My Journey to Fatdom!

First memory of feeling fat at age 10.  I was NOT in any way overweight.  I was just a skinny, pale, freckled girl.  I remember pinching my stomach.  Started doing the exercises from girly magazines. I remember my mum being concerned about her weight, but not in an over-the-top way.

School years, I did not know how to diet other than thinking eating food was the problem and that exercising was good.  So I would not eat at school all day regularly only to be really hungry when I got home.  Spent many years alternating between trying to avoid food and trying to get my hands on food. 

Started to gain weight  at age 14 as I was developing fast - hello boobs and hips! I thought that I was getting fat, but really couldn't have been 'cos I used to wear those little tops that expose your middle (god if I tried that now!).  I did make friends with a girl who was quite overweight and we loved cooking and buying food.  I do not recall trying to not eat or worrying about my weight, I just enjoyed eating for a while.  But then, I remember being totally horrified to find that I had reached 9 stone.  Some people commented on it, my jeans were tight and I stopped wearing those tops!  I still did not know how to diet properly, so I started hiding myself by wearing clothes that were way too big.

By the time I was 16 I was about 10 stone and used to wear those body suit tops to 'hold me in'.  Really though, old photos prove that I never looked fat, but I really thought I was huge.  I'd left home by then as well.

By the time I was 17 I weighed about 11 stone, but always told people that I was 10!  I still did'nt  know anything about proper weight loss but discovered starving myself again, but this time I did it alot more. However, starving leads to binging.  I would eat-strarve-eat-strarve and with that my weight went up and down.  By the time I reached 18 I weighed 9 stone, which was a tad underweight for my height.  

I entered into a relationship with a much, much older guy and moved in with him.  He said that I was not looking after myself and I started to eat normally.  In no time at all I was 11 stone again, then 12.  I would starve my way down to 11 then eat myself back up to 12, then starve back to 11. I did this until I was pregnant at 19 years old.

Being pregnant felt good, I felt free from trying to loose weight  and that felt really great.  I gained 2 stone, which is a fairly average weight gain.  After the birth, I was 13 stone and I successfully reduced my weight back to 11 stone, after discovering my first diet book (the first of very many!).

I left my partner at age 21 and lived on my own for the first time, then I started overeating more, and went up to 12 and a half.  I kept trying to lose weight, but could never get it less than 12, my binges were getting worse.

Lost weight again and was 11 stone at age 22.  Met a new man (who I went on to marry).  I kept the weight off quite a while cos I was in love, then I got content, enjoyed cooking us big meals and my weight went all the way up to 13 stone.

 Felt really terrible, joined Rosemary Conelly class, got back to 11 stone!

Put the weight back on and more, and eventually went up to 14 stone.   I was not able to loose weight for my wedding dress, trying loads of diets and methods (I could not sustain the starving thing, I really started to feel addicted to food).  I got married at age 24  in a size 18 dress (that needed to be made bigger around the waist and I weighed 14 stone. Felt horrible.

Barely 6 months after getting married, I weighed 15 stone, food addiction was really taking hold.  

Pregnant again, and felt free again. The curious thing about being pregnant was that I could forget dieting, but I also didn't binge either!  I was free! I was 17 stone at 9 months pregnant.

 I again successfully managed to get back to my pre baby weight which was 15 stone.  

I lost another stone gained it back with extra, lost another stone, gained it back with extra etc etc, until I weighed 16 stone. Then 17 stone. Then 17.5 I have joined countess slimming clubs, tried herbal remedies, all kinds of exercise (only to stop), and I spent loads on books, DVD's only to succeed then regain the weight. It seems the older you get the harder it all becomes. Over the years I have tried slimming world (twice), weight watchers (joined 4 times), cabbage soup diet, slim-fast, diretics, laxatives, kellogs eat 2 bowls of ceral a day diet, Atkins for one week (lost 9 pounds, but couldn't eat another egg), detox diets, high protien diet and er I think that's all of them.

New years resolution 2004, age 27.  Using what I have learned from the best diet plan I tried, I lost over three stone getting down to 14 stone again, felt so great and looked pretty good too.  The compliments flowed, it was so good. I realised that I was not ugly at 14 stone all all, shame I couldn't realise that on my wedding day!  But it did not last and I regained it all, back to 17 stone, felt totally gutted. Why, Why, Why? I felt that there is something totally wrong with me.

I concluded that I have yo-yo dieted my body into this state and it needs to stop. Then something happened, I gave up dieting!  I decided to eat normally, like normal people do, and started to tackle the binging issue.  Instead of binging every day, I did it about once/twice a week (which was still a positve change for me).  I lost a stone over the summer of last year, getting back to 16 stone.  No dieting, and starting to watch my binging. I have stayed more or less the same weight since.

So here I am today, twenty years on, on DS telling you my fat story! I have now started another diet and fitness program, and I have to admit it scares me a lot.  I am scared of failing yet again, I am scared of getting carried away and stopping eating (diets can trigger other types of destructive/obsessive behaviour in me) I am scared of un-doing good work etc.  But this has to be it, it has to be a change for life.  I want my life back! No more fads, no more extremes, just something I can stick to long term.