It was only last year but it seems an eternity away...

On the weekdays, I used to nearly always skip breakfast and lunch becuase i was in school and i hate eating in front of people. So i saved myself for when i got home and i think this is where the problems arose. I used to come home and have a sandwich, a big one with im sure plenty of calories then go into the cupboard and eat cakes and biscuits until i was positively stuffed. Then dinner came and i could never eat all of it becuase i had pigged out so much beforehand... a few hours after dinner i made another visit out to the kitchen and raided the cupboard again, eating at late hours a lot of the time, which was not a good idea. I never drinked a lot of water or ate a lot of fruit... There is no way i could even try to eat like that now, id be physically sick...

Then on the weekends, i just ate all day out of boredom...There was always something to munch on...

I think the hardest part of a diet is getting through two straight days. For me i always had this attitude of "I can start tomorrow" and of course, tomorrow never came. THen, when i had a good day of dieting, i came to the next day and i would think "well its only been one day". But once over that 2 day mark, i found it hard to go back on what id achieved...

I use to eat absolutely terrible. I really feel surprised that I don't weigh more based on the crap I was eating. I put on like 40 pounds in a year after getting my new job because it was farther away and I'd eat out at fast food restaurants every day.

I would always skip breakfast and have a soda and candy bar at work. Or two candy bars. Then I'd go to Bojangles and get their fried chicken strips and seasoned fries. Then I'd come home and have a frozen pizza or cheese sticks w/more fries. I'd have a bowl of ice cream and usually completely eat a bag of chips in one setting. Then I'd maybe pick at whatever was in the cabinents until it was time for bed.

I'd just eat whenever I felt like it. Even if I wasn't hungry, pretty much if I wasn't full, I was eating. I'd go to walmart and buy like 3 of those chocolate oranges and eat one or two right away. EVERY single time I left the house I'd go to Starbucks and get one of those huge caramel frappacinos or a milkshake or something.

I'd weight myself occasionally, see the scale going up, and get depressed but then I'd get right off it and forget about it. I'm glad that I'm on the right track now. I feel good about myself just being on this "diet", even though I'm no where near my goal.

I wish everyone would find a site like fitday and enter in all the things they used to eat. I was shocked and it was no bloody wonder I was gaining.

My biggest problem was that it never really registered in my mind how much I was overeating day after day after day. I never looked at labels, I would just eat when I was hungry, bored, sad, etc. It's hard right now to eat less than 1800 calories a day, but it's getting easier. I think once I start seeing the numbers on the scale drop, then it'll be hard to even think about going abck to the way I used to eat.

Part of the problem that the OP stated is the not eating breakfast and lunch. That just sets you up for binging in the afternoon/evening. I know how tempting it can be to skip a meal, but when I do, I really pay for it with the constant munchies! I can't tell you how many times I'll stick my head in the pantry or fridge looking for something quick and convenient that I can shove in my mouth to appease the munchie god! And when I do that, the calories just keep on rising!

I was depressed, and I'd eat to make myself feel better.

I'd eat cookies, bread, crackers, chips, and ice cream in relatively copious amounts. I didn't feel huge about it, because my girlfriend ate just as much (and sometimes more), but unlike me, she stayed thin. She also never cooks healthy things, so we'd eat things like steak, fried plantains, and lots of rice and pasta. Carbs are the devil.

We also went out to eat quite frequently, because she hates my cooking (I know quite a few tasty but HEALTHY recipes that she has no interest in eating), hates frozen dinners, thinks sandwiches are for "poor white people" , and sometimes just doesn't feel like cooking herself. We've had our ups and downs financially, so when we were broke, we'd do lunch at McDonalds and dinner at On the Border or a Pan Asian place. I'd eat way too much food at those places, but wouldn't even know it, because it didn't FEEL like a lot of food. They have insane amounts of calories at restaurants, and it was hard to believe at first.

On top of that, in the morning, I'd be hungry but didn't feel like cereal and had no time to MAKE breakfast, so I'd go and grab a bag of Chex Mix or Trail Mix or chips instead and eat it at my VERY sedentary 50-60 hour a week for meager pay job. I'd often eat Checkers or Chinese food for lunch. I started riding my bike to my job (12 miles a day total, 6 each way), but it didn't do much good since I was already eating more than I was burning AND under a lot of stress.

AND... there would also be times where I wouldn't eat breakfast and sometimes not even lunch, just like the OP, so I'd totally binge when I got home. I didn't count calories because I didn't want to know.

I can't believe how much I used to eat, either--but I did it unknowingly because often it was "healthy" home cooked foods. I had no idea how many calories potatoes have, for example. Or how many calories in a tablespoon of salad dressing. I never measured foods, I just dumped it on my plate and ate it as long as it tasted good.

Well, now that I know what I'm doing, it's a lot easier to stop! At this point in my journey I almost have a counter in my head that says, "OK, that's enough of that--and that--and that." And I do actually stop now.

Jay

Oh, I always ate breakfast, I loved to eat so much I sure wasn't going to skip a "legit" chance to eat - huge bowl of sugary cereal OR a muffin/venti latte combo. Nice big sugar spike to set off sugar/carb attacks for the rest of the day

Learning about portion sizes was such a huge shock, to pour an actual serving of cereal into my cereal bowl and compare it to how much I used to eat for breakfast - wow. I was probably eating 3-4 servings of cereal.

Iknow every thing . I just don't pay any attention to it.

I wake up at night and eat. Sometimes I don't even remember that I have done it until I see something out on the counter in the morning. I have eaten half a jar of peanutbutter, neat. I have eaten a whole bag of cookies. That kind of stuff. One time when I was extremely stressed, I tried to eat ground coffee out of the can. That woke me up fast. I read some place that eating during the night means I have serious mental problems. Yikes.

For some reason, when start a serious diet, I don't seem to have a problem with eating in the night. Once in a while, I wake up really hungry and I go eat a wasa crisp, but no "sleep-eating".

Anyway, this wierd eating has packed on a lot of weight. I am hoping I can continue this not eating at night in to maintenance.

I was the exact same way you are... I always wake up too late for breakfast, skip lunch, then come home and have a sandwich, or some popcorn and a pop.... go to piano lessons or something... Then dinner, I would still eat all of dinner. Plus late night snacking. This year will definately be different!

god u need to here mine ... it was like a sumos diet! im surprised i wasnt fatter

breakie- a cup of tea and half of a family pack of borbon creams (chocolate biscuits for those who've never heard of the borbons)
mid morn- a wham bar, a vimto bar and a loli pop
lunch- chicken mayo sandwich, bag of crisps and a cake
snacks- bag of crisps, bits of leftovers from other nights
dinner- takeaway (different one depends) chineese or indian or english or thai
desert- ice cream with chocolate sauce
then i would snack on crisps or borbons and cups of tea.

i no i may not have weighed alot but compared to my height and age i was just huge! and that was how i used to eat about a year ago... i havent been on a strict proper diet for that long tho.. just been on it for nearly 2 weeks... since last year ive been trying to cut back and i slowly lost weight but i still never excersised so this time i have.... ok ill shut up now lol xxx

Oh, I can totally relate to this post! I cannot believe I let myself consume so much food for so long. And even when I thought I was eating relatively healthy, I didn't have a clue - I used to get a salad at the Corner Bakery for lunch a few times a week that has 800 calories in it! I almost fell on the floor when I looked that one up! Of course, now that I'm a bit smarter about things, I'm not surprised at all - it was loaded with cheese, sour cream, tortilla chips, etc. Fitday, I thank you for opening my eyes!

On a "normal" day, about 3000 calories.

Breakfast and lunch were fine (about 700 cal total) and I hardly ever snacked during the day, but as soon as I got home I started eating and drinking alcohol compulsively... 2000+ cal in 4 hours. After 10pm I'd usually never eat.

I shudder when I think of how and what I used to eat. I never knew what a growling stomach felt like becuase I was alway eating. Even when I was full, I could still eat.

Breakfast would be 3 eggs, pancakes, any cake or cookies lying around; lunch would be scarfing down a pound of cold cuts, baked potatoes or rice with lots of butter, candy; dinner would be super-sized portions with lots of gravy, salad dressing, and big desserts. I could easily eat twice what my husband ate. I couldn't understand him when he said that he just couldn't eat another bite and left food on his plate. Of course, he stayed slim while I just kept ballooning upward on the scale and outward in proportion.

I used to eat whole boxes of sweet cereals, nuts, pretzels, ice cream. I would start eating first thing in the morning and continue until I went to bed. Of course, I would always be falling asleep on the couch from sugar and carb overload. I couldn't walk up a flight of stairs without huffing and puffing. I'd used ton's of Gold Bond medicated powder to sooth the chafing skin on my body.

I never want to go back to that miserable experience - I was in a physical, emotional and spiritual ****-hole.

It was good to write this response - it reminded me of how much I've changed and how far I've come. I'm very thankful for the support and help I've received on this forum!

Same here. I really used to binge out of depression and boredom. I also used to skip breakfast all the time. I'm still not a breakfast person but I make myself eat something at least like yogurt or a snack bar or oatmeal. Since I've started eating breakfast I feel a lot better and do a lot better with my eating. It is amazing how much one can eat just mindlessly.