I've been at least slightly overweight for as long as I can remember, but it has gotten worse since I went to college, and I peaked last year at around 242 lbs. Part of that was due to muscle gain when I started lifting but most of which was fat from eating too much. After 8 months of DietBetting, I'm down over 60 lbs, took 7 inches off my waist and am approaching the weight I was at when I was 14 years old. My wife found the site, and since we both needed to lose weight, wanted to do it together. She thought it would appeal to my competitive side, and she was right. It helped that it was presented in a game format, that it had a competitive element and that it had money on the line. I think the biggest thing that made it work for me was that I realized that my weight was under my control; there was some set of actions I could take that would result in my victory. I could only lose if I defeated myself by failing to take those actions. With money on the line, I found defeat inexcusable, so I figured out a plan to win and executed on it repeatedly. If you're competitive, need to lose weight and refuse to lose when money is on the line, do it. Like they say, its not gambling; you have a large amount of control over your weight by the actions you take, so you can win if you want it badly enough.