I'd say my whole life too....I honestly can't remember ever being "skinny" or whatever. I always felt bigger than my friends and now looking at pictures from back then, I want to shake the little girl in the picture and tell her to start then.

But I'm proud of myself for finally figuring out what works and what's best for me.

I could've stood to lose about 10 lbs at 16. That was almost 11 years ago, and instead I gained about 30 lbs.

I thought I needed to lose weight at 11, but looking back at pictures, that was ridiculous. It was just puberty, but as a formerly thin child who developed early, I didn't realize what was going on.

Since forever.

When I was 3 my parents noticed I was still holding my baby fat and took me to the doctor who proceeded to put me on a strict diet. This is a BAD time to put someone on a diet of any kind because this is when hunger set points and metabolism forms, so I sort of had my ability to determine my own appetite taken away from me. My parents do regret that.

Tack on a rocky childhood where my only comfort was food and from then on, I was just hungry all the time. I was pretty much just overweight until my senior year of high school when I wandered into obese territory. When I was 22, I went through some life altering experiences that made me throw up my hands and say "enough" and I lost the weight. I maintained the loss for 4 years and regained 15-20 pounds after my wedding last summer. I'm working my way down though and feel good about my ability to regain control :)

My ex, like my dad, kept a very close watch on my weight and gave reminders when things were getting out of "control". At 30 years old and 135 pounds my ex told me he was tired of my belly poking out and my cottage cheese legs. He divorced me less than a year later. I told him then that I would get fat and find someone who loved me when I was fat and would appreciate it when I lost weight, not expect it. Boy did I ever come to eat those words...18 months later I married again, this time weighing 174, as opposed to the 111 I weighed when ex and I married. The only problem was this hubby loved me no matter what. He even joined me in gaining the next 50 pounds. He now joins me on this wonderful journey that is weight loss. So the answer to the question would be 9 years.

I've been overweight since I was about 13, but not by much. I was always trying to lose weight in high school. My parents never really said anything to me about losing weight, so my efforts were always a secret. I didn't start to really pack on the pounds until I was 20 or so. It feels like I've been obese my entire life, but that's not really the case. All I know is that it's been far too long.

I remember trying to diet to get to 75 lbs (I think?) when I was 8 years old, I remember thinking that was a "normal" weight because that's what everyone else was, I think I was over by 5 or 10 lbs, enough to be a bigger size than everyone else, that's when it all started. I'm almost 40 now and I've been classified as "overweight" ever since, although I spent a good part of my teens, 20s and 30s weight-training and heavily involved in running/biking, triathlons/kickboxing etc. so I was one of those muscular, fit, but heavier girls, at the time though I still thought I was "fat" at 170 lbs, and working my tail off every day. Truth be told, I did not know "fat" until I got pregnant, the second time bringing me to a whopping 279 lbs (PIH with a ton of water retention) after second baby a year and half ago I started my journey at 255 lbs and am only just now seeing "the light" at the end of the tunnel. My first goal is 160 lbs, 10 lbs lower than what I used to be able to maintain, so it's going to be a tough haul, because I'm even wondering if I really put my mind to it, maybe I could even go to 150 or 145??? But I'll start with 160 hold that for awhile and go from there :)

I was put on my first diet at around 3 years of age, went from being a fat kid to an obese teenager, and reached my highest weight shortly after graduating from college. I literally haven't been a normal weight since infancy...

I've been overweight most of my life. I was just slightly overweight until I got my period at age 11. By the time I hit 15, I was morbidly obese (in the low 200s).

i remember always being acutely aware of eating much more than my friends and always being on the bigger side, even from elementary school. i think i was conscious of watching my weight or actively trying to lose weight since maybe i was 11 or 12. i'm 28 now. in hs i tried a variety of stupid self-designed diets and occasional jogs between 1 and 3 miles, but maintained a slow but steady gain of prob at least 15 lbs in 4 yrs. i'm not sure at what weight my mother began hassling me specifically about my weight being a problem, rather than just generally fitness and watching what i weighed (which began in 5th grade). i specifically remember in 12th grade at 140 pounds (oh the horror!) both of my parents sat me down in an intervention-style approach to talk to me about my weight problem and how they were lovingly concerned. in the first two years of college i probably maintained, but i was running about 12 miles a week and eating low fat everything (this was the end of the 90s). i was so frustrated at years of denying myself, years of killing myself running, and not losing ANY weight. so at the age of 20, i threw in the towel and gave up entirely. so in the 7 years that followed, i gained an additional 40 lbs eating mostly as i wanted to eat and not ever exercising except for a few spurts here and there. until i finally decided enough was enough. in 2008 i was diagnosed with pcos and found out that that could be responsible for my inability to lose weight despite diet and exercise (see all of hs and half of college). i started on medication to help with this and lost 16 lbs between october and january without actually changing my lifestyle. in january i decided to actually try a real dieting plan. so that's where we are now. interestingly, according to the bmi chart, i technically didn't enter the overweight range until sometime in college. amazing how i spent all of high school full of self-loathing.

Since birth. Seriously, I think the only time I was normal was when I was born. I think it went downhill at about 6 months of age.

I have been varying degrees of overweight all my life less a few short stints in HS, 20's and after a year on PhenFen.

Oh how I wish I didn't beat up the +10 lb Luise, she might not have gotten to the +100 lb Luise.

At 40 something my new goal is NOT to be defined by my weight. When soemone has to describe me, it will be about my hair, height, personality, NOT, the fat chick down the hall. Oh I long for that day!

Puberty seemed to bring it on. I've looked at photographs of myself before sixth grade & in them I'm a normal, fairly slender girl. A little buck-toothed (fixed later, after years of wearing a retainer). Then WHAM! I've got hips & a butt like a grown woman, and breasts that are already on their way to looking like a grown woman's. Not coincidentally, at about the same time, I stopped swimming in the summer & I stopped going horseback riding afer school nearly every other day. Instead, I read a lot of books, wrote stories & poems, & stayed in my room listening to music. Also, I became a latch key kid, so I was eating a lot from the time I got home till later when my parents got back from work.

Wow, I've read all of your posts with great interest!

Not to discredit others, but it does feel nice to see others who have struggled with weight their whole lives, like me. On the Biggest Loser, many of the contestants have at one time been quite thin and only recently gained a lot of weight. I feel like they choose those contestants on purpose and while I can relate to their struggles with losing weight, part of me feels like it's not exactly the same as other adults who've never EVER been a healthy weight for their height.

I also can relate to many of you who said as children or teens, you were only 10-20 lbs overweight. Me too. But I felt so fat and disgusting. The other day, one of my Korean students came up to me, pointed to his friend and said "Teacher, he FAT!" I'll bet these two boys weighed the same but the boy he was pointing to was a couple inches shorter. The difference between being "fat" and "normal" is so small when you are young. At my lowest weight, I weighed 125. But I WANTED to weigh 115. In all my pictures I felt TOO FAT and now those are my inspiration pictures, to prove I can be a size 10 again (though honestly, I still want to be less than that... but I will be ELATED to be a 10 again... or even at 12 at this point).

I was a bit chubby in middle school- about 12 but in HS was a 16/18.... I have gone up to a 20 in college but am in an 18 again for the last few years... the most I ever lost was 30 lbs and weighed 220.... which is 2 less than my current weight.... I feel this will be my success.. oh, I am 28 so I have been a chunk for a really long time.... :)

I was tall, thin and could eat anything without consequences until about age 27 or so, then especially at 30 the dear metabolism changed. I had a "good run" though... it's my entire 30s I spent mostly overweight - 10-20 lbs, sometimes yo yo'ing down but this time determined to get it down for good and stay within 5 lbs of target weight.