Why do you overeat?

Many people who blog about losing weight have always been overweight.  A few will talk about slowly gaining weight after having children, but never really seemed to have necessarily overeaten before.

While that is true to me as well (a slow weight gain that began in my late 30s), I also distinctly recall when and why I began to overeat.

I really began to turn to food when I was around 15, pushed in that direction by my dad and stepmother.

By the time I entered high school, I was 5'2" and weighed around 100 pounds, wearing around a size 4/6 (no idea what size that would be today).  My dad and stepmother began criticizing my eating habits (I had a healthy appetite), telling me that I would get fat if I kept eating that way,  Needless to say, that only made me want to eat all the more.

God knows there wasn't much to enjoy at their house on the weekends (eventually I refused to go, then I left for school and didn't have to go) - food was something to enjoy.  That was the point that I consciously turned to food.