My weight and my clothes size don't make sense to me

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sexymamadraeger
sexymamadraeger Posts: 239 Member
in Goal: Maintaining Weight
Can someone explain this to me? I am 42 yrs old and 5.6 and 150 lbs. I just got myself into a size 6 which I'm thrilled about (lost 133 lbs so far). Last time I was a size 6 I was 18 and 120 lbs. My figure is waaaaaay different than back then. I figure that's post kids and hormones etc... I'm fine with it. But how can I be 30 lbs more and the same clothes size? Is it the age difference? Body composition?
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  • ceiswyn
    ceiswyn Posts: 2,256 Member
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    I’d guess body comp. My mother and I are similar weights and heights, but I work out and have a reasonable amount of muscle, whereas she’s disabled and hasn’t been able to exercise in years. She wears a size 16 top, and I wear a size 12.
  • netitheyeti
    netitheyeti Posts: 539 Member
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    either body composition or the difference in sizing, or a combination of both?
    I've tried on my grandma's old dresses and some of my mom's old skirts, I'm like 1-2 sizes bigger in stuff from the early 80s than what I normally buy (at least going by the rather small sample of the stuff I've tried on)
  • ZazieMFP
    ZazieMFP Posts: 25 Member
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    In the 70's and 80s', the smallest ready-to-wear size for women was 6, if I recall. Now, the smallest size is 2, in most brands targeting 35-65 years-old, and 0 and 00 in brands catering to the younger crowd.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,874 Member
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    A size 6 then is not the same as a size 6 now...it's called vanity sizing.
  • sexymamadraeger
    sexymamadraeger Posts: 239 Member
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    I wondered about vanity sizing. But we're talking 1995 not the 70s and 80s. Has it changed that much in the past 20 years? I was reading about how different labels size their clothes differently. So you could be a 6 in one store and a 8 or 10 in another.
  • sexymamadraeger
    sexymamadraeger Posts: 239 Member
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    Btw, I read that Marilyn Monroe would have been a size 4 or 6 today. She was like a 12 in her day. But that was decades ago. Crazy to think sizes might have changed that much even in the last 20 years!
  • Naaer
    Naaer Posts: 212 Member
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    I'm with the people who are calling it vanity sizing...
  • sexymamadraeger
    sexymamadraeger Posts: 239 Member
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    Wow! That's crazy. So it has changed a lot recently. That is kind of depressing and sad really. That size matters to us so much. I've also noticed that sometimes it's hard to find size 6's. There's a lot more 10s and 12s on the rack. It used to be the other way around.
  • missysippy930
    missysippy930 Posts: 2,577 Member
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    Vanity sizing.
    I was never a size 10 at 140 in the 70's
    Now size 10 at 149

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