To think that if I was slim as a child and teenager, I should be slim as an adult?

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Most people I know from childhood have kept the same kind of BMI/body shape they had as a child/teenager. For example, those who were really skinny as teenagers are still skinny as adults. Those who were overweight as children are now overweight adults, etc. Obviously excluding any specific causes for changes in weight such as health conditions, pregnancies, etc.

I was slim my entire life until my early 20s, and during my 20s I've put on a lot of weight and weight from a size 10/12 at 20 to now a size 18 at 28. I've not had any pregnancies or have any known health conditions that impact my weight.

I'm trying to figure out where it went wrong... I don't know anyone else who has gained a lot of weight in their 20s. I'm wanting to lose weight now and I'm thinking of trying to go back to what I used to eat when I was 20. It wasn't particularly healthy, but it was 'normal' food and small portion sizes.

My DH was reed thin throughout childhood and teens. Started gaining weight in early 20s and has been overweight since. Cannot lose weight through conventional dieting either.

Thyroid? Mine went south in my early 30s and I went from being able to eat anything and stay slim, to having to pretty much halve my food intake to stay the same size.

My 6 sisters and I were ALL whippet slim as children and adults up to around 35.

Then we all turned into our maternal Granny - cube on legs. Huge boobs. Genetics.

It can often be linked to your thyroid not functioning as it should. You should seek advice from your GP, OP.

No I don’t think that’s necessarily true at all. Build stays the same but diet and lifestyle don’t have to! Those are much more likely to be the cause of weight gain or loss than medical issues such as thyroid (though this is of course possible!)

Discovering alcohol expanded my waist for some reason 🤦‍♂️

My DB was very slim all his life, as a result his eating habits aren’t as good as they could be, as he hasn’t had to worry about it.

It’s caught up with him in his late 30’s

When I was 5, the school nurse told my mum I was underweight. So everyone fed me up. By 10 I was overweight and put on a diet.
By 13 I'd developed an eating disorder and was severely underweight.
At 18 I became bulimic and went to the gym a lot.
Then in my 20s, I started drinking a lot and eating lots of kebabs etc. And stopped going to the gym.
By late 20s/early 30s, I was obese. Mid 30s - morbidly obese.
At 39 I was diagnosed with ADHD and medicated. One of the side effects is weight loss as I'm not binge eating as much and it reduces appetite.
I'm nearly 41 now and still morbidly obese, but the weight is coming off.
I don't think I'll ever be slim again though.

It depends totally on what you eat, unless you have some super amazing metabolism or smoke.

My USA cousins were all thin when young in the 70s/80s but now all quite big because of horrible USA diet.

Most people I know are bigger, there was hardly any restaurants or convenience foods in the 80s and early 90s

I think it can be quite common to gain weight in 20’s…eg university often coincides (crap food and too much alcohol)- also women often find a partner who they may cook and eat with and it’s easy to fall into the habit of eating same portion sizes as the bigger (often male) partner and enjoying regular bottles of wine on the sofa…both of which I have experienced. Later on in life - kids/pregnancies/demands of looking after a family mean not enough time and attention paid to self-care…

All women in my family have been skinny until early twenties and I've never seen it happen to others. We are not alone!

Same. Size 6/8 in younger years, no dieting or strenuous exercise. By mid twenties I was having to do 180 mins intense HIIT exercise a week to stay a size 10, plus slimming world. Then my thyroid packed up late twenties and now I'm 16/18 in mid thirties. Slimming world no longer works. No energy for HIIT because babies. Depressing.

I was heavily overweight as a child/teen because of the bad eating habits of my parents. I was the biggest kid from te whole school, not something to be proud of. I got bullied a lot by some nasty slim girls. When I went to uni I discovered healthy food and sports and changed totally.

I got slimmer as i good older but a lot of my old friends just got bigger. I still live in the city i went to school and sometimes i see an old bully somewhere and they’re all fatter than me. Karma!

Slim child and adult until my thyroid started to malfunction in mid/late 30s. Lost weight in early 50s and was slim. Now overweight again but working on it.

Came to say this but it's already been said.

I was stuck thin through teens and twenties put in quite a bit in my early thirties due to an excellent canteen at work and sitting with DH on the sofa having takeaways and wine.

Lots a lot of it after two DC and being constantly active with them - not just at a desk anymore

*stick thin

I was very thin when I was young and in my teens, too thin really. But I was very active and lived at home with a mum that cooked really good healthy food from scratch. I started gaining weight in my 20s when I moved out of home, went out drinking more and pretty much stopped exercising. Also our metabolism slows down which is a factor. I have lost it again through hard work and exercise, it's slowly creeping back on now with perimenopause

No, not the case at all. There are lots of factors that can and do mean that plenty of people who are slim kids/teens become overweight adults. Metabolism slows as you get older, diets and lifestyles change. My dad was very lean and athletic throughout his teens - keen sportsman etc - but then got married and had a family at 21 and has been either slightly or very overweight for most of his adult life. Basically he was just less active (still sporty but not competitively like he was in his teens) and also because he wasn't living with his parents any more he had more choice over what food was in the house etc and just became more into food and eating out generally as he got older, had less time for exercise, busy job with a lot of car travel, etc.

I think quite a few people do put weight on in their 20s - possibly stopping the exercise they did as a child / teenager, and also changing the type of food they eat as they move into independent adulthood. Anyone whose diet comprises food from take out chicken places , or eats the kind of gourmet junk food which is popular now - eg dirty fries, stacked burgers, even the luxury mac'n'cheeses will be eating possibly 3 x as many calories as food that is basically home cooked . And as well as less actual exercise people can sometimes just move less in life generally - working in an office can sometimes mean sitting down for 8+ hours a day, a seated commute and sitting in front of TV in the evening . School and college more likely meant walking across the building to different lessons, walking to and from etc

I have known this happen amongst women I’ve known a long time, but it is often related to pregnancy. Or when people learned to drive and got office jobs.

Lifestyle creep - it’s easy to put away an extra 100-200 calories every day, plus a takeaway a week, and loads less activity as you get a car and stop using public transport as you earn more money.

Me too!
I was really thin as a teen and early 20s (it was great!), started putting weight on around 23. Crashed through 'healthy' BMI after first child at 30 and haven't really stopped - 15 years later, I'm obese.
Can't seem to lose weight either - I've basically never stopped gaining weight. Every time I lose I put it all back on and more within months. Not sure what the answer is!

As a kid and teen I was in umpteen sports clubs, I walked everywhere for miles a day to and from school or college. I was a thin person until I was 18. At Uni I did the same exercise and walking, but with the addition of copious quantities of alcohol my calorie intake was creeping up and so did my weight.

At 24 I stopped all sport, joined the police, drove absolutely everywhere, terrible diet due to lack of sleep and time to cook as I worked so much, lots of sitting in my new role in a car or at a desk and had to force myself to fit the gym or running around my 80hr week work. I got fatter.

I'm now 40 ish, very fat and sedentary. I don't run because I absolutely hated it for the last 30yrs, I loathe the gym, don't want to start a team sport and accept I need to change things.

Life changes as you age - your priorities and responsibilities change, your requirements of yourself and others change, and you have to be aware of different things and choose what's important.

I decided many years ago that my MH was more important than my dress size, and focused on that. Now my MH is much better, I need to focus on my dress size really.

I think most children are thin though, I think it's when we get access to unlimited food, snacks and booze that it starts to go wrong, and we've often much more sedentary as adults. My kids are only young but very rarely still, I can sit for hours at work without moving and that obviously takes its toll.

I found a diet mostly consisting of wine and fags in my 20s meant I was slim but unhealthy, in my 30s I could easily lose some weight by cutting down a bit but now in my 40s I do have to be way more mindful of what I'm eating and I have to exercise regularly or else I pile it on.