How has this happened?

Breast Feeding QA » Girls Breast Feeding » How has this happened?

Question:

Okay, I know this may sound familiar to some people….but I woke up this morning weighing 250 pounds!!! I didn’t start out life this way. In fact, I was a skinny teenager…at 5"9 I only weighed 130 pounds…now I way 120 pounds more, I’ve actually added a whole other me!!!! And it’s not because of the two babies I’ve had ( I actually have already lost the baby weight) it’s because I just ate myself to that weight. I’m embarrased and sad when I look in the mirror…especially when I’m naked…YIPES!!! Here’s the serious part….why can’t I stop eating…it’s very logical…eat less, lose weight. But, honestly, the first thing I think of in the morning, is what am I going to eat for breakfast, and then what am I going to snack on, what’s for lunch…etc…it’s like a horrible fixation. I want to start yet another diet, but basically I don’t know what to do anymore. I’ve tried everything. And also, this may sound familiar….my whole freaking family, including in-laws are skinny! I even have a sister-in-law who just won a bikini contest…whatever!! It’s horrible…and I have to sit and listen to how they think they are all fat. Who do they think they are talking to? I just want to crawl under a chair (but I probably wouldn’t fit!). Anyway, I am so tired of feeling like this and I have to do something. I want to be healthy and here for my kids who are 1 and a newborn. I thought maybe I could just write a blog everyday or when I feel like eating a whole cake. Any tips would be appreciated! My main problem is I just want to eat all of the time!!!! Good luck to everyone trying to lose weight….I hope writing like this helps! — jaymie227

Response:

I know just how you feel. All my in-laws are tiny too and I always feel like I am a giant among the little people when I visit. Even my grown daughter is tiny too and that really makes me the big one. But I have learned the hard way, that the first thing to get your mind off eating is to find something else you enjoy doing like gardening, crafts, sewing etc. Then each morning switch your mind to thinking about the other thing you enjoy doing. Maybe it is redecorating your room, or putting in some new plants. That’s a start anyway. Hang in there, you have taken the first step by deciding to loose the weight. Sandy

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Okay, I know this may sound familiar to some people….but I woke up this morning weighing 250 pounds!!! I didn’t start out life this way. In fact, I was a skinny teenager…at 5"9 I only weighed 130 pounds…now I way 120 pounds more, I’ve actually added a whole other me!!!! And it’s not because of the two babies I’ve had ( I actually have already lost the baby weight) it’s because I just ate myself to that weight. I’m embarrased and sad when I look in the mirror…especially when I’m naked…YIPES!!! Here’s the serious part….why can’t I stop eating…it’s very logical…eat less, lose weight. But, honestly, the first thing I think of in the morning, is what am I going to eat for breakfast, and then what am I going to snack on, what’s for lunch…etc…it’s like a horrible fixation. I want to start yet another diet, but basically I don’t know what to do anymore. I’ve tried everything. And also, this may sound familiar….my whole freaking family, including in-laws are skinny! I even have a sister-in-law who just won a bikini contest…whatever!! It’s horrible…and I have to sit and listen to how they think they are all fat. Who do they think they are talking to? I just want to crawl under a chair (but I probably wouldn’t fit!). Anyway, I am so tired of feeling like this and I have to do something. I want to be healthy and here for my kids who are 1 and a newborn. I thought maybe I could just write a blog everyday or when I feel like eating a whole cake. Any tips would be appreciated! My main problem is I just want to eat all of the time!!!! Good luck to everyone trying to lose weight….I hope writing like this helps! — jaymie227

Response:

You have a one year old and a newborn and you’ve already lost all of your baby weight? So the weight was gained pre-pregnancy(s)? I have been working through issues with an unhealthy preoccupation with food, also. I believe mine was present pre-pregnancy, to some degree, but was greatly exacerbated by being pregnant. It’s been getting better and better because it seems the more you get away from obsessing about food the more you dislike that behavior and the more irrational it seems. I would recommend distancing yourself from activities or situations that cause you to think about food. At the beginning of my diet I ate Lean Cuisine meals often because it kept me out of that food preparation mode. Since your kids are little you have an advantage because you don’t have to cook big family style meals for them. Good luck and I hope to hear more about your progress! Wendy

Response:

Thanks for your suggestions. I need to fixate on the fact that I don’t want diabetes (I had it with both pregnancies) and I really do want to be healthy. It doesn’t help that I am breast feeding, which just makes me hungrier….I only have 3 1/2 months more of that…my daughter is 2 1/2 months and I am trying to make it until six months. By the way, what a fallacy that you lose weight when you breast feed….it just makes me crazy hungry! Today I just kind of took it slow and after a meal, if I got hungry I would tell myself, "you can have a yogurt at 10 a.m. just hang on until then. My 20-year highschool reunion in in four years and I skipped both the 10 and 15 because I was so humiliated about my weight. I really would like to get it off and be able to hold my head up high. It’s so embarrassing when I run into people I haven’t seen since college. I saw an old boyfriend at the zoo and I haven’t seen him for 10 years. Anyway, when I saw him I just said, "hi" and then booked on out of there. At the top of the hill, I stopped and just started crying because I was so humiliated. All I could think of for the rest of the day was that he was probably thinking, "Oh my God, she was so huge!" It’s not that I even care about him, I just hate what has happened to me. I have a wonderful husband who never says anything and still loves me for who I am, but it would be nice if I could love me for who I am, too. Thanks for the help, girls, you guys hang in there too!!! — jaymie227

Response:

Okay, I know this may sound familiar to some people….but I woke up this morning weighing 250 pounds!!! I want to start yet another diet, but basically I don’t know what to do anymore. I’ve tried everything.

I’ve tried alot of diets, and they never worked for me either. The only real success I’ve ever had is by making permanent changes in the way I eat/live, and start doing so with baby steps. I started ridiculously easy. At the very start, I told myself I would spend 5 minutes a day exercising. I also stopped eating large, hungry man tv dinners and switched to the diet ones. Both of these changes were fairly easy and painless to make, but even so I could see a difference. It didn’t take long until I was making more, more drastic changes. But only when I was ready to, and able to keep doing them consistently. I’ve included a "How Annie is doing it" section in my website listed in my sig, if you are interested in the specifics of how I’ve managed to lose the weight I have. Good luck, and I hope we see more of your around here! — Annie As of 8-05-05: 258/215.5/140 Standing at 5 foot 4. 2.5 pound loss from 7-29-05. 42.5 pounds lost. 75.5 left to go. Started February/07/05 Come visit my weight-loss web site, Annie Takes Off. http://webpages.charter.net/lenny13/DietFrontPage.html 42.5 pounds lost. 75.5 left to go. Started February/07/05 Come visit my weight-loss web site, Annie Takes Off. http://webpages.charter.net/lenny13/DietFrontPage.html

Response:

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Thanks for your suggestions. I need to fixate on the fact that I don’t want diabetes (I had it with both pregnancies) and I really do want to be healthy. It doesn’t help that I am breast feeding, which just makes me hungrier….I only have 3 1/2 months more of that…my daughter is 2 1/2 months and I am trying to make it until six months. By the way, what a fallacy that you lose weight when you breast feed….it just makes me crazy hungry! Today I just kind of took it slow and after a meal, if I got hungry I would tell myself, "you can have a yogurt at 10 a.m. just hang on until then. My 20-year highschool reunion in in four years and I skipped both the 10 and 15 because I was so humiliated about my weight. I really would like to get it off and be able to hold my head up high. It’s so embarrassing when I run into people I haven’t seen since college. I saw an old boyfriend at the zoo and I haven’t seen him for 10 years. Anyway, when I saw him I just said, "hi" and then booked on out of there. At the top of the hill, I stopped and just started crying because I was so humiliated. All I could think of for the rest of the day was that he was probably thinking, "Oh my God, she was so huge!" It’s not that I even care about him, I just hate what has happened to me. I have a wonderful husband who never says anything and still loves me for who I am, but it would be nice if I could love me for who I am, too. Thanks for the help, girls, you guys hang in there too!!!

I really feel for you — we have different weight histories (I have never been normal weight) but I do know the pain of being 250 lbs. and more. Several things stuck out to me from your post — one, that once you start eating you can’t stop thinking about it and planning what you’re having next. Another was that you will write when you want to eat an entire cake. The other is that you had diabetes with your pregnancies. I am wondering if you are in the "insulin resistance" category of pre-diabetes. Does it run in your family at all? I know that I have a lot of trouble with insulin reactions to refined carbohydrates. If I eat potato or tortilla chips, restaurant bread basket rolls, breakfast cereal, or sugarfree anything, it starts me on a vicious circle where I cannot stop eating those things even though I "want" to stop or tell myself "that’s the last one" or "OK no more that’s it" — insulin only laughs at these lame protests, LOL. It is a physical reaction. Try keeping track of what you are eating at www.fitday.com or another free weight loss site and see if you are indeed consuming too many processed foods or refined carbohydrates. Try combining protein into each and every meal so that your blood sugar stays on an even keel. Limit the amount of refined carbohydrates you eat and bulk up on vegetables instead. Protein sources could include chicken breast, low-fat cheese or dairy items, a little natural peanut butter, etc. Also try to drink 8-10 glasses of water a day to really get that full feeling (I don’t know if drinking more water would affect your breastfeeding so maybe you might have to wait for that one? I know nothing about breastfeeding). Please keep posting — there’s lots of success here and there’s no reason that it can’t happen for you too. Mary 325-168-150

Response:

Thanks for the advice, I will totally check out that website. I need all the help I can get. I am really hoping that I can get past this and lose the weight. I am so tired of feeling like this. Nothing looks good on me and I don’t even want my husband to touch me. I keep telling him it’s the kids and I’m just so tired, but really it’s that I find myself so completely disgusting I don’t want him to see. I really need to tell him how I feel or he is going to think there is something wrong with him. My worst part is my stomach. After two babies and two C-Sections it freaking needs it’s own zip code. I HATE it!!!!!! Before I had the babies, I was fat, but it was firm and I still had a waist…now it’s all gone to h*ll. It doesn’t even look human. I hope losing weight will help with that, or I’m going to have to save up for plastic surgery…maybe I should go on extreme makeover….I can tell them my stomach needs to look more human….ha!! The one part of my life I am so lucky in is that all of my friends and family are so supportive. No one ever says anything negative about my weight (they are all thin) and even though I feel self-conscience around them, it’s not because of anything they do. On the flip-side, that means I have no one to blame but myself…so I have to fix this. I can’t live like this and I don’t want my kids to be embarrased by me. On a good note, I’ve lost a couple of pounds this week! Hooray!!!! – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Thanks for your suggestions. I need to fixate on the fact that I don’t want diabetes (I had it with both pregnancies) and I really do want to be healthy. It doesn’t help that I am breast feeding, which just makes me hungrier….I only have 3 1/2 months more of that…my daughter is 2 1/2 months and I am trying to make it until six months. By the way, what a fallacy that you lose weight when you breast feed….it just makes me crazy hungry! Today I just kind of took it slow and after a meal, if I got hungry I would tell myself, "you can have a yogurt at 10 a.m. just hang on until then. My 20-year highschool reunion in in four years and I skipped both the 10 and 15 because I was so humiliated about my weight. I really would like to get it off and be able to hold my head up high. It’s so embarrassing when I run into people I haven’t seen since college. I saw an old boyfriend at the zoo and I haven’t seen him for 10 years. Anyway, when I saw him I just said, "hi" and then booked on out of there. At the top of the hill, I stopped and just started crying because I was so humiliated. All I could think of for the rest of the day was that he was probably thinking, "Oh my God, she was so huge!" It’s not that I even care about him, I just hate what has happened to me. I have a wonderful husband who never says anything and still loves me for who I am, but it would be nice if I could love me for who I am, too. Thanks for the help, girls, you guys hang in there too!!! - I really feel for you — we have different weight histories (I have never been normal weight) but I do know the pain of being 250 lbs. and more. Several things stuck out to me from your post — one, that once you start eating you can’t stop thinking about it and planning what you’re having next. Another was that you will write when you want to eat an entire cake. The other is that you had diabetes with your pregnancies. I am wondering if you are in the "insulin resistance" category of pre-diabetes. Does it run in your family at all? I know that I have a lot of trouble with insulin reactions to refined carbohydrates. If I eat potato or tortilla chips, restaurant bread basket rolls, breakfast cereal, or sugarfree anything, it starts me on a vicious circle where I cannot stop eating those things even though I "want" to stop or tell myself "that’s the last one" or "OK no more that’s it" — insulin only laughs at these lame protests, LOL. It is a physical reaction. Try keeping track of what you are eating at www.fitday.com or another free weight loss site and see if you are indeed consuming too many processed foods or refined carbohydrates. Try combining protein into each and every meal so that your blood sugar stays on an even keel. Limit the amount of refined carbohydrates you eat and bulk up on vegetables instead. Protein sources could include chicken breast, low-fat cheese or dairy items, a little natural peanut butter, etc. Also try to drink 8-10 glasses of water a day to really get that full feeling (I don’t know if drinking more water would affect your breastfeeding so maybe you might have to wait for that one? I know nothing about breastfeeding). Please keep posting — there’s lots of success here and there’s no reason that it can’t happen for you too. Mary 325-168-150

– jaymie227

Response:

and I don’t even want my husband to touch me. I keep telling him it’s the kids and I’m just so tired, but really it’s that I find myself so completely disgusting I don’t want him to see. I really need to tell him how I feel or he is going to think there is something wrong with him.

You’d better tell him asap. You don’t want him looking outside of your marraige for ‘comfort’. I’m not saying he WILL do this because I do not know him but I have talked to a LOT of married men who DO look outside thier marraiges for such things and the number one thing they say is that they are not getting that attention at home. Let him know how you feel right away. Good luck to you.