I've been overweight ever since I went through puberty. While most of my friends were getting skinnier I was gaining weight. The only thing that kept off the weight was the many hours a day working out through high school for football, soccer, and swimming. Even with those many hours of workouts, I still was considered in the obese range being 30 lbs over the ideal weight for my height. When I moved to college, I stopped working out and put on some pounds. Other than one brief semester of strenuous workouts and an unexplained illness that lowered my weight below 220, I was always on the hefty side. For the majority of college I weighed between 220 and 230. My last year and a half of college was not good and I put on another 10 to 15 pounds. After leaving college I spent a year at my parents house were I lost most of that 10 pounds or so, but once I started my job it started going back up. I started working really long hours so would eat out most nights. I would also meet up with friends at the bar and have a few beers (mainly high calorie wheat beers). After about a year of that I started to notice how tight my clothes were getting and how tired I was. I just happened to step on a scale after being on vacation for a week where someone I hadn't seen for a year had commented that I had put on some pounds. That day standing on the scale and seeing that it said almost 270 pounds really opened my eyes. I sat down and re-evaluated my life. After many trials, I'm finally on my way to a healthier weight. My ultimate goal is 180 (maybe even lower) and a current goal of 220. 18 more pounds to go!!