People Always Look Skinny in Old Photos!

hannahbellelechter

I was born in 1990 and I hardly ever was inside, weather permitting. I danced, did gymnastics, and generally did a LOT of running around. Of course my mom would feed us the occasional McDonald's and order pizza every once in awhile but she mostly cooked meals at home. When I got older I sat on the computer more than went outside, chose the easier drive-thru than cooking my own meals, etc. It really has nothing to do with the era, I think, but your decision making.

amysj303

I was reading an article in the paper this weekend about one researchers theory on why obesity has sky rocketed:

in part, "Women in the 1950s and 1960s — think Betty Draper on the hit TV show "Mad Men " — were generally advised to restrict weight gain in pregnancy to as little as 10 pounds. Inadequate nutrition in some of these women could easily have programmed their babies to catch up on growth during infancy — and studies suggest such growth spurts increase the risk of later obesity."



Read more: 1950s women may have triggered obesity epidemic - The Denver Post http://www.denverpost.com/fitness/ci_19658388#ixzz1iRBMNQo8
Read The Denver Post's Terms of Use of its content: http://www.denverpost.com/termsofuse

havingitall

When I was growing up it was fairly infrequent that we went out to eat. Now it's practically the default option for many... I know before dieting I went out quite a lot.

Also, when we ate at home the portion sizes were never as large as what we are served today in a restaurant. Restaurants have one-upped each other to offer gargantuan meals, appetizers, deserts and of course buffets in order to compete for our dining dollars.

I'll bet that even when we (Americans) eat at home these days we unconsciously super-size our meals to match what we are familiar with from going out to eat so often.

I have to agree. I was born in 1962. We very rarely ate out. Maybe once or twice a year. It was a financial thing. My Mom made nearly everything from scratch. I learned to bake when I was about 6 years old and cook full meals when I was 10. My Mom worked part time, but we still helped around the house a lot.

As well, we were outside all the time; summer or winter. Staying inside was boring and probably meant you had to help around the house!

capriciousmoon

I've always thought it's odd how the "obesity epidemic" seemed to come out of nowhere. I was born in 1983. When I was in school it was rare to see any kids that were overweight, maybe only one or two in a class. Now suddenly most people are overweight or obese? It's weird.

AnninStPaul

There was also a lot less snacking, a lot less soda, and many fewer artificial sweeteners, in addition to the smaller portion sizes and higher activity levels others have mentioned.

Personally, I blame the use of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), which was launched in the 1970s.

michelefloyd

Dlcam, Sue and Missy, thank you for the responses personal to my situation. It was a complete error on my part to suggest I was keeping off 60 pounds I'd gained, by the way. I freaking wish! No, I meant to say I was working off 60 pounds. At the end of the day, I can blame my age and circumstances but that's not going to shed the pounds. Boo hoo hoo.

All of these answers are fascinating because clearly they're all clues to what is troubling 2/3 of the population in more than a few countries.

Westerners more lazy? Definitely! I remember when I ventured into becoming environmentally conscious my friends initially wouldn't walk from one store to another within the same shopping center. Oh no, we had to drive from one side of the parking lot to the other.

Processed food, sweeteners, modified food? I don't know as much about this on an expert level, but it makes sense and certainly has been stated for years with apparently no one refuting it.

Easier, more sedentary life? This one really made me think because it's very interesting that the increase in obesity has skyrocketed since VCR/DVD/blu-ray/Netflix and the almighty internet became popular. I certainly sit on my *ss a lot more than when I was a teen. Thing is, last time I didn't have a computer I was a teenager. I'm just not sure how to fill the time because I'm really not keen on hanging out at the mall or cinema.

Finally, food education? Maybe this is the answer to all of the above until we're living like the Jetsons. I certainly don't want us to go the Wall-E path. MyFitnessPal has helped me become aware of what I thought were small indulgences, but actually were sabotaging my attempts at moderation. Logging the exercise I'm doing is also very appealing to my self-competitive nature.

Going back to the top of this post, whining is going to get me nowhere but still, it's not something we should accept as our lot without some discussion.

jadedone

I think that the food additives will play a role as well. Packaged foods before either didn't exist or were made with regular stuff. Today, you couldn't recreate 90% of packaged goods at home without a chemistry set.

it_be_asin

I think a lot comes down to portion size. We ate less food when I was a kid. I remember sharing a family size pizza between a family of 4 people (mum, dad, and me and my little sister) - the pizza cost about $18, but in the late 80's and early 90's this was a lot more in real dollars. These days, the pizza costs the same money, but my salary has doubled since I started working just over 9 years ago. And I have only been promoted once. These days, so many people buy a large pizza for $10 from pizza hut and eat it all by themselves. When I was growing up, that would have been expected to feed at least two, if not three people.

I remember eating 1 cup (if that) of 3 different veggies and two lamb chops or half a steak as a pretty typical dinner when I was growing up. Granted, this was my dinner when I was about ten or so! Or maybe two sausages with two slices of bread and tomato sauce if mum was busy that night. At recess, I might have had one piece of fruit, and when I was a teenager a 20g snack pack of chips. I might have had 1 or 1.5 sandwiches for lunch made on the small sandwich loaves we got when I was a kid, not the bread you get now which can be twice the size of the 80's sandwich loaf. And I felt like a pig eating 1.5 sandwiches on those little baby 80's slices of bread.

ShapeUpSidney

In the US, obesity besets the impoverished more than those with money. Convenience foods are cheaper than healthy, whole foods. A gallon of milk certainly costs more than Sunny D or Coca-Cola. These foods are bought by the lower classes, often single mothers, with very little time to prepare meals. At what point did the government make it possible for people to use "welfare" funds to purchase junk food? I'm pretty sure the timing lines up perfectly with the onset of the obesity epidemic.

ShapeUpSidney

Back in the 60s and 70s, if you were poor, you went to the food bank and got giant jars of pb, loaves of bread, and a log of government cheese.

Now, if you're on welfare, you go to BJs and get jumbo sized cheetos and a 30 rack of Mountain Dew with EBT.

michelefloyd

I agree with you girls -- I was born in 1970, and I don't think I stayed inside much at all when the weather was good. And I helped my mom maintain 3+ acres of yard and fields, and hauled firewood. My parents still do all that stuff, and they're 71 and 73, and still in good shape.

I also wonder if more additives and artificial sweeteners in everything is having an impact. I know we had some of that growing up (Cheetos was one of my favorite snacks, not to mention TV dinners when mom and dad were out), but...? I also wonder about the hormones in meats. I try not to be a nutjob about this stuff, but I wonder if that's why teenagers look like they're 25 by the time they're 12...?

Personally, I think it's the advent of processed foods in general that has done the most work in making us fatter. Taking the OPs original breakfast, now the biscuits are made from finely processed flour and not made at home. The flour in the gravy itself goes the same. In fact, I would be surprised if any gravy now sold on market shelves are actually made using rendered animal fats, like they used to be.

Of course, people that ate that example breakfast didn't get fat immediately because
a) People did more manual labor. It's hard to think of any technological advance that doesn't involve *someone* doing less physical labor. Technology has advanced much since then.
b) Getting fat off of that breakfast takes time, especially if you then go and work on the farm that produced it for the rest of the day.
c) It is likely that you were served a smaller portion back then, simply because animals were not as big and factory farming was only getting revved up.
d) The amount of meat that we're now taking in, per capita, is far larger than it used to be. It's likely that the breakfast the OP described was normal back then because it was simply awesome that we were able to get that many meats, in those quantities, at the table without going broke. Historically, humans have eaten relatively small amounts of meat out of a diet of mostly vegetables (excluding certain African and Mandarin tribes). In other words, that breakfast was a novelty. If you could afford to eat that (even at industrial food prices) you're still talking a lot of money. Leading me to the next point:
e) That's a rich person's breakfast. Or it's a farmer's. Either way, I think it's pretty safe to say that unless you're one of those two people, you didn't eat that every day. You probably ate a packaged cereal instead. Which is just as bad, IMHO.

Southeastern Kentucky is one of the poorest regions in the US. Just ask Victoria Beckham! ha I was so surprised to hear you describe that as a rich person's meal. That's the breakfast I was served every day / every time I visited KY from my dawning years to 2006 but I get your point. I think it was more of a weekend (or company) thing for my family and they probably ate oatmeal or eggs and toast during the week. But my mom's idea of toast is with butter, sugar and cinnamon, I might add!

We haven't farmed in a couple of generations but for the Kentuckian grandparents, that was replaced with coal-mining. I can see where the men wouldn't necessarily put on weight but it's the women I'm thinking of. They stayed home and didn't have more than a family garden. And they didn't have 10 kids to look after either! My grandma had 3 kids but was thin as a rail all her life. When my mom was my age (and had also had 3 kids) she was thinner than I am now having had no children. We ate out all the time and even when we were home, mom made some really unhealthy dinners. I know I was skinny because I was just a kid, but she stayed thin, too.

tameko2

. . . Let's face it, fifty years ago if you ate a cookie, someone in the family had to bake it.

Well I'm over fifty years old and I can tell you that they had PLENTY of processed and pre-packaged goodies back then. In fact, some of them were even worse than the products they sell now. I think the major problem nowadays is our distorted view of what a proper portion is. Look at McDonald's. When I was a kid, an adult would order a burger, fries and drink equivalent in size to what they sell as their kiddie meal now. This and the fact that after work/after school activities have gone from physically active things to sitting on ones behind in front of a computer or TV screen for hours.

I agree, portions were smaller and stuff like soda and juice was served in smaller cups AND was a special treat, not something you drank 3 times a day. when was the last time you actually looked at a "real" juice glass? A traditional juice glass is like 4 ounces. So sure maybe you went back for seconds of juice and had a whopping 8 ounces. Whereas my boyfriend probably drinks about 30 ounces of soda a day, and if I *let* him buy juice, he drinks it out of 16 ounce glasses. sometimes 2 of them. Not to mention unending snacking - sure there were 'bad' snacks before but people ate ONE portion of them, not 3.

dmpizza

They spent 1000's of calories doing things we have machines(or others) to do, or things we jsut don't bother with anymore, like ironing, etc...

dmpizza

It's the big bad Americans...... Ooooohhhhhh.......

Thank you for that.

ruby_red_rose

Just my take on it.

People were more active, women generally were doing most chores manually, alot of our modern conveniences have made us lazy, people expended a lot more energy then watched less tv, no home computors.

I was born in 75 & remember walking 5-6 miles with my mother to visit my grandmother for an hour or two, the walk would take longer than the visit, we had a car but never used it all the time.

Just general changes in our lifestyles, also packaged food & ready meals became popular around that time, we never had a freezer till the mid 80's so most of our food although quite carb & fat laden was always fresh cooked & with fresh meat & ingredients.

I think you are spot on. In addition, all the people you are thinking of have probably added on a little bit more weight every year, so 20 years later, they are all more heavy than they were 20 years ago.

sunflower_yogi

Fast food was around but not so prevalent as it is today. Moms usually stayed at home and made meals, even like the ones you described, instead of picking up McDonalds or pizza on the way home from work. Kids played outside and were active outside of school hours. Video games didn't exist in 1976 beyond Pong and neither did the personal computer. People might still have sat in front of the TV but there were only 4 channels so there wasn't always something on to watch.

YES. this^.

Grokette

It is a lot of things that play into this..............

People were more active

Ate far less fast food and much MORE home cooked food

No GMO grown vegetables and fruits

Most of the meat was free range or grass fed, not factory farmed. If grains are given to cows, pigs and chickens to make them fat, what do you think it is doing to us?????

The food pyramid they want everyone to go by was much more balanced with a lot less grains and more fat and protein.

manderson27

I was born in 1956 and I remember my hunter gatherer parents going off each day to try and kill a mammoth and collect berries, While us kids did cave paintings for entertainment and ran away from wolves for excercise. :bigsmile:

ajball90

I was born in 1990 and I hardly ever was inside, weather permitting. I danced, did gymnastics, and generally did a LOT of running around. Of course my mom would feed us the occasional McDonald's and order pizza every once in awhile but she mostly cooked meals at home. When I got older I sat on the computer more than went outside, chose the easier drive-thru than cooking my own meals, etc. It really has nothing to do with the era, I think, but your decision making.

^ me too

Kristyannj

I think people got much more exercise back in the day.

Grokette

I was born in 1956 and I remember my hunter gatherer parents going off each day to try and kill a mammoth and collect berries, While us kids did cave paintings for entertainment and ran away from wolves for excercise. :bigsmile:

Wow, why bring such smart alleck comments into a great thread???

Are you putting down those of us that are living the Paleo lifestyle?

DannyMussels

Portion sizes have gotten larger, clothing sizes as well (watch some 80s vids and check how slim the guys are).

Also companies have found ways to make stuff taste better, by jacking up the calories, so typical meals are in the 1000+ range, whereas years ago they were alot more basic. Additives and preservatives (hfcs being cheaper and more shelf stable) will also increase calories on a lot of dishes.

People drink crap like crazy lattes or coffees nowadays in the 300-800 calorie range that didn't really exist 20-50yrs ago.

So much more is at everyones fingertips, convenience is rarely a good choice when it comes to your health.

That's juts a few of the reasons.

michelefloyd

I was born in 1956 and I remember my hunter gatherer parents going off each day to try and kill a mammoth and collect berries, While us kids did cave paintings for entertainment and ran away from wolves for excercise. :bigsmile:

Wow, why bring such smart alleck comments into a great thread???

Are you putting down those of us that are living the Paleo lifestyle?

You guys both gave me a good laugh.

DannyMussels

They spent 1000's of calories doing things we have machines(or others) to do, or things we jsut don't bother with anymore, like ironing, etc...

This is actually a great reason too.

Back in the day (30-40yrs ago) my dad built his own house, garage, garden, did all his yardwork, siding, driveway, took out trees, painted, singled his roofs, etc.

Nowadays i think people are too busy to do it themselves, or in lots of cases its cheaper and easier to hire someone else. That, and most things are done easier/faster by machine.

Very true.

Umeboshi

There have always been fat people.
http://oldtimefatties.tumblr.com/

JasonSwetland

We ate out 1-2 times a month and if we did eat fast food such as Mcdonalds it was a small fry and a cheeseburger, otherwise all our food was cooked at home. Now its supersized lunches everday, processesed food not home grown in the garden and giant portions. The processed meat has steroids in them- chemicals that trigger hormonal growth. Itamazes me that the idea that we put all these chemicals to make our food grow larger (plants and animals alike) would suddenly stop working once the animal dies- same with Non organic-Veggies.

Also pop, people drink crates of the stuff now, when I was a kid, soda pop was a rare treat, otherwise it was juice milk (from non steroidal cows) and water. The pop back then used sugar and not corn syrup (which is genticaly mutated to grow bacteria and stimulates growth hormones in our brains)

All this modified and geneticaly created and modified superfoods passes the modifications on to us and thats why we are so big. You are what you eat. It isnt until we start eating stuff that comes from the ground, grown without chemicals, anti bodies, mutated engineering, that we let our bodies rest and go back to digesting nutrition.

We eat chemicals and not nutrition. Thats what I think is the difference anyways. Oh and computers- videogames- a lack of competetiveness taught to children in schools also reduces the likelyhood of them being inspired by physical achievement.

seehawkmomma

I think besides:

-More fast food/package foods
-More tv/computers/video game
-More work/less work-outs

I really cant see any other reasons why people have gotten obese.

HOWEVER. There is such a social and health pressure now to lose weight. I predict by the time my daughter is 12 she will not have the same issues kids today are having.

seehawkmomma

I think besides:

-More fast food/package foods
-More tv/computers/video game
-More work/less work-outs

I really cant see any other reasons why people have gotten obese.

HOWEVER. There is such a social and health pressure now to lose weight. I predict by the time my daughter is 12 she will not have the same issues kids today are having.