The secrets of overweight people

[ColouringPencils]

I mean this in a light-hearted way, but I guess it might also be helpful to us to see where we're getting it from.

I'll start:

I always serve myself the largest portion, and often nick a few extra bites in between the cooking and serving stages.

I eat a full meal whether I am particularly hungry or not (then often have seconds).

I gave up sugar and doubled my cheese intake (then I went back on sugar too).

Speaking of which, no meal is not improved by a generous topping of grated cheese.

I could quite happily drink a bottle of wine a night, although I don't let myself. On my 'good' nights I drink hot chocolate/ couple of beers and eat crisps instead.

Sometimes if nobody has seen me eat my first slice of toast, I'll put a third one in. This is especially the case when it's white bread, the 'only one' I could buy in the corner shop.

When DH is away I love to read and eat chocolate in bed.

Anyone else got any good tips to help me continue to sabotage my weight loss efforts?

I don't drink enough/any water, I have huge plates which I always fill when I cook a meal. I drink when I'm stressed, happy or at home, I eat whatever cakes are lying around at work. I weigh more than my very tall slim boyfriend. When I eat like him on our days off the weight drops off me

@peachgreen I am the same about exercise, I am absolutely mortified doing any form of exercise.
I can't explain it. I have mentioned it to a few fit people over the years and they said they felt a tiny bit self conscious when they went running first, but quickly got over it.

I am going down through the ground embarassed in case anyone sees me doing it, but would so love to get over this and be fit.
My back has been hurting me lately and the physiotherapist gave me exercises to do every day to strengthen up. I have been doing the exercises, but am fully ready if anyone sees me to quickly tell them that 'I have to do it because my back is hurting me' so it all be a medical reason and I'm not just an idiot doing exercise for nothing.
What is wrong with me? If i am in a gym, surely the other person is there too so why am I so embarrassed. Its always been like this, even in school I would never do p.e. never.
I am going to admit this here, but even if someone says they saw me 'out walking' or comments on me doing any exercise, I burn with shame.

Maybe pretending it is for medical reasons will cure this in me? This stupid phobia, is just holding me back.

Thanks to everyone on this thread who opened up. For the woman saying she eats nothing and is still fat, maybe you are sleepwalking and raiding the fridge in your sleep, I saw a programme about it before.

Overeating like this is almost a form of self harm. Does it start with low self esteem?

Is the key to tackling obesity through people's minds and not their tummies?

Deep down, what is it all about?

Stop at the shop between leaving work and picking up the kids and buy a feast of crap to gorge on in the car.

Eat an array of beige/brown foods secretly every single time you go into the kitchen.

Be “organised” by buying Easter eggs months in advance when they first appear in the shops, then continually eat/replace/eat/replace until Easter.

Despise yourself.

Do no exercise at all.

Spend pretty much all your disposable income on food and drink, then complain that you can’t afford the nice things that everyone else has.

Start a new diet every single Monday of the year. Abandon the diet mid week, and gorge on your favourite, most calorific foods because you’re starting a diet properly on Monday and this time you really mean it.

Be successful at a diet every once in a while, enjoy the compliments and be increasingly embarrassed as everyone ignores the fact that you pile the weight back on more quickly every time - consider your weight gain to be almost literally the elephant in the room.

Have crippling anxiety that gets worse when you’re hungry and seems to be able to literally be squished down with food.

Look like crap all the time because you’ll buy nice clothes when you’re thin and these cheap, nasty clothes will do for now whilst you’re fat. Have an entire wardrobe of lovely clothes that you fit in for about a fortnight every two years.

At work, listen to people who are a size ten complain about how fat they feel at the moment because they’re usually a size 8 and want to cry.

Eat as an emotional reaction to literally anything that happens, positive, negative or mediocre.

Is the key to tackling obesity through people's minds and not their tummies?

Of course it is.

@IndianaMoleWoman

I hear you.

Apart from the periods of weight loss. That hasn't happened for me, for some years now.

I started listening to the 'brain over binge' podcast recently. Interestingly they theorise that telling people that the main core problems behind their weight are emotional and need to be overcome first makes them feel like they are 'broken' and that because of that dieting is hopeless. They say if you just make a habit of dismissing urges to binge as just nonsense from the 'lower brain' (as opposed the sophisticated 'higher brain') you will get better and more practised at avoiding overeating. It sounds ridiculously simplistic and obvious but actually it's helping me to be a bit more mindful with my eating habits.

@pippitypoppitypoo

I agree with that. I’ve lost 2stone recently and the biggest change is that I no longer ban myself from things and then feel guilty if I slip up. I’m allowed everything- just a little. If I eat a bit then it is not the end of the world.

I’ve also started offsetting- a chocolate bar now means a salad for dinner or not dinner later.

Pip that sounds similar to Never Binge Again, where you characterise your bingeing as a 'pig' and tell it to shut up every time you want to binge. It was free book on kindle for a while, maybe still is.

What!

Wrong thread sorry.

Please can someone let me know how so many of you eat a kilo of chocolate in one sitting? Or more importantly what chocolate is this?! As you will see from my name I looooooove the chocolate!

My main reason for being so large is emotional eating, but across the full range of emotions
I’m happy- I eat
I’m sad- I eat
I’m celebrating- I eat
I’m commiserating- I eat
I’m worried/ stressed - I eat
I’m relaxed - I eat
I’m ill- I eat
I’m feeling better! - I eat

And so on and so forth

ChocolateAddictionIsReal not in a sitting, sorry if I said that. Maybe in a day. I used to buy smaller 'large' bars of chocolate, maybe 200g, and keep them in the fridge. I would have some every time I went in the kitchen. Getting through five bars a day wasn't unheard of.

And I still do eat too much, mainly chocolate but this sort of bad habit is firmly in the past. As well as eating a pack of deli cookies on the way home from the supermarket. If I hadn't stopped I think I'd be dead by fifty (not exaggerating).

@Oliversmumsarmy it's pretty much impossible to lose weight with an untreated under active thyroid.

The standard GP TSH test does not identify everyone who has a thyroid problem. It's worth looking at the thyroid UK website and checking through to see if you are symptomatic and if so get further tests. The NHS is truly shit on thyroid issues and they are very common for women.

I diet all day at work. Weetabix for breakfast and soup for lunch and only fruit in between if I'm really hungry....

..then I get home, I eat my dinner (big portions) normally have seconds, then I want a snack, chocolate, crisps, then some toast and tea before bed, maybe some chocolate biscuits as well.

I just cant seem to mentally stop myself in the evening like I can during the day. :(

Percy Pigs.

Can't go in an M & S without the temptation

😁 🐷

Chickenwing, this is exactly why don’t eat after 6pm type of diets are so successful. Nobody binges in the morning or middle of the day, way too busy for that. It all happens at night, when all in done, the mind is free and kids are in bed, so no distractions. To make it worth, our metabolism is at worst at night and best in the morning.

Worse not worth!

Have a busy life with three kids, 2 with SN and a boob mad baby. Get hardly any time to yourself, and be unable to even eat a snack at home without at least one child clawing at you. Start to associate “rare child free time” with “I can eat on my own”.

As soon as you get to escape the madness, head somewhere with lovely rich food that feels quiet and peaceful even when it’s teeming with other diners, because you don’t have your kids with you. Enjoy the food even if you aren’t hungry, because it means you can sit down and think and feel human.

Rules I should have learnt from my mother:

1. Not having a car and thus walking everywhere is enough exercise. Yet we'd amble along slowly, never getting our heart-rates up. She would tell me how I was much fitter than everyone else in my class, yet I was overweight and couldn't run for toffee. She was convinced she got far more exercise than any of the other parents and is quite smug about it, forgetting to realise that they were probably all going to the gym after drop-off for a session every day.

2. Despite being so fit she recognised she was overweight so was always on a diet. So I grew up on low-fat (high sugar) yoghurts, spreads etc. But then we’d get treat food for good measure.

3. A meal is not a meal without a sweet element at the end. So yogurts (LFHS) after lunch and dinner at the very least. She was gobsmacked to find puddings are a rare treat in my house!

4. Now she's a diagnosed diabetic, a trip for a check-up is obviously followed by a cafe trip for cake!

Years of bad eating and no exercise,have taken their toll.I dont know where too start

(Finally actually reading the thread properly)

Most supermarket car parks resemble vast drive-in private restaurants: every other car will have someone taking time out of their day to scoff down their trigger foods before driving home with the 'real' shopping.
Oh god I think I do this sometimes. I don’t drive but I’ve been known to get something secret and sit on a park bench with the shopping bags at my feet.

Another tip - move somewhere with deliveroo and ubereats. Enjoy the novelty... which doesn’t wear off even after nearly a year of living there. Look forward to having the house to yourself and being able to enjoy a delivery to yourself.

Eat a sugary chocolatey bowl of cereal first thing and then get distracted so you forget to eat until you suddenly have such a (what I assume is a) blood sugar crash that you get shaky and a sensible meal or snack isn’t enough, you have to eat everything, like Pac-Man as someone mentioned upthread.