The only time I was ever truly svelte was when I had no car and had a serious cocaine addiction. Of course, being slim didn’t seem to be worth it at the time. Prior to that I was pretty husky all of my childhood and again soon after quitting the coke.
Add to that a propensity to be physically indolent, a deep and abiding love of beer (which is expressed with far too much brio and frequency), a bitch of an oral fixation, and the fact that an incredible number of foods just taste so damn good, and here we are. I should also say I’m a strong irrational believer in the fabled “someday” that I know will never come. Once it does, I’ll be perfect from then on.
I think it was just age. I didn’t eat any differently in my thirties then I did in my twenties. But around thirty, my body slowed down and I started suffering the effects on my unhealthy diet.
Alcohol. Sigh. I loves me my drinks, and like Athena, can easily drink up an extra 800-1000 calories a day. Easily.
I’ve mused to El Hubbo, “I could just stop eating, you know. I could use orange juice and tomato juice and such as mixers, that’d give me nutrients…”
Total bummer. I’m exercising more and eating better, and am down 11ish pounds. I still make room in the diet for a couple of glasses of wine, but it’s not ever nearly as much as I’d like to have.
I’m a stress eater and lately work/life has been chock full of stress. Sometimes when I leave work I just want to go home, skip dinner and eat a pint of ice cream. At least I’ve kept up pretty well with my exercise regimen so far, but I need to get back on a healthier diet plan ASAP!
I’m pretty sure that what pushed me into weight gain was dieting.
I look back at what I used to eat and it’s exactly what I’m trying to eat now. After my second child I decided I needed to diet to drop the last couple pounds I’d gained and went on a low fat diet. The increase in processed foods, change in my eating habits and the slow steady increase of sugar and white flour carbs in my diet started a yoyo cycle of weight loss and gain that’s gone on for 20 years.
Of course it’s not the sole issue, I was also working insane hours and raising two kids which is a recipe for processed food and reduced exercise all on it’s own, but it’s still a little jarring to be trying to find my way back to eating exactly the way I used to. Now I just need to get rid of the habits and triggers of the last two decades of poor eating
Making it worse was that I was always very thin. I’m 6’1" and I was 125lbs when I got out of college with the usual college diet of large pizzas and vodka. So when I started gaining weight years later, it was actually welcome and I had no incentive to change my habits. Plus my old job was located near numerous places for burgers, beef sandwiches, burritos and anything else you could think of. I eventually scratched 220 lbs and am working to drop that down to 180 or so. Knocked 10 lbs off so far.
Similar story here. I quit drinking a little over a year ago, didn’t really change anything else in my diet, and have lost over 70 pounds since then! Everyone asks me what I’m doing to lose weight, and I just say, “I stopped drinking my calories.”
I’m of normal weight, but am shaped rather like an apple now. I’m older, so my weight is settling strangely anyhow, but my waist has really thickened so that pants that fit in my waist are baggy in the seat and thighs. I see a lot of 60-ish women like this - Ivana Trump is one. I don’t know what causes it in other women, but for me it’s Coke.
For me, it vass ze Germans. When I worked in Germany, beer often cost less, or about the same, as a bottle of water, and tasted much better. Then toss in the Kaesespaetzle and other fun to eat and high calorie dishes. I could always rationalize: how often will I be here. For a while I was running every other day, then I started to get some knee pain. Over a couple of years it adds up.
I have dropped about 15 pounds of the Germany, mostly through exercise, although I have to admit my eating habits in LA aren’t much better.
You mean today? Right now? Easter candy! (I also blame Wegmans grocery store, they sell foil-wrapped chocolates by the pound for 9 months of the year and I can’t seem stop buying “just a handful”. Also almonds, peanuts, cashews, trail mix, granola - all that stuff meant to be used in baking and cooking never last long enough for that purpose.)
Two bouts of depression (one in the early 90’s for about 30 pounds and one in 2002 for another 30), and a lack of self-control when it comes to making healthy choices. I don’t understand how anyone could choose to have a side salad when there are French fries available. It’s like people who eat half a candy bar and put the rest away for later. I am surrounded by robots; it’s the only explanation.
Working at a place that would deep fry battered chicken bits and then toss them in a sugary lime-pineapple-ginger sauce, which we’d serve over white rice with deep fried egg rolls on the side. That was my sophomore 15 right there. (I didn’t get the freshman 15 because that year I was working on the grill side of the food court and usually had much lower cal meals at the end of my shift.)
