Do naturally thin people actually think different?

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  • Need2Exerc1se
    Need2Exerc1se Posts: 13,575 Member
    DX2JX2 wrote: »
    Yes - naturally thin people don't tend to care about food as anything but nourishment. There's zero emotional attachment to it.

    I'm not sure how you define "naturally thin," but I know plenty of people in the normal weight range who don't seem to employ any specific strategies to manage their weight and they still have favorite foods, things they prefer to eat, and foods that bring up emotional reactions or memories for them, etc.

    Obviously we can never get inside someone else's head, but I don't think it's accurate to say that these people don't care about food as anything but nourishment.

    I agree with this. I was thin for most of my adult life and got called 'naturally thin' a lot. But I wasn't. I loved food as much then as now. I chose not to overeat. It was sometimes a struggle but I wanted to be thin. Just like now.

    I do know what I consider to be naturally thin people. Those people who don't think about food except when hungry. That stop eating when full. That just naturally don't overeat. That was never me, even when I was thin.

    I think it's true for some thin people, sure. But I think there are also "naturally thin" people who do think about food as something other than nourishment, whether it's having favorite foods, disliking certain foods, or having emotional attachments to certain types of foods.

    My husband, for example, has never been overweight and doesn't employ any specific weight control strategies (unless he's been actively misleading me for fifteen years, which is always possible, I suppose). But he loves chocolate and has some every single day. He is very particular about his coffee and the type of milk that goes into it. He gets visibly excited about certain meals. His thoughts about food as easily as emotional and attached as mine, the difference is that he is "naturally" satisfied with much smaller portions than would satisfy me.

    I think people can exist all across this spectrum, that's all I'm saying.

    I agree with all that. People are so different from one another.
  • Terebynthia
    Terebynthia Posts: 75 Member
    Relevant to this topic I think - it's a good watch http://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-truth-about-slim-people - also available on YouTube for non UK folk IIRC.
  • DaddieCat
    DaddieCat Posts: 3,643 Member
    iowalinda wrote: »
    Some people have a mindset/attitude toward food of "eating to live", rather than "living to eat". Some people desire food because it looks/tastes/sounds good, while others look at food as fuel. My goal is to see food as fuel :)

    Thinking of food as math and budgeting it like money was a very effective tool for me, tbh.
  • ccsernica
    ccsernica Posts: 1,040 Member
    edited January 2018
    I'd say that "thinking differently about food" is the very definition of "naturally thin".
    iowalinda wrote: »
    Some people have a mindset/attitude toward food of "eating to live", rather than "living to eat". Some people desire food because it looks/tastes/sounds good, while others look at food as fuel. My goal is to see food as fuel :)
    That sounds like a dreary outlook. I finally got a grip on weight management (yes, maintenance, long term) when I discovered that I could, and should, enjoy food; it was actually the depriving myself of enjoyment, that through a set of very explicable mechanisms, made me overeat.
    Approaching food mainly as fuel doesn't have to be dreary, and it doesn't mean you don't enjoy food. It means that you don't indulge yourself in that particular pleasure unnecessarily. Most pleasures can be harmful if overdone, and eating is no different.
  • oat_bran
    oat_bran Posts: 370 Member
    All the "naturally thin" people I know (my husband and all my in-laws) genuinely don't want food if they're not hungry. That's the main difference I notice.

    They also get antsy when they have eaten a lot, and want to get up and go for a long walk or something. It's not necessarily the same day, might be the following day, but it happens. They also eat less on following days.

    It's not a difference in how they and I *think*. They barely think about it at all. It's a difference in feelings and reactions.

    Intuitive eating like that just blows my mind. I know a lot of people like this. The concept of body and mind being so in tune and autoregulating the calorie intake and expendurw without much concious awareness of the process! That's how our bodies are supposed to.work idea. But I don't think i'll ever be alble to learn this. I've had disordered eating since I was 10 and later a full blown ED. My hunger cues are forever messed up. Still I often dream that some day I'll ve able to mentain not trough logging, not even through habit but intuitively.
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  • SomeNights246
    SomeNights246 Posts: 807 Member
    I doubt you can generalize it like this. My fiance is "naturally" thin (in that he can eat whatever he wants and he never seems to gain weight), and he does feel the same way as me about food. He stresses over it, worries about his weight, sometimes feels out of control around food, etc.

    And anyway. You never know if someone is "naturally" thin. When I was thin, a lot of people thought I was just that way naturally (even had my therapist assume my fear of gaining weight while pregnant was because I'd never been overweight), but I wasn't. I was pretty much eating at a deficit to maintain a weight that wasn't healthy for my body.
  • Katimira
    Katimira Posts: 50 Member
    edited January 2018
    Most of the people I know who have always been at a healthy weight work at it. They talk about health and healthy foods a lot. They make an effort to exercise regularly, not for weight loss but because it's good for them, helps them manage stress. They try to eat healthy because they feel better that way. They frequently talk about wanting to lose those pesky 5 pounds.

    It's perhaps a mindset, but it isn't one that is far off from what MFP is all about: eat right and be active.
  • Fitnessmom82
    Fitnessmom82 Posts: 376 Member
    I was always thin (I guess you would call it naturally thin, as I never tried to diet or change my body). I was always mindful of what I ate in terms of portion size but I ate whatever types of food I wanted. Somewhere along the line I started little changes in habit from being tired or stressed or feeling as though I deserved a treat. I'd finish a whole huge restaurant meal instead of having half, more than one soda per day, sweets after every meal. It was little changes that i didn't notice in my day to day but I packed on 60 pounds in 5 years. Now that I've got most of that weight off I notice that I think more like the old, thin me.