Why are you overweight?

[Fantina]

I was slim and fit and active all through childhood and adolescence and went from 10 stones to 17 stones in about four years after the birth of my third child who didn’t sleep. I packed on the lbs through inhaling sugar and convenience food as I was exhausted and taking short cuts to save time and for an instant hit.

My third DC is now 8 so I can’t claim to still be in the new child fug of exhaustion. I now eat for emotional comfort but I’m interested in where others feel their weight gain came from.

Lack of proper thought when food shopping so end up with bits and pieces rather than ingredients for full meals, so end up relying a lot on takeaways. Plus I have a 1yo now so less time to prep and cook.

All treats revolve around food as well...birthday = meal out, weekends = cafe lunch out (probably) plus evening takeaway.

So basically just too drawn to the convenient and tasty nature of eating out/takeaways.

Mine started during my 4th pregnancy after 2 nasty miscarriages during the pandemic. I weigh about 2 stone more than I always used to, I shovel down so much kids left overs, snacks, sugary treats etc so I'm not surprised.. but I can't seem to get my mind set sorted to do anything about it.

My youngest was a horrendous colic baby who never slept also but now he's 2.5 he's pretty good as sleeping so I don't have the excuse either!

Too much wine.
Too many carbs - they are cheap, easy to cook and comforting when I’m tired.
lack of time / dedication to planning - I’m a bit ‘fuck it’ by nature, and tend to wing it in many areas of life. This is not conducive to mindful eating.

i only eat twice a day (mostly)

I think it’s the high calorie choices

today I had two slices of bread, butter, tin of tuna, mayo, red onion and bag of small crisps for lunch. God knows how many calories in that

tonight I had a wrap with mozzarella, tomato paste, 5 slices of chorizo again very calorific.

Yesterday evening it was two slices of toast, a tin of beans, 2 eggs & 2 babybels - about 1000 calories

lunch was skinny bagel, 2 scrambled eggs and a cheese slice

I’m 11st 7.

Cutting back never seems to make much difference.

I rarely snack and if I do it’s on olives that I get once a week in my food shop. Yummy! But again calorific

Menopause. Dd had an eating disorder. Locdown. And now I can't be arsed. To lose weight past menopause one has to eat seriously little. I am focusing on not gaining anymore and accepting the one and a half stone over my usual ore menopause/ pre DD Ed/ pre lockdown weight.

Because I love to eat and don't seem to have an off button! I have been much slimmer but I worked out every day and counted every calorie and it wasn't sustainable. Lock down and I ate even more.

Eating too much and not cutting down when I left Uni & got a day job. Up to that point, I just about burned what I ate/drank, and could cut back a bit if my jeans got too tight.

once I started sitting down for 8 hours a day (and not walking to lectures/dancing like a loon for hours), the weight crept on. I’ve lost it a couple of times, but I seem to stick around 12 stone/size 14/just overweight.

I’m active, 15k+ steps a day, but am too greedy and enjoy a pint or three.

Wine, lockdown, broke my knee, wfh, perimeno, exhausted. Hate how I look but in a difficult cycle and struggle to get back on a very rigid fasting, alcohol free course to get back to a size 10.

I eat too much food and drink too much wine - other than that I am perfect.

Because if I eat anything more than 1200 calories in a day I gain weight. And 1200 a day is fucking miserable so I usually go over my allotted calories at least once a week. And once a month I have a take away. So I'm fat because I refuse to starve myself, basically.

Probably just eating too much crap - I go to the gym twice a week, walk the dogs every day and swim or do aqua zumba once a week and I am huge!!

Greed, sugar cravings, not enough exercise, too much food, peri menopause, health conditioned etc etc

I was in the healthy weight range but then I took on a job with stupid long hours. I ended up buying food out at lunchtime and just eating junk when I got home that didn't need cooking.
Have changed jobs now and starting to turn it back in the right direction but it's really much more difficult than I expected as I've developed a real taste for the junk food, having pretty much lived off it for a couple of years.

This for me.
I suspect I also have ADHD and therefore have little impulse control

It’s not a treat, it’s a punishment.

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZGeADfEHU/

A combination of PCOS, dopamine chasing, being quite short, crappy genetics and just generally loving food. The only way my weight stays healthy is if I am always hungry. It’s quite crap and involves some very intensive/obsessive willpower and therefore my weight is not healthy!

WFH.

No exercise.

Some days I don't leave the house apart from ten minute school run.

I'm very fat now and need to do something about it.

Cheese and wine at the weekend.

I've been asking myself this since the age of 10 started periods then and that's when I first blew up.

I went food shopping with my size 0 friend the other day and couldn't honestly see much difference in what we'd buy except they brought loads of 'dairy free' chocolate pots.

WFH / sedentary job.
Perimenopause.

I don't really snack. I rarely drink alcohol. I tend to eat twice a day and it's usually 'from scratch' / homemade (not saying I never have a takeaway or a shop-bought cake but it's not the basis of my diet). I don't binge, have enormous portions etc.

But I do eat a lot of carbs, I do cook with plenty of butter etc, and so that combined with v. little exercise and the joys of peri means that I'm easily 2 stone heavier than I should be.

I really love food. Good food is one of the joys of life. I don't want to eat 1200 bloody calories every day and obsess about my choices constantly. So...I'll probably stay overweight even though I'd prefer not to be.

This …. Except I rarely go over but no doctor believes that I only eat 1,200 calories a day so there is nothing I can do. And I still gain weight …. about 1 to 2 lbs a month but over the 3 years of perimenopause /menopause that equals 3 stone gain. Not sure what else I can do ….. doctors say there is nothing wrong with me so I basically have to be starving all the time and still put in weight.

I'm not at the moment but have been, drastically so. It's because I eat too much and don't move enough. I also have PCOS so pile on weight looking at carbs and sugar, however I know this so if I stick to 1500 calories or less lowish carb/sugar and exercise 3 times a week + I can maintain a healthy weight. Yes I know others can eat more than me and not gain but that's not me so I can feel angry about eating the cakes and gaining while my slim friend eats chocolate and take aways all the time and never gains a pound, but that won't change the outcome. If I want to be slim that's the lifestyle I have to maintain. That's the mindset I have to be in

Because since I turned 43 I can't eat or drink anything without it sticking to my mid section.

Probably the same reason virtually everybody is… I eat/drink more than my body needs and don’t move around enough under my own steam.

However, I have stopped eating/drinking too much and I am shrinking (slowly). I still need to increase the moving around though.

Quite simply, I ate too much. My BMI got to 26. I tried blaming perimenopause, hormones, wondered if my thyroid was out of whack. I was just deluding myself. As soon as I started using my fitness pal I was appalled at how much I was eating. Now my BMI is 21 and I make better choices. Usually!