"big boned"

Coming from an overweight family and being overweight for as long as I can remember My dad was 6' and weighed 350ish pounds My mom is 5'2 300ish I have poor eating habits since childhood (parent always gave food to keep us busy/quiet) even poorer cooking habits. Im not really an over eater I used to be an emotional eater but not so much now that I am older. My first question is about certain body builds such as you hear people say all the time "big boned" I'm trying to figure out how to determine my for ideal body weight I am built more like my dad than my mom. I am 5'3 about 281 pounds so pretty close to my mom but I am smaller than her she wears a 28 where I where a 22 I also know it comes down to body shape as well such as she has a flat butt and I have a bubble butt lol and my shoulder are wider than hers. Thoughts??

At 5'3", your healthy weight range (based on BMI) is 104.4 lbs - 141.1 lbs

I'm saying this as gently as possible - as you've been overweight as long as you can remember, you won't know your frame size until you get closer/into your healthy weight range. Don't worry about where you fall within that range right now, as the top end already requires losing half your current weight - quite the goal. However, if you break that larger goal down into smaller, achievable, interim goals - you can and will get there, if you put in the effort required. If you MUST have an overall goal right now - pick 140 lbs. Then, if you discover you are big-boned, you'll have already achieved your healthy BMI. And it's a lot easier mentally, to adjust your goal down another 10-15 lbs at the end of the weight-loss journey, than it is to add it on at the beginning when you're already facing a daunting task.

I have struggled with my weight my entire adult life. I'm 5'8" and my BMI recommended weight range is 121.7 lbs - 164.4 lbs. In January 2013, I hit my highest weight/starting weight - just under 240. My lowest weight after a crazy starvation diet I would NEVER do again, was 148 lbs. And I HATED my body at 148 - I had no butt, no boobs and felt like a 12 year old boy instead of a woman. I was too skinny for my liking, and despite that - my hips and shoulders mandated a size no smaller than an 8/10. Hardly "tiny", so yes - I do think I am big-boned, in the sense that I have broad shoulders and a wide pelvis. I will never, ever, ever be able to fit into a size 2. And I'm ok with that. This time around, I'm aiming for the higher end of my BMI range - somewhere between 155-160. I can live with being a 10/12.

I hope this helps you. Good luck on your journey!

Our bones are definitely not all the same size! A large boned woman can healthily weigh 10 lbs more than a small boned woman. Here is a link for calculating your ideal BMI based on your frame (bone) size, including an easy way to measure how big or small boned your really are:

http://www.dietandfitnesstoday.com/bodyFrame.php

Hey! That elbow breadth thing recognizes me as large-framed! I've never seen that before. My wrists and ankles (and calves) are little, but I'm pretty clearly wide-framed other than my extremities.

At a weight in the mid-80 lb range at 5'6", I was a size 5 (I was sick and emaciated due to a disease, with tons of muscle loss). Size 5! These 6 foot supermodels who are size zero clearly don't have my child-bearing pelvic bones, lol.

I think the wrist measurements thing is flawed. By the time I entered the healthy weight range my shoulders and hips were looking really boney and when I reached the mid range for healthy weight people were saying I was starting to look anorexic. My wrists are 5.5 inches so that should make me a small to medium frame but I am very wide.

I don't really think frame size is important though, being a healthy weight and feeling happy about your body is what matters.

I think it's very mean and wrong to say nobody is big burned - personally I know I am not..

But some women are built with narrower hips and chests etc.. Iike someone 5ft tall can fit the same size jeans (not leg length but waist and hips as someone 5 ft 9.. Les say...

They are both healthy with flat tummies, the 5ft 9 girl is in a size 12 and looks super skinny that's how she is built - long and athletic - the 5 ft girl is curvy like an hourglass...

Also a tall girl can be built etc etc

Just cos we may have weight to loose and some of us may not have seen ourselves at our health weight/bmi doesn't mean that we can't have different proportions - that's genetics.. That's individuality..

We shouldn't deny it...

Bones are all basically the same size. Some people may have broader shoulders or wider hips, etc, but the bone sizes are basically the same. So all this talk about body type/shape is generally a load of crap, and most often used by people who are making excuses or trying to justify something.

Just focus on eating right and getting some exercise. It's impossible to know your ideal body weight until you get there. I've changed my ideal weight several times already and I'm within 20lbs of where I want to be. Then at some point I said the hell with a target body weight, I want to get leaner, stronger, and faster... the scale can read whatever it wants to.

If all bones were the same size then how can they be wider or broader?? And how could one person be taller than another. Bones come in different sizes.

The second paragraph is pretty good advice though.

OP, if you are talking about your ideal healthy weight, then that too can be hard to nail down, but will have more to do with how much muscle vs fat you have for your height, than with your bone structure. That's why charts always have a range.

Bones come in different lengths, but when you average out the circumference based on the frame, they are all pretty much equal in percentages. If I was 4" taller with the same frame, my bone circumference would slightly increase, but the percentages of circumference vs length would still be the same.

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But if you were 4" taller your ideal weight would likely be higher so I don't really see how that is pertinent. While frame width may not change a healthy weight much if height is the same, that doesn't make bones all the same size.

Well of course my weight would be higher if I kept everything in retrospect. I believe what people are speaking here of is how "big boned" relates to actual circumference and not length. Hell you lengthen anyone's bones who are overweight/obese without changing their weight and they will look thinner. But the circumference analogy for "big boned" isn't a legitimate reasoning for why people carry extra weight.

A.C.E. Certified Personal/Group FitnessTrainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

But the body is usually porportionate. Longer bones would require a greater circumference for the correct volume of marrow to be present to make the bones as durable as shorter bones. If a bone is longer, but with the same circumference as a shorter bone, then the fulcrum changes placing greater stress on the bone.

* I don't know if vernacularly I got this right, but I do know what I'm talking about. Longer bones would need a greater circumference for equivalent durability and strength of shorter bones... because physics. Someone help me out here.

I did mention if a bone is longer in length, that the percentage of circumference would equal it in my above post.

A.C.E. Certified Personal/Group FitnessTrainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

Our bones are definitely not all the same size! A large boned woman can healthily weigh 10 lbs more than a small boned woman. Here is a link for calculating your ideal BMI based on your frame (bone) size, including an easy way to measure how big or small boned your really are:

http://www.dietandfitnesstoday.com/bodyFrame.php

I have titchy wrists so using wrist measurement I came out small boned, but when I did it by elbow bredth I came out as large boned. So I'm still none the wiser! Will continue concentrating on decreasing BF.

All the bones I played with in nursing school were about the same size.


That sounded really bad.

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: LOVE it!