General

Really well put!

I would love there to be more research into it but I am convinced there has to be genetics and a cross over of nurture/nature dynamics.

I remember being around 4 years old, thinking an awful lot about what it would be like to be a truly massive person. I'd also imagine other people being massive.

Weight gain sequences on TV were profoundly hypnotising too.

As I got older, it acquired a sense of immediacy, like it wasn't just something I thought about, but something important to me.

For what it's worth, I feel like I've had these fascinations, kinks, fetishes, whatever you want to call it for as long as I can remember. It feels like it's been there since the beginning, or like I'm "hardwired" to be into this.

Early on, I didn't have the context or vocabulary to understand what was going on. What I knew was that I felt a good sort of funny or tingly, when I saw- or thought about very fat women. Especially if they were eating, gluttonous, getting bigger etc.

There were certainly pieces of media that I found particularly exciting, made me feel that funny way. But it was more like a puzzle piece snapping into place, rather than causing me to develop these interests/ kinks.

That is almost exactly my own story. Fascination with fat and fat women in early years and a growing wish to get fat myself, like a sumo wrestler. Then over the first years of puberty it got sexualised and in the youth years it slowly transformed after some successful weight gains... And losses afterwards, into mostly being a feeder. My wife, not being a "natural feedee" , has developed into, not exactly a feedee, but not NOT a feedee either. She has more than doubled in size since we met and she is proud and happy.

I mean in the 6th grade I wrote a story where Medusa got her snakes to hypnotize people into bringing her food, and she got fatter and fatter, lol.

I also remember as a kid watching family members (adults) talk sadly/upset in regards to dieting and how hard it is and I remember thinking 'why bother, just be happy'

Also can echo fascination with bigger bellies, wanting hugs from fat folks, and eating lots of junk food until my belly hurt

How VERY interesting! Exactly in 6th grade I wrote two stories, not about what you did, but definitely feederism related: one about two of my classmates getting stuck on a remote island where they were caught by cannonbals and fattened up and one about two children ending up in a future where it was illegal to be slim so they were fattened up when they were discovered.

I had pretty similar experiences to others:
Violet Beauregard’s infamous scene.
Various other cartoon characters getting fat.

I think for me one of the tip offs was the old “before & after” pics in old magazines, especially when the weight lost was actually very substantial.

I think one of the reasons I’m so secretive about my preferences is my mom. Sometimes when she sees a fat person she will mention how sad she is to see it. She’s never really malicious about it, in fact she is very empathetic & I understand how unhealthy being fat is, but I guess it has left me feeling abnormal.

Let’s not get started on Mums and their Fatphobia ways, especially boomers we would need a new threat to trauma dump haha

I was stuffing pillows in my clothes from the age of 11. My very first sexual fantasies were of touring multiple buffets. When my parents were out, I would have stuffing sessions. I went through a brief stage at sixteen of kiding myself I liked thin people. But I have always known.

I'm not sure that I would describe them as "warning" signs, as such a term implies that this 1) Could have been avoided, and 2) Is something which should have been avoided.

But yes. Various bits of television when I was very young which either activated something internally or brought attention to something already unknowingly activated. Many examples come to mind, but this is the one I always think of first, and I don't think I've ever seen it mentioned before.

tinytoons.fandom.com/wiki/Cinemaniacs!

Note this paragraph from the synopsis:

"Superbabs goes after Wex by disguising herself as a television talk show host and questioning Wex. He reveals to her that he created a machine that reached out from space and through the drawing paper, grabbing a bottle of ink from the table and pouring it on the drawing that has Acme Ares on it. The talk show host then reveals herself as Superbabs to Wex, who tells her he knows her super weakness and pulls out a large carrot cake. She tries to resist at first, but gives in and eats one after another as Wex keeps giving them to her, laughing hysterically the entire time, until she is so obese she can barely move."

So...

Massive weight gain? Check. Overwhelming mobility impairment due to said massive weight gain? Check. Accompanying humiliation kink? Check.

That cartoon really stuck with me.