(Thanks Steve)

[Guest guest]

Thank you for allowing me to join. I'm anxious to see what will become

of this group.

Me? I've been a big girl all my life. My mom had me on my first

official 'diet' since I was 10 yrs old in 1970. I've done them all.

Well, not Craig as it was too expensive. The most successful for

me was fen-phen. I lost 70 lbs and walked up to 4 miles a day. I was

healthier than I had ever been in my life. My endocrinologist put me on

it when I refused to go with gastric bypass in 1994. When the drugs

went off the market the real battle began. I tried a modified medi-fast

plan, lost 45 pounds in about 8 weeks and threw myself into early

menopause. Go Figure.

Now, heck I just want to eat better, feel better and walk alot.

I don't know that I have ever been discriminated against, at least not

openly, but I've never felt like I fit in. Emotionally I've always had

to be the 'fun one' to compensate for being the fat one, the one with

'such a pretty face'.

Lot's of emotional hurt.

Good luck with this group

in CA

" B "

susan_blackdog

Re: Thanks Steve

I've often wondered about people who have struggled with their weight since

childhood. One things is how does a child overeat. Where does this come from?

Secondly, with so much experience of the pain and discomfort of being over

weight, why isn't that enough to motivate a change in eating behaviors. It's

difficult to understand why we put so much effort into things to help us after

the fact (diets, medicines, appetite suppressants) but very little into working

on the problem beforehand. What I mean is that if we could focus as much energy

into not overeating / poorly eating in the first place, then there wouldn't be a

need for the remedy in the second place.

I wasn't overweight as a child. If anything I was skinny and weak. Then I had a

growth spurt and developed into a large man. Not fat, just large. I left the

Marines at 235lbs and was in the best shape of my life. I went five more years

and never gained or lost a pound regardless of what I ate. But I didn't over eat

all. It wasn't until I was involved in a fatality accident (my fault) that I

began to use food for comfort. And I didn't even realize I was doing it. I went

from 235 to 280 then 320 which I maintained until I got married at 30 years old.

After the marriage I added 90 more pounds for a total of 410.

I never tried a diet or to simply modify my eating until I was 33 and got so

depressed that I didn't want to live anymore. After that i tried this thing and

that thing but never had any success. six years go by before I finally had had

enough and well, you guys know what I did next.

But even walking across the country isn't enough to make change unless you are

truly ready to change everything. I have found that with the willingness to

change you need a willingness to deal with the causes of the eating behavior.

Without dealing with the reasons why you self-destruct you can never really fix

the whole problem. It's like buying bald tires for your car because the tires

you have are no good. The cure is as useless as the problem.

I hope I'm not philosophizing, I'm actually interested in asking you whether you

know any answers to the original questions I posed in this post.

Steve