because they made a thing of it, food became something that had to be sneaked and eaten when I was alone. I saw eating as a bad, shameful thing.
I had a horrendous time when I went up to secondary school and was bullied really nastily for three years (I was never called fat even once though.) The bullying was so horrible that I changed schools between year 9 and year 10, and when I went shopping with my mum for the new school uniform I’d have to wear she told me I’d be the fattest girl there and no one would want to be friends with me.
I went on a strict diet and I got down to well below 8 stone, looking back I think I was bordering on being anorexic, I was certainly obsessive. But when I left school and started at sixth form college life had another blow for me as my mum was diagnosed with terminal cancer and three months later she died. My dad went to pieces and we stopped having meal times as such and I think I gained around 2 stone in this time which wasn’t that horrendous really but I was just snacking and picking a lot. I really slammed weight on when I went to university though. I didn’t like it but felt pressured to enjoy myself even though I wasn’t and I sort of fooled myself into thinking I was having an amazing time when really I was extremely unhappy. I couldn’t sleep and would go to the 24 hour Spar for chocolate and sweets at 3 a.m. and would buy chips and pizzas too. I felt very uncomfortable still eating in front of people as a hangover from my childhood so would buy takeaways or sweets and eat them in my room. I don't know what I weighed when I left as I was totally in denial and living in stretchy trousers and tops and telling myself I was a size 14 and I wasn't! :sigh:
I started teacher training after I left and then started my first teaching job - now that was VERY hard and I practically lived at McDonalds. One horrible day a boy called me fat repeatedly, you effing fat b-tch etc and I wasn't bothered by anything but being called fat and I bought a set of scales and I weighed 14 and a half stone. I tried to lose weight but "couldn't" (I gave up to easily but also I just didn't know how.) Then I decided to leave that school and got another job and also bought a house, at the age of 24 it was like going home and I decided I didn't want to "go home" weighing 14 and a half stone so I went on a diet - I did it "my way" which wasn't very healthy but was effective and lost 3 and a half stone and I bounced between 10 and a half and 11 and a half since. I'm pleased I've never let myself get that big again (although I realise now that although I was fat I wasn't THAT fat, I am always so hard on myself) but when the scales pushed 12 stone I took action with the cambridge diet, I can't really cook (I do want to learn) so find WW and the like so hard.
I hope that with this diet I can put my food demons to rest and realise that I can eat and enjoy food again as part of a healthy balanced approach to food and to life.
How about you? x
 
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Woah BIG font, so sorry! Can I edit?
 
Well I was 8 stones throughout my teens..never put on any pounds, never lost any..then in a year and a half i put on 4 stones! i didnt even realise..it just crept up on me somehow..and then popped down to doctors who diagnosed me with an underactive thyroid!! :(
 
hey puzzles.....
thanks for sharing :)
Ive done Psychology degree, and worked at a dietitians....and through professional and personal experience Ive realised there are a million things that contribute to our weight problems....rarely is it just about being hungry!! Im currently up and down between 14 and 15 stone and cant do ww cos as soon as i eat ANYTHING it ends up in a binge and i cant stop!! Last night I had A massive bread bun with butter, a cherry scone, bag of crisps and a bowl of cereal in about 10 minutes....how gross is that, i wasnt even hungry!! To me the cambridge diet is the only thing that works cos i need to take food out of the mix completely. I did the diet last yr and lost almost 2 stone in a few weeks and felt amazing...but i lost my job and couldnt afford the diet any more...big mistake...i hadnt had the time to sort out my eating habits and problems with food and i piled it back on. This was worse because i KNEW ppl had noticed the difference before and would see that id failed and regained!!
I remember being on diets from about 10 years old..i seemed to gain a stone every year and by the age of 13 i was 13 stone...at 14 i was 14 stone and ive been 14 or 15 ever since. I got down to 13st when i was 20 but that didnt last either.
with me i can pin point it to when my parents divorced....it was a really bad and messy divorce and we moved round a bit. when i went to visit my dad he would always have loads of food and treats in and id eat what i wanted cos he'd leave me and go to the pub....id stuff my face cos i was bored and lonely....then the next week he would buy me books on exercise and dieting then buy loads of crap in. I think my parents saw food as a way of rewards and keeping me sweet while i was between the 2 of them. Since then, food to me has always been a reward...or a treat. \its never been about being hungry, its boredom, a celebration, or numbs the pain during bad times.
Im hoping CD will give me a bloody good start and make me feel better about myself. Im hoping that once i get back to feeling a bit more comfortable i'll realise i dont wanna get bigger again. Im sick of being told i have a pretty face....ive been likened to holly willoughby!! but whats the use of that when u have a body like dawn french.....heehee. We can do it puzzles.... :)
someone once said to me......
the greatest thing in life is doing what others think you cant do.....
i think people dont believe i can do this.....so im bloody going to do it!!! whos with me??? LOL!!!! xx
 
That's such an interesting story, thanks for sharing. I'm glad I did, although it's made my life sound horrible which it hasn't been - but my parents did have a real thing about weight for whatever reason :( xx
 
I can think of many many reasons why I am bigger than I should be and whilst it's important to establish why you are big and realise how it has happened, I finally realised that it's time to stop hiding behind those as I live in my own home now, noone buys food or chooses what i eat now, I have total autonomy over everything in my life, and now I decide what and when I eat, and if one day I decide that i need to eat more than normal then I think about it, and then if I still need to i do, with the full knowledge it will take me a little longer to reach my eventual goal. I did cambridge from sept to mid jan and lost weight from 19stone 4 to 17stone1, I stopped because I just couldn't keep to it 100% and it was expensive now, I have a personal trainer twice a week and I eat the best I can, I currently weigh 16stone3lbs, I've lost inches too. I have a little goal of reaching 13stone 9 by the end of the year, but I'm not gonna get too depressed if i don't make it, as long as I stop yo-yo-ing I'll be happy. I don't believe food is the enemy, and whilst it helps many to take food out of the equation you do have to eventual eat again and thats when you deal with the issues, many find they are on cambridge.... lose loads but still think of it as a back up when they slowly put most of what they have lost back on again, they return back to cambridge 'as the only thing that has ever worked!' it does work, and there are few that do keep it off long term, like KD and a couple of others, then there are others who are on/off it. Lose the weight with cambridge its a great tool, but also don't look to the past for the answers of why you are what you are, its who you are now, and what you want to be in the future which is important, you can't change past events.

I've probably offended loads of people but I'm no making any judgements, i am a recovering food-aholic just on my own course too you know, and this is how I see it
 
You haven't offended me and you make some valuable points but I think as a previous poster said, gaining weight and over eating is about everything but being hungry and identifying what those "things" are is part of moving on.

After all, you can't find the answers if you don't know what the question is! :) xx
 
wow.
I feel for all of you...........
I think my story is about the same as many of yours, my weight has been up and down all of my life, top weight 250 low 140 and current is 175 with a current goal of 150.
I have lost all or most of my weight 2 times , the first time was 21 years ago , I loved it !!!
but , put on 20 pounds and then it just kept climbing up
the next 15 years up and down..........
and then lost 100 pounds !!!!!!!5 years ago
and then 2 years ago I let it slip.......
now I am back on track.
I know how I need to eat to stay thin and I just need to stay with it , I will be 50 in may and I plan to look and feel great!!!!!!! I am almost 5'8 so I am starting to look good
someone guessed my age yesterday and said I was under 35..........
I look young , feel young and I have a very young heart........bring on 50.......
 
some very moving stories for sure.
my weight problems began at the age of 5. until then i was like a little blonde fairy, light as a feather, barely an ounce of fat on me. then i was very poorly at age 4 with constant chronic cases of tonsilitus which led to me losing weight (which i definately couldnt afford to lose at the time) so at the age of 5 i had my tonsils out. now, for quite some time i had virtually lived on yoghurts, soft fruits , soups and ice cream as i had a frequent sore throat and had devellopped a fear of swallowing rough foods.
however, after the surgery and recovery i discovered that i could enjoy food and i certainly did just that. i remember eating crunchy foods , chewy sweets, ships, bread etc etc and really enjoying them more than the average child probably would.
slowly from that point on i started to gain weight. at first of course this was considered a good thing as i was so tiny anyway but it wasnt too long before i was getting a little chubby.
by the time i was 6 i was the chubby girl in my classroom in primary school ( and was reminded of it constantly by some of the other kids).
i think this was when i started comfort eating. eating had already become something of a thrill to me and so i used it as a way to feel good when others made me feel bad.
it was also around this time that my mother married my step dad who i didnt bond with at all.
they went on to have a daughter when i was 7 and i was treated very differently to her by my step dad, leading to more insecurities and more eating.
by the time i was 11 and starting high school i weighed about 14 stones and was very unhappy with the way i looked.
through highschool i did have friends but on the inside i always felt like the freak. this is something i have never managed to shake off as i still feel that way to this day.
when i was 15 i found that my stepdad ( who i had believed to be my real dad until then, although obviously i knew they werent married until i was 6 ) was not my real dad and then discovered that my real dad was another member of the family. this led to a major slippery slope for me and i binged badly and daily for quite some time .
my first job after leaving school was for kwik save and i soon found myself buying boxes of cakes , biscuits, crisps and sneaking them up to my room where i would binge madly on them, then cry with the guilt for the rest of the night.
when i was 18 i got pregnant and settled down with my partner and went on to have 2 children, although we now have a daughter in law, baby grandson and a foster son living with us too so there are 7 of us now.
the turning point for me .... well, there were 2 really.
one was when i went to the doctors and the doctors window was open as i sat talking to him.
suddenly some scally lad stook his head in the window and laughed. then he removed his head and shouted ' hey look, there is a right fat beef in here' i felt like dieing that day and it really knocked my confidence in going out in public.
the second thing was going to alton towers with my partner and my sister.
we were queueing to go on a ride for ages when my sister needed the toilet. i said i would go back with her as i didnt really want to go on that ride anyway.
so we had to make our way back through the huge queue of people saying ' excuse me , excuse me' all the way when some man shouted at the top of his voice ' hey look , she was too fat to sit in the ride, they sent her off'
now as much as many people were disgusted by his remark, there were a fair few who laughed and they were the only ones i could hear as i fought back the tears and pushed through the queue. i was distraught and am no longer at all comfortable going out at all.
i have tried diet after diet since then, but i have been asked by my sister to be her bridesmaid at her wedding in october and i want to enjoy it, i want to be proud to be there with her on her day..... i deserve it.
 
wow cheryl,
ur story really moved me. i have also had ppl shouting things at me in public....its disgusting. I dont seem to get that as much now, although the fear of it is always there and so Im constantly worrying and nervous when Im out, and hate walking past gangs of youths for fear of them calling me names. my fella doesnt understand this and often makes me just walk past them....he doesnt get how embarassing it can be....he thinks im gorgeous, and doesnt get that i dont agree.
this is it ladies, no more feeling this way.
we are as deserving as anyone else (much more deserving than some of the scum we have all experienced......)
we will show them all :)


the greatest feeling in life is doing things others thought u could not do :)

xxx
 
Well.. I was tiny when I was a toddler upto about 3-4 and I just pilled it on over night! My mum drank but was more of a binge drinker and drank at night. I would hate coming home from the age of 8 so i ate and my mum brought me the food. Instead of spending time with my family as they worked alot I was brought treats and presents to make me happy. It wasn't so much fast food more chocolate and sweets, sandwiches ect. She tried to kill herself alot, and i heard a few years after she did but was brought back to life.
Then when I started high school I was big. About size 14 at 11-12 years old? Then I was bulled every day without fail. Then grammar school at 14.. Worse time of my life. I was bullied by everyone and the teachers. I would buy food at break and lunch and just seem to eat alot. Then id come hon from school have my tea then in bed (or have my tea in bed) at 6! I never went out. Had no proper friends so I comfort ate.I would diet every year before my holiday abroad with family and lose a stone or two then put it back on.

I turned to sex at 14-15. I would "fall in love" easily and get used by older men (who thought I was 18) for sex ect and at the time I loved it. As I was being shown I was attractive (tbf I did look a hell of alot older and dressed like an 18yr old!)

At 16 I met my OH on the Internet. We met up and I fell for him. He ended up living at my parents with me while he looked fe work, as he moved from Yorkshire to Leicestershire to be with me. When he found a job we ate out ALOT! used to go to asda at midnight for food. I fell pregnant just before my 17th birthday and ended up really eating for two. (my mum had stoped drinking 3years before)

I would stay in bed all day and eat and sleep.

I then had my daughter and when she was 2months I started CD. I lost 4stone to my birthday and then I messed up and didn't go back on. Ended up pilling the weight back on and more.. I then fell pregnant again and didn't eat as much crap as I had a 12month old to look after!
Also when I was 20 weeks pregnant my mum was diagnosed with cancer and was given 12months to live. She passed away after 6 months when my 2nd child was 6weeks. I miss her so much.
When my son was born, started CD in jan 2010. Messed About most of the year and here I am now. After managing to lose 7stone. Trying not to mess about! As I feel every year iv been on a bloody diet I just want to be thin and enjoy life now! And I'm only 20.
 
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