Weight, were you raised in a family who encouraged you to eat hearty/overeat maybe, or maybe undereat?

Yes! My mum was a good cook but the portions were big. When I got a little older, I was probably a bit OCD about food, I can remember I would only eat 6 chips and would count them! On the other hand, I don't remember us eating snacks between meals which is probably why I seldom have snacky things in my cupboard now.
 

My mother worked. She loaded our plates from side to side and you had to eat every bite. But she fed us about 4 pm. No snacks in the house. You ate at mealtime…period. Played out side. No tv untill after bath in evenings. No saturday cartoons. Go play… We were all thin and only my sister has managed to hit somewhere around 150 I would guess.
 
Mom wasn't much of a cook

Weeknights it was beans on bread
Weekends we sometimes had roast beef
Pancakes Sunday morn

Never a weight prob as a kid

Gained weight like crazy when I was kicked upstairs into an office job......where the donuts were

Retired at 265 lbs
Waddled around building the cabins
shop floor jig 500.jpg

Weight fell off from working hard no matter what I ate

swing low.jpg

Settled in to around 200 lbs

woodsman 2.jpg

Stayed that way
Learned to eat until no longer hungry
No real regimen
Just can't overeat then I work hard (get too thirsty)


In town....still 200 lbs
Comfy
I can breathe and tie my shoes at the same time
I rather enjoy that
 

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LadyEmeraude said:
As child, I was always served very full meals by my mom, a very amazing cook while
growing up, as were the rest of my family. We were brought up to eat until full, very
full in fact. Second helpings were offered, and so we did. Extra pounds came on our
bodies and so it was. I think that habit of over eating stayed with me for many years.
Then when I was out of the house and on my own, I got ahold of my overeating and
balanced my eating ways to be more healthy. Still though, I was challenged with stopping
at the point of being satisfied in my stomach and thoughts, but still wanting more to be
filled up and full. Over all my years, I have been a bit on the higher side of average for my
height, never the lower side of pounds, at this time in my adult Senior life, I am 25 pounds
over my ideal weight, which is 145, so now I am 165-170. I say all this mostly for a topic about
how we might have been raised in our households, and to do with eating and habits thereof.
I to this day always want mostly to eat until I am full or really full, choices I realize. So anyway
did your upbringing have a large impact on your eating habits over the years, OR none at all?
Far as appearance I am good with how I look, or at least appear to myself.

Now over to you...
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We were poor, it was a challenge just to get enough to eat. So I value good food now, perhaps a bit too much!
 
mum couldnt cook, everything came out of a tin or packet ,
ive never been a food person, as a kid i was too busy trying to go back out with my friends
but even now, i eat to live ....not live to eat......
food still doesnt appeal to me ......always been slim, around the 8st ------9st mark
 
Gary O' said:
Mom wasn't much of a cook

Weeknights it was beans on bread
Weekends we sometimes had roast beef
Pancakes Sunday morn

Never a weight prob as a kid

Gained weight like crazy when I was kicked upstairs......where the donuts were

Retired at 265 lbs
Waddled around building the cabins
View attachment 268606

Weight fell off from working hard no matter what I ate

View attachment 268604

Settled in to around 200 lbs

View attachment 268607

Stayed that way
Learned to eat until no longer hungry
No real regimen
Just can't overeat then work hard (get too thirsty)


In town....still 200 lbs
Comfy
I can breathe and tie my shoes at the same time
I rather enjoy that
Click to expand...
Did you see the face in the ground behind you in the last pic?
 
No fast foods back then. All meals were home cooked. Lots of potatoes and venison. We had a root cellar and mom canned lots of garden veggies and some fruits. Jams and jellies were a big hit with me. I loved codfish, boiled potatoes and gravy. Home baked goods many times. As I look back, I realize that these home cooked meals were better for me than most of the frozen and fast foods today.
 
No one in my family was ever heavy, food was never a focal point for us.

True story...when I was in maybe 5th grade I got just a tad pudgy. My oldest brother began calling me Bertha butt (I'm a guy), he would grab my boob and say things like "bigger than my girlfriends". Trust me, that pudge disappeared damn quick!
 
There was no drama around meal time in our home growing up. We ate it or didn’t but mostly thankful to have it. Most of our foods came from the garden. Pork was raised on the farm and shared among several families. Same with chicken. The only emotions connected with food were when we were excited with anticipation for upcoming holiday foods that we normally wouldn’t often get.
 
This is a triggering issue for me. (though I really don't like that word) Any food, weight/body shaming is common control tactic by borderline parents.

I guess my stepfather, who was the youngest of a large family, had told my mother if he didn't like dinner, he'd make a sandwich. Probably not an issue with his family but my mother used this comment back at him a number of times to berate him. Often ranting on about what they ate in Germany. Like I could care, I was a kid.

When I started comfort eating and gaining weight at 8 YO, I couldn't have given my mother a greater gift. It's a lifelong issue for me. We weren't allowed a lot of sugary things or chips. So when I moved out and made money, that was not a good thing for me. I could go to the store and buy that stuff.
 
Gary O' said:
Mom wasn't much of a cook

Weeknights it was beans on bread
Weekends we sometimes had roast beef
Pancakes Sunday morn

Never a weight prob as a kid

Gained weight like crazy when I was kicked upstairs......where the donuts were

Retired at 265 lbs
Waddled around building the cabins
View attachment 268606

Weight fell off from working hard no matter what I ate

View attachment 268604

Settled in to around 200 lbs

View attachment 268607

Stayed that way
Learned to eat until no longer hungry
No real regimen
Just can't overeat then work hard (get too thirsty)


In town....still 200 lbs
Comfy
I can breathe and tie my shoes at the same time
I rather enjoy that
Click to expand...
Hey Gary...picture no 1...are you doing a dance?
 
I ate well, started breakfast with oatmeal+all bran & milk+ sugar. Then served eggs-bacon & toast. Had school lunch, usually a sandwich and fruit, maybe chips too(don't recall). Dinner was prepared by my grandmother(living with us) or my dad(stay at home, blind). I could take what I wanted, of course had to eat what I took. I was a big kid(tall) and active, so no weight problems growing up. Every so often we would have dessert after dinner, ice cream or whatever. My parent's didn't buy sodas, what sugary sweet crap I did have I bought with my allowance.
 
We had livestock, grew veggies and had fruit trees. There were no packaged foods in the house for snacks. Fresh fruits were the go to for snacking. My grandmother did most of the cooking and the rule was to clean your plate. We didn't get to serve ourselves, dinner plates were already dished out.

Chores and playing outside kept us in shape.

When I left for college, I weighed 155 at 6ft tall. When I graduated, I was up to 165 lbs. Two friends and I used to eat as much as we wanted. We thought it funny because two female classmates that sometimes ate breakfast with us would have like an egg, half an English muffin and a glass of orange juice. They would remark how disgusting it was that we ate like a double order of pancakes, scrambled eggs (topped with ketchup) and bacon. Years later, I thought the three of us would have been great in the movie National Lampoon's Animal House.

Anyway, my current weight is 173 with no spare tires and no beer belly. What I think works is that I'm conscious of what foods I eat, exercise 6 days a week and maybe genetics.
 
My mom freaked out because I was short for my age. She took me to doctors who caused her even more stress by telling her,
"He'll be lucky if he makes it to 5 ft. tall." (The doctors were 1 ft. off; at 6 ft, I'm the tallest one in my family.)
Some doctors gave her stupid advice about how to make me grow to a normal height, like "Feed him lots of cereal & eggs." She always encouraged me to overeat.
 
win231 said:
My mom freaked out because I was short for my age. She took me to doctors who caused her even more stress by telling her,
"He'll be lucky if he makes it to 5 ft. tall." (The doctors were 1 ft. off; at 6 ft, I'm the tallest one in my family.)
Some doctors gave her stupid advice about how to make me grow to a normal height, like "Feed him lots of cereal & eggs." She always encouraged me to overeat.
Click to expand...
I was such a tall child, they were considering having me operated on to stop my growth. Too bad no one ever thought to tell my parents to feed me less so I wouldn't grow too tall.

Suddenly I stopped growing at age 11. I'm average height for a woman.
 
charry said:
mum couldnt cook, everything came out of a tin or packet ,
ive never been a food person, as a kid i was too busy trying to go back out with my friends
but even now, i eat to live ....not live to eat......
food still doesnt appeal to me ......always been slim, around the 8st ------9st mark
Click to expand...
Actually that is a very good attitude to food. Too many of us eat for comfort and other reasons rather than just regarding food as necessary fuel.
 
I was a pretty skinny kid, but it wasn't for lack of food. The rule around our house was, "Take all you want, but eat what you take."

I became homeless for a while and only ate lunch at the local soup kitchen 6 days a week. I got real thin then. I'm a little heavier now. LOL
 
MikeyDude said:
I was a pretty skinny kid, but it wasn't for lack of food. The rule around our house was, "Take all you want, but eat what you take."

I became homeless for a while and only ate lunch at the local soup kitchen 6 days a week. I got real thin then. I'm a little heavier now. LOL
Click to expand...
You must have had a very hard and frightening time. I do hope you are settled, warm and safe now.
 

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