DID YOUR MOTHER MAKE YOU OVERWEIGHT?

No my mum didn't make me overweight. But she did teach me to view food in a way that helped me make myself overweight.

I posted this in another thread yesterday, but my mum was of the wartime generation, and I was born in the 60s, but her wartime habits stuck with her, "waste not,want not" and so on, so it was a cardinal sin to waste food! I still have a lot of her kitchen habits, like if I make custard or gravy with powder, I save a bit of the milk or water to swill out the bowl I mix it in!

I've carried a sense of responsibility and obligation, and a real hangup about leaving food. So that's meant I'll always eat more than I needed to. I still struggle to leave food - either on my plate, or on the serving plate! Eating with friends is hard - at home I just cook my portions.

My mum was the opposite in fact - we never had much money, so couldn't afford much in the way of sweet treats. We'd have them on a Sunday only! And often home bakes, so not as exciting as shop bought. So on the rare occasion when we ate tea at an aunty's house, there would be all these wonderful goodies - Penguin or Club biscuits! Battenburg cake! Mr Kipling cakes! Mmmmm. But we knew we could take ONE and then no matter how much our aunty plied is with seconds, we knew we couldn't have another, on pain of death! And mum would be sitting there watching. So we politely declined, weeping inside. So when I got older, and could buy my own, that restriction wasn't there any more and I could sit and eat the whole packet if I wanted, and did. And gained weight!.

Also, I've copied my dad who used to put a thick layer of salt all over his food, and butter on his bread by the slice! - I've tried and tried, and I can't taste my food without adding salt and I can't eat bread or crackers or scones without a thick layer of butter. (so I eat very little of them now!)

I think we pick up things from our parents that they aren't trying to impart. My mum was trying to teach me good things about not wasting food - the flip side is that I've taken this sense of obligation that's caused me problems.

The other thing to remember is that in the war and post war years, food was totally different - no processed food, everything cooked from scratch, and much less unhealthy, and sugar after rationing was a luxury! Your mum couldn't conceive of a world like ours, where we're bombarded with sugar and fat! She was probably motivated by her experiences of privation in the war, not wanting you to be deprived and denied - we're looking with hindsight with our experience of overeating and overweight.

ed: Just thought too, I'm the one who piled the weight on. My sister has always been slim. Same mother, same experiences, different outcome!

Oh definitely. She always doubled or tripped portion sizes. She always made me clean my plate and veggies always consisted of a half a plate of fried buttery veggies with sauces on them. I never had a chance growing up. And I never understood why other ppl could eat what appeared to be the same foods of me and not be fat while i was always bigger. Well, mainly portion control and yup, grew up poor and of course macaroni and cheese, cookies, granola bars, candy , chips, pop, tuna and mayo, all those things for sure made me fat. And when you don't understand portion control, it's almost impossible to properly diet.

As a child, I wasn't overweight until about 3rd grade. And that was due to my mother not saying "no" to me when I wanted more food, but didn't need it. Now, I took control of how I ate (somewhat) and became more active as a teenager and became healthier, so go me. But, I ballooned back up when I hit my mid 20s. I have no one to blame but myself for my former adulthood obesity. Yes, it was from learned habits I had from childhood, but I made the choice to not do anything about it.

I am scarily like my mother. I don't recall her ever not being on a diet, and her weight fluctuated considerably throughout my life. I remember her trying to talk to me about my weight when I was about 16 (and way too sensitive to talk about that sort of thing!) and saying that it was killing her to watch me go through the exact same thing she had gone through. My weight has fluctuated constantly throughout my life, I'm also constantly "on a diet" and have been conscious of my weight since I was about 9 years old.

The funny thing is, I have two sisters (non identical twin and two years older) and they are both tiny and have never had a weight issue in their lives. In saying that, both of my sisters are petite, have small frames and are pretty narrow. By contrast, I have wide hips, shoulders and big feet. I have always felt bigger than I probably am because I was always surrounded by tiny people. My frame is more like my mothers though and we have so many similarities now - in mannerisms, our sense of humour etc. When I go home, I'm often referred to as her mini-me. So maybe a tendency towards certain eating habits is learned. I don't know why I'm so much like my mum and my sisters are so different though. My weight is totally down to me though and my tendency towards gluttony - we always had reasonably healthy food (rarely had chocolate or chips or soda in the house) but I remember binge eating - in secret - when I was in primary school.

I can't even imagine how it's a theory that could properly be tested as there are so many variables - and circumstances that disprove the rule.

My mom was heavy for her height. She also was a heavy smoker. Somehow, only one of us six kids ended up with a weight problem in our teens-- my brother. He was a chubby, overeating baby and grew into a chubby, adolescent and teen. He got teased and bullied a lot for it (looking back, it was wrong of my dad and my brothers to call him "moose"), and ended up with an eating disorder.

I was just thinking about this topic the other day. My mom, despite her own weight issues, managed to sneak in healthy eating habits and food choices without our realizing it. Snacks were tomato slices with mayo (gross now, but yummy then), no pop in the house, and junk food was an occasional treat.

My mom and dad are depression era survivors. My mom came from a wealthy family, so she always had food to eat during the depression. One of my favorite stories from her childhood was the "Peanut Butter v Pork Roast" story. Her mother refused to allow peanut butter in the house, because that's "what poor people ate" during the depression. My mom LOVED the "forbidden fruit", and begged and pleaded for my grandmother to buy some for her. Since she wouldn't, mom got very clever. They would always have some big roast for Sunday, and mom would take pieces of roast into school and trade them for peanut butter sandwiches.

The other funny story here is what my mom used to say to me regarding junk food: "You better watch what you eat, because when you're 25, your metabolism is going to come to a screeching halt and you won't be able to eat so much of it anymore without gaining weight" (I was a VERY skinny, gawky, kid. One day, I grew tired of hearing her lecture, and I called her out on it. I said, "Mom, I'll stop going to Burger King when you take that cigarette out of your mouth as you lecture me about poor health habits". That shut her up.

Absolutely not. I made myself overweight. It would be unfair to blame someone else for my poor choices.

I will say that my mother (and father) are both obese. They taught me horrible habits. That being said, I was never overweight as a child because I played hard, year-round. I became obese when I was still eating 3000+ calories a day and then sat on my *kitten* all day. That was *me* being lazy. Now I am trying to inspire my mom to eat right and exercise.

I can inherently only blame myself for my weight problems but I think my mother AND my ex-husband have played a pretty big role in this also. I was raised that you clean your plate. It is VERY hard for me to push away from the table, even when I am full, without cleaning my plate. My ex-husband would always question what I was eating, "Do you think you should be eating that?" or he would put away ding dongs and twinkies for his lunch for work and forbid me to eat them. So, when he went to work, so did I. I would eat at least one every day just to show him I could. Then when we separated and finally divorced, I ate whatever I wanted. Yeah, I really showed him, didn't I?

I feel like my parents and my grandmother have something to do with my appetite now. When I was a kid I wasn't as picky as my brother and sister (especially my sister) and I would usually eat all my food. This lead to much praise from my family and I was held up as an example of a "good eater". I was a good deal younger than my siblings so I couldn't really be smarter than they were, and I never had any activities growing up (if I asked to do something my mom would briefly express enthusiasm and then forget about it) so it felt like that was about the only thing I could be "good" at. So I'd finish my food, eat seconds and even thirds... I just got used to that and now it takes a lot for me to be full.

For me, yes, my mom was definitely part of the problem. Add genes in there, and I was screwed. She passed her incredibly f'd-up relationship with food onto me. She watched everything I put in my mouth and when I was away from home she would grill me on every morsel I ate while gone. She made food and my weight a HUGE issue. I became a "secret eater"- basically binging when no one was looking. She knows this now and feels really pretty guilty because she didn't do it on purpose.

But now I'm an adult and it's time to take control and do what I need to do to help keep the weight off. Therapy has helped me a bunch. I haven't binged in 6 months.

Whew.

Parents may dictate what you eat as a child, but it doesn't influence the choices you make as an adult. It may have put you in a bad position, not taught you about balancing out your diet, etc. but ultimately the choices you make on a daily basis are your own, not your mother's, father's, society's, etc.

Too often I think people are looking for someone or something to be their scapegoat. You are ultimately responsible for the way you are, you can make a choice to change, improve, be healthier, or you can choose not to. It really is that simple. Obviously there are different things that happen in life that can contribute to weight gain (or loss) but for the most part, its the daily choices we make.

Parents may dictate what you eat as a child, but it doesn't influence the choices you make as an adult. It may have put you in a bad position, not taught you about balancing out your diet, etc. but ultimately the choices you make on a daily basis are your own, not your mother's, father's, society's, etc.

Too often I think people are looking for someone or something to be their scapegoat. You are ultimately responsible for the way you are, you can make a choice to change, improve, be healthier, or you can choose not to. It really is that simple. Obviously there are different things that happen in life that can contribute to weight gain (or loss) but for the most part, its the daily choices we make.

While I appreciate your point of view for myself, (as in that's the way I feel for me personally) but taking into consideration what I know about how my in-laws describe their childhoods, children were not taught to question their parents like they are today.

Obedience was what parents wanted from their children, not thought provoking open minded point & counter-point conversation. It's important to note it was a different time
I always imagine it in black & white :blushing:

Parents may dictate what you eat as a child, but it doesn't influence the choices you make as an adult. It may have put you in a bad position, not taught you about balancing out your diet, etc. but ultimately the choices you make on a daily basis are your own, not your mother's, father's, society's, etc.

Too often I think people are looking for someone or something to be their scapegoat. You are ultimately responsible for the way you are, you can make a choice to change, improve, be healthier, or you can choose not to. It really is that simple. Obviously there are different things that happen in life that can contribute to weight gain (or loss) but for the most part, its the daily choices we make.

No, it isn't as simple as "you're an adult now, so you should know better". Why do you think there are so many cases of child abuse, molestation, spousal abuse, etc? Because the adults learned that from their parents. Adults learn what they are taught as children. They are constantly bombarded with lessons through living. If a child is raised with poor eating habits, they will not know how to change those habits until they are retrained as an adult.

Who we are and what we become are definitely influenced by how we were raised as children. There is absolutely no debating this issue.

Parents may dictate what you eat as a child, but it doesn't influence the choices you make as an adult. It may have put you in a bad position, not taught you about balancing out your diet, etc. but ultimately the choices you make on a daily basis are your own, not your mother's, father's, society's, etc.

Too often I think people are looking for someone or something to be their scapegoat. You are ultimately responsible for the way you are, you can make a choice to change, improve, be healthier, or you can choose not to. It really is that simple. Obviously there are different things that happen in life that can contribute to weight gain (or loss) but for the most part, its the daily choices we make.

No, it isn't as simple as "you're an adult now, so you should know better". Why do you think there are so many cases of child abuse, molestation, spousal abuse, etc? Because the adults learned that from their parents. Adults learn what they are taught as children. They are constantly bombarded with lessons through living. If a child is raised with poor eating habits, they will not know how to change those habits until they are retrained as an adult.

Who we are and what we become are definitely influenced by how we were raised as children. There is absolutely no debating this issue.

I'll agree with you on that as well.
It takes a great deal of courage to reject one's upbringing, to question and challenge what one has been taught.

Consider the concept of prejudice being taught and along with that, consider that the era the OP speaks of as being most influential in this context, that children were taught 'to be seen, not heard'.

Mom & dad's version of the world was often absolute. Many people didn't question LOTS of things in those days.

Parents may dictate what you eat as a child, but it doesn't influence the choices you make as an adult. It may have put you in a bad position, not taught you about balancing out your diet, etc. but ultimately the choices you make on a daily basis are your own, not your mother's, father's, society's, etc.

Too often I think people are looking for someone or something to be their scapegoat. You are ultimately responsible for the way you are, you can make a choice to change, improve, be healthier, or you can choose not to. It really is that simple. Obviously there are different things that happen in life that can contribute to weight gain (or loss) but for the most part, its the daily choices we make.

As I posted earlier I do have a bad relationship with food due to parental abuse but I have also had lots of counselling and this has allowed me to see why I have these issues. I know that I will always have issues but instead of using them as excuse I plan around them - but there will always be part of me that will overeat as I' spent 11 years wondering when the next meal would come from ( or if it was edible).

I know that if there are treats in the house or spare food going I''ll eat it so I just don't buy it. However it has taken over 20 years and lots of support to get there so it not as easy as the choices we make as an adult and many of us are still influenced by our childhoods.