I've been chubby since fourth grade. I've been fat since seventh. I've been obese for almost three years and it is wearing me out. I was raised to eat whatever tasted the best. Lard covered lard cakes fried in lard or whatever. I didn't really notice how bad it was going from about 200 to 250 when I was three months pregnant with my son. They asked when the last time I weighed myself was and this adorable brunette just smiled while she asked me all these healthy questions from her size 2 floral skirt. I was so embarrassed.

I gained 15 pounds with my son, lost 23, went back to 250 and hovered there until I was done breastfeeding at nine months. Oh, how sad I was to realize that I was not chubby, but obese and just unhappy with myself when I should be overjoyed at how awesome my life is!

I vow to be gorgeous. To myself, to my husband, to my son. I want everyone around me to say "I am SO proud of you. You are gorgeous." I want to be gorgeous inside, I want to feel like my weight is such a small part of me and I am awesome.

I got big by completely ignoring my weight. Eating large portions of everything and being way not active. I didn't even like going for a walk. I'm changing my life for the sake of everyone around me, but most of all, myself.

I'm going to be fit and healthy because, really, what are my other options?

I pinpoint it at 4-5 years ago. I had never been medically overweight until then, though I was somewhat depressed/anxious, reaching the higher points of my healthy range (and meaning to drop some pounds) when suddenly, the unexpected death of my sister threw me into depression.

This huge weight gain was, I think, a result of my social and work isolation as well as my apathy. I only vaguely and occasionally cared that I was getting fatter because it wasn't a priority (however, nothing was a priority). I stopped taking care of other physical-beauty related things because of my weight -- nothing else was worth it because, well, 'I have bigger problems' (literally).

(Edited to add -- Oh, and I got married out of college, when we were both continuing in school. We made just under 18k a year and I thought I was brilliant for making it work with nightly dinners solely based on potatoes, white pasta or rice every night -- dark days. At the same time I was also recently reformed from teenage eating disorders so I was also kind of proud of myself! If I could go back, I'd run up a credit card, anything.)

I had (have) been basically suspended from my normal life. I went on a 'diet' twice but it didn't stick.

At some point last year I realized that the weight was no longer a symptom, but a cause. I was now avoiding things because of my weight and my discomfort (vain discomfort, not really physical).

Since August I have been using my relative isolation and lack of a full life for my new purpose, using it to concentrate on weight loss, health and self-improvement. There's a lot I'm still not ready for, but that's what this time is for. With all the weight I lose, I notice I start taking better care of other things, especially things to do with my person.

I started crying just the other day when I realized that I gained, and am losing, the approximate weight of my sister who died (she was still a child, not an adult weight). I've actually been carrying her around, I think, and now I don't want that anymore. Geez, I am starting to tear up just writing this.

Even though my specific story is overall different from what I've read, I can't even begin to say how many single sentences on this thread have reflected me as well. It's all a blur -- wasn't happy about getting near 200 so stopped checking -- so many single sentences.

And I too will have the stretch marks forever from gaining so fast. I just hope my skin snaps back. I'm going on 28 and it could go either way for the rest of my weight loss, I guess.

This is a very interesting thread! I reflect a lot on our society as a whole and why obesity is epidemic.

As a population, we don't move much anymore. People used to have to physically work for daily needs -- till the fields, milk the cows, chop wood -- and walk miles every day. We don't, our lives have become extremely sedentary. Kids don't even play outside as much as they used to because of safety concerns and computer games. On top of that, high calorie density food is readily available, cheap, and easy. Advertisers push it in our faces everywhere we look. Portion sizes are enormous. We eat, and we sit. That's not even considering emotional eating, physical ailments, and medications that contribute to weight gain. It's no wonder that so many are obese. It's a wonder that even more aren't!

Like a couple of the other posters, I wasn't heavy as a child, but I've fought the battle of the pudge my whole adult life. My most recent "AHA" moment came when I weighed more than when I was pregnant, and absolutely nothing fit (not even my fat clothes -- and I was NOT going to get even-bigger sizes!!). I've yo-yo'd many times, and I'm determined that this will be the last. But, I have to choose to live differently than just about everyone else around me, and frankly, it gets tiring sometimes.

I'm not saying that we aren't responsible for our actions -- what we choose to eat and do -- because we are. But, when every input around us pushes high calorie foods in our face, when restaurants don't have to post calorie counts, when every social gathering revolves around food, and when our cities aren't bike or walker-friendly -- it sure doesn't make it any easier.

Wow! This thread is fascinating! I'm always looking for books, magazines, online articles, and tv programs that are related to weight because they help to motivate me, and this thread I think has them all beat! It so full of emotion and sincerity and reality! Thank you all so much! It's so interesting to hear the different paths and journeys that people have taken.

I was a thin girl who didn't know she was thin. I always wanted to weigh less than I did. I never suffered from anorexia or bulimia, thank God, but I always had weight issues. I am 5'8"-5'9" and at 18 years old at 118 lbs, I wanted to weigh 115. At 21 years old at 121, I wanted to weigh 118. I remember once at 19 years old weighing 124 and fasting for 7 days, only drinking water, as a way to lose weight. That was the first and last time I tried that at least! I may have lost weight, but I was mean and nasty and barely had any energy to get out of bed! In college, I had a caliper test done that indicated my "perfect" weight was 124.8, which I thought was too high! But as I got older, that became my goal weight. I yo-yo dieted between 125-135 during the first 5 years of my marriage. I remember once getting to 137, and my husband making "cute comments" about my weight, quickly saying he was just teasing. Let's face it, young men are idiots, lol! But because I had issues with weight, I never forgot it. Fortunately, he is a mature and wonderful man now, who just yesterday said, "My god, Jacqui, you're beautiful," and I could see it in his eyes that he really thought so. So I forgive him for all his mistakes of the past and, hopefully, he forgives me of mine! And boy, have I made some mistakes!

During my first pregnancy, I stopped dieting for the first time since I was a pre-teen, and I went from 135 lbs to 192 lbs, and I have the stretch marks to prove it! Luckily, the weight came back off fairly quickly, but this time, it was a little harder to keep my weight down, and my yo-yo-dieting this time went from 125-145 lbs. Then I got pregnant with my daughter, and I swore I wasn't going to eat "all out" like I did carrying my son. Even so, I started out at 140 and went to 186 lbs. After my daughter was born, I really had trouble trying to get down to 125. I did it once. Mostly, I hovered between 135-145. Over the years the yo-yo dieting started taking its toll, and I found myself sometimes weighing 150 and even 155 lbs.

Then 10 years ago, I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, and that led to depression, and I was prescribed meds for both conditions, which caused me to really struggle to stay in the 140s. To make matters worse, the antidepressants threw me into hypomania, and so I was then diagnosed as having bipolar 2, and I was given mood stabilizers, and that was the kiss of death, weight-wise. My weight jumped 50 lbs in 6 months! It was a shock, but I was so messed up emotionally by that time that the weight was the least of my worries. After 4 years of wild mood swings, I weaned myself off all meds. It's been a mind-over-matter thing. The RA is not severe and only requires meds when it flares now. The depression I treated through going to therapy. And the bipolar 2 hypomania was a reaction to the antidepressants, so since I am no longer on them, I no longer have hypomania. I've been "crazy-free," lol, for 6 years now. And have only had to take anti-inflammatory medicine for my RA once for only a brief time.

Going off meds made it easier for me to lose weight again, but by that time, I was resentful about ever having to diet again. I saw what I had done to myself, how ridiculous I had been about my weight, and I swore my daughter would never grow up ever thinking she was fat or had to diet, and so I de-emphasized the need/desire to be "skinny" or to diet. (Thankfully, both my children, who are in college now, are naturally thin and do not have weight issues.) But it's been 10 years now since my last diet, and it's time to think about my weight again, and this time, to do it in a healthy way. I can see the mistakes I made along the way--the severe calories restrictions, the going "on" and "off" diets, and never changing the way I eat in order to be healthy. I no longer want to weigh 125. I want to weigh 145, which is a healthy weight for me. I no longer eat junk food. I eat healthily, consuming whole foods with a balance of protein, complex carbs, and healthy fats, and I drink only water and green tea. I refuse to eat less than 1200 calories a day and that would be the very lowest I would eat. I am no longer "on" a diet that I'm planning to go "off" once I reach my goal weight. I created this problem with a boost from meds at the end, and now I'm going to fix it...not to be thin but to be healthy.

I cannot say how happy I am to have had this thread have this kind of response. I am so glad that I didn't seem to offend anyone.

I am going to make a kinda weird comparasion...forgive me for a moment...
One day, many years ago, I saw a Jerry Springer episode (lol, life lessons from Jerry!) which was about transexuals. After listening to them talk (and fight of course, it was Springer) I remember thinking how awful it must be to feel like you were born another sex and how you must really feel it necessary to be that other sex. I mean why would anyone do that, putting themselves on the outside of societies "norms", just because. Ever since then, I tend to be more accepting of things that others may find wrong or immoral or whatever.

And how is this relevant? Well, I think that most of us, especailly those on the smaller side of obese, may look at those who are much heavier than us and say "how could they let that happen?" Listening to everyone's individidual stories and understanding more about how they got there makes it harder to be judgemental. Everyone, including myself has reasons that they have gotten to this point in life. A huge common thread is depression, that I think no one can understand unless they have been there.

I cannot tell you how grateful I am to learn some about all of you and I hope that you all get somewhere with your weight loss that you can be happy and healthy even if it isn't that size 6. Something that I am taking away from this thread and this site in general is that I need to stop freaking out if I am not losing fast enough. Why am I in such a hurry? Continue to make better choices and it will eventually come off. If it is 1 pound a week until I am at a comfortable weight, so be it. I will still look and feel a lot better a year from now.

Good luck and thank you to all of you!!!

Aw -- thanks! I'm trying to not let it get to me, but I was so fit for so long that this still doesn't feel like it's REAL. Like it should go away if I just, you know, walk a couple nights a week or stay away from chocolate. But I'm slooooooooooooooooo...ooooowly coming to terms with the fact that it IS real, and if I don't want to feel this way any more -- and I don't -- then the only solution is to force my body to obey my mind .

I don't know how I let myself get this way, well yes I do and no I don't.

I was always chubby. I look back at old photos of myself and I was always just a bit chubby, not huge but noticeable. I had a tummy, but I liked to eat. I think part of what saved me was my mother cooked at home but very healthy.

Then just before I hit highschool I thinned out. I was like 145/150 lbs but very curvy. I wore size 10/12 jeans and had guys all over me. I loved my body. I was on the swim team all four years and though my eating wasn't good I was thin.

Then I hit college and BALLOONED. I gained like 85 lbs in 4 years, part of it was always studying, the other part was eating bad, eating out daily, and so on. Then I found out I had PCOS also- right after I went on birth control was when my body went NUTS.

I wish I thought about things more when I was younger- but I'm still young-26- and I want to get rid of this weight so that I can live out the rest of my life healthier than I am now- I don't want to be on all sorts of medications for blood pressure and so on. I'm too young to deal with that!

Wow, you guys are all so open and honest about your struggles with weight that you make me tear up! This is a wow! thread and I'm going to print it out and keep it around.

I've always had weight issues, but in high school and college I managed to keep myself at 130-140. After college my weight started creeping up, and by my mid-30s, I was around 228. I got home from a trip to Scotland and had hit that high plateau. I was devastated...but saw how it happened. Bad eating, no exercise, and blissfully avoiding reality. I thought that if I wore stretch pants and baggy shirts, no one would notice. At that low point, I decided to get serious about losing some weight, and I did very well. I lost 40 lbs over 6 months and dropped to 180. And then I got sloppy. I had not made the life changes that are necessary to keeping the weight off. I went back to eating large portions, drinking alcohol, avoiding the gym, and pretending that nothing was happening. And I ballooned right back up to 208.

Now I'm back down to 197. I'm forcing myself to read about eating, why we eat, and how to come to terms with eating. I'm facing the fact that, at age 47, I cannot eat like a teenager any more. I cannot be my desired, healthy weight of 140 (doctor's rec.) and have gin on the rocks, chocolate cake, heavy pastas, and other stuff I love to eat. I just cannot.

What's helping me greatly this time is using the same psychology I used to quit a 20-year smoking habit 8 years ago. I do this one minute/hour/day at a time. When I woke up in the morning, I used to tell myself, "Today, I will not smoke. No matter what." When I was quitting, I never thought about 6 months from now, or a year from now, I just thought about the next hour or day. And it was amazing how those days piled up. And I didn't smoke. That was 8 years ago, and it was the best thing I could have ever done for myself.

So now I take this one day at a time. And I'm educating myself, and doing some introspection. Because if I do not change my eating habits, and find my triggers, this is going to happen again. And this time, in my mind, I tell myself that I know how good I could look and that there's nothing to be scared of when I eventually do look that good.

My deepest thanks to you all!

I was a scrawny, underweight kid, an average-sized teenager but I struggled a bit with my weight after getting put on meds for depression, then through most of college I was a health nut, eating well and exercising like a maniac, weighed about 135 and went jogging all the time. Then I got put on prednisone which causes weight gain and increased appetite. I won't put all the blame on the drug, but it acted as a catalyst anyway. I gained and became depressed about gaining. I ended up gaining some amazing amount in a short period, something like 60 pounds in a matter of months. This put tremendous strain on my body, since my muscles and joints just weren't used to carrying around the extra weight; it was like suddenly carrying a big bag of cement everywhere with me. My body couldn't handle it and just walking to class gave me horrid back pains. The weight gain killed my self esteem and made me not want to exercise in front of people, so I just sat in my room and ate and got more depressed and inactive. I felt self conscious to the point I wouldn't want to leave the house unless I absolutely had to. My clothes weren't fitting and I'd hide under layers of baggy tshirts and hoodies and I just had no self esteem. I gained so fast that the stretch marks on my stomach were horrid (prednisone encourages the weight gain to happen in your midsection) and I felt like a monster.

It really was sort of a blur for me, and all this started about 2 years ago, and I didn't really notice until I saw a photo of me a friend took at a bar and I was like "OMG is that even me?" I didn't recognize myself. I knew I'd gained, but it never really hit me over the head until then, and then I started trying to go for walks more (starting very slow), lifting weights in my room (so I didn't feel so self-conscious), eating healthier, etc. I screwed up a few times, I'd lose 20 or 30 pounds, then I'd get sick with the flu or something and end up where I started, but I'm trying to change all that now.

This is an amazing thread. I can't really respond to it fully now as I'm way too emotional (I lost a very dear friend this week and amongst other things he was one of my health/diet buddies who had his own battle with depression and weight )- thank you all so much for your openness and honesty. Its amazing!

I think there are many factors contributing to obesity in people in general, and me in particular. Sometimes listing them off, sounds like a big excuse list though.

One thing that has helped me tremendously, is getting my hormones under control, with the right birth control. It's been such a drastic difference that I'm really sorry I wasn't more aggressive in seeking treatment much earlier (like decades earlier).

I wonder if genetics don't play a role (I'm adopted, and my food issues and weight gain patterns are distinctly different than my adoptive family's).

I do find it ironic that even at my highest weight, when I saw anyone larger than myself I wondered "how does that happen," even though as I gained weight, the number of people larger than myself got smaller and smaller.

I think understanding the factors and influences contributing to obesity is helpful, but only so much as it helps us develop strategies to address them. Sometimes it can be so overwhelming it can seem hopeless. If I am dealing with genetic, social, cultural, economic, psychological, and physiological factors (as we all are), it can seem hopeless. How can I dig myself out of this hole that I (with the help of internal and external forces) have gotten myself into?

How I got to my highest weight is both complicated and simple, and how I'm getting to where I'm going is pretty much the same. You do what you gotta do.

I LOVE this thread. I want to thank everyone for sharing their stories because I can tell that they have come from your heart.

My weight loss journey has been a long one. I’ve battled my weight since my early to mid twenties after the birth of my now 21DD. I spent much of my late twenties and thirties being chubby and trying to convince myself and others around me that I was perfectly happy at this weight and size. My weight yo-yoed up and down usually landing around 180-185. Besides, I was generally a size 16—I could shop in regular stores for bottoms. The top is another matter since I am amply endowed and usually wear/wore an XL.

By my mid thirties I was having some health issues after the birth of my son. It was discovered that my thyroid was low and I started on medication. I was also 245 lbs. I had gained 50 lbs in 3 months. Yikes! Through exercise (which I like because it makes me feel refreshed) and white-knuckling (starving)I got down to my stand-by weight of 180-185. I continued to exercise fairly regularly but started to eat pretty much whatever I wanted in whatever portion size I wanted, and I thought that that was just fine.

Eight to ten years later and after a kitchen remodel, I found myself 10lbs heavier. Those prepackaged foods are loaded with calories, salt and taste yucky to boot. Then after a serious emotional upheaval with my now DS13(He’s doing much better now, btw.), I gained another 10lbs. I also stopped exercising altogether. Are you sensing that perhaps I eat out of emotional stress? But wait, that’s not all—I also like to reward myself with food! I don’t eat late at night, because I’ll have indigestion/heartburn, so that’s not my problem. My danger hour is the time that I get home from work (2:45-3pm) until my son gets home from school (3:30-4pm). My reward/snack probably added another whole meal to my daily calorie intake, because I would of course eat dinner too.

I too have struggled with anxiety and depression on an off during my adult years. But I also think that as a mom I completely ignored my own needs, and my weight. I wasn’t on my list as Oprah says. I figured if I was clean, had my hair and makeup on, and was dressed somewhat appropriately I was ok. As my mom always said, “Nobody’s looking at you.” Which sounds mean when you first hear it, but when you think about it it makes sense. Most people are too concerned with how they appear to others to notice you. I feel like our outside selves are often a reflection of how we feel on the inside.

I gained all my weight by being an emotional eater.

That and a combination of too much beer , fast food and too little exercise!

I was a thin child who always had to wear "slim" jeans. Once I was a teenager, I was still slim but thought I was fat because I weighed 155 (I'm almost 6 feet tall, for goodness sake!). When I was 16, I was a cheerleader who also had an after-school job so my day was go, go, go from 6:30 AM till sometimes 10 PM. Many days I would survive on candy bars, and I got so thin and exhausted that I stopped menstruating.

I got married when I was 19 to the wrong person. Nice guy, wrong person for me. I had struggled with (untreated) depression since I was 14 or 15 years old. I still managed to stay fairly thin during this time, but I don't know how because I ate a lot of junk. I remember in my early 20's a friend and I went on diets because we both weighed 165.

I gained 70 pounds with my first pregnancy at age 24. The baby was born with some problems (he's now fine, thank goodness) so it was a very emotional, upsetting time. I lost almost all the weight (60 lbs) and then became pregnant again within the year. I gained 60 pounds and after the baby came, lost all but 10. So now I was 20 pounds heavier than before babies. I had bad post-partum depression with incompetant treatment after the second baby and the weight gain started then. Up, up, up I went.

I would lose and gain the same 30 or so pounds several times over the next 20 years. I was never really thin, but mostly felt OK about how I looked. Like many here, I just fooled myself into thinking that I was a little chubby or "busty". 12 years ago, I got divorced....I changed from being depressed to being kind of scared and alone.

I've never told anyone what I am about to tell you guys: After my divorce, I figured that eating was going to be my only physical pleasure from here on out, so why not just eat? I had no man and no sex life, and now I was also supposed to give up the pleasure of eating whatever and whenever I wanted? I was very angry at that thought. I would do half-hearted attempts at losing, but it never really stuck. Then several years ago, I got serious and lost 30 pounds. I looked good, felt great.....and guys started paying a LOT of attention to me. Whooops! Time to regain the weight! I kept it off for a year or so but, as of January, it was back plus more.

So....in January I found myself weighing 30 pounds more than I weighed with a full-term pregnancy of a 10 pound baby. How depressing is THAT. But I was also sick with asthma, tired and crying all the time, and literally bursting from the seams of my ony pair of jeans.

I decided that I had to get serious this time. I was tired of feeling fat and invisible and alone. So I faced the scale and I googled for help and, thank God, I found you guys. This place literally threw me a life preserver as I was barely keeping my head above water. You've kept me afloat as I slowly learn to swim again.

I figure that, once I hit the place where I'm really looking good, then I will use my EAP visits with the mental health counselor and just learn to deal with male attention. Do I feel that this is the last time? Yes, but I also felt that way last time I lost weight so I cannot rely on my feelings. I have to rely on my behavior this time around.

And now I have to go because I am going to be seriously late for work!!!!