Support for NPR and the following message come from the Walton Family Foundation, working to create access to opportunity for people and communities by tackling tough social and environmental problems.

More information is at waltonfamilyfoundation.org.

Hey, everybody. It's Maria Kedoy. I cover health and science for NPR, and I'm the host of NPR's Life Kit Guide to

Rethinking Weight Loss. As part of reporting that guide, we asked you for your weight loss

stories, and a lot of you told us you had some pretty negative experiences. I'm 35, and I've been on a

diet since I was a teenager. I went on my first diet when I was 19 years old because I had put on the freshman 20 in my case.

One year when I was pretty unhappy, I lost a ton of weight just because I didn't have an appetite.

And suddenly everyone was giving me so much love and attention and asking me what my weight loss secret was.

This led to several years of me trying to keep the weight off.

That was Linda Gerhard, Kristen Lent, and Talia Cooper.

They told us that even if their diet started off okay and they lost some weight,

after a while, their relationships with food got a little messed up.

Weight Watchers made me something of a binge eater where I'd steadfastly count my points all week long,

weigh in, and then binge for the day that I weighed in.

It just meant that I got more and more obsessed with food.

Thus began a cycle of finding a new diet, losing weight, and eventually gaining all my weight back, usually

with a few extra pounds just for fun.

And all of this is unfortunately pretty common.

Research suggests that around 90% of people who lose weight end up gaining it back.

And I can just put you in a really

maddening mindset. I found myself crying over a 0.2 pound weight gain in the bathroom. That's 0.2

pounds. It's less than a pound. And restrictive diets can also lead to serious health problems

...