[Lauren201]

When I was a kid, all through middle school and high school, I was NOT fat. I had no idea I wasn't fat. It is crazy to think that you can not be fat but think you are. I weighed 120 and I'm 5'3". Now I'm 218lbs (started at 230) and according to most sites, I am obese. When I look back at my old high school pictures and see myself, I can't believe how skinny I was. I wish I could go back in time and give myself a huge talkin'-to about body image.

I know exactly how my body image problems started.. when I was a little girl (around 8 years old) my grandma told me how ugly I was and that I had several extra "tires". (I wasn't and didn't, but I believed her)Then when I had to get my shots to go into high school they weighed me and I was 120, my mom said, "Don't worry hunny! We won't tell your father." These kind of comments were told to me my whole life, I believe my parents were really talking to themselves but I didn't know it then. I was told regularly that I was fat.

Now here's where I need to mention both of my parents are my adoptive parents, they adopted me from birth and they were both obese. They never made any attempt to feed me any healthy meals, let me drink as much soda as I wanted and didn't teach me anything but to eat crap and I was still a good weight until now of course.

I wish I could go back in time and kick them all in the rear, seriously.

I'm trying to work through my issues and I have a lot of them. I've been teaching myself about nutrition and eating healthy. I've mostly given up the soda (I'll have one occasionally). I'm pretty sure I'm in need of some serious therapy, but all in good time!