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| Shortly after discovering Beer, pizza, chicken wings and Monday night football.
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JLTHOMAS99
5/21/08 11:56 P
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| I was around 175 when I got married in 1980. I remember getting up to about 190 around 1990 and I still felt good. Suddenly in the mid-90's my body took over and I shot up to 205. That's when I got lethargic, felt fat, noticed my 'back fat' and found it difficult to move around under the sink and under the car. I peaked out at 250 in February 2007, when I was in Hawaii and they weighed everyone for a helicopter tour. That's when I decided I needed to do something about it. It took until Sept 2007 to discuss it with my doctor, and he sent me to the Preventive Cardiac dept at Henry Ford Hospital. Then I found SparkPeople in January 2008 and I'm well on my way to a NEW ME!
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eh... I feel a little self conscious about saying this to some of you, but for most of my adult life I weighed less than 180. However, about 2 years ago I had to buy new clothes and found that I no longer fit into the sizes I was use to buying. When I hopped on a scale I found I was tipping it at 195. It was at that point that I took a good look in the mirror and did not like what I saw, but did nothing to change it.
A few months later, I got sick (48hr flu or something) that left me desiring only water for drinks. The first day was horrid because I was suffering from Caffine with-drawls. After that weekend I stopped drinking Dr. Pepper 24/7, and made the switch to 2 coffees in the morning, and 100% water in the afternoon with a reward of a "Sprite Zero" at the end of the week. If you haven't tried it, Sprite Zero is NOT very tasty in the "I want a soda" dept, and it helped me to stay away from sodas.
After 1 year of not drinking soda 24/7, I found I lost 15lbs (teatered between 180 and 185 most of the time). However, I still was not too pleased with myself in the mirror. Plus, I still felt some what lethargic in the afternoons.
So late summer last year, I actually decided I wanted to get back to my Marine Corps level. So, I started myself on an exercise routine, and have been improving every week...
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Haha, TYLERH, I can relate.
I was going to a party, dressed up as a Spartan from the movie 300. I drew a six-pack on my stomach with a Shaprie, and my girlfriend at the time said, "Man, I remember when you used to actually have a six-pack."
...oh well!
Also, people getting fat are always the first to know, and guys get laughed at when they tell their friends, "dude, I think I'm getting fat."
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| When I hit 227 and I didn't like how most of my clothes were fitting... I said "that is it"!
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| When I saw pictures of me before and after college...that's when I knew it was time to get back on the weight-loss train and make it happen!
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| I don't remember when I realized I was bigger than I wanted to be. However, I remember being happy when I broke 200 pounds for some reason. Now, I'd like to go back to it! That was about 10 years ago, I've always been a big guy but never thought of as fat until then. It might have also been the time when I asked my wife if she remembered when I had "six-pack" abs. After thinking for a second she said, "no." Ha ha!
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I was on medicine that caused a lot of weight gain (170 lbs, 37 in waist) about 10 years ago. When that ended, I lost most of the weight pretty quickly, but I had no regular exercise routine.
A few years ago my (now ex-)wife left us, and I lost a lots of weight by not eating or sleeping much, but that wasn't healthy. I set my goal here above the low weight from that time.
When I started thinking about getting back to dating, I realized that there seemed to be more weight around my belly than I liked. I did the Polar Bear swim on New Year's Day this year and saw a picture of myself without my shirt. That convinced me that I needed to do something intentional.
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MRBHENDRIX
4/25/08 2:26 P
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| well let's see. I was is in the army deployed in iraq at the time. I kept spraining my ankle so that kept me from doing physical training. that lasted a month. My battery then moved to another place and while there i didnt do physical training either. A couple weeks before redeploying home our battalion was all back together. From there we begin to fly back home. Since when i got home i was 3 months from getting out the army, i had out-processing to do rather than physical training. So that was maybe five or six months of no physical training and at the time i took it as a much needed rest after doing physical training EVERY week day for a couple years. so all my uniforms got tight and i still cant fit into them
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| I kept outgrowing my pants about 3 years ago but in the words of Homer Simpson, "when women gain weight the go on a diet and when guys gain weight they buy bigger pants." I bought bigger belts too. LOL!
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MISTEESOY6979
4/16/08 9:23 A
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I started gaining a lot of weight once I started taking medication that I need to take and one of the bad side effects is that you will gain a lot of weight if you doing exercise everyday. Therefore, it was a few years ago when I started taking the drugs I need. I lost a lot of weight in 2004 (50 lbs to be exact), so I know I can do it once i put my mind to it.
Thanks for the question.
Thanks for reading this.
God Bless you, your family and friend's.
Michael
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WANNASEEABS
4/15/08 8:17 P
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I havent been skinny since about 6 years old. Allways had muscles without having to work for them.
When i was 16 I went on hollidays with my dad but he couldnt get any time off. I didn't have a car and walking distance was McDonalds(Which I didn't have near my house, and a video store. So i sat and watched movies and ate burgers for 6 weeks. Allways been heavy since. Even now im over 220 but my gf thinks that im looking thinner and fitter. Don't think i'll ever get to under 200lbs. I would look too skinny.
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SNEAKYGREG
4/5/08 11:23 A
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| I knew I was gaining after I quit smoking but last fall we had to have our pictures taken for the management team wall... well needless to say when I hit my gola there will be a new picture of me up there
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When I was a kid I would eat whatever I wanted, all the time pretty much. Never drank water, only coke. Amazingly enough, even though I wasn't skinny, I wasn't obese either. I started playing basketball in high school and throughout college, and that helped me to continue eating pretty much whatever I wanted w/o gaining much weight.
But then I got depressed, and sedentary. But I still ate the same, or perhaps even worse. I balloned up to 245 lbs and I didn't even realize it all that much. I mean, I knew I had a gut, but didn't think I was carrying that much weight.
Then I went out to play basketball for the first time in a while and was I in for a shock. I was turning red in the face, struggling to move, and just a shadow of my former self.
I put my foot down at that moment and lost about 70 lbs over a 4 month period. I was starting to look and feel good and was only about 10 lbs away from my goal. Then I got cocky and completely fell off the wagon. Put on 20lbs in about 6 months and am now looking to rededicate myself to reaching my goal(165 lbs) and then assesing what I want to do from there.
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i first started to pack on pounds when i hit forty. recently i switched jobs and experienced a lot more stress in my workplace. my weight climbed higher than it had ever been.
now in my fifties i figure i need to lose my thirty additional pounds and reverse the trend.
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| I noticed a huge gain right after I started my full-time career in teaching last year.
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When I got married in 1968, I weighed about 195 pounds, and that is about where I was when I entered the Air Force a year or so later. My weight stayed pretty stable until the late 70s when I got assigned to Spain. From that point on, with assignments to Germany, and travel to Italy and other parts of Europe, the battle was on. I got up to about 220 and stayed there as my max weight was 218, and I could starve a couple of days and make the limit. Once I left the Air Force, my weight went up to about 240 to 250 over the next 6 or seven years. (The highest it got was a little less than 260.)
I have known for 20 years that I should lose weight, but I have not been serious about doing so, obviously. The impetus from the amateur radio hobby is what finally got me off dead center.
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| Looking back now I guess it was probably about 4th grade when I started to feel/look bigger than the other kids and I didn't know why. I was always active. I didn't really start to feel overweight until probably the middle of high school though. College is what did me in though. I just continued to gain and here I am.
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I was never thin; some of the earliest pictures of me show me sporting a pudge. All through school I was the fat kid. HS got into sports (especially Wrestling) and was "in shape" for the first time in my life- that lasted till the time I graduated.
My weight has been a life long battle (with many failures and defeats)
One thing I would like to add-
A website and group like this is doing me a world of good.
As the "Fat Kid" I always felt highly isolated from the other kids; they were skinny (or at least not as fat as I was)- they had it "good\easy". As a kid (and even carrying it over into adulthood) I believed that no one had to struggle with weight like I did.
I would just like to thank everyone for sharing.
I, for one, know that there can be some deep hurts and defense mechanisms which (for the sake of self-preservation) can make it difficult or uncomfortable to do so.
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| After getting married. 23 years and about 50 lbs.
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JHUFFMAN60
2/13/08 8:25 A
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| I have been big most of my life. I have been on diets since I was a teenager. Every time I loose, something happens to trigger weight gain again. Also, after being married 3 times I have noticed that I gain about 100 pounds each time, and then struggle to reduce. I told my wife that we were going to stay together until death because I can not afford to gain anymore weight. LOL
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| I'd also kind of like to point out that even after I noticed I was gaining weight (3rd-4th grade) I always told myself that I would thin out as I grew up over the next six years or so because I didn't realize I was doing anything wrong, clearly I was, but at the time I didn't know what I was doing that was actually causing me to gain weight so I was never able to objectively figure out what I needed to do to stop from gaining weight. Even though I hit 300 last January and that's when I decided to lose it all, I'm not really sure how long I was that weight. I'm pretty sure I was probably about 270-280 throughout the end of high school and college added some more back on as I ate even worse when I lived on my own.
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| i struggled with my weight all through school...hit kinda a plateu in high school playing football at around 220 just after graduation i hit an all time high of 285 i went to college my girlfrend and i broke up and bam 185 in three months.. but things like that never last....after marriage weight went up and down and after my divorce i actually gained weight, more and more and went back up to 268 which is were i am at now..... i see my daughter who is in the 3rd grade struggling with the same problem...she is now 120 pounds and not very tall...it is kinda hard for me to preach to her about losing weight and eating healty when i am the way that i am... so this is my motivation, and probably the strongest i have ever had!!!
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| I really noticed in late 2004/early 2005 lost a little weight, had some personal problems lost about 35 pounds, gained almost 60 back and now am trying to lose it and keep it off
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BIGPOPPA08
2/10/08 1:03 A
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| Soon after my I started dating my wife about 10 years ago, and then substantial jumps with each of her 5 pregnancies.
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BIGPOPPA08
2/10/08 1:01 A
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| Soon after my I started dating my wife about 10 years ago, and then substantial jumps with each of her 5 pregnancies.
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| 3rd year of college did it for me....Went from 225 in high school, to 235 1st year, 240 second year, and 260 third year... Unfortunately it has been uphill since but since the new year, am steadily working back down. 24lbs to date and counting.
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| I first noticed my weight gain when my wife was pregnant with our son. I thought it was all a bunch of crap but it sure happened to me. I have let my weight baloon all over the place since high school. The best I have ever felt was the summer I worked for a nursery doing lawncare/landscaping...I walked 40 lbs right off in about 4 months. I weight 250lb now and I'm on my way to 200lbs. Good luck guys!
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WESTARR61205
2/5/08 9:19 A
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| When I was a kid me and my best friend lived next door to each other and and had bike and rode all around town, down the train tracks ect. so we were like a pair of twigs then collage came and beer came and i got a car so i got lazy. Then one day i went to visit my grandmother and she said "Wow your getting big, i thought nothing of it grandma always said that but instead of putting her hand on my head it was on my beer and pizza gut then i realized i was growing out not up.
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| been big my whole life - lost some weight in HS, but gained it back after i quit playing rugby in college. gained another 50 lbs in my early 20s, then lost 90, then gained back 120. it's been a real struggle to come to terms with my weight and eating, but i am definitely getting there.
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| In 2nd grade I was thin, 3rd grade was far from it... CLEARLY, the summer in between wasn't very good for me, but honestly I couldn't tell you what was so bad or why it happened when it did because I was a very active child. I know later on (3 or 4 years later) that I didn't ever exercise or eat right, and ate large portions, etc, but I don't remember what happened that led me there.
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| I had a growth spurt between 9th and 10th grade. Was 5'4" my freshman physical and by my next one I was 5'10" amd 163. Stayed fairly low and graduated at 177 but after marriage I got into the pizza business and that was it - by 24 I was in the 240 range and 287 at 40. I have been below 200 only one time in the last 20 years.
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RANDYZ*RESOLVE
1/20/08 8:24 P
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I really appreciate the posts. I was just thinking about my childhood and adulthood today. I knew I wasn't the only one to go through school fat.
I know that I'm going to keep moving along this journey. Thanks guys for being here.
We can DO ... what we could never do ALONE!
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was always an overweight kid, Not as bad as I am now, but I was always the biggest kid in my class. The last day of school in 6th grade, I broke my leg very badly, and was in a cast up to my hip all summer. What did I do? Sat and watched TV, and played Atari(kinda date's this doesn't it?), and read. Not much exercise you can do when you can't move your one leg at all.
So, Junior High came along, and I was now the "Fat Kid" in the school, which made me a target for the Jocks to pick on. It got so bad that I would find excuses not to go to school, those mystery illnesses. Mom had enough of it, since I didn't have a father around to teach me to fight back, she signed me up for karate. I loved it, and the more I got involved, the more weight came off. I started competetive fighting, training sometimes 36-40 hrs a week, and after a few months, I went from the 290lb "fat kid" to a 236lb chiseled combat machine. No more getting picked on, no more confidance problems. Well, once High School was done, I got too busy wiht college, work, social life, that I didn't have as much time to train, and it was costing me money that I wasn't really using. So, from then on, the weight ballooned, and I'm where I am today.
Now, Much like you, with this program and the memory of how I did it the last time, I'm going ot make a go of it again. I got too much to turn around, and it's not going to be easy, or quick, but nothing this important ever is!
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Hello Randy,
It sure is easy to regain weight-it seems that most of the times that I yo-yoed up and down in weight that I would reach new highs and not drop back to the old lower lows.This time my dream is to reach 155 though my wife thinks I am crazy-she has struggled with long plateaus and I usually dont-but right now I am stuck on 213-I hope that when I drive into town tommorrow to weigh that I will find that I have finally got off of this current plateau.
Living with your grandma encouraged your weight gain-most of my relatives are also overweight and it can be tricky if not nearly impossible to eat meals with them.
One thing I must confess about my years of being overweight is I am also "cheap"-I would never refuse free food and for many years I worked for Italians who were always offering me donuts, pastries, bagels, pizza.In this mindset we also would eat at every "all you can eat" restuarant we could find-thinking that we were saving a bundle Unfortunately those added pounds led to my diabetes and sleep apnea.
The path ahead looks clear and I am sure that armed with the knowlege this site provides and the friends here to offer encouragement that we will reach our goals.
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RANDYZ*RESOLVE
1/20/08 2:22 P
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thanks for sharing David
One thing I didn't mention about my weight gain. My mom was really sick just before I gained weight. My dad, sister and I stayed at my grandma's for several weeks. My dad had to go buy me new clothes while we lived there .. after that i gained and lost and gained and was heavy 95% of the time.
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Hi TADZIOWV,
When I was little my parents were very poor and I was very thin (we had an old tin roof shack in rural northern Florida and had an outhouse)-when we moved to the city I was introduced to Pizza and Sphaghetti and lots of other great tasting foods.My dad was already overweight and he put on more pounds-and I gained a lot of weight and was overweight from about 10 years old until I was 16-in the Boy Scouts I fell in love with hiking and camping which motivated me to lose weight-so I counted calories using an old Barbarba Krause Calorie Counter book and kept a diet diary shooting for 1,200 calories a day-it worked! Both of my parents were very supportive and they also did some dieting!I gained weight and lost weight several times before I got married-and I gained lots of weight after marriage because my wife and I both enjoy eating.I was diagnosed with diabetes back in the early '90's, my dear dad died about 5 years after his heart transplant, my doctors all wanted me to get my weight under control to help with my blood pressure and cholesterol-so I decided to do something about it again-I knew that unless I turned my life around my life span is going to come to a quick end.Fortunately my son and daughter do not have a weight problem (yet)and my wife is also dieting (she is on Weight Watchers).I want to be around to watch my grandchildren grow up now that I am a grandpa
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RANDYZ*RESOLVE
1/20/08 1:21 P
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When I was a kid they thought I was way to skinny. I have pictures of me being so thin.
Then I remember by 4th grade we had a fitness day during gym. I was the heaviest kid in the class. I don't think I ever felt the same after that day.
I remember trying to "control" my food and eliminate things very young. Through out high school is was diet after diet. I had a good model because mom also was dieting all the time.
My dad never supportive - always the first to notice I was "off" my diet again. And an uncle that always had to remind me in front of family ... "he ate to live and I ate to live". Still have a resentment against him ... like that hurts him.
I read today in on one of the message boards .. "who do you want to "prove wrong" the most" ... ME ... I want to prove myself wrong - I can love the weight and I can keep it off -- with Sparkpeople, my TOPS group, my huge support system of Friends and Family.
Thanks for "listening".
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