Bigdoug:
It’s a little bit of both for me. Many of my family and relatives are on the bigger side, some are fine with it, others were trying to lose on and off. So there is definitely a genetic/nature component to my size. I have also always admired fat people and considered them more attractive as long as I can remember. As a child, I always wanted to grow up to be a fat adult. Due to personal issues of both my parents at the time, I lived with one of my aunts in my preteens and early teens. She’s always been a large woman and more than happy to provide lots of food to her family. This is where some of the nurture comes in: while living with her, I learned to appreciate large meals and developed a big appetite.

PositiveFA:
I’ve known about my feederism fetish since age 4. I have always wondered if it came more from Nature or Nuture. I had loving Mother who was overweight and didn’t diet, but that’s about it. It didn’t seem like enough for me to develop a full blown feederism fetish when it comes to external factors. It would be cool to know how fetishes like these form.

Munchies:
Mine was nurture.

I'm a black woman born and raised in the South. In my culture, we believe that when you love your man, you feed him well. I remember joking around with my grandma about this one day when I told her how much I love to cook. She told me that if I love to cook so much, then my future husband will be happy and well fed.

Then she told me that I better get me a big man because not every guy likes to eat.

Initially, I preferred big men in general. Muscular, fat, somewhere in between - didn't matter. But over time, I noticed that muscular men tended to use food as fuel while fat men tended to take a more hedonistic approach. The latter seemed more enjoyable than the former to feed.

On top of all that, fat men feel nicer than leaner men.

Expeng:
I also really like this topic, but I'm definitely somewhere between nature and nurture here.

On one hand, like half of my family growing up was in the overweight to obese range, so I was "exposed" to it pretty regularly. But being larger was never seen as a positive thing, especially by my mom, so it was definitely in my nature as well. At some point in second grade, I remember looking around at the larger members of my family and thinking something like, "If they can be fat, why can't I?" I remember sneaking spoonfuls of sugar on occasion in an attempt to gain weight. I remember thinking about writing "weight gain tips" around the same time as well, despite at the time not having any clue it was something anyone except myself was interested in... plus, I was in second grade, so it's not like I was an expert on the matter or anything lol.

Around late middle school/early high school, I discovered the wonders of the world wide web. I read stories on this site actually on multiple occasions, and I found gainers on YouTube that I would watch literally just to watch. I remember 8th grade was the time I fully realized and accepted that I really like fat girls. On top of that, I kind of did this weird thing where I would wear an old pair of jeans with a click button under my pajama pants at home. The jeans were tight on account of me still growing, but I loved being able to expand my stomach a little bit and just pop the button.

These days, I still get sudden urges to just start gaining weight again and again, but several things hold me back from committing. The thought of getting questioned on it constantly is something I'd dread to deal with, for starters. But also, I still hold a subtle negative bias on how fat looks on myself. That's a significant part of the reason on why I decided to make an account here in the first place. Further normalize the idea of fat so I can learn to accept myself at any size.

Whoa, that went a bit off-topic. Anyway, I guess to summarize, nature and nurture both played a hand in my journey here.

PositiveFA:
I’ve known about my feederism fetish since age 4. I have always wondered if it came more from Nature or Nuture. I had loving Mother who was overweight and didn’t diet, but that’s about it. It didn’t seem like enough for me to develop a full blown feederism fetish when it comes to external factors. It would be cool to know how fetishes like these form.

BigBallBellyGirl:
I love this topic, and I think the answer is, it varies from person to person. Some people are influenced by family lifestyle, others initially start eating as a trauma response or for comfort, and then there are those of us who just, well, love fat.

In my case, I'm a fat person in a thin to average sized family. I remember being very very small, before kindergarten, and loving cartoons where a character ate a lot or visibly ballooned up. I was also chubby by the time I was three or four, and I remember people commenting on my chubby cheeks and pot belly. By first grade, my mother was pushing healthy snacks only, but my father was a little more lenient. Still, I wasn't exactly pigging out, because where would a 6-year-old get access to tons of extra food? Nevertheless, I started to get properly fat, and by 4th grade I could no longer fit in the school desks. I also remember the issue being raised at my pediatrician's office, and he just treated it as an issue of eating too much and playing too little.

I will add, I've always had a proclivity to being sedentary. Sports or physical activity didn't interest me. I liked to write, draw, and I loved movies. Exactly burning a bunch of calories.

By 3rd and 4th grade, I started to stash household snacks in my bedroom, and that's whenI really put on weight. I hit 200 before 8th grade, and in high school, I went up to 300 lb.

Interestingly, teasing as a fat kid didn't bother me. Classmates would comment that I tired out more quickly in PE, that I had a big tummy, or that I had gained weight over the summer. I knew all of those things were true, so I didn't really perceive the teasing as an insult. I think the fact that I didn't react negatively meant I didn't get teased a whole lot. There was no payoff to anyone who wanted to make fun of me.

In high school, I also started exploring the internet. I lurked on this site as a guest before I was old enough to join. I looked at pictures, read A LOT of fiction, and usually stuffed my belly while I was doing it. I also got a part time job, meaning I had money to satisfy my appetite. Then there was college, when I could eat whatever I wanted, when I wanted. This was when I decided I would one day become not just fat, but super obese. It's also when I had my first real feedee experience.

I said all this to say, there was nothing about my upbringing that would have overtly encouraged this lifestyle. My interests also predated the knowledge there could be anything about eating and gaining. I'd definitely have to say it's nature for me.