I was really thin until about age 20, never particularly sporty, but had a pretty well defined body and like Gaz said, without blowing my own trumpet too much, I was a ladies man and could hold my own with no problems
Between 20 and 21 I put on a lot of weight - I had a long-term girlfriend so didn't think too much about my image. I had a job which meant I was in the car a lot, so every time I filled up with fuel, or needed a pee on the motorway, I'd buy bags of chocolate, McDonalds, Coke, you name it....
I was also drinking quite a lot and eating out many times a week at night.
By the time I was 22, I was known as "Fat Josh".
I was single, finding it difficult to get dates which I'd never had any trouble with before. I found it hard to buy the clothes I was used to wearing (probably a good thing in some respects as my love of esoteric clothing designers was costing me dear!!!) and I also felt terrible a lot of the time, both ill and unfit.
During my 20's, which should have been the best time in my life, I was "Fat Josh". With a few notable exceptions, most of the girls I had relationships with were also overweight too, which didn't help at all.
I've tried a few diets in the past: DIY WeightWatchers (using one of their calculators - weight loss was too slow), Atkins (felt terrible after a month as all I'd been eating was pretty much meat and cheese!), SlimFast (never lasted more than a couple of weeks max)... None of them lost me much weight really, and it all came back when I started eating the way I did before.
Anyway, I got to 29 in February 2006. I weighed a lot, I was (and still am on) blood pressure tablets, and I thought "I've got to do something before I'm 30". So, I started eating really healthily, started swimming 3 or 4 times a week and cut down on the booze (although I'd had a full year off drinking the year before but lost no weight in the process).
I got down to maybe 17.5 stone, something like that. Wow, what a difference! I got my Mojo back and "met"
3 very attractive ladies in quite a short space of time!! Things were looking up!
Well, I then met someone locally who I fell for and ended up being with for almost 2 years (we recently split up for good
). During this time we both ate and ate and ate until in February this year I weighed 19 stone 12 pounds... Pretty much the heaviest I've ever been.
Anyway, after all that, I'm on a mission now to get thin and to get my Mojo back again! I'm determined too, that if I do get into another relationship, I'll make sure I don't slip back into the habit of eating loads, as that's what's done me over in the past.
Sorry for another long post!!