Are you happy being fat (Overweight)

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Are you too fat to create a poll? :pac:

Aestivalis

Every overweight person who nearly has an asthma attack when they walk up a flight of stairs tells me a different story.

Was out out working with an overweight person once. This guys not massive but still has a considerable gut. We had to hop a fence in a field...and he literally couldnt lift his leg and climb it. Got all flustered and upset about it

Another time working with a very obese girl. We had to duck under a fence. This barrier about chest height (it was at a horse track), and you had to duck a small bit.
Anyway, this girl made a big fuss about having to bend over a mere few centimetres. Then it happened, as she was struggling under it she lost her balance and keeled forward very slowly (almost dramatic), she put out her hand to brake the fall.
She ended up stuck in that position slightly keeled over with 2 hands supporting her out front and she couldnt correct herself.........
She also sprained her wrist from merely doing this.

Tried to help and ask if she was alright but got the aggressive treatment.

I'm no saint myself, I love sweets and cake, I do have a bit of a gut on me but I try my best to stay fit and able. But overweight is really a debilitating thing and has serious health implications even though a person may not realise them.

I'm mainly saying this because I've heard a new trend about "fat acceptance" and its absolutely disgusting in my opinion. In-denial at its best.

cantdecide

I don't know if I'm 'overweight'. I'm much taller than average and after spending my whole life being between chubby and very much obese (XXXL shirts and struggling to close 36" jeans), I decided I had to do something drastic in my mid twenties so I decided to run. I only managed to get through about six months before my knee gave out but thankfully, my weight and my health were definitely much better. Over the last few years, I've walked and I've educated myself about food and fixed most of my bad habits and slowly, I've lost a lot of weight.

These days, people will call me slim all the time but because I have the amazing beerless beer belly, I can't ever feel like I'm slim. I always feel flabby. Last year, I had been doing highly physical work and walking a round trip of about 8KM every day. Add an accident in Asia (a four week saga) to the food disagreeing with me and I arrived home positively gaunt. I didn't recognise myself in the mirror... but I still felt fat because if the flab. I do feel much much better now than I have in the past. At 32, I've never felt better tbh.

Satisfaction is the word. It's not that I'm not happy- it's more that I'm not satisfied.

Muise...

Princess Peach wrote: »

Thinking about celebs being in great shape, how many hours a week do regular people spend doing shopping, cleaning, cooking and such that celebs can pay someone to do?

I'd do much more exercise if I could come home to a clean house and a good meal ready for me everyday!

But housework is exercise.

meeeeh

I don't look perfect. I'm between size 12 or 10 for the last 20 years. My waist size is bigger after two kids than it was five years ago but that is ok. I don't like it when I gain weight but last time I lost weight it was because of stress. I would take couple of pounds more any time.

I would die if I had to live of grilled chicken breast and steamed veg. But I'm not a fan of fry ups or take outs either. I like well prepared, versatile food, proper butter, olive oil instead of those disgusting oil sprays, a glass of wine and I also love vegetables and fruit. I could do with more execercise atm but I will sort that out after couple of health niggles get better.

I think there is so much more than just looks to people. I can understand how someone who is overweight can feel unhappy (I do almost every time I try on a pair of jeans) but I would also hate to be some who needs to have perfect body to be happy. I guess I'm lucky enough that my happiness depends on so much more than just my looks.

spankysue

I'm about a stone overweight and perfectly happy about it.

I lost over 3 stone a couple of years ago and while I was happy with my body, I didn't stop thinking or talking about what I was eating or what I couldn't eat and that made me miserable so I put back on a stone and now I feel normal again and don't obsess about what I eat.

Shenshen

I'm obese, and I don't really care if any of you believe me or not, I'm rather happy with it.
I'm fit enough, in summer I swim about 1h each day, in winter I'd work out about half an hour a day at home, so no, I won't be out of breath going up a flight of stairs.
My blood pressure is fine, and my blood sugar levels are better than would be expected of a normal-weight person.

Yes, I realise that I'm at a higher risk of developing certain conditions, but the way I see it we all have to die of something and I'd rather die fat and contend than thin and miserable.

I love the way my body feels, I like the curves I have (yes, even the ones around my belly) and I don't really see why I would want to change that just to please other people I don't even know. No, thanks.

Addle

I'm fat, and I'm not happy about it.
Out of my friends, I'm the only one that's overweight.
The women range from slim to skinny.
In their company, I'm very aware of how much they don't eat and drink.
They'll order a dessert at dinner but just play with their food on the plate.
I love desserts. I'll never give them up entirely.
They must live by Kate Moss' principal that nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.

Amalgam

I weighed about 120kg in April 2013. I am a rather short man. I was in a bad way..

My aim was, '85kg by Christmas'.

I had hypertension, constantly bloodshot eyes and everything was a struggle, attempting to tie shoe laces cut my breath and left me wanting to wretch. I couldn't really bend down much, I was very chilly in winter and was addicted to having a hot water bottle in bed. I just had very bad circulation.

I would occasionally vomit in my sleep, into my mouth.. and I had severe bouts of reflux.

My trousers/jeans would be destroyed quickly, no space between my thighs.

My trigger for change was realising that my next pair of jeans would probably be at or above a 40inch waist.. and after visiting a local retailer for a 'brand jean', being told that (with grace and very politely) I'd need to consult a 'specialist shop' for certain waist sizes.

Clothing for the obese is very limited in choice and very very unflattering, your cut of jean is, basically, 'Elephant leg'..

I was at a low, mentally, as a result of where I was, physically. The two were inextricably linked.

I started walking a lot. No meat, no bread, particularly white bread. No cheeses. No salt in my food, no added sugar. Cut out more or less all heavily 'processed' foods, Value Pies, Goujons, Nuggets etc.. Processed my own base ingredients, to feed myself. Substituted Buttermilk for milk in cereals/casual drink. I became, a vegetarian. I still drink Buttermilk though, so, I don't know where that places me.

Substituted biscuits and processed snacks/cakes etc.. (pure sh-t, you might as well be eating brick dust mixed with sugar and fat..) for fruits and nuts. I stopped eating after 7,30pm.

I had it in my mind that I was playing the 'long game'.. that even if I only dropped 5kg after a few weeks, that would serve as a test run, for me, psychologically.

115-110kg hobbled by.. then 105kg lumbered past me.. then the magic 100kg, great boost for me.

95kg was a great 'body function' point, reflux and fungal/yeast-like issues around thighs vanish. Skin normal. Goodbye Mycil and similar. I no longer sweat doing more or less nothing. My skin improves.

>> My tablet and Desktop both break/malfunction at this point, within days of each other. I have a think about how I'm using technology and my 'needs'. I decide to replace neither.

Stuck at 91kg. I'd been using a gravity walker in the evenings, but I just seemed 'stuck', this went on for weeks. I notice a very sturdy and imposing eliptical exerciser being used as a tie rack in a local charity shop.

89kg, I build up my stamina to an average of 120 minutes a day.. plus walking anywhere that I need to go. 3 excursions in excess of 20km a week, with a daily average of about 10km and the eliptical useage, at home.

34inch waist and weighing 82kg, as of this morning, after breakfast.

I'll consult with my Doctor at 80kg and see where our conversation takes me.

---

You're stuck between a rock and a hard place, a food industry that treats its customers with pure contempt and malice.. and a weight loss industry that will happily distract you with dangerous fads (fluid loss) and empty your wallet.

If you have issues, talk to your Doctor. You don't have to deprive yourself, or break your body, to change.

You just need patience.

CathyMoran

Am not fat, would have a BMI of around 20 but would be curvy. Am also a mother of two young children and an oesophageal cancer survivor, the surgery of which means that I will never be fat. It is only in the past year that I have accepted my shape.

fatknacker

Aestivalis wrote: »

Was out out working with an overweight person once. This guys not massive but still has a considerable gut. We had to hop a fence in a field...and he literally couldnt lift his leg and climb it. Got all flustered and upset about it

Another time working with a very obese girl. We had to duck under a fence. This barrier about chest height (it was at a horse track), and you had to duck a small bit.

What do you do? Are you a poacher?

PopRocks

I was always pretty big growing up despite doing plenty of sport and eating healthy during the week (stayed with my dad at the weekends and he wouldn't have served very healthy stuff but I don't remember over indulging much)
When I hit about 16 I started to like a guy who only dated rail thin girls and decided I wanted to loose the weight to try and attract his attention.. despite my weight never getting in the way of my dating before.
I joined the gym, walked 2 -3 miles a day and cut out fizzy drinks and all junk food.. saw no results after 3 months, I'd only gone down 5 pounds and I was miserable... I kept trying harder and harder till eventually I was on a diet of less than 350 calories a day. I was too embarrassed and exhausted to continue in the gym so instead my walks turned in to long, slow, 6 mile walks every day. After 4 months I'd dropped almost 6 stone. I was smaller than I'd been since I was 10 years old and fitting in to size 10 jeans. I continued with this "diet" for another month or so but the weight loss had slowed right down again and I was maybe loosing a pound each week. A friendly older relative suggested I try throwing up everything I ate "to loose that last stone" and terrified of still looking like I needed to loose weight, I followed her advice for a while before coming to my senses. All in all my battle with my weight lasted about a year and it was the most miserable year of my life.

I did end up getting with the guy I liked... he told me he would have been with me as I was in the first place!

Over the four years we spent together the two of us gained a lot of weight. He needed to gain it as he was quite under weight when I met him.

So here I am now, bigger than I started before all that.. The last time I weighed myself (In the last two months) I was somewhere between 18 and 19 stone... and I don't think I've ever been more confident with my body.

Sure it's big and there's bumps where there shouldn't be but I couldn't love it more if I tried. It's my body and it's mine. I love it and everyone I'm intimate with loves it.

The only thing my lovely fat body does is stop me from wearing small clothes.

I can still run, walk, dance, do circuits in curves, touch my toes without bending my knees (I'm actually incredibly flexible) and have amazing sex. All without spending my time counting calories, throwing up and exercising aimlessly for the sake of being smaller for people who just don't care.

I understand that there are much, much healthier ways of loosing weight, but I tried those, they didn't work for me and I became obsessed and for me personally... that was much unhealthier being fat.

bodhi085

Long story short I'm approaching 40 this year.. I gained weight from eating too many sweet stuff etc. I ended up with moobs and a belly and size 34 waist.
Weighed in at 173lbs. Hated it and was getting out of breath running around after my 2 yr old. In June I downloaded an app calorie counting. I stuck to it and I'm now 132lbs size 28/30 waist. Moobless and six pack and stiil going strong using it. An app has saved me as far as I'm concerned. I had a medical at the beginning on December and doctor said I'm probably better health than in my 20s. I don't smoke and drink maybe a beer once in a while. I feel the best if ever been and full of energy. That's my experience and I hated being fat.

Wibbs

Buy smaller plates and bowls. Crazy though it may sound.. Have a look at antique dinner sets and compare them to modern. The old stuff is a lot smaller in size and therefore smaller in portions. In general today people eat way more than they actually need to live and thrive. And if you're feeling dodgy because you haven't eaten in three or four hours that's not a good sign for your insulin response. An average healthy human being should not feel physically bad if they don't eat for 12 hours, mentally it might be "ahh FFS", but physically you should feel OK, if not a little brighter.

Aestivalis

Just to comment on something previously said. There's nothing miserable about being thin. Being thin and normal weight is probably the best you can ever feel. It feels so much better than being overweight in every manner.

fatknacker wrote: »

What do you do? Are you a poacher?

Fields
Fences
Horses

I might be a vet, or a farmer, or a racetrack steward, a landscaper, an auctioneer, biologist, surveyor, etc etc

Holsten

I reckon I'm about 30lbs overweight now after Christmas, and I am NOT happy at all.

After new year it's back to health.

Muise...

Aestivalis wrote: »

Fields
Fences
Horses

I might be a vet, or a farmer, or a racetrack steward, a landscaper, an auctioneer, biologist, surveyor, etc etc

sounds like a ride anyways.

Stheno

Wibbs wrote: »

Buy smaller plates and bowls. Crazy though it may sound.. Have a look at antique dinner sets and compare them to modern. The old stuff is a lot smaller in size and therefore smaller in portions. In general today people eat way more than they actually need to live and thrive. And if you're feeling dodgy because you haven't eaten in three or four hours that's not a good sign for your insulin response. An average healthy human being should not feel physically bad if they don't eat for 12 hours, mentally it might be "ahh FFS", but physically you should feel OK, if not a little brighter.

100% agree, I have my dinner e.g. stew in a cereal/soup bowl, the OH has his on a plate, and his is twice mine.

I'm a size 6-8 and despite putting on 3 kg and going up to 66kg in weight @ 5'8 I still look very skinny and get very disparaging comments about how thin I am, despite those comments coming from people who know I am very physically active, eat 2k+ calories 5 days out of 7 and rarely suffer ill health.

I would hate to be overweight, this stems from a childhood with an overweight mother for whom her weight was a constant issue.

I was also a big bulky child but for some reason at about 17 I lost a pile of weight and got my "adult" shape

liliq

I'm about 5 stone overweight and I hate it.
I was never skinny, but was very athletic until I was in my early 20's, lost my fitness in college, progressively gained more & more weight, got pregnant & ballooned.
I was very until until I joined a gym 8 months ago, and even though I'm still obese (embarrassed to actually type 'I'm obese'), I'm a lot fitter now than I was- i can do a decent hour in the gym, comfortably walk/ jog 5k.
I'm definitely not happy being this much overweight. It's down to my diet now, though. I eat well during the day, but once evening hits I eat a lot of sugar & crap.
I got my fitness somewhat in track in 2013, diets turn in 2014.
I honestly don't believe anyone could be happy with being overweight. And although it shouldn't be, personally at this stage my happiness is tied in with my weight. It's a matter if health now.

Stheno

liliq wrote: »

I'm about 5 stone overweight and I hate it.
I was never skinny, but was very athletic until I was in my early 20's, lost my fitness in college, progressively gained more & more weight, got pregnant & ballooned.
I was very until until I joined a gym 8 months ago, and even though I'm still obese (embarrassed to actually type 'I'm obese'), I'm a lot fitter now than I was- i can do a decent hour in the gym, comfortably walk/ jog 5k.
I'm definitely not happy being this much overweight. It's down to my diet now, though. I eat well during the day, but once evening hits I eat a lot of sugar & crap.
I got my fitness somewhat in track in 2013, diets turn in 2014.
I honestly don't believe anyone could be happy with being overweight. And although it shouldn't be, personally at this stage my happiness is tied in with my weight. It's a matter if health now.

See I was thin when unfit, now I'm fit and skinny, despite putting on weight, I've lost inches bodyfat wise, my shoulders are a bit bigger, my waist is smaller, etc

It's not my fault that getting fit made me skinnier, but healthier, I probably look unhealthy to overweight people, but have a bmi of 23

livemusic4life

I was a terribly skinny child. Filled out in a good way as i got to my mid teens. Played lots of sports til i was 25 - i weighed 8-8.5 stone. Then i started being plagued by health issues. Now, after spinal injuries 3 years ago, i can barely walk, i'm now a little over 11 stone at 4ft "11. I feel the size of a house. Even at 10 st i had no grumblings about my weight, but now that I'm obese on the bmi chart i could cry every time I look in the mirror. I try not to eat junk but i get down from the constant severe pain that i comfort eat. My physio holds no punches in calling me obese. Its just a spiral of depression. I don't know how to get out of it. People berating me makes me feel worse so i have toast or chocolate or biscuits or indeed all 3.

So, no, i am definitely not happy being obese.

Queen-Mise

Amalgam wrote: »

I weighed about 120kg in April 2013. I am a rather short man. I was in a bad way..

My aim was, '85kg by Christmas'.

Just had to reiterate way - well done you.


I'd would be overweight and probably be classed as obese. It bothers me especially when I bloat up as I look six months pregnant.

I did five weeks of Insanity and toned up loads last August (and then EP happened, went back to college and haven't gotten back into a routine yet).

Planning on getting fit again this January. I am seven weeks of the fags tomorrow, so really don't want to turn into the Michelin Man.

I am tall - I don't want to get anywhere near my 'ideal' weight, I think it would look awful on me, I am too tall. I would like to lose about three stone, get down to an easy 14/16.

I try not to take too much notice of weight - have been through too much sh*t in the past five years. I want to do it now for health and ego reasons

Legs.Eleven

Imo, I think it's fecking tough to stay fit in Ireland. I'm visiting for Chrimbo and sitting here all ready to go, having got up early to go for a walk and it's pissing down outside. In Madrid it's almost guaranteed to be dry and sunny making walking outdoors a pleasure.

I'm not overweight personally but even to maintain your existing weight would be quite tough, I'd imagine. I was always heavier while living here. I'm sitting in my parents house surrounded by Christmas food and obviously to turn the telly on and eat is the more appealing option.

Sucking it up and going for a walk is what I'll do in the end but doing that everyday is not very motivating. I'm not lazy and like walking but I'd rather chew on wool than go out there.

Potatoeman

PopRocks wrote: »

I was always pretty big growing up despite doing plenty of sport and eating healthy during the week (stayed with my dad at the weekends and he wouldn't have served very healthy stuff but I don't remember over indulging much)
When I hit about 16 I started to like a guy who only dated rail thin girls and decided I wanted to loose the weight to try and attract his attention.. despite my weight never getting in the way of my dating before.
I joined the gym, walked 2 -3 miles a day and cut out fizzy drinks and all junk food.. saw no results after 3 months, I'd only gone down 5 pounds and I was miserable... I kept trying harder and harder till eventually I was on a diet of less than 350 calories a day. I was too embarrassed and exhausted to continue in the gym so instead my walks turned in to long, slow, 6 mile walks every day. After 4 months I'd dropped almost 6 stone. I was smaller than I'd been since I was 10 years old and fitting in to size 10 jeans. I continued with this "diet" for another month or so but the weight loss had slowed right down again and I was maybe loosing a pound each week. A friendly older relative suggested I try throwing up everything I ate "to loose that last stone" and terrified of still looking like I needed to loose weight, I followed her advice for a while before coming to my senses. All in all my battle with my weight lasted about a year and it was the most miserable year of my life.

I did end up getting with the guy I liked... he told me he would have been with me as I was in the first place!

Over the four years we spent together the two of us gained a lot of weight. He needed to gain it as he was quite under weight when I met him.

So here I am now, bigger than I started before all that.. The last time I weighed myself (In the last two months) I was somewhere between 18 and 19 stone... and I don't think I've ever been more confident with my body.

Sure it's big and there's bumps where there shouldn't be but I couldn't love it more if I tried. It's my body and it's mine. I love it and everyone I'm intimate with loves it.

The only thing my lovely fat body does is stop me from wearing small clothes.

I can still run, walk, dance, do circuits in curves, touch my toes without bending my knees (I'm actually incredibly flexible) and have amazing sex. All without spending my time counting calories, throwing up and exercising aimlessly for the sake of being smaller for people who just don't care.

I understand that there are much, much healthier ways of loosing weight, but I tried those, they didn't work for me and I became obsessed and for me personally... that was much unhealthier being fat.

People get hung up on their weight but when you were training you were gaining muscle. Muscle is heavier than fat so you can gain some weight.
You seem to be writing off being active and healthy when you never tried it properly.

RedXIV

Not happy being overweight but have been training myself to get past it. Have to admit, this is the first Xmas ever where I could see the trends that I would have classed as "normal" being "I couldn't physically eat that much again". Its been a slow enough process, especially the last few months but as the motivational posters keep harking on about, its still progress

I actually moved out of the "Obese" category and into "OverWeight" category recently enough on the BMI scale and was never happier to be called Overweight

I'd echo others that said its diet mainly, I actually am amazed I was able to eat as much as I could at my worst, I'm certainly not able to match it anymore.

flutterflye

I always put on a lot of weight every time I get pregnant. It takes ages to shed. I hate it. Absolutely hate it.
Note to self - Stop getting pregnant!

Lux23

I've been very ill recently and have lost a lot of weight, would much rather be chubby then be as sick as I am now!

Shenshen

Wibbs wrote: »

Buy smaller plates and bowls. Crazy though it may sound.. Have a look at antique dinner sets and compare them to modern. The old stuff is a lot smaller in size and therefore smaller in portions. In general today people eat way more than they actually need to live and thrive. And if you're feeling dodgy because you haven't eaten in three or four hours that's not a good sign for your insulin response. An average healthy human being should not feel physically bad if they don't eat for 12 hours, mentally it might be "ahh FFS", but physically you should feel OK, if not a little brighter.

I don't think the first part is entirely true. Yes, there is a bit of a fashion for having completely oversized plates recently, but that's not been about for so long really.
I remember when I was about 13 or 14 and in the process of becoming obese, my grandmother at Sunday dinner one day exclaimed that she couldn't get her head around how I could be growing fat seeing how little I ate. When she was that age, she would easily have 4 or 5 potato dumplings (German thing, very very heavy and filling) in one meal, whereas I would struggle to finish off one. Yet she grew up to be skinny as a rake.
I think it's not so much the size of portions we eat, it's more down to the fact that I spent my days sitting in school and at my desk studying, while she spent her days doing heavy work in the fields and on the farm. Add to that the fact that growing up, I would have meat 3 meals a day while when she was growing up the only meat the family would have was 2 pidgeons to share between 7 on Sundays and I do believe that while portion size is important, it's even more important what's contained in that portion and what you'll do afterwards to burn it off again.

Wibbs

Still portion control is a huge part of it. Especially now as you point out people tend to be more sedentary. Fat doesn't come from air. A person who is fat is taking in more food than is being used as fuel. Outside of rare enough medical conditions that's the basics of it. The whys are more complex though. Comfort eating, mental illness, type of foods being eaten, social pressures etc.

I have to say though I don't like the upward trend on what the cut off for "fat" is. I understand it's to avoid being a dick about people in particular, but in general when it's acceptable for a bloke to rock a beergut or that a size 18 woman is curvy it's a bit too far for me. I know whole extended families that are fat with nary a thin adult among them and it's a bit odd. I personally don't care, as it's none of my beeswax, but I don't think it's good for society. We're well behind the US in the fat stakes, but that could be our future.

CathyMoran

I use the term curvy as my hips and chest are bigger than my waist but would only be a size 10 at my largest point and normally wear between a size 6 and 8. I hate the way curvy has been overtaken...I am a bit too thin at the moment as was ill over Christmas