Influence of parents

I think it's a tough thing to blame everything on parents. Yeah, they could have been better role models when I was younger and instilled the healthy mind set, but when I got to high school, I could have changed things. Instead, I wasn't strong enough (or wasn't educated enough) to go healthy.

You can blame your parents, but in the end, I think it's really you that has to answer for all the decisions. It took me a while to come to grips with that and make the change.

it definately does!!!!
we were not allowed to leave the table till our plates were clean.
my ex-husband too. made me eat all the extra food, cuz he hated leftovers.
its so drilled in my head now that i can not waste food. that i will force it down till its gone.:sick:
its so hard to break that brain washing!!!

I think there are lots of things that influence that part of ourselves. Our families, our friends, the area we live in, your mindset on food, etc... We're all here, because we're taking responsibility for ourselves & making a healthy change no matter what caused us to become overweight.

I definitely developed a weird relationship to food as a result of my parents' attitude toward food and eating. In my very early life, we were very, very poor and my brother and I were told to eat everything on our plates, no matter what it tasted like. As I grew older, my brothers and I were very competitive and if I didn't grab food it would disappear, with all the teasing and one-up-manship you find in bitter sibling rivalries.

Top that off with my parents dispassionately telling me I *couldn't* have as much as my brothers--because I was a girl (and girls need to eat less)--with all of the gender resentment and double standards attached, then throw in a healthy dose of unhealthy lifestyle and it's really absolutely no surprise that became overweight.

But here I am now. The real challenge is for me to really take ownership of my life and my body, take responsibility for my past choices, then get on with the business of reversing as much damage as I can before I get too old to enjoy myself fully!

Glad to be here, looking forward to getting healthier!

I had an eye opening moment recently. My parents came to visit for a few days and I planned meals to accomodate their tastes rather than my own. DH and I have been eating home-cooked, less processed food and less meat in the last several months and I'm down about 40#. This visit with my folks was the first time I had eaten the way I was raised since I started logging on MFP. The eye opening thing for me was that I logged the food before I ate it and as a result ate much less than I would have as a child but still struggled to stay under my calorie goals.

For example, we had one meal that was casing hot dogs with vegetable beef soup. When I logged the meal, I decided to eat one hot dog and one bowl of soup. It wasn't very filling or satisfying, even though it was like 600 calories. When I was a kid, I'd have eaten 2-3 hot dogs and 2 bowls of soup, plus "sides" like cheese, jello, canned fruit, milk, etc. My typical meal now is a big bowl of bean chili or a huge salad with tofu, runs about 350 calories, and keeps me satisfied for about 3 hours. It's no wonder I was a fat kid (before kids were fat) and am still struggling with my weight into my 40's, when the way I learned to eat was filled with high calorie, low nutrition, salty, processed foods and caloric beverages.

All that being said, I DO NOT blame my parents for "failing" to teach me about nutrition. They became parents in the early years of convenience food, before we learned how bad it is for you. They learned the lessons that the food industry taught at that time. Mom worked full time, raised two kids, and the whole family ate breakfast and supper together every day. They did a great job. I've learned that, in order to grow, I have to let go of blaming my parents for what's "wrong" in my life. They may have made all the decisions for me for the first 18 years, but they did the best they could, and I'm in control of who I am and what I do now. Not that this personal responsibility thing is easy. It's not. But, it's the person I've decided I want to be.

*jumps off of soap box and goes to make a bowl of oatmeal*

I volunteer at an elementary school on the weekends and its funny to sometimes see how "the apple usually doesn't fall far from the tree." When you look at the bigger children in the class, and then meet their parents, you can usually see why. Sometimes its genetic.. sometimes not. I know it's mean to say but it happens to happen that way.

It made me realize that as a child I was accustomed to big meals because I grew up with 3 brothers, and while they were active, they expected me to "be a girl" and play with dolls and not come out to play basketball and soccer and whatever other sports with them. My parents weren't all that into health & fitness either. "Girls don't wear gym shorts and play with balls." So I was eating and eating and not working anything off. I was never overweight but I didn't have the nicest body. I was petite and the upper edge of a healthy weight. In high school I joined the softball and lacrosse teams even though my mother wasn't a "soccer mom" and didnt really come watch me play or even acknowledge that I was doing anything good for myself. Eating didn't change either. Pizza and mcdonalds it was. As soon as I moved to college and started running with my roommate and eating healthier, everyone saw that I was losing weight and it felt great. My roommate used to have an eating disorder so she was working on starting to look healthier... eating right and exercising.. which definitely helped me.

That being said.. we're all adults now and know better. I wouldn't blame it all on them. With 4 children and not being educated about health it was hard for our parents too. Our environment is a large part of who we are but now that I'm back home I do my own grocery shopping and hit the gym pretty hard. You can't work on the new you if you're still holding onto the old one...

my mother NEVER restricted what i ate as a child.

i used to eat alot, and have always been a good eater. as a child, i was very active. i would never sit in front of the tv or anything like that, i was always encouraged to go out and play.

but as a teenager, i started eating fast food, and unhealthy options, that is why i am over weight. i cannot blame my mother what so ever, she never told me i must eat something, nor did she tell me i couldn't. she just gave me lots of great options, like fruits and veggies, and i made the choice of what to eat and when. i would say i was very fit and healthy until i was around 15. and by then, i couldn't blame my mother.

my personal belif is that i am overweight, not due to bad teachings, but due to lack of self control on my part.

And Kimbie -- there are sooo many comfort foods from growing up that I really need to watch my portions on, too....like any italian food! IMO it is really about portion control. I won't make it in the long haul if I can't have ice cream, cheeseburgers, beer, wine, and steak in moderation :happy:

Oh, girl, I eat me some comfort food, too. :bigsmile: Like you, I watch my portions and make deliberate decisions about what goes in my mouth. My weaknesses are potato chips with dip and pizza. Soft serve ice cream in the summer. But, I'm happy to report my tastes are changing and I don't crave these foods as much as I used to. Chocolate, now, that's a daily event....

That reminds me, there's a Lindt bar here somewhere.....

My mother was very harsh with me. I had some childhood trama that caused me to eat eat eat eat eat. When i was 9 years old i first saw that i had stretch marks and i was SOOO embarrassed to wear a bathing suit. Instead of telling me im beautiful the way i am, my mother would tell me im fat, tell me im going to be big as a house if i continued to eat the way i eat, everytime food went missing i was blamed.. i really had a huge problem. When my mom would take me to the doctor she has NEVER EVER stood there as watched me get weighed. She always had to "go to the bathroom" when i was getting weighed. It was like she was ashamed of me so that added more and more to my issue. my dad never told me i was fat. He would tell me i should do more walking around but he never told me i would be unhappy for the rest of my life if im fat. I dont want to blame her, but i really wish she would have been my support instead of the person i hid food from. It was like a rush hiding food under my pillow, by the washer or dryer, and now that i think about i was alone. Even at 22 she told me i was getting too big. But now i know when i have kids and they gain weight or dont look like what everyone else looks like, i know how to react and what to say because i wish it was said to me. Because my mother way that way towards me it motivates me everyday to be that daughter she always wanted me to look like, but at the same time ill be the person i've wanted to look like since iw as a little girl. :-)