What Made You Want To Lose Weight?

For me there wasn't a big moment in my life that changed anything but...

Theres a poster in our SW that is a map of Great Britain and shows two ways, a straight road or a wiggly line going all the way down all the back roads to the goal location. I've chosen the straight line down. Choosing this road means that I can get a slightly quicker result without any lapses. This is not an instant fix but a permanent lifestyle change but I intend to continue to work hard and reap the rewards over the coming months.

x
 
Miami, you have such a caring and positive attitude, I have no doubt you will continue to inspire others as you just have me! :>)
 
I'd always been uncomfortable with my weight as at age 11 I was 5'1" and about 130 lbs ish. Compared to my friends I was a lot fatter than them and they were classed as pretty and got attention, whereas I didn't so I thought I was fat. Ever since this blurry time in my life I have wanted to lose weight. However I just got fatter and fatter whilst gaining a grand total of 2" in height. My dad always used to say he was concerned about my weight because all the females on his side are very pear shaped and fat. At the start of 2009 he died of an unexpected heart attack at 40. As a child I was never scared of dying of cancer, it was always heart attacks that got me. Now I knew I was more susceptible to one it really scared me but all that happened was I gained more weight and actually hit an obese BMI.

My knees started to hurt, I was out of breath quicker and complete strangers (mostly men) had taken to calling me fat and other things in the street. It took two years of trying my hardest to lose 16 lbs and in September last year, I joined my college gym with most of those 16 lbs back on. In December I sat and thought about my weight and how I had never achieved any goals I had set and then I thought about my dad. I knew being overweight was a risk factor for a heart attack and I knew whenever I saw him, he would mention my weight. I also had been fed up of being fat since the age of 13 and vowed to be thin before I turned 20 (next month). I joined Weight Watchers on January 5th and am now the lightest I remember weighing.

Sorry for long post! :p
 
ChubLock said:
Well I've always known I need to lose weight but I am not happy in my own skin...I am disgusting!

Chublock,

As you begin to start losing weight you'll love being in your skin so much that you wouldn't wanna be anybody else but yourself :)
 
For me there were lots of reasons, but mainly my health. I've been overweight all my adult life, and I think I'd always just assumed that at some point it would fall off (naive or what!), then I realised I was getting near 30 and unless I did something to stop my weight gain I was going to have serious health problems in the future. I was also really unfit and it was limiting what I was able to do, and my joints hurt all the time. My big wake up call was when a friend came to visit, and she put pics of us up on facebook afterwards. I'd spent years kidding myself that every picture was just a bad angle or terrible lighting, that I wasn't actually that overweight (a few pounds maybe...), but for some reason this picture was the final straw that broke the donkeys back and I stopped being able to kid myself.
 
For me I just don't want 'this' to be my life anymore. I've been overweight my whole life pretty much and ballooned from a size 18 to a size 26 when I left home. I lost a bit and maintained around a size 20, then that crept up to where I am now at size 22/24. I use sizes because I didn't weight myself for years!!

I sortof put my life on hold and always said I'd do things when I lost weight - be it boyfriends, holidays, or whatever. Then I woke up this year and realised I've been wishing my life away since I was a teenager. I hit the big 30 next year and I'm stuck in a an unhappy place that I don't want to be anymore. I've watched guys I've been interested in meet and marry their wives and go on to have babies, all whilst I was sitting at home chomping my way through a box of donuts or chocolate cookies.

Also, being slimmer is something I've thought about EVERY day for the longest time, and it really is now or never for me. I don't want to wake up 39 and wish I'd done it ten years ago because I already feel that way at 29 :) Losing weight is a choice I make every day and I choose a better life for myself :D

Oh wow, that post moved me to tears when I read it this morning.:cry:I don't think a post has ever struck a cord with me so much!

Sorry I can't really contribute to this great thread as I am still struggling big time.
 
lola0607 said:
Is it weird that I'm doing this so I can be heard. Maybe it's childish.

I contribute to a team meeting in work and no one listens, I talk amongst the girls and no one listens. My boss talks down to me, I have a distinct feeling that when you see me you just see fat and nothing else. No wit humour or intelligence. Just a girl who indulges too much and can't control herself (eating)

That's my reason and it may not be right (very childish of me). But it's a one that will spur me on. Here's hopeing!! :)

You know. I never thought about it like that. But you're right. When I was a size 10? People saw/heard me. I would speak and their heads would turn just to look upon me like I was pleasant to look at.
Now that I'm back to looking like Ellie the elephant? no one is remotely interested in what I have to say. Even when it is a matter of importance. But you know what? They're the ones who are missing out. Cos when it's my time to better my life I'm leaving all those who ignore me, behind :D
 
For me it was a few things really, i couldnt get into old trousers anymore so could see my waist going up all the time, and i hated the site of myself in the mirror. I would keep a t-shirt on at the beach because i hated how i looked. When i saw myself on pics, all i focussed on was the chins.

The turning point was an incident with a rude youth.

I was rushing through town and knocked her.. i turned to apologise and she shrieked 'watch where your going, fat (insert invective)

The day after that i simply stopped eating any junk, started dieting and started exercising.
 
For me its a number of reasons- Im doing it for my health, to be happy, and I think one of the main reasons is to have a baby. I fell pregnant 3 yrs ago but unfortunatly lost it at 12 weeks - it wasn't said but im pretty sure it was due to my size. I want to be able to be confortable in clothes- especially in the summer. I want to be able to do more things with my 11yr old son and partner. When I go on a plane I want the seat belt to do up - unlike this year where I had to wear an extender. There are so many reasons that makes me want to loose weight. I have been struggling a bit lately, but reading this thread has helped me think of why its important for me to loose the weight and I'm feeling more motivated now. :)
 
I had loss a lot of weight on the run up to my wedding (august 2009) and sadly put it all mainly back on over the past 2 years due to being on steriods, in addition my hubby and I are TTC and in need of fertility treatement on the NHS which we have been told my BMI must be under 30 closer to 25 if possible so need to get a move on n get shifting also sick of not being able to wear the clothes i love n having to hide in tents x
 
I pile 90% of any weight on my belly, so I just look out of proportion when I'm even slightly overweight, like a little barrel on legs... I don't carry it well and have seen people with BMIs into the 30's who look better than me at a BMI of 25, also I'm vain and if I can look great (imo anyway! :p) for a bit of effort, why not - the tipping point this time was getting near to being too big for my largest size trousers, I just thought "time to deal with this now," also not getting any younger (41 next month) and I want to lose the flub while my skin still has some elasticity.

And yeah people do take larger people, esp. women, less seriously in general, this makes me really angry... :flamingmad:
 
You and I think along the same lines RachBlue, and have the same BMI goal and body type! It's the same for me, I carry it round the middle and upper body so have 'back flab' and love handles and a spare tyre and a belly even at a healthy weight and being only 5'4" I really do have to be quite slim to look great. I would like to get down to the bottom end of my healthy weight range to look great in clothes and feel confident and enjoy my sexy years while there's still a few left! I already feel a lot better at just over 9st but I know that another stone down I will feel 10x better about my body.

In answer to the OP I never didn't want to lose weight, I had crept up to 9st 10lb before I had kids and although I was still technically not overweight, I wanted to slim down to my usual 8st odd for the above reasons. Then I became pregnant and piled on maybe 3-4 stone. I couldn't wait to get it gone! I slimmed down once (it took 3 years!) but again my weight started to creep up and I got pregnant again and once again piled some weight back on. I've lost it all now but why stop there?
 
When I was in my early teens I was normal weight but between the age of 14 to 19 years old I went down to just under 4 stone because I wasnt happy at the times as I was having problems with stuff at school. I stopped eating my lunches and also I had some many sore throats I would have to have weeks off school and have eat soup because I couldn't swallow anything because of the pain.

When I started working in 1987 my waist was only about 20" which fine as the time because I was happy with my weight. In August 1988 I started working with horses which was very hard work because I was so small in weight. I think the hay and straw bales weighed more than me. when I left in October 1989 I had gained around 14lbs so I was up to about 5st. My weigh increase after my first operation to remove a cyst off my right ovary they also took my appendix out at the same time. Between 1990 and 1995 I had 5 operations to remove cysts and in 1993 I lost my left ovary and tube.

In 1991 I started to work in a local bingo hall I weighted around 6st and by the time I left in 1997 i had gained about 3st. Between 1997 - 2001 I started about the same. Since 2001 I have gained about 4st as I have been in a wheelchair since then. I did lose 24lbs in the last year but it has crept back on. I want to look good at 40 as I am not happy with what look like now.
Dee
 
I'm with RachBlue and Surfinbernard on this:

When I started I was about 8/9lbs overweight, and saw myself on slipperly slope. While I have never been massive, I've spent most of my adult life swinging between having a healthy BMI and being slightly overweight.

I know some pear shaped ladies will dispute this, but I really do think that being apple shaped is the hardest shape to dress with. When I'm carrying extra weight I look like an egg on legs, or a bumble bee. However the good thing is, with exercise and weight loss, apple shapes can become athletic shapes (Cameron Diaz is an apple shape dontcha know) - which is the thought thats spurring me on at the moment!

Further to this, and one of my biggest reasons for loosing, is that storing weight around your middle leaves you likely to suffer diabetes etc, which sucks, but at least its added incentive!!
 
The main reason that I gained weight in the first place was because I started having health problems. Almost a year after that I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia, a chronic pain disease. Since then I have lost even more weight than when I started and even though I still always don't feel that well, being thinner makes it that much easier when I do have flare ups. Being large and sick is the worst possible feeling I have ever dealt with and to somewhat feel normal is a blessing.
 
I have a couple of reasons for starting,

One is for my childrens sake, I want to be able to do everything with them and not worry
Two, Im getting married and want to look my best.
And the third one is a comment a man made on a recent night out. I was out with 7 other girls, all of them size 8-12 so me being a size 20/22 felt crap anyways. We were outside as some were smoking and we had split into two groups. These blokes were chatting to the girls and then came over to me and my two friends and said looking at them 'i bet you two are with them girls over there as you are all gorgeous' I got completely ignored even though I was blantantly with them! My friend said what about her too refering to me, the bloke just looked at me and smirked. I have never felt so bad and embarresed in all my life and resolved never to feel like that again.

Ive been overweight forever but nothing has ever struck a cord with me before until that bloke smirked at me!! Never again!!
 
Hi everyone mine is because im sick hiding away . I dont even bother putting make up on any more cos i think because im a size 22 whats the point i look terrible anyway. I also have high blood pressure and m terrified something will happen to me and my little girl will have no mammy . My own mam died at 46 and im 39 so its really been in my head for the last while . Here is to us all being healthier and happier x x
 
AmandaT said:
I have a couple of reasons for starting,

One is for my childrens sake, I want to be able to do everything with them and not worry
Two, Im getting married and want to look my best.
And the third one is a comment a man made on a recent night out. I was out with 7 other girls, all of them size 8-12 so me being a size 20/22 felt crap anyways. We were outside as some were smoking and we had split into two groups. These blokes were chatting to the girls and then came over to me and my two friends and said looking at them 'i bet you two are with them girls over there as you are all gorgeous' I got completely ignored even though I was blantantly with them! My friend said what about her too refering to me, the bloke just looked at me and smirked. I have never felt so bad and embarresed in all my life and resolved never to feel like that again.

Ive been overweight forever but nothing has ever struck a cord with me before until that bloke smirked at me!! Never again!!

Ohhh Amanda, that's terrible. Wicked even. Like how could he miss you anyway if he thought you were big. Like what's he trying to say?
I used to have size 10-12 friends and when we went clubbing? I felt like an outcast, til I lost the weight and I started getting all the attention. They stopped hanging out with me after that. It's like a subconscious thing befriending someone whose opposite to you so you can make them look good or stand out more. That's just my feel and some friends can object to the idea that their only friends with you because you look a certain way, but once you start changing? They're either happy for you or loathe you and accuse you of "acting" different because you're no longer the third wheel.
I hope you do reach your goal so you can know how great it feels to reject someone like that shallow, rude superficial guy.
 
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