[K3lly]

I'm not sure if this is in the right spot!!

Hi, I am new here! I am 25 yrs old, and I *just* weighed myself. ((after eating)) and I am a whopping 203lbs. I am at the heaviest I have ever been. If I remember correctly my feel good weight was at around 130ish.

Since i have recently SEEN the blah that is me.... I have been stressing about it, and wanting to change. I was talking about it all to a friend of mine, and when I told her I was 200lbs, she honestly laughed at me, and told me to tell her the truth. Her and a couple others have told me I do not look anywhere near 200lbs..... But I am!! Now I understand that muscle is more dense than fat, hence it weighs more. And my legs are muscular.....

But how can my 200lbs seem so different from someone elses 200lbs?

A friend and coworker of mine tells me she is 130lbs. Yet standing side by side we don't look like there is a 70lb difference!!

[ThicknPretty]

Are your friends overweight or average size people? I know that most people who have never been 200 pounds don't actually realize that it isn't "that" big, you know what I mean? 200 pounds sounds like such a BIG number to them and they think they would know if someone they saw on a regular basis weighed that much. In reality, though, 200 pounds is a weight that is easily achieved (unfortunately) and quite a few of us have done it!

And everyone carries their weight differently, of course.

[JulieJ08]

The longer I'm here the more I know that there can be a 50 pound difference between people of the same height and size. Differences in muscle mass, differences in bone mass, how much water in our tissues.

And body shapes also change how we look, especially when you start comparing sizes. Women who carry more weight in the abdomen and less in the hips and legs wear a lot smaller pant sizes than pear-shaped women of the same weight, and when people report their size in posts, I think they most often mean pant size.

It's really pretty amazing how much weight can vary like that, but it's so true! Hang around a little bit and you'll see how true it is. In the end, you learn to think more about your fitness, and your size, than your weight.

And it's a good thing for you - the more you weigh at a given size, the more calories it will take to maintain I'm the opposite, I seem to weigh a lot less than other people posting who are shorter than me and wearing the same size. Light-framed, I guess.

[K3lly]

Originally Posted by ThicknPretty

Are your friends overweight or average size people?

A lot of my friends are overweight. One of my friends is tall, and 300+.
He has lost weight before but keeps packing it back on. I feel bed because he is one of the ones that get pissed off when I mention my weight. Kinda like 'what are you complaining about, 3 of you could fit in my pants' At 200lbs I feel huge, lazy, ugly, and plain ol' yucky.

[Shannon in ATL]

Originally Posted by K3lly

He has lost weight before but keeps packing it back on.

Another point - 'he' has lost weight. I've noticed that a lot of men just can't estimate how much a woman weighs.

[MathGirl87]

It all depends on your height, your frame size, and where you carry your weight.

For instance, my friends can't believe that I am over 200 lbs. because I don't look like it..but then again, I am 5'7" which is moderately tall, I have a large frame (to determine frame size: wrap your thumb and ring finger around your other wrist, if your fingers can tough comfortably or overlap, you have a small frame, if they just barely touch you have a medium frame, and if they don't touch at all you have a large frame), and I carry most of my weight in my upper thighs...and because I am always wearing spanx no one can tell.

So my healthy weight range is between 143-163lbs..which may seem high, but since I have a large frame it's normal.

Does that make sense?

[mortonpixie]

I am always "heavy for size". At goal - I was 150lbs but wore a size 8 in jeans...still 10lbs "to heavy" according to those st*pid charts! But at 150lbs, I was running 20 miles/wk, counting calories and feeling wonderful! That was only 3 years ago...but TWO BABIES ago. I'm shooting for 160 this time!

[nelie]

I don't know, a lot of people seem to think they don't look like their weight. How tall are you? What size do you wear?

[K3lly]

Originally Posted by Shannon in ATL

Another point - 'he' has lost weight. I've noticed that a lot of men just can't estimate how much a woman weighs.

I'm not sure if this matters to his ability to gauge weight, but he is a transsexual, and is more woman than I could ever be!! lol

Originally Posted by nelie

I don't know, a lot of people seem to think they don't look like their weight. How tall are you? What size do you wear?

I am 5 6
I can still cram my big behind into a 14, but yesterday I bought a pair of 18s that fit me really good.

[nelie]

Originally Posted by K3lly

I am 5 6
I can still cram my big behind into a 14, but yesterday I bought a pair of 18s that fit me really good.

That seems pretty average size for someone of 200 lbs but again it varies based on muscle. I am a bit over 200 and I wear a 14 or 16 size pant. (misses sizes, not plus sizes)

Also, people really don't seem to have a good grasp of what a certain weight should look like. If you are older, you tend to have less muscle and thus may be bigger than someone younger. I'm in my mid 30s so someone in their 40s or 50s may look bigger than me/wear a bigger size while someone in their 20s may wear a smaller size.

[JulieJ08]

Originally Posted by nelie

That seems pretty average size for someone of 200 lbs but again it varies based on muscle. I am a bit over 200 and I wear a 14 or 16 size pant. (misses sizes, not plus sizes)

That's a good illustration of the variability. We're similar height, and at a bit less than 200 pounds, I wore an 18 and was closing in on size 20. 14 was impossible in any brand - not too tight but impossible.

[Windchime]

Originally Posted by JulieJ08

That's a good illustration of the variability. We're similar height, and at a bit less than 200 pounds, I wore an 18 and was closing in on size 20. 14 was impossible in any brand - not too tight but impossible.

It is interesting. I see people posting frequently who are 6" shorter than me, weigh 40 pounds more and are wearing the same size (or smaller!??) pants than me. I couldn't get into 14's until I was down to about 205 pounds; at 192, I am still in 14's. I have some jeans that are 12s (thank you, stretch denim) but size 12 slacks are still painted on and indecently tight.

[theCandEs]

Well, sometimes on here I feel bad for complaining about being overweight because I only weigh 173 lbs. BUT, I'm REALLY short, so my BMI is 31, which is considered obese. I wear a size 16 (regular size) and can squeeze my big butt into a 14 relaxed fit if I want to, but then I am uncomfortable. I think being short makes me look heavier than someone taller and sometimes I wish I had some height working for me.
So don't sweat it, and be glad you don't look heavy. Do what you need to do for you!

[dangerousfish]

I think everyone has posted good thoughts. Height, age, where your fat is located, people not realizing what 200 pounds looks like (no one does, I swear), I would like to post my own theory and that is called "boobdo" which is a term my mother learned from her own father and has lived on in our family. Boobdo is only for women but it is shorthand for "belly sticks out further than your boobs do". The male equivalent is "dickdo", for the curious.

Women that carry more fat in their boobs than their bellies look more "in proportion" (hourglass figure) and people often underestimate their weight because of this; they look "thinner" and "healthier". For example, a friend of mine got a breast reduction and all of a sudden we noticed she had a belly and was chubby. Now, she knew she wanted/needed to lose weight (and the boob job was part of this plan) and all of us knew this but _seeing_ her belly now sticking out further than her boobs it was like, "huh."

My breasts are not large, especially for my size (I gained 90 pounds and barely a cup size) and I have a severe case of boobdo. This makes me look heavier than a girl of the same height and weight with a more hourglass figure (waist smaller than hips and chest).

[Supernatural]

This is an interesting discussion for me - I always say that I come from farmer stock - I have never been, and I will never be a thin, light person (and that's okay with me). I have no problem with being a solid, muscular woman - I'm just a solid, muscular woman with a little too much of a fat layer on top of the solid.

I think being so solid is why the BMI doesn't seem particularly accurate for me - at my healthiest weight as a young adult, I was well into the "overweight" part of the scale for my height, but I was nowhere near overweight and my body was in excellent shape. Now I'm aiming for clearing up some weight-related health issues, and I don't plan to pay a lot of attention to my BMI.