[newnewpdro]

Over a decade ago I DIY'd going from 225 to ~165 and have kept it off.

The main success factor in my opinion was becoming single and staying single, as well as restructuring my life in general, especially how/who I socialize with.

It's pretty easy to do what's right for you when you go solo.

The process isn't really different than a drug addict trying to go clean and avoid relapse. It's all about the friends and environment, you have to change it all.

[james_s_tayler]

Not gonna lie when I got married and had a kid and started a new job all at the same time my weight went up like almost 30kg.

[newnewpdro]

To be fair, it's entirely possible to enter a family, social, and employment situation that reinforces healthy choices.

My point was more along the lines of the existing environment being largely responsible for the emergent property of being overweight/unhealthy.

Unless you change the environment, it makes it very difficult to sustainably alter the emergent outputs, which is what we are.

I found it easiest to simply replace and/or eliminate the major environmental problems rather than try modify them in-place. Nobody likes to be forced to live differently, and in my experience, the relationship's happiness was largely derived from the shared unhealthy activities.

After enough time living the healthier life as an individual, access to the healthier environments improves. Healthy members of the opposite sex that have also figured it out become attracted to you, employers who secretly discriminate against unhealthy employees start making offers, same for friend circles. But it's a privileged lifestyle, so it's not the easy/likely default option open to all.