Has anyone ever worked out why their demon was being fat?

[bluetrampolines]

I know how to diet. I know how to exercise. I have every aspect of my life nailed. Almost. Apart from being fat.

Why is this my demon? Can anyone help?

If I could give one piece of advice to my teenage self it would be 'don't go on that first bloody diet'. I was slim and gorgeous but because I'm tall and carry a lot of muscle I thought I should be a stone or so lighter. And so began a lifetime of yo-yoing up and down.

I'm happy, I'm sorted, I love my life but the missing piece is my relationship with food. It's a bastard honestly.

So no advice but my total empathy and support.

The bloke on the radio yesterday said it is basically much more influenced by genetics than you would ever think.

@foxfoxsierra

Is that including your rmr?

I go through 1300 a day by existing

I’m the same. My uncle, aunt, cousins and mum and dad are overweight and I use food as a comfort. I always did except when I was self harming and starving myself. I think there’s something buried deep down and I use food to bury it but being overweight is ruining my life. I don’t like going out, I feel shy and embarrassed and I stop doing things because of it.

*I was in Spain for 10 days recently. Drove down. Parked on the drive way to the villa. Went out to eat every night, pasta, pizza, ice cream. Italian restaurants every night. Huge amount of food.
No exercise because we drove everywhere

Was it cutting out food between meals maybe ? In hot countries I don't tend to eat chocolate and tea and biscuits and all the various little things throughout the day*

I don't tend to eat biscuits and snacks at home.

What annoys me the most is on the odd occasion I have been to the doctor about my weight they tell me to cut out a list of foods I don't eat anyway because I don't like them.

I have never ate a doughnut in my life (can't stand the smell) and I can't remember the last time I ate a biscuit. (Probably decades ago).

@YouAreMyRain

Yep that's to do with the limbic system or lizard brain, I know it as fight, flight, feed, fear, freeze, and fornication

Some people just have fast metabolisms - this does not make them more virtuous or mean they have more will power or that they love themselves more. Women should stop basing their self worth on how skinny they are.
I know it's hard because we have internalised misogyny.
Be kind to yourself OP. And by "be kind" I don't mean "don't eat"

It's fucking hard work staying even remotely slim for me, tbh.
It a a battle and I have to plan meals, snacks etc.

Also finding what food works and doesn't work is a massive factor. 500 cals of veg soup and an omelette is far more filling than 3 cookies. Not as fun but I'd rather be slim and full off the soup than starving an hour later off cookies.

Some people just have fast metabolisms -

^^

Not sure if I believe this. These fast metabolism people seem to eat lots of veg and salads. I've never met anyone who can eat as much as me and stay slim. Ever. Just anecdotal tho

Stoke the furry wall talks a lot of sense.

I think people can have faster metabolisms.

I do know a guy who was 6ft 2” and 7.5 stone. He ate constantly huge amounts and never put an ounce on till he was in his 40s.

His daughter was consistently eating several thousand calories per day. Even as a baby she was having an 8 oz bottle virtually every hour or 2. It nearly killed them.
She was 5ft and weighed 5 stone at 18.

Many gps and hospital appointments later they concluded it was genetics. However no idea where it came from because grand parents were very short and very fat.

Yes Olivers We are all different and do react to different foods. We would all be fat or thin if we weren't.

People with 'fast metabolisms' just eat less and move more.

No lethal drizzle people with a fast metabolism don't just eat less and move more.

I grew up eating the same in fact less than my sisters. I'm a lot bigger from age 12. Nothing I did was going to give me their frame and size, I'm taller, wider, heavier and fatter.

They are not any of this yet they would eat more than me as I was aware of my size and they indulged in seconds and pizza whilst I didn't.

I only started indulging when I realised that I was not like them. That I could not watch what I eat and stay as small as them, no matter what I ate, I was still bigger than them so why restrict myself constantly?

If I do restrict im smaller but never like them. They both still eat more than me.

People with 'fast metabolisms' just eat less and move more

Rubbish the whole point of fast metabolisms is people eat more and move less but still lose weight.

Recent programme on this had 2 people who constantly ate but never put on any weight.

They did I think it was called a basal metabolic test or something like that to test how many calories a person, even if they lie down all day would use.

The woman on the programme if I remember, was I think needed 1800 calories per day just to not lose weight if she just took to her bed.

The reporter who was not so skinny had the test done and was around 1200 calories per day.

So the woman on the programme could eat 600 calories more just to stay the same.

That is also true, Open. A good example of denial is my dh; he will , say he isn't hungry at breakfast but have a large cup of coffee and cream, skip lunch; have a mint sweet and another cup of coffee ,then sit down late have a glass of wine or 2 with a heavy meal.

He doesn't lose weight! I don't wonder why!

I know I dropped a stone by giving up caffeine and not eating carbs and protein at the same meal and I wasn't even trying to!!

@Bluetrampolines I could have written this.

Generally all round happy person with no issues other than random compulsive eating.

People always said to me that it’s filling an emotional void but I don’t think that’s it- I have no void I am aware of.

I found a great podcast called ‘brain over binge’ in which she said that you are eating for no reason other than to get rid of the urge to eat.

Rings so true to me- doesn’t help when the feeling is overwhelming and I feel like I’m losing my mind. Might be worth a listen for you though?

There are so many reasons. I'm not fat but I am carrying more weight than I'd like.

I have a DD who is so slim and I have watched in fascination, as she has grown up, her approach to food.

She appears to eat like a pig. She eats sweets, crisps, chocolate and all that kind of thing (she's late teens, so it's not like I was feeding her that shit when she was a toddler, it was all pombears and raisins then) but she only eats small quantities. Food is of little interest to her and she will forget to eat or not bother to eat and she'll leave half eaten packets or crisps around, because she just couldn't be bothered to finish them. She also eats at the pace of a snail. The rest of us will have finished our meal and she'll only be a third of the way through hers.

I fucking love food and am INCAPABLE of leaving a half eaten bag of crisps or half eaten anything. My portion control is hopeless and if it is on my plate, I feel obliged to finish it, regardless of whether I feel full or not. I boredom eat, comfort eat, happy eat and if I weren't vain, I think I'd be the size of whale.

I wish I knew! I'm an intelligent person with many friends and a good job, but I spend around 80% of my waking life thinking about food and hating myself for not being slim. I've lost and regained and lost again the same three stone so many times over the years that I think I've destroyed my metabolism - I recently tried to do a calorie-counting type of diet and I lost nothing despite having stuck to it religiously for more than 4 weeks. I would so love to be able to make peace with myself and accept my body the way it is, and I've had therapy to try to get to that place, but I just can't shake off the slim=worthy message that society endorses.

Margot You've got it!!!! Or your DD has!!! I mentioned Paul Mackenna upthread and his method is to eat SLOWLY , really tasting and enjoying the food. (not in front of a screen or standing up). It works! I lost 3 stone on it and am maintaining with it! Also ONLY eat when you're hungry and STOP when you feel full. So don't starve either.

Although now , with age I do have to stop eating at 7.30. pm and often don't have breakfast till 9 or 10am. I find that helps me sleep better too.

I think people put too much on their own willpower and ability to control themselves (demonstrated on this thread) and so little on the biological responses our body has to the food we eat.

It really matters how you fuel your body.

If you eat a lot of carbs (most people do in the UK) you are triggering your pancreas to make insulin to be able to deal with it. You fuel on fast burning glucose.

Glucose (the whole GI thing) is used quickly or stored in cells as fat.

This process makes you constantly hungry.

It’s not your willpower, not your failings as a human, it’s your body that evolved over millions of years.

Learn about your body before you give up. Quit saying it’s about willpower. It’s not!

Do you really think that the fattest version of humans that has ever existed (30% obese) have somehow lost all its willpower after millions of years? That’s ludicrous!

It’s the food we eat.

Look up high fat low carb diets, look up keto diets!
I eat this way and I categorically state that I do not eat less because I’ve got some magical will power, I eat ‘less’ because I’m literally not hungry.

Reverse the food triangle and your weight will transform

I've done low carb hi fat diets (for long periods of time) and yes I lost some weight but I'd always stall eventually and it didn't prevent me from overeating, not to mention the fact that it messed with my thyroid and made me feel a bit depressed, every time.

Also, none of the 'naturally' slim people I know do low carb/hi fat! There is more to it than that.

So why do you think our country is obese?

A catastrophic failure of willpower?