How many of you are breaking new limits?

[Nike]

I'm curious - how many of you have always struggled with weight since childhood and were hardly ever at the weight you wanted to be, and now you are breaking new grounds with low-carbing?

I read somewhere that statistically, people who never had problems with weight as children/teens/early 20s are way more likely to shed the pounds gained through bad eating habits/slowing metabolism/pregnancies etc than those who had never been thin ... :confused:

Just wondering if those statistics had not taken low carbing into consideration! :)

Thanks in advance for all the input! :cool:

[Natrushka]

None of the options really apply to me:

I was always a very active child and teen (figure skating and competitive swimming) - I think this kept my weight in check, until intense exercise was no longer part of my lifestyle (University). I gained a huge amount of weight during the four years I was in university (I was 280 lbs at one point).

Something happend in January of '88 - I went on the very first 'diet' of my life. No more candy bars, no more coke classic. It started out quite innocently - eating less, eating more whole foods and doing a little exercise again. It blossomed into calorie restriction (800-900 calories a day), fat gram counting and excessive exercise (jogging, aerobics, cycling for hours a day). I lost 132 lbs in less than a year and did quite the number on my metabolism. I also didnt have a life for the year - all my time was spent working and/or exercising.

Over the course of about 3 years I started living - now that I had a 'new body' and I gained back about 25 lbs - I say about because I got rid of the scale - I had become so obsessed that even I realized it was getting out of control. I lived at that weight/size (size 11/12) for a good many years - I still exercised but kept it to about an hour a day 6 days a week. Whenever my clothing got too tight I'd increase the exercise and skip meals.

For a brief period in '95 I must have weighed about 220 lbs - just prior to the big "D" (divorce). Once again I increased the exercise and went ultra low fat and brought my weight back down to a size 11/12. This is where my body seems to be happy (interestingly this is where I kind of am now).

When I started LCing last August I weighed myself for the first time in years - about 12 of them. It was a few days after I started PP and I was 241, size 20. Up until that time I had been trying with absolutely no success to get back down to an 11/12 with all my old tricks - reduced calories, excessive cardio (two 45 minute sessions every day, 6 days a week). Nothing worked. I actually got fatter.

The rest is history. I'm not sure if I qualify as a yo-yo dieter or not - I have lost and gained the same 40 lbs 3 times, but always over the course of a few years, with the exception of that first time. The first time is also the smallest I ever was - size 7 at 155 lbs.

I know that by continuing on with my new WOL that I will eventually be the leanest, healthiest and fittest I have ever been in my life. I am too logically minded to not see it. LC is the only time I have ever lost fat without much effort - and it's the only time I have done so w/o becoming obsessive about the numbers.

Nat

[razzle]

I cant vote either. I was a fat teen (gained 50 pounds at puberty, without much changing my eating). I'm nowhere near my lowest weight...but my lowest weight was an anorectic weight.

I am at my peak of health.

[mbschlgr]

I can't find one to choose exactly either.

I wan't a fat kid, gained in my late teens, lost it in my early twenties, then with a bad marriage, pregnancy and divorce, in my thirties, I gained! I lost it then with diet pills (60 lbs to be exact)

Kept it off for a time, got remarried, and developed thyroid disease... kept gaining, gained on weight watchers no less!!! Well, hypothyroidism with hyperinsulinism was the diagnosis, had to remove carbs, I then immediately began to lose weight.

Just this past winter I slacked! Ate carbs that I know I shouldn't have, they began to add up and so did 10 lbs.

My weigh t troubles seem to have always been from a "problem" not just cause I was always fat, or always thin.

Yes yo yo, but LCing is a WOL for me... It has to be, not a means to just lose weight fast or to get to where I was at one time, weight loss with LCing is only a happy side effect for me!!

[Nike]

Wow, thanks for all the replies. I guess my poll is way too simplified for a complicated issue like this where everyone has a personal story.
I guess I've just been reading too much lately and of course there's the "traditional" low fat method to losing weight that every nutrition book preaches, and the low carb method that so many love to hate. It just also happens that many of the books and resources that advise a low fat/high carb way of living also mention that many of the great weight loss results are not typical and spew off a list of reasons why people may not lose as much as they want to - one of those reasons it mentions is that people who have had weight problems as children (basically if you were found that you were consistently heavier than your size 0 class mates as a kid/teen) are morely likely to struggle with weight all their life and will probably never reach that "ideal" weight they want. Those books recommend losing 10% of your weight and being happy with that.
So I guess I was curious if those traditional low fat books were wrong, and if people who never lost all the excess weight the traditional way have found amazing results with low carbing :)

Of course everyone's story is unique. For me, I was never "severely" overweight, but I was never thin either. I'm not trying to be super-model skinny, anyone who looks at me would have to agree that I could stand to lose some fat and I'm just trying to get healthier in general. Traditional low-fat diets have been extremely hard to stick with and never produced more than average results for me, and now suddenly I look at this totally different point of view and new way of life - its great :) and I'm hoping to see good results. But of course I don't want to expect too much, which is why I was wondering about people's experiences with losing the excess weight even if they were "plump" kids :) like me.

I guess I'm just hoping to find out that traditional diet books are wrong about that assumption! :D

[mbschlgr]

Nike,

I look at the "low fat" way of doing things this way:

With the new trend in low fat society has never been fatter, so what does that tell you. All of the low fat foods are full of carbs to make up for the taste, therefore, causign us to be hungrier more often and overeating all of the carb laiden stuff!!!

Hmmmmm does make one wonder about all of those books now doesn't it!!!

Good idea and thought provoking!

[gracie-poo]

Another vote for none of the above!

Actually, I marked the "never been thin, and it's taking me places I've never been" etc. but that is really not true. I was a healthy weight as a teenager up until about age 20 but I have never been skinny by any means. I floated around in the size 10/12 arena for most of my life, which is certainly not bad!

I always had a frighteningly great attitude about my figure. In fact, I rarely ever thought about dieting or exercising. I gained and lost 10 lbs here with no thought. But somewhere around age 20, I went over 170 and it REALLY began to show up on my body. Until that point, my tall frame hid the weight pretty well. Then, a stint with birth control popped me up to 190, none of my clothes fit, suddenly I couldn't even fit into regular sizes and I was too stubborn and proud to delve into plus sizes. Hell no! I went off the pill immediately and lost five pounds. My attempts at diets were laughable (I just buyed "lite" sour cream instead of regular, and had 3 pieces of pizza instead of 4) which is probably good....I didn't try to starve my metabilism to $hit. And I took up exercise and weight training (which was REALLY good for me) and lost another 5 to 180 lbs.

And then, there was LC......which takes me to 149, the thinnest I've been since I was 14.

Nike, only time will tell whether I will get to the level of slenderness I desire...I think all of us know that. I do think many of us have a set point our body likes to be at, but for 99% of us, that set point is entirely reasonable and attractive. I don't think there is ANYTHING wrong with being 69 inches tall and 150 pounds! Anything's better than 190! :)

[chewie1012]

I have been overweight for about 26 years. As a teen I was fat. In my senior year I went from 230lbs to 170 lbs. I am 6 foot 2 inches. I was very thin. I did by smoking and drinking coffee and only eating one meal and that was lunch. This woe has been the easiest thing I have ever done to lose weight. The only difficult part for me is preparing meals. I am the king of leftovers. My wife and children are not doing this wol so there leftovers are usually mac and cheese or something else like that that I can't have.

[Kristine]

I voted for "never had a weight problem/LCing to get back to where I was." That was the closest. :) Technically, I've never really have a weight problem. The heaviest I've been was 160 due to birth control hormones. But that doesn't mean I don't have an *eating* problem. I guess the starving outweighed the bingeing enough for me to narrowly avoid obesity (no pun intended :) ), but I've probably gained and lost hundreds of pounds since I was a teenager. :( I was a profession dieter. No more: low-carbing is a good way to manage food so that I can eat to live instead of living to eat.

[DebPenny]

None of your poll questions fit me. I was a "normal" size until I hit puberty. Then my problems started (PCOS). I was never diagnosed with it until this year and I'll be 45 this year. I consider that I did not have a weight problem until I was 14. But saying that I never had a weight problem or always had a weight problem just doesn't fit.

As to this WOL taking me places I have never been to:

I have never stuck to a diet this long before (5 months and counting) and of course this is a WOL, not a diet. I have never felt this good since I was a kid. I have never enjoyed working out like this since I was a kid and on a synchronized swimming team. I have never been so healthy since I was a kid.

Will I ever stop this WOL? NO!

Thanks for asking!

BTW: Until I started TSP, I thought I was at the weight I wanted to be, or at least resigned to be. I was proud of myself for maintaining the same weight for most of 15 years. I wasn't dieting most of that time and thought there was no way I was ever going to be able to get my weight down. Now I know better.

;-Deb

[Lisa N]

None of the poll questions quite fit for me, either. I've been overweight since I was a small child aside from a couple of years in high school when I was extremely active in sports. Once I started college and became less active, the pounds started piling on and it seemed there was little I could do about it. No matter how much I cut calories and dieted, I kept gaining weight. I'm currently at the lowest weight I have been in about 17 years and still heading downward, but I'm not going to see my high school weight ever again for a couple of reasons. The first and biggest is that I now have more lean body mass than I did when I was 17 and weighed 125 lbs. (I'm also not 17 anymore). Since my lean body mass is higher, a healthy weight for me is also higher. I'm not willing to sacrifice lean body mass to see a lower weight on the scale.
Taking me to new places? Oh, yes. I feel and look better than I have in years (many of them) and have more confidence now than ever before in my life. I finally feel like I'm in control of my weight instead of it controlling me for the first time in my life and that's a feeling I'm not willing to give up for any amount of high carb food.

[Meg_S]

The first question kind of fits me.
I was a very active kid - always one of the best at sports with skinny arms/legs and a big tire around my middle. (my sisters were little sticks) My family ate a lot of white bread, macaroni, bagels and even more butter to go with it. Once I hit ten the weight just started to pack on.. I always tried to "starve myself" because I thought that was the way to get thin, but was so addicted it could only last 1-5 days before a binge.
As a teenager I was too shy to exercise because I thought anyone who saw me would be disgusted at how fat I looked when I worked out, and all sports discontinued because of joint pain. (I grew quickly, 5 10" at 12 years old).

At 17 I joined a gym class called "superfit" at school, which was all weight training and running. In 6 months I had not lost a pound, and realized that no amount of exercise is going to thin me out without low-carb, because I had read Atkins and thought it made sense. (I had tried induction twice, and lost enough for me to notice each time, but found it too hard to eat that way in my parents house)

This lifestyle has been a Godsend. I had tried it for a week or two when I met my husband, but was still close to my fattest. I've been lowcarbing on and off for a few years now. For the last year and a half I've been living with my husband (instead of my family) and it ihas really sunk in that I control what food is in the house, and in my belly.

It is funny, I wanted to kickstart my diet by being super strict for a short time this past spring, and exercising really hard... and those habits STUCK.
I can't drink diet sodas anymore because the chemical taste is too disgusting. I can't eat more than a bite of pastas, ice cream etc. If my husband is eating something which normally the sight of would put me on a binge - usually I ask him if I can smell it, and that is enough to turn me off. (of course I have cheat days!)
Actually in the last 2 weeks I have switched to a CKD, which is one carb up day per week and I find it really hard to eat the necessary carbs. I dread that day.

The last 6 months have really changed my mindset of this being a "diet" instead of just the way I eat. Exercise has been incredible too - I find myself "eating for exercise" instead of eating for pleasure. Don't get me wrong, I *loooooove* to eat. It is one of my favourite pastimes, and I love to create delicious, feel good, lowcarb meals.
I'll be thinking about sushi and ready to drive to the store - and then I'll think, "ugh, I am going to feel so crappy and bloated" and it will turn me off.

This has never happened in my life! Even in the last year tasting carbs would throw me into an eating frenzy. Now I can accept that I have a problem, and it is almost easy to keep my addictive personality in check. I weight less than I did when I was 12, and am fitter than I've ever been in my life.

Sorry this took so long!!

Meg


ps: the coolest thing happened this weekend. My younger "very slim, never had a prob with her weight or eating" sister told me she can't fit into her "nice shorts" So she wants to come to my house for two weeks because she knows she'll lose the fat eating here!

[chewie1012]

Great story Meg and I think your doing great.
Jerry

[Meg_S]

Thanks Jerry!
It still hasn't sunk in that I'm actually a success when it comes to my body, because there is so much I want to work on.

Thanks to all of the wonderful people in these forums who share pieces of their life with me. It is always inspirational!

Meg

[yari20]

I can't choose any response to your poll either. I was always fit, all my life (until I got married and had kids), I was a size 11 and usually weighed anywhere from 135 to 140. (I probably would've fit in smaller clothes, but my hips have always been a bit wide). Anyways, I was usually active, doing sports, exercising, dancing. Unfortunately, after I got married and had my kids, my weight has been on a constant upswing.

I am finally losing weight :D and I'm thrilled to see the pounds dropping after not seeing any movement on the scale (except for up, of course) for over 6 months. Finally, something is working!

Good luck to all.

Yari

[Dawn, Fl.]

Nope I can't Vote either,

I was nice and thin when I was young....didn't even start gaining wieght until I went on Birth Control pills...then the pounds came and came and never stoped...until now...not until I started eating LC did I ever loose a pound. And in doing all that "low fat" and "fat free" all I did was wind up in the hospital due to lack of sodium. So here I am and here I will stay!

[freydis]

When I weighed 145 in high school, after an entire summer of starvation and heavy exercise, LOTS of people thought I was still overweight. I came back to school that year able to run marathons and win/place, but was still teased for my size. A girl in my gym class, amazed at what I was accomplishing while "overweight," sat next to me on a bench one day and started punching my leg. Poking, punching, trying to jiggle it, etc. My muscles were so taut that she couldn't even depress the skin. She turned to me and said, "You're NOT fat!" I looked at what she was trying to do and asked her to try the same thing on my arms. There was a little skin depression there, but not much. So, my body fat MUST have been pretty low, but my size was still an issue. Yes, I have big bones, but I wasn't the only person with big bones. I was the only person in my high school class (72 people) who was singled out for size. And, at home, my family considered me too large. But that was the most slim I ever achieved. I don't think I'll make it that far, but close would be nice.

[catspaw]

When I was 6 years old, my grandmother told me I was built like a Mack truck. So, I guess I've always had a weight problem :p

My graduation picture from high school makes me cringe. One of the reasons I joined the Army was because I knew I would have to keep my weight under some sort of control. (Not one of the usual reasons the recruiters use!) Just having that external pressure helps me a lot - I don't know how big I would have gotten if I hadn't had it.

Actually I have quite a bit of muscle (now), but I still have plenty to lose. One shot of Depo-provera was enough to convince me NEVER to do that again.

My lowest so far has been 129, which is well under what I was in high school.

[sr5]

Hi,
I was thin (5' 6"/ 100 lbs) until I quit smoking in my 30's. I started exercising and lost weight to a size 6 (120 lbs). I started gaining again in my 40's (still exercising), I tried to eat low fat and still gained.

In August of this year I watched a program titled "What if it's all been a BIG FAT LIE", it mentioned Atkins which I had always heard was dangerous. I bought Dr. Atkins' book and read cover to cover and realized why I have been gaining weight. Since starting Atkins my cholesterol has gone down and I feel great! I have more energy and am starting run up hill again instead of walking. I am down to a size 8 and weigh 146. I don't want to weigh 100 or even 120. My goal is 140 and I know I will get there!

I love eating low carb and I don't miss sugar or bread in the least. All week long at work we have had tons of candy and cookies and it doesn't bother me. Listening to people complain how they feel and then continue to eat all the sugar and carbs makes me all the more determined to continue a low carb way of life.

[mrbean]

Hi all,

I was always an overweight person up until my middle teens. It was around late '94 that an uncle of mine told me about low carbing. I was around 305 - 310lbs at the time, so I was obviously interested in any advice he would give me. "Do not consume any more than 20 grams of carbs per day. Stay away from anything with sugar in it," were his exact words. I had no clue I was on the Adkins diet until a few years had passed and I read one of his books.

I lost 90lbs in 90 days. Nope, that's not a typo! I was down to 215lbs exactly 90 days after starting this new low-carb lifestyle. I eventually got into weightlifting at this weight so I could shape my body. Within two years I was 210lbs with a very respectable 11% body fat. For the last few years my weight has fluctuated from 205-220lbs depending on the time of the year (I gain near the holidays; who doesn't? :)) In the summertime, I am never above 210lbs. I have my body fat measured every 6 months to make sure that I am still on track. I also weigh myself every six weeks or so.

Please do not take my post as bragging or anything like that. It just amazes me at how wonderful a low carb lifestyle has been for myself and others. My sister lost over 60lbs and my mother lost over 100lbs low carbing, also.

The disinformation going around about low carbing is nothing short of absurd. Topics such as "you will lose muscle mass" or "all you lose is water weight" are what really crack me up. A friend of mine once asked me how I stay in such great shape. I told him that I eat eggs with bacon for breakfast, chicken for lunch, and a steak that could choke an alligator for dinner, workout a few days a week and that's it. Of course after he chuckled in disbelief, I explained the low carb lifestyle that we follow. His reply was the same as most uninformed people: "But that's such an unhealthy diet."
My response: "Do I look unhealthy to you?"

I had this same conversation with well over 50 people in the last few years.


I have to be honest here. I still have somewhat of an image problem. I still see myself as a fat person inside a healthy man's body. I guess being very overweight for most of my life has had somewhat of an impact on my self-confidence. I still keep some of my old clothes tucked away in my closet to remind myself of exactly why I chose a low carb lifestyle.

I still to this very day, love carbs. I "cheat" once a week on Sunday's. I'll have burgers and pizza;my two favorite foods. Granted, I always make sure to take my carb-cutters. These cheats have helped my keep my sanity throughout all this. For me, I will not follow anything where I feel deprived. I would hate to give up my occasional cheats. The only time I give them up is when my weight starts to reach 220. No problem, I'll skip a cheat day for two weeks and be back down to 210lbs. It's like clockwork.

I used to never understand what people meant when they say that one must be in tune with their body. Now I do, and it is a wonderful thing. That's the beauty of this low carb lifestyle. We are always in tune with our bodies. Low carbing allows us to adjust and tweak our metabolism's like a fine watch or a powerful race car.

For all those who are on a "stall" or just starting out, please do not give up. Of course you will have your ups and downs. Who doesn't? I, and many others, have been doing this for several years and we still have our days. You just take the good with the bad just like anything else in life. Trust me, you'll have many more good days than bad ones with lifestyle. The best part is that you'll never go hungry.

Thanks for reading.

[srd0821]

Such a great post! Thank you so much for sharing!

Shannon's fitday (http://fitday.com/WebFit/PublicJournals.html?Owner=srd0821)

[jsandy]

In high school, I ate everything in sight trying to bulk up for sports. After school I actually lost a few pounds, but when I enlisted and went to boot camp I started putting them on. I never knew people ate potatoes 3 times a day!

During unaccompanied tours in Japan and SEA the weight fell off. My diet was superior, I ate less, and walked everywhere. I ate very few meals on base. I came back from Thailand weighing 140 lb. The dysentary helped! I became a yo yo dieter and would lose 20 lb one time and 30 lb another time only to get it back plus more.

About 5 years ago, my wife and I tried Atkins and I lost 30 lb and she 20 lb. in approx 3 mo. We quit worrying about weight and pretty much went back to the old ways except we kept the high fat foods and started eating high carbs again.

We are low carbing again and it is a lot harder, but we are committed to a lifestyle change forever. I know now that LC is more important, but calories are still part of the equation. A dessert that has only 5 gm of carbs but 500 calories is not all that good of a deal!

[timco]

Funny you should say that about losing weight in SEA. I have found that third-world travel (I know most of SEA isn't really the third world, but you get the point) helps me shed pounds quickly and effortlessly. You walk everywhere, eat less, your appetite disappears, and, if you're lucky you might just get dysentary and really lose some weight.

[Gailew]

I chose the last one because I think you mean started out with no weight problem but then later gained. I was very thin, even tried to gain weight in my 20's by drinking a milkshake with every meal. I eventually gained a pound or two and then caught a cold and lost it in a couple of days. Sure it was fun eating everything I could get my hands on, but I looked skeletal. Now I know I have an unsteady thyroid. It's been over-active and under-active. Once I started gaining (after being treated for Graves' Disease), in my 30's, nothing I tried kept my weight from going up until lcing. It's been slow going, 20 pounds lost in over a year, but I feel so good, I will stay with this WOE no matter what my weight. I believe I will eventually get to a healthy weight and stay there with this lifestyle.

[ginyer]

Hi,
My weight gain came on later in life....I did enjoy not having to wage that battle the first 40 years of my life....could eat anything...oh, those were the days. But after a painful divorce and the death of my best friend to breast cancer, I found myself with an extra 50 pounds over the period of 18 months. It was like my entire system changed. Honestly, I don't feel that my eating habits changed, but I did add alcohol at home in the evenings and believe this was the beginning of the weight gain. It has now been six years, and I am on a quest to get my old self back! For a while, I just didn't care and was ready to accept things the way they are, but for health purposes I don't feel like I have a choice anymore, so I am on my way to find the old me.