I started my meat and veggie diet in May 2000 and lost about 60 pounds in about 6 monthes. I fell into cheating at about 235 pounds but managed to maintain for around 2 years. Then I discovered DANDR and decided the ketogenic diet was for me. The truly lc induction diet melted the other 40 pounds away in mere monthes. That was around 2 years or so ago and I have wavered no more than 10 pounds in that time. Of course, a man my size can gain or lose 10 pounds of water in a day so I think I have done pretty well

I still don't believe I am thin at times. A while back I saw a picture of myself (they are rare since I have always hated my picture being taken, as most fat people do) and couldn't believe that my face looks normal, actually almost too thin. I still feel like the fat kid in school, though. It really takes some getting accustomed to!

I wasn't overweight as a kid, but I thought I was, since I weighed more than all the other girls. I found an old calendar last year that had "Christa and Mom start diet" on January 1st- I was 12. It was the onset of the yo-yo dieting that let to the pounds packing on. Unfortunately, in spite of the best intention, that yo-yo cycle is hard to break.

Great question MsTwacky!
Another nurse checking in!
I've had a weight problem all my life. I too remember shopping for "plus" clothes as a young teen. I even belonged to a hospital run weight loss group for kids... called "Lean Teens". I slimmed down some at the beginning of highschool but was heavy again as a senior. Then Nursing school hit and I ballooned. I lost weight again but still thought I was so fat... looking back at pictures I would love to be "that fat" again.... minus the big hair.
Anyway.... my diets throughout life have been Lean Teens which was based on a balanced ADA diet, Medifast (a strict liquid diet.... lost 40 lbs and my gallbladder), weight watchers too many times to count, Jenny Craig, weight trimmers, the list goes on and on....... I'm quite the diet failure and pro at yo-yo-ing. I've also been on and off LC so obviously commitment is a problem .....
Anyway.... here's to thinner and healthier days ahead.
Gypsy

I was in my 20's when I began having miscarriages...my health went down the drain and my weight began to creep up. I lost most of the weight I gained after having my son in 1984, but a few years after that I began breaking out in hives and having all kinds of problems. And the weight really began to climb.

I have PCOS and before having my son I gained about 40lbs....lost it while pregnant and stayed small for about a year then boom gained 40 pounds in about a 2 month period thats when i found out I had hypothyroidism...later after gaining another 20lbs and a lot more test I found out I had PCOS so that would be the cause of my weight gain but I think I would have gradually gained if it weren't for that...Not sure though...but thats defiantly a family history!!!

Take care

I see pictures where I was thin until age 3 then I turned chubby. I remember being 6 years old and my mother buying me womens sized clothes. I started TOPS when I was 14 at 177 lbs. When I graduated high school at 18 I was 200 lbs. This has been a life long problem... but as I look back our home was full of carbs. Everything was fried in bacon grease...potatoes, even bread. My mother was a stay at home mom who made bread and sweets weekly, potatoes and pasta were at almost every meal.

I have PCOS too!! I know it's a struggle with weight when you have PCOS!!

But the absolute best thing for it is to not eat sugar and high carb foods. When I was 22 I gave up sugar, flour and grains. Even with PCOS the weight fell off of me. About 70 lbs in 6-7 months. Yet being thin was a whole new world and I found out that sugar was a very powerful coping tool and addiction because once I started to eat it again, I couldn't stop!!! I gained 80 lbs back reaching my top weight of 238lbs!!! Because certain foods were my life long friend (so I thought) I returned to them. That's why I'm curious to see how the people who have turned to food since childhood have managed to give them up and what have they done to fill that void.

I was skinny most of my childhood until I was about 16 and then I started to gain and it really exploded when I went away to college, etc..

No, I gained all my weight after having children. I had five children, one in 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, and 2003. Before that I was always at the top of my weight, but mostly muscular and very fit. I don't want to be skinny, I just want to be healthy!

I am 47 years old. I began gaining weight 10 years ago. That is also when I noticed symptoms of hypoglycemia. I also think that perimenopause was approaching ( I think that there is a connection between the two ). I have been pregnant 3 times and I lost all or most of my baby fat after each birth. This was dissapointing at the time because I had been soooo skinny. I wanted to hold onto some weight and I thought childbirth would help. I am not muscular or athletic in the least so when I was skinny, I really looked skinny. But, when I put on weight, I really looked fat.

I started gaining weight as soon as I left school. I had always been able to eat unreservedly, and thanks to growing up in a family with lousy eating habits, that was a lot. So when I finished school and stopped playing sport and walking or cycling everywhere, the pounds started to pile on It is interesting hearing everyone else's journeys.

Well add me in the overweight child category. My story is similar to that of another poster who blamed their grandparents. I love my mother dearly, but we are an italian family and my mother's way of showing love was food. My food choices were never restricted growing up, and I was in fact encouraged to eat, eat, eat.

My weight problem started probably when I was around 8 or 9. I would come home from school and my mother would fix me a bagel with either butter or cream cheese for a snack. She was always demanding that we clean our plates. There were always high fat snacks in the house. Chips, cookies, cakes, anything and everything that was bad for you. We never had things like fruit or veggies in the house to snack on. I grew up believing that veggies were for cooking with, to make a meal. Never even thought of actually having a veggie as a snack. My mom never bought fruit to snack on.
I love my mother with all my heart but do blame her to a degree for my weight problems. She encouraged unhealthy eating all throughout my childhood, and as a result of that I built eating habits that were thoroughly unhealthy and doomed me to be overweight.
I was also diagnosed with PCOS (after I was already overweight for years) which didn't help me any. I have been struggling all of my life with my weight. It doesn't help either that my biological father is severely overweight, and I take after his side of the family, while my sister takes after my mom's side, the skinny side.
I remember so many days when I would get made fun of. I would think I looked pretty decent, then someone would destroy any shred of self esteem I had by making a hurtful comment. One day that particularly stands out in my mind (and probably always will) is the day that my sister, myself, and my step-sister went to a concert on the boardwalk. We were just walking along, minding our own business (I was about 15 at this time) and a group of guys walked by and one of them said "eat a salad." For no reason. I was SO hurt by this, and even more hurt because my sister and step-sister nearly busted a gut laughing about it.
There was only one year in my life that I was skinny. From 18 to 19. I went out to the club every Friday night and we would dance for 5 or 6 hours straight. I was having so much fun with my friends that I would forget to eat, and before I knew it, I looked FANTASTIC! I'd lost a bunch of weight (I'll never know how much, I never weighed myself, but I was wearing a size 7) and I was just feeling and looking so good. Then I stopped going to the club and hanging out with that friend, and started eating again, and it came right back on.
WOW how I loved that feeling of being thin for the first time in my life. And ironically, when I was that thin, I looked in the mirror and still saw the same, fat person. If only I knew then what I know now.
So I have always had an unhealthy relationship with food, and I am trying to change that now by making this a WOL, as opposed to thinking of it as a diet. (I hate to even use the word.) It's going to take a long time for me to retrain myself and my entire way of thinking, but it will be worth it, so I will perservere.
Sorry to be so long winded, lol. That's my story.

It's interesting reading everyone's history with being overweight.
To add to my previous post I'd like to say that I can't blame anyone but me for being overweight. Even as a child. My Mom always cooked traditional, well balanced, healthy meals. She was heavy for a time and had a blood disorder that required to lose weight and follow a strict diet to bring her lipids down to normal (her triglycerides were through the roof... hyperproteinlipidemia). My Dad was always a junk eater and I have 3 older siblings (way older) so there was always available junk to get into after eating the well balanced diet prepared by my mother.
As far as I can remember I always loved food. And always snuck junk food.... as much as I could get. I remember as a kid noticing that my friends didn't "like" junk food like I did. How could they just eat half of that cupcake. I remember biking to the store to buy candy and even raiding pantry closets of houses where I was babysitting. How sad.
Looking back it's very embarrassing but I was like a machine. Never seemed to get enough food.
I guess some things never change..... still love junk food.
Gypsy