I was thin growing up and stayed thin until I got to college. While I was growing up my mom controlled every bite I ate & I was allowed absolutely no sugar. When I got out on my own I at any and all bad carbs I could get my hands on. Gaining 5-10 pounds a year until last May when someoneI knew shared her success on Atkins. It seems, it was what my body was begging for, to get back to no sugar. I wish it wasn't that way but it is so I'll just have to learn to live with it or without it (the sugar that is) the rest of my life.

I was in elementary school wearing a size 12 in womens! I always "knew" I was fat... but it really didn't start bothering me until I was a senior in high school. I looked at myself one day and was just like... "OH MY GOD - I'm fat"... when I got in college it got worse... I wasn't worried about who liked me or whatever... I was just embarassed at what I looked like. So I started to lose.

I became overweight after having my first baby.

I was a thin kid growing up.

I was skinny as heck until the age of 8-9, then I started gaining slowly but surely. The problem was two-fold, that year I had a teacher who seemed to have it in for me and pretty much did away with my self-esteem which caused me to seek refuge in food. On the other hand, I ate at noon with my grandmother who lived close by, I also stayed with her after school until my parents could come pick me up. She showed love through food. I was denied nothing: chocolate, chips, etc. She always made sure there was plenty to go around.
Since then, I emotionally binged a lot which only made everything worse. The fatter I got, the less self-esteem I had, the more I ate.
I reached my top weigth around age 21-22 at about 198lbs (I'm 5.4ft).

I was thin, infact model thin for most of my life, and then once I hit 18 or 20 the weight began to pile on then. I found out I had PCOS, but I do think I was overeating too.
I think sometimes you are pre-disposed to being heavy all of your life, and sometimes, like me, I was thin and then put on weight - which I think was 50% illness and 50% my own fault

Ive always been heavy, although in school I was considered "chunky" until 4th grade, then I remember going shopping for and easter dress and having to buy a Womans 18!!! what a sad day it is when a 10 year old sees those numbers

I started off tall and thin but developed food issues in my early teens. Then I was tall and chubby and had to fight to stay "just chubby". I didn't get significantly overweight until I was in college, but ever since then it has been a major up-down battle with weight.

I do remember sneak eating and hiding food as early as 12 .

I was skinny as a kid and after highschool. Then I got pregnant and gained a lot of weight, like 40 lbs. Then after the baby I slowly got up to 10 lbs more.

I was a "chunky" child but when I got to 13 I became anorexic and I lost a tremendous amount of weight and I struggled with this issue for years. Then I was a normal weight during my pregnancies and it wasn't until 7 years ago that my weight soared.

I was normal/thin as a child. We would have bacon and eggs for breakfast and come home for a hot lunch (main meal of day) My father worked a few blocks away, and supper was leftover soup from lunch and cold German sausage and salad.

I started to gain weight in high school when there was no time to get home for lunch so I would take a sandwich (which I hated) some fruit. I would always fall asleep in the pm. I was playing a lot of sports which helped keep off too much weight. My sister went to well over 200 lbs at this point, I went up to 150 and a size 10.

When I left home, I was able to keep a stable weight as I was very active and ate what I liked (very Atkins like). Started a family and thought it was important to cut down on red meat. Ended up with severe eczema and asthma. Have been eating a combination of Blood Type and Atkins in 1997 and have been able to maintain a decent weight range for 7 years.

I was a skinny kid until I was 8. I'm not sure exactly which event triggered huge amounts of eating as a few major things were going on: my much desired brother was born, we moved to a new neighbourhood away from all my friends to a place where I had none and was teased constantly and I continued to be abused by a family acquaintence. The combination left me miserable, alone and eating everything I could reach to try to dull the pain.

By 10, I outgrew all the "pretty plus" kids' clothes and by 12, I was in a 14 womens. I ate my way through high school reaching 235 at 16. I remember my sister making me a grad dress because they didn't come in my size and teasing me about it being made by a tent and awning shop because it looked just like a big violet tent. (My sis was the same size as me, 4 years older - she's even bigger now).

It wasn't until I left my parent's home that I started to lose weight and actually care how I looked.

Now, I promise myself to never get anywhere near those big numbers again.

Julie

I was very, very skinny as a child, and not particularly interested in food. My favorite snack was cold, plain, iceburg lettuce. And then puberty hit and it's been a fight ever since then. Sometimes I won, sometimes the fat won.

I have always been a little on the chunky side. As a kid, I always got tons of exercise. We lived across the street from an awesome city park, with a free swimming pool in the summer, a pond which we would skate on in the winter, and a huge hill for sledding. My mom didn't own a car, so we walked everywhere. However, I ate junk food like it was going out of style. Candy, ice cream, you name it! I often think back to my eating habits, realizing that if I had cut out all the sugar, I would have been an incredibly lean kid!

The fact that I was always a little on the heavy side has made it difficult to figure out what my goal weight should be now. How many others have had this problem & what did you do about it?

Wow, I'm amazed that I'm in the majority (overweight child).

My parents tried to feed me healthy but someone close to me said, when I was nine, that I should start watching what I eat. This constant mention of my weight and dieting was enough to send me spiraling out of control in a binge and starve, gorge and diet cycle which has lasted through to my adult years.

I don't blame that person at all. I wish he had thought about the things he said to me when I was young. I know he did it to try and help as he is overweight and didn't want me to turn out that way too.

I blame myself but I'm taking control of my life. I've been what I consider "average - to - thin" a few times in my life. As a teenager and when I was 22 and then again at 23. So I know I can do it.

I know y'all can, too!

Oh, I would also like to add that I'm glad I grew up a little overweight. As I enter my mid 20's I notice many girls my age who were very thin (without dieting) struggling with their weight gain (which is a natural aging process, but only to a small degree). They are not used to eating healthfully and are putting on weight very quickly. They don't know how to handle not being "beautiful" (as they think... personally I don't agree with beauty having a definite form) or thin as they used to be. I know a few girls who cry about it a lot, or refuse to buy plus sized clothing because of the stigma attached.

So growing up and always watching what I eat, and knowing how important exercise and activity is, I am faring quite well in not gaining significant amounts of weight in comparison to when I was young. I'm still overweight, but emotionally I can deal with it without self-hatred.

Does anyone feel similarly?