I'm going to enter this thread with a bit about me and my experiences. I realise this is going to open me up to a heap of abuse from the anti-fat crowd - I'm not particularly concerned.
I'm fat, I've always been fat or considered myself to be, although this hasnt always been the case. My being fat probably stems to a god awful diet when I was a child and an inability to break away from that awful food for long periods of time.
I currently weigh 19 stone, down from 20.3 stone at the start of the year, but I'm still fat enough that I should be walking around on 4 legs and mooing. I understand this, I live with this fact every day of my life, from waking up in the morning to when I head off to bed at night. My being fat has a profound impact on my life - I'm borderline diabetic, I suffer from OSA (I know this, although it has not been diagnosed, as the cure is not being fat and I dont want to waste a doctors time to have him tell me something I already know.)
I'm currently entering my second attempt at shedding some mass this year. My first attempt started just after Christmas 2013, where I decided to increase the amount of exercise I did, and keep an eye on, but not really control the amount of calories I was taking in. For a while, it worked, it was a stupid idea, but it worked. I walked for 3 hours a day, I ate 3000 calories a day, and weight was still coming off. However, lets be realistic here - walking 3 hours a day gets pretty dull pretty quickly and that soon tapered off. I dropped to walking only when needed, still 3-4 miles a day as a minimum, but the eating didn't change and as expected the weight came back. I should mention here I work in an office role which really does not help.
Between the last "diet" and this one I kept the walking up, my fitness is without a doubt better than it was at the start of the year. Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to be running any marathons and I still end up sweating like a rapist after a 30 minute brisk walk but I also know that I can clock up an 8 mile walk without dropping dead. This time, I'm controlling the amount of calories I take in, its early days yet - how long will I stick to it? I honestly don't know. Right now I'd say that I'll see it through till I'm down to the 13 stone mark, but I've made promises like that before.
The interesting thing for me is how I got to 20 stone. I said I always had a bad diet, even as a kid, and that is the major contributing factor - but despite always feeling fat, I've never always been fat.
At 18 years of age I weighed in at 16 stone. By 19 I was 12 stone. By 21 I was 9 stone 8lbs - and I still hated myself and felt like I was fat. I look at the pictures of me at 21 and I look gaunt and almost skeletal - I'm a bit over 6ft tall and I have a large frame. At 21 I was size 28 waist, I hated being that BIG - Yes, I thought a 28 waist was big.
21-23 were good years - despite the self loathing I felt for myself I had a decent social life, I had an active job and I was enjoying myself for the most part. By 23 I was 12 stone, again a perfectly healthy weight for a guy of my build to be, I hated it, it was traumatic having put that weight back - despite absolutely everybody telling me that I looked a lot better and healthier - in my head there was the constant fear of the fat coming back, eventually the fear broke me and it did come back, 16.5 stone - my friends teased me saying "Fat Chris" was back. I spent 18 miserable months around that weight before a friend from work (who I freely admit I wanted to tap) offered to help me lose some weight, she was training to be a dietician so I was the perfect project for her and it was beneficial to me.
The next year was the only time in my life I spent eating properly and exercising properly at the same time. I went from 16.5 back down to 12.5 - I signed up for a 10 day charity walk along the Great Wall of China. Again I never felt comfortable in my own skin, always felt like a disgusting whale, but I was generally happier and life was better. I met the woman who within 4 years would become my wife and things were rosey.
Once I moved in with my other half I let myself go somewhat - this is pretty much a global phenomenon according to every friend I have ever spoken to about the subject says that this generally happens once you settle down. You don't need to go to as much effort to impress anymore so you don't have the same drive, you're also not in complete control of every meal and you have less free time. I went up to 14 stone, probably 10-15 pounds over where I should be, but I'd say within acceptable norms for somebody around 27.
Friday, March 20th 2009 - my dad died. Now everybody I know tells me this is what broke me and why I am what I am now. I think its probably just a convenient excuse - but then again I've always been hard on myself. I maintained weight until I got married in September 2009, by Christmas 2009 I was up 15.5 stone.
January 2010 I started my first ever office job - no longer was I a smooth talking salesman running around the shop floor like a blue-assed fly, I was sat in a desk for 10+ hours a day. I was married so there wasn't anything exciting to look forward to, the wife was pregnant so she was getting fat too. By 2012 I was 20 stone, and for the next 2 and half years I've hovered around there. I'm approaching 32, I should be in the final years of my prime - and I'm letting that slip by far too quickly.
I know what foods to eat, I know how to exercise, I absolutely hate the look of my blubber in the mirror, I hate not being able to do things that my friends do because I'm too much of a fat mess to do it - yet for the past 2 years if I've had a tough day I'd grab a kebab on the way home, because hey, why not?!
There a lot of people in this thread that have never been fat - great for you, you probably have far more willpower than I do, or less emotional baggage from growing up fat, whatever - and I truly hope you never have to feel about yourself the way I do every damn day and at the same time feel so powerless to change something that should be so easy to change.
For all the funny people who want to mock me, call me a whale, whatever - you're not saying anything that I haven't thought about myself. Fatties might be an easy target for your putdowns, but you're probably wasting your time as you're not saying anything we've not said about ourselves before. In my case all you would be doing is driving me towards my next doughnut - effectively compounding the problem you hate so much.
Anyway, dont know what that is, some kind of emo ramble, just felt like I needed to say it.
Fingers crossed this time the weight comes off and it stays off eh?
Peace.
