Bold and beautiful cat lover with a compassionate heart.
This Weight Loss Buddy is : Offline
This Buddy last logged in at 05-02-2011
Birthday: 13-10-1955
This is my story
I was a skinny child with asthma; so skinny my mother took me to the doctor, who reassured her it was probably better for me to be a little underweight with my chest condition. Because I was asthmatic I was unable to join in the sports or active games at junior school; this, I believe, contributed to me never really getting into sport or liking exercise.
I never thought about my weight or diet, or what I was consuming until my late teens, I had stayed fairly slim most of my life (although no longer skinny!!) My weight did fluctuate depending on what I was doing; for instance during a turbulent relationship with a particular boyfriend I lost quite a bit of weight, – I don’t know how much because I never weighed myself but people starting making comments about me looking ill. This relationship ended and I got back to a more healthy/normal weight without any conscious change in my eating habits. I guess I just wasn’t using the same amount of nervous energy.
Then I started to gain weight and people I hadn’t seen for a while made comments about “carrying some timber”! And so the dieting began; gain a few pounds, loose a few pounds. But I managed to stay around a size 12-14.
In my late 20’s and married to a man that definitely liked women on the skinny side, the battle began in earnest. I was constantly watching what I ate and trying this or that diet, most of which worked for a while. Then like everybody else the weight returned plus a bit more and by now my dress size repeatedly hit size 16 or even 18 occasionally. In desperation I started using slimming pills to suppress my appetite and these worked, they worked very well. But I could only control my weight or keep slim while I was taking them. I got back to a size 12 (even some size 10 clothes) I felt more confident and attractive at a size 12 but it was hard going and I had to eat less and less; most days I would miss breakfast having only a black coffee with no milk or sugar then only have an apple for lunch and eat a small meal in the evening with my husband. If we were going to a party or for a meal at the weekend I would virtually stave myself for a couple of days to save my calories up for the social event. If I didn’t take the pills (and suffer the side effects) and monitor every morsel that went in my mouth the weight would creep back up. On holidays it was nothing for me to gain 10-12 lbs without really “pigging out”, even on active skiing holidays I usually put 5 lbs on in a week.
Finally, after my divorce I decided that constantly denying myself, counting calories and taking amphetamine based drugs was making me very miserable. So I stopped worrying about it, I ate and drank exactly what I wanted and as much as I felt like. It was fantastic, the most liberating thing I have ever done. Of course I put on weight but I stopped worrying about it and stopped bothering if men fancied me or not. BTW: Yeah, they do still fancy a bigger girl. Men a much less critical about our bodies than we are ourselves (my ex might be the exception that proves the rule tho’).
But now I am almost 55 years old, I am a size 24/26 and weigh in at over 18st 7lbs. I have various health issues and need to change to a healthier life style, drop several stone and I really need to get more active. But due to being so overweight and a couple of my conditions it is very difficult for me to exercise; so I am considering paying for a Gastric Lap band operation to drop a couple of stone which should enable me to exercise more easily. But they don't come cheap so will have to save up my pennies for quite a while.
