I'm sure I'm not the only one who has yo-yo'd in the past, but I thought it would be nice to talk about some of the more extreme times. I am definitely an all or nothing girl, and go through more than the average yo yo. Here's where I've been over the past few years...
Pre2006: Slow but consistent gain & stabilization periods (always over 200)
Sept 2006 250
March '07 190
July '08 288
Today 257
I've been pretty big all my life, and gained the last few pounds (to 250) when I settled in with my ex boyfriend. After we separated in sept '06, I got a job working 10 hour shifts of physical work in a warehouse, and lost 60 pounds. Problem is, I never adjusted the way I ate... I just worked hard all day and didn't have time to eat! Needless to say, when I quit that job and went back to school, I gained, and gained...and gained. My heaviest was this summer, and now for the first time in my life I am on a healthy eating plan that I have been able to stick to for two months, and I've lost 30 pounds.
So what about you, yo-yo'ers? What are your stories?
Age 15: 140
Age 16: 115 (um... starvation )
Age 17: 130
Age 18: 140
Age 19: 170
Age 20: 180
Age 21: 150 (LAWL)
Age 22: 190
Age 23: 206
Current: 196 (healthy living )
Anywhere from 115-206 in the last 8 years.
If I'm doing my math right (however, usually not), I've gained and lost 186 lbs over the last 8 years.
Age 15 - 140
Started my first "diet" didn't really know what I was doing (just tried to eat less and ride my bike, got down to 133)
Age 19 - 160
My first "crash diet." Ate nothing but rice krispies and an orange per day for weeks. Took dexatrim. Got down to 137 before I binged at a Fourth of July party. I regained the weight so fast I got 3 permanent stretch marks on my belly to remind me.
Age 21 (or thereabouts) - 175
Did the "low fat" diet. Concentrated one eating less than 20 grams of fat per day. Still ate tons of white carbs (pasta, rice, white potatoes and Snackwells were a big part of my diet). Lost hair by the handfulls in the shower, skipped my only period in my life. Got down to 142 or so.
Late 20s - 30s
Constant cycles of dieting, but stayed fairly consistently between 150 and 170. I would get up to 170, "diet" lose some weight. Quit, "eat normally" regain weight, repeat.
Age 35 - got to 200 lbs. Changed my life. Lost 70lbs in a 18 months, have been around 130 lbs ever since (4 year maintenance).
Started starving myself, eating only a few meals a week at 17. 130-135 was my low then (60 lbs in the span of 2 or 3 months... Grandpa died in Nov, which triggered my starving myself, I was skinny by Feb.) , after always being around 190.
Then at 20, and pregnant, figured I could eat anything I wanted cuz I was pregnant. 260!!
At 25, started starving myself again, lost 30 lbs in a hurry, then wanted to do it healthy. Got down to 190 with diet and exercise, then fell into not eating again which took me to 169.
That's my downfall, I get so frustrated with diet and exercise and just give up. It just seems easier not to eat sometimes.
Age 12: 180
Age 15: 160 after going on the cabbage soup diet for 3 months with my mom
Age 17: over 200
Age 18: 180 Cabbage soup diet/lifeguarding/crash dieting constantly
Age 19: 170 First semester of College... ate nothing but vegetables
Age 20: 215 2nd year of school ate at the cafeteria
Age 20: 170 600 calorie diet for 6 months
Age 21: 260 after being pregnant with my son
Age 23: 170 after doing it the right way!
Age 25: 230 after being pregnant with my daughter...
My weight is all over the place! I blame the cabbage soup... *sigh* my mom didn't know better.
During High School: Maintained a weight between 112-120
First Year of College: Weight crashed all the way down to 100
Second Year of College: Fluctuated between 110-120
Junior and Senior Year of College: steady gain to 120-125
Two years living back at home after college: hit my heaviest - 138!!
Moral of the story: Must move out of the house!! LOL
Heaviest: 138
Skinniest: 100
Current Goal: 110
Current Weight: 127
I yo yo'd between 330 and 360 for about 6 years. I'd get down to 330, then stop losing weight despite exercise/calorie reduction, get frustrated, then gain back to 360. I did it at least 10 times. Then a little over 4 years ago, I got to 330... then kept going down and have been basically going down ever since.
Age 15: 220
Age 16: 180 - didn't eat, walked for hours a day and lost a fast 40 pounds...not good
Age 17: 240 - got married, moved away from my family etc
Age 21: ~200 - started eating better joined a gym and started losing
Age 22: 169 - got to my lowest weight of 169 by eating healthy and training for a triathlon
Age 23 (current): 193 - that was what I went back up to and am currently losing again
its crazy....
o just got bigger and bigger....
until i reached over 200lbs....
and decided enuf was enuf....
now i have been going down/stabalising for the last 4 years....
once i get ther im going to do everything i can to stay there....
At 44 years old I think some of you are amateurs at yo yo weight losses/gains. My main highs/lows look something like this:
Was always a chubby child at by about 14 I weighed around 170lb.
Lost by skipping breakfast and lunch and only eating once a day to reach 150lb at 16.
Between 16-18 fluctuated between 150-165.
From 18-20 on an upward phase whilst at college and gained to about 180.
At 21 (final year in college), lost again and reached about 155.
I maintained around 155 for a few years and met my now husband. Eating like he did saw me rise to 190.
Around 25 years old I did my first 'proper' diet and joined Slimming World. I lost about 40lb to get back to my all time low of 150. I fluctuated within 10lb of this for about 3 years getting back to my low in 1992 (aged 28) when I got married. Was pregnant within months and soon up over 200lb (don't know exactly as I was too embarrassed to get weighed).
In my late 20s/early 30s was a bad period weight wise and I did nothing to control my weight during this time and in October 1995, joined Slimming World again at 255.
Lost 65lb in 18 months to get 190 by March 1997. Got promotion at work and with a busy job as a manager with a young child the healthy eating went out the window once again. Regained up to about 230 when I got pregnant again in 1998. Again don't know what weight I got up to but was around 250 post delivery.
Between 1999 and 2002 saw another period in my life when I did nothing to control my eating and reached an all time high of 290 in October 2002 when I joined Weight Watchers. Lost around 60lb over a two year period to get down to 230. In Sept 2004 I had emergency surgery and 6 weeks off work when I started another upward trend. I would start WW, Slimming World etc lose 10 or 20 lbs and give up. By May 2007 I was back up to 290 when something just clicked.
I've lost 97lb since then and still losing. I hope this will be the final time that I have to lose a large amount of weight.
Sorry for the rather long-winded tale but you did ask!
Went on my first "diet" at age 14 and 170 pounds. I went on a 500 calorie diet a day (with my mom) and lost 40 pounds in one summer. Stayed at that weight for a couple of years and started gaining my senior year of HS. Lost it again right before graduation and held again until my Sophomore year of college, (moved to a dorm).
When I finished college I was at an all time high (at the time) of 225. Got a new job, an apt. and a car, and didn't have money to eat. Got back to around 170 and stayed that weight for years.
Met my husband and gained 55 pounds within 6 months of our wedding. Joined WW and lost 80 pounds and stayed at 140 pounds for approx 1 week.
Gained to 175 and stayed there for years until preggers w/ baby no. 1 and mother was dying of cancer. Gained 75 pounds during pregnancy/death of mother. Joined WW again and got down to 175 and stayed there for another 5 years.
Got preggers again and gained 60 pounds. Lost 60 pounds and stayed at 175 for several years and began suffering from major depression, anxiety/panic disorder, obsessive drinking, bulimia (purging, exercising and sleeping it off varieties)and gained 165 pounds in 2 years.
I actually don't know what my highest weight was. My scale said error. After 2 weeks of 1200 calories a day it still said error. I went and bought a new scale that went to 400 pounds and I weighed in at 333. Since then I have modified my eating, got professional help, and have began a journey of a lifetime.
18 - 100lbs, good weight for my size
19- 85lbs, started losing because of health reasons and continued on purpose
20- 135lbs, started therapy and meds, gained like crazy
21 - 120lbs, lost all the weight in one month eating 800 calories and exercising
24 - 135lbs, gained it all back within a couple years
25 - 161lbs, went totally nuts and was put on antipsychotics, also living in a hotel part of the week for three months due to my husband being out of town (I spent 1/2 the week with him) and gained FAST
26 - 147lbs currently
Last edited by LandonsBaby; 10-06-2008 at 01:49 PM.
Here is my very long winded story on my emotional eating rollercoaster. I never even realized I was an emotional eater until a year ago. Here's my story:
age 13: 156 lb. (by the end of 8th grade)
14: 135-140 lb. (right before high school started....I never dieted I think I had a very active summer that year)
15: 145 lb. (a lot less active)
16: 129 lb (started a very active job but I also started dieting for the first time and ate very little).
17: 160 (hello drivers license....license to eat without my mom's watchful eye plus I was under a lot of stress that year)
18: 186 (I was starting as a nurses assistant and I was overwhelmed stress, the job was awful and this is when I know my severe emotional eating started. I also took a semester off of college for financial reasons and I was so worried over this).
19: 201 (just kept eating poorly, working nights and I (at the time) couldn't cope, worked 2 jobs while in school and always ate junky food on the run (wish I had the knowledge I have now then)
20-22: 160's. Was restrictive at an unsustainable level. Stress was good and I thought it was under control until:
23: 230's. Oh man this was the year I fell apart. For me there was just too much change too soon. Between age 22-23 I moved away from home and in with future husband, studied to pass nursing school and my board exams, worked full time with school and clinical time, graduated, quit my job of 7 years that I loved (not the nursing assistant job by my pharmacy job), planned a wedding and got married. Plus my grandmother died (we were very very close honestly it was very traumatic). And my childhood house that I adored was bulldozed by the highway department.
24: 230-240 was continuing having difficulty adjusting to my new career as an RN. It honestly was a hard adjustment for me. I love my job but it can be a pressure cooker sometimes.
25: 240's
26: 256 (my highest ever) my job was killing me. I had severe plantar faciitis in both feet that severely limited me. I hit a low point.
27: 240-230 flutuation with no dieting. Found my dream RN job that I absolutely love. No longer binging like I was.
28: 246: This may sound ridiculous but until this age I had no clue what emotional eating was. Not until I sat down and correlated my weight with my place in life did I realize that I was a stress eater. I realized weight was coming off because I was settled now. My house was in order my life wasn't as hectic and I loved my work. The weight was coming off on its own. I started a sensible plan in 11/07 and have been slowly losing. I have an awareness of my stress and managed it.
29: 216, 40 lb down from my highest. I have been promoted at work which is stressful, my other grandma died in april and there is a lot of family turmoil, however I have not gained it all back! The awareness has really helped me overcome emotional eating. I have learned so much from 3FC forum and honestly attribute my success to it. Thank you 3FC!
Sorry for the long post but it really helps me to see this written out like this. I just wish I knew what was happening over the years. If I feel the emotional eating is returning I will surely seek help. That was no way to live!
Have you extreme yo-yo'ed in the past?
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