Horripilated
New member
Right brief intro time...
I'm Horripilated, but please just call me Rip, it's easier on the fingers. I'm a 20 year old female from Manchester England and ultimately I'm here because I need all the help I can get.
My weight has yoyo'd all my life, as a kid I was pretty active and so I was just regular build but as I got older things went a bit wrong. I'm the classic social outcast; I worried endlessly about my grades at school and so studied hard and got a name as being the "swot" of the school. Didn't help that I was also experimenting with the goth lifestyle and was unsure of my sexuality. Needless to say I was ruthlessly bullied and as a result became more withdrawn and spent less time outdoors and socialising with others.
It wasn't necessarily that I comfort ate, I just really like eating and like all the wrong foods. Being indoors all the time made trips to the kitchen more tempting and soon I was 12 stone (168lbs - just as a quick conversion to save my new American friends the math), which isn't easy to hide when you're only 5 feet tall. I finally decided something had to change and by reducing my calorific intake to 1500 a day I was able to drop 37lbs over quite a long period.
My new "diet" became second nature and I felt much better in myself but even so I wasn't satisfied with my weight and so stuck at it. That was until I went away to university. Suddenly I was being catered for and not being able to check the nutritional info on what I was eating was a problem but I tried to chose sensibly from the menu and I was getting much more exercise running up and down the hills in Durham to lectures.
Then I had a mental breakdown. It's probably worth noting at this point that I suffer from severe OCD (the cleaning kind) and it spiralled out of control without the support of my family behind me. I became a complete recluse and am stil dependent on my family to help me out with daily activitioes, so much so that my dad has had to give up work to be "on call" in case I have a crisis at home.
The upshot of this is that I became depressed and since I was now stuck in the house all the time again the weight began to pile on again. At first I kidded myself that it was only a few pounds and I was going through a rough patch; I'd done it before so I could do it again. Fast forward 2 years and I weighed in at 15 stone (210lbs) and I decided enough was enough, it was time to get my life back. My treatment for my OCD may have hit a roadblock but I know how much more capable I feel when I feel positive about myself and I'm hoping weight loss will kick-start that again.
My goal weight is 7 1/2 stone (105lbs) so I should literally be "half the woman I was" when I'm finished. So far I've lost 10lbs and plan to stick to the reduced calorie intake as my method as I know it works for me, I tried the Atkins but after an initial huge weight loss it all crept back on when I started eating "normally". So basically I'm here for support and advice and hopefully will be able to give the same back to others here.
That's my long-winded way of saying hi really
Since I'm house-bound I'd appreciate people to chat to as a way of keeping motivated and to try and maintain some form of social contact, my Yahoo ID is in my profile or message me for my MSN if that's better for you. Also, I didn't mean to offend anybody by putting the weight conversions in brackets, I wasn't trying to insult people's intelligence I was just trying to make it easier for people to read.
Look forward to getting to know you all, as it's much healthier than getting to know that packet of biscuits I know is in the cupboard
*edit* I just realised, that wasn't very brief, sorry about that :S
I'm Horripilated, but please just call me Rip, it's easier on the fingers. I'm a 20 year old female from Manchester England and ultimately I'm here because I need all the help I can get.
My weight has yoyo'd all my life, as a kid I was pretty active and so I was just regular build but as I got older things went a bit wrong. I'm the classic social outcast; I worried endlessly about my grades at school and so studied hard and got a name as being the "swot" of the school. Didn't help that I was also experimenting with the goth lifestyle and was unsure of my sexuality. Needless to say I was ruthlessly bullied and as a result became more withdrawn and spent less time outdoors and socialising with others.
It wasn't necessarily that I comfort ate, I just really like eating and like all the wrong foods. Being indoors all the time made trips to the kitchen more tempting and soon I was 12 stone (168lbs - just as a quick conversion to save my new American friends the math), which isn't easy to hide when you're only 5 feet tall. I finally decided something had to change and by reducing my calorific intake to 1500 a day I was able to drop 37lbs over quite a long period.
My new "diet" became second nature and I felt much better in myself but even so I wasn't satisfied with my weight and so stuck at it. That was until I went away to university. Suddenly I was being catered for and not being able to check the nutritional info on what I was eating was a problem but I tried to chose sensibly from the menu and I was getting much more exercise running up and down the hills in Durham to lectures.
Then I had a mental breakdown. It's probably worth noting at this point that I suffer from severe OCD (the cleaning kind) and it spiralled out of control without the support of my family behind me. I became a complete recluse and am stil dependent on my family to help me out with daily activitioes, so much so that my dad has had to give up work to be "on call" in case I have a crisis at home.
The upshot of this is that I became depressed and since I was now stuck in the house all the time again the weight began to pile on again. At first I kidded myself that it was only a few pounds and I was going through a rough patch; I'd done it before so I could do it again. Fast forward 2 years and I weighed in at 15 stone (210lbs) and I decided enough was enough, it was time to get my life back. My treatment for my OCD may have hit a roadblock but I know how much more capable I feel when I feel positive about myself and I'm hoping weight loss will kick-start that again.
My goal weight is 7 1/2 stone (105lbs) so I should literally be "half the woman I was" when I'm finished. So far I've lost 10lbs and plan to stick to the reduced calorie intake as my method as I know it works for me, I tried the Atkins but after an initial huge weight loss it all crept back on when I started eating "normally". So basically I'm here for support and advice and hopefully will be able to give the same back to others here.
That's my long-winded way of saying hi really
Look forward to getting to know you all, as it's much healthier than getting to know that packet of biscuits I know is in the cupboard
*edit* I just realised, that wasn't very brief, sorry about that :S
