How did you get fat?

Christa-- You have told me recently how difficult it is to a be a young woman today-- and while I agree, here's something maybe you didn't know about how hard it was in days of yore: When I was a senior in high school, I weighed 179 pounds--- not a lot more than you did. At that time, that wasn't considered "thick"-- that was considered obese. I was by FAR the largest girl in my senior class. I was called "fatso" and "piggy" and pushed down the stairs and ridiculed more or less daily. Gym teachers pulled me aside and lectured me about my habits, or singled me out in front of others as a bad example. I wore a size 16. Prom dresses did not exist in over a size 14, because it was presumed that no one over that size could get a date (my size 16 dress was custom made after a weekend of nothing but insults at the off-the rack stores.) The maximum size that even a specialty store carried was a 22. There were no "cool clothes" for girls that size, so I bought a lot of scarves and funky shoes to make outfits more interesting. Times were challenging, even then. The bigger issue with body-image and the public today is the HUGE disparity between the reality and media images of women. Models are getting thinner, as young women are larger than ever before. The ladies in the magazines are a size 0 or 2, while high school girls come in all sizes these days. When I coached varsity swimming a couple years back-- I was shocked to find we had swimmers and divers who wore a size 18, 20, 22-- and these were the athletic girls in my district! Both eras were rough on women, in different ways. So when you get angry at the way you and your peers are treated today, understand tht you are not alone-- even though the standards change and the times do too, the struggle your facing is really just a new flavor of the same old crap. When I look at pictures of myself then, I was beautiful. My body was healthy and round and rosy cheeked-- I have gorgeous skin and pretty eyes-- and most days, I'd give anything to be that girl again. So try to enjoy yourself while you're there-- you *are* beautiful, truly, and you need to know that.  

I too, was not always overweight but after I had quit smoking and going out with friends, I really began to use food to fill those and other voids.  Food is definately my drug of choice.  I kept a steady weight of about 160-170 being 5'7 I fely good at that size.  Ten the scale began to climb.  I lost my husband in December and had my second son in Jan.  Needless to say I have been using food like never before.  I am at an all time high of 277lbs.  I don't feel like my self and with the risk of sounding like many weightloss commercials, I am not able to be the mom I want to be.  My sister has had the lap band surgery, but I am still trying to pull myself together and learn how to eat right.

Growing up I always thought of myself as a fat child.  I still remember in 6th grade looking for a dress and my older cousin saying "oh, you're too big to wear that dress."  It was such a neat dress, but I didn't get it.  Anyway, I really started gaining weight in 8th grade and know what happened.  It's simple, my father mentally abused not only my mom (though she tried to protect us as much as possible), but my siblings and myself as well.  Try hearing day in and day out that what you do isn't good enough or your worthless and soon you begin to believe it.  I remember in 6th grade when I hurt my foot I was too scared to say anything.  My mom heard me crying in my room and took me to the hospital at 9 p.m. at night.  The next morning my dad came in my room to see my cast (yup, it was broken) and said, see this is what you get for playing around. Anyway, throughout high school I would sneak snacks to cope and fill up the emptyness.  My youngest cousin once asked why my dad didn't like him.  As a young teen I looked at him and said, "Oh Ryan it isn't you.  Dad doesn't like any kids."  Yes, I was including myself when I said it.  In high school I tried to "disappear" and succeeded for the most part.  By my senior year in high school I may have weighed 200lbs.  Now my third year in college I lived by myself in an apartment and I see now that was the worst thing I could have done.  Sure I continued to go to work as scheduled, but I slowly started skipping classes.  I literally lived in that apartment in front of the TV trying to escape from life.  That year of solitude made communicating with people difficult for a decade.  By this time I was up to 280 lbs.   I finally dug myself out of this low self-esteem when I not only went back to college, but graduated in 2000 with high honors.  As for if my dad ever stopped the mental abuse?  He continued on my mom until she passed away.  He tried it with me once (now twice) after she died.  The first time was a couple months after and he already had a girlfriend and made a comment that was geared to put me down.  I asked him to walk me out since I was at his house and proceeded to tell him I didn't appreciate him first of all bashing my mothers memory and second putting me down.  I did tell him that if he couldn't say anything nice about my mom then to not say anything at all.  As for his comment about me?  Well he could either keep his lips zipped or we wouldn't be talking anymore.  That really made him see I believe that I wouldn't stand for it. Now he tried to "put me back in my place" again a little over a month ago.  I basically told him this is how it is and if you don't like it then don't talk to me again. As for my self esteem?  I love who I am now.  Do I like the fact I weigh so much?  Oh heck no, but I'm working on it.  Will I be successful?  Oh definitely.  I am a blessed woman...I am a pretty smart, funny, and loving lady with a supportive and wonderful DB (love of my life), and very supportive and cool siblings. 

Melinda -- I see a lot of similiarities with your story and my experiences.  I too basically shut myself in my apartment and stopped socializing when I gained the weight.  And, it wasn't my father (I had no relationship with him), but my mother who was verbally abusive throughout my childhood and well into my adulthood.  It was only after I grew a spine, a lot of self-confidence and self-esteem when I pulled her aside and told her that either she was going to have to change the way she treated me or our relationship was over.  I'm happy to say that from that day forward her attitude totally changed toward me and we now have a great relationship.  I don't think she really respected me before that time.  Well, she respects me now -- big time.  People treat you the way you let them.

Here is my story.. I came out of the womb at 180lbs....   I weighed that in 6th grade... I was always a big child, although I believe I was average during my first 2 years. My mother said after I got my immunization shots, that was it. I wasn't the same. She said I would drink a gallon of milk a day, when I was on bottles.  From there it snowballed. It was like during the summer when school wasn't out, we just sat around the house, and ate ate ate. Every summer I would gain a few extra pounds. In high school it got really bad. Social situations, social rejection, peer pressure, taunting, mocking, isolation, depression, etc..  that made me eat more and more for comfort. Finally I had that moment in junior college that I was worthy of a good, healthy life and had to work for it. From that point on, it's been gravy.  I've come across some other psychological reasons how I got fat too, but I won't go Dr. Phil and Oprah on ya! I may get emotional.

How and/or Why did I get fat? Both my parents are over 300 pounds, so I suspect there may be a genetic component, but in the nature vs nurture reasoning I'd definitely say it has more to do with the nurture side of things.  This is my theory--I learned overeating from my dad and comfort eating from my mom.  I never saw my mother overeat, but she always had boxes and boxes of chocolate covered cherries in her bedside cabinet.  Nearly everyday when I got home from school, she was in bed having an afternoon "rest".  She eats when she's upset, but never in front of anybody.  Dad just eats a lot.  Pretty much whatever you put in front of him whether he's hungry or not.  I was at a normal weight until 2nd grade.  I had a teacher who, so it seemed, hated kids, or at least hated me.  That's when I turned to food.  I'd snack from the time I got home from school and then eat all my dinner as well.  College was the same and then I became a teacher and so the 4:00-snac****il-supper-time-and-then-eat-a-full-meal routine was well established from an early age.  Now that I'm a mother, I'm still in the kitchen everyday at 4:00 getting dinner ready and it is sooo hard not to snack while I'm cooking.  It's like it's engrained.  I try to make sure that the 4:00 food is fruit ot carrot sticks, but sometimes (sigh). 

I'll tell you how I got fat.  When I was eight, my father told me the cir****tances of my conception.  He didn't use a condom one night, and got my mother pregnant with me.  She didn't want another pregnancy, since she had bled dangerously heavily on the last one with my sister, so she was angry when my father told me this.  Of course, at the time, she never mentioned the bleeding or say why she was so angry.  I assumed it was because she didn't want me.  My father disciplined me and my sister by hitting us.  This frightened me, and I was afraid and hated my father, feeling he didn't love me if he did this.  When I asked him why he hated me, he seemed surprised and asked why I assumed that.  I told him that he hit me, so he must hate me, and he said no he hit me because he loved me.  This sounded so crazy to me, that I withdrew from his from then on.

I became obsessed with overeating at the age of ate, and started putting on weight at the age of puberty;  11 years old.  And it goes on and gets worse from there.  My father told me that I was gross, fat and ugly at the age of 13, and I believed him!  That ruined my body image for years.  That's how I became fat.

Denise Phares

 

 Denise.. it's amazing the long-term effects of words on us as young children. God... mom was totally accepting of my size no matter how big I was.. She NEVER called me fat. NEVER NEVER.. She supported me 200% in all my endeavors.. My dad on the other hand..that's the Dr. Phil and Oprah story. I can wholeheartedly relate to you. The effed up part about it is.. he doesn't even realize this is an issue today, and I hate to bring it up because it makes me angry along with a bunch of other unneeded emotions right now. Ok now I want to go and scream.  

Parents really are in a position to mess up a child for life.  My mother hitting, okay, beating me as a child certainly contributed to the belief that she didn’t care for me.  Now I know different.  I know that she raised me the way that she was raised and she simply didn’t know any better.  I do remember though when I was in my late 20s and gaining hugh amounts of weight very quickly, that I experienced a weird sense of pleasure because I realized how much she hated me getting fat.  But, at some point I realized that I had to stop using my issues with my mother as an excuse for continuing to abuse myself.  For the most part I’ve gotten over the things my mother did and said to me while growing up.  But, every once in a while I experience a jolt of fury when I think back to the bad old days.

I was lucky in that my parents never said anything about my weight at all.  I had excellent grades, was trustworthy and knew that they approved of me.  My older brother was another story.  He called me names, ridiculed me, told me I was a disgrace to the family and got his friends to call me the same horrible names.  I was 10; he was 20.  Terribly negative impact.  

My weight went up significantly in 2nd grade when I was 7 as I posted earlier, but the teasing when I was ten had a lot more impact.