My Mother Made me Fat

[britjojo]

No kidding. I was a normally built kid, till she started putting me on diets.

From age 7, whenever she would go on one of her crash diets, she made me do it too. My sister was too young and my father refused, so it was just me she subjected to it. I would get a single small chicken breast for my dinner, my main meal of the day, and nothing else.

I was starving, all the time. So I ate. Whenever I had the chance, whenever she wasn't looking I would steal cookies and potato chips from the cupboard. Slices of bread that I would throw anything on-even just a slab of butter.

So I gained weight, basically because I was eating crap. I now weight 195lbs (was a lot less before I had my baby) and am slowly bringing it down.

What does this have to do with this forum? It was HER addiction to dieting, and her 'need' to not do it alone, along with her daily weigh ins, that led me down a path of obesity.

See what we can do for our children when we really try?

[mtajim]

Thats a sad story, sometimes parents try to take care there childrens so much that in turn it starts hurting them

[rox]

yeah parents have this weird way of controlling their kids actions..
even my dad sometimes used to say ' i want pretty daughters'..anyway..that was one of the factors that escalated into anorexia..

im glad you are bringing the weight down.
focus on HEALTH..and you'll meet your goal.
dont bring vanity and being skinny into your mind cause that will ruin everything.

have a healthy lifestyle..and replace bad habits with good ones.

[QuietLunatic]

It was one of my older sisters who had the same effect on me. She was big on dieting and tried to get me onto that hamster-wheel as well. I'm overweight at the moment, but I have a good figure and I'm very healthy, so it's not too bad.

[ozzie]

I also thought the same thing about my mother sometimes. She was addicted to baking. She baked goodies all the time and we had dessert at nearly every meal. I feel certain it has something to do with my wanting sweets so much!

How are you managing to bring your weight down? I'm having a lot of trouble doing that.

[QuietLunatic]

I'm in a weight loss challenge on another forum and aiming for 170 from 189 pounds. We're trying different techniques and see how well we do. I think I'm blessed with good genes as far as cholesterol and blood pressure go, and I use my upper body at work all the time, so that helps keep me reasonably fit. But I AM too sedentary the rest of the time. I need to get more active.

[britjojo]

I also have very good cholesterol and my BP throughout pregnancy was always on the low side, very bottom of normal.

I am working on exercise only. I am still nursing my toddler, and for that reason do not want to mess with my diet. There are problems with nursing and dieting, for one because as the fat is burned fast, the toxins stored in fat can be expelled in breast milk. I had a friend who's kid broke out in acne after the mother fasted for two days.

Right now it's just exercise vids and outdoors fun with my kid. Last summer, for my sister's wedding, I shed 14lb that way.

[shinningstar]

I'm proud of having a good parents. I'm physically fit and well-discipline. My parents are good teacher. They punished me if ever I done something wrong. They always encouraged me to eat fruits and vegetables. That's why I'll do the same thing too for my kids. I'll never let them grow as a spoiled brat.

[britjojo]

My parents always disciplined me too, nor I am a spoiled brat. If you read my posts you will see that what happened to me was as a direct result of her being TOO hard on me. I wrote this post as a warning, not an encouragement to be bad to your children. Kids need love, not punishment.

[mtajim]

Yes , thats true , my parents never punished me niether there were too stict , they taught me what was good and what was bad , so i never got spoiled

[Insulinwarrior]

I was touched by your story, Brit - I, too, am in the same position and I don't think people realise how serious putting children on 'diets' is. Shinning*sic star I hope did not mean to suggest that all overweight people are simply spoiled brats - if so it is unhelpful and I honestly don't know why he/she would post here but it sould simply be ignored.

Most reputible nutritionists and even medical practitioners now understand that "dieting makes you fat" - that is the old fashioned, low-calorie starvation diets destroy your metabolism - well imagine what happens when that is inflicted upon a child before their body has matured properly!! My first conscious memory of being put on a diet (because my mother was doing it) was at 7 yrs old also: I know because I vividly remember my mother telling me to calculate how many calories I should in take each day which was 100Xyour age - that's 700 calories! (if you were over 25 there was some other calculation you did - and clearly this was not meant for children) 700 calories for a growing child - that's insane! In fact it's abuse. Of course as I hit teenage-hood I actually did start to get a little 'heavy' (according to my mother) - that's when she taught me how to throw up if I'd eaten more than my Musashi slimming bar for lunch at school or had gone to a friend's house for dinner. My body was starving ALL THE TIME.

The idea that a child is STARVING all the time isn't just about hunger. It's not just about disciplining someone (even an adult) to ignore their hunger (which, I now understand is the worst thing you can d if you want to lose weight) because not proivding enough food isn't just about calories - it's not even just about the body going into starvation mode and storing fat anyway - it's about nutrition. It's about the vitamins and minerals you don't get. The low-fat/no-fat diets simply don't allow for the majority of vitamins which are fat-soluble to enter the body. I was CONSTANTLY ill as a child, always had tonsilitis, couldn't ward off a cold, my immune system was virtually non-existant.

My teeth and bones, to this day, are smaller and weaker than they would have been because my mother believed dairy was fattening - I was given calcium supplements every now and again (she was big on vitamin pills and now has a failing liver due to the extreme amount she took) but nothing is as nutritious as real food (and low-fat dairy is NOT real food when you take the fat out of dairy all you end up with is a cup of lactose = sugar!)

Worst of all I have developed Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome - a potentially infertility-causing syndrome directly related to high insulin levels and insulin resistance(recent medical journals are beginning to refer to it as a cause). This insulin resistance causes the body to starve at a cellular level (because the insulin cannot get sugar into the cell to be turned into energy) and then results in higher levels of insulin (because the bloodsugar levels remain high since it's not going into the cells and the pancreas pumps more out.) Many people with my syndrome are over-eaters and it's NOT a discipline thing - their body BELIEVES IT IS STARVING AT A CELLULAR LEVEL - as my nutritionist put it "Of course you can't stop yourself, if you could, you'd die"
This insulin resistant condition, if not checked, can lead to diabetes as, eventually, the pancreas simply cannot pump any more insulin because it has been so overworked - and it is cause d by too much sugar - an this means not just chocolates and sweets but LOW FAT non-foods we all know including dairy which are not only loaded with sugar for taste but when treated to remove fa are often simply sugar. My mother's favourite 'healthy diets' were Rosemary Stanton's anti-cancer diets: essentially vegetarian, high grain, lots of fresh fruit juices - which are, of course, sugar! (This woman is still considered Australia's authritative nutritionist and yet she has presided over the worst increase in obesity in history - it makes me sooo angry)

The last aspect of putting children on diets is psychological. Food when you are hungry (genuinely hungry) is a basic, animal need. If you tell a child she/he cannot eat when they are genuinely hungry there are visceral responses which gets right into the core of the child's psyche a) I am not safe, my parent cannot provide for me; and/or b) I am not worthy of even the most basic human needs - this one specifically arises when the child is denied food when they can see others eating around them and so they know it is available.
Think about that - think about how it feels to believe you are neither safe in the world, and that the person who should love you unconditionally thinks you are unworthy even of food in your stomach - how could you be worthy of anything else in your life. Trust me when I say this stuff lasts a life time.

The key to this is not to give the child food whenever they ask for it but to help the child to know when they are genuinely hungry and not to create excess hunger (which is genuine) by stimulating insulin over-production with sugary (which does not necessarily mean sweet) non-foods like chips, low-fat milk, white bread etc...

The sad truth is, my mother was probably desperate for me not to have the weight problems she believed she had (she started dieting and throwing up in her twenties when she hit 8stone, "a lady weighs 7 and a half stone") but the new diet industry had her just as muddled as we are now. It is no coincidence that the obesity epidemic and the weight-loss industry have grown together it is the industry that has CAUSED it.

It was in 2005 when at my highest weight that I walked into a nutritionists office and she saw my shape and said "let's check your insulin." Since the, with the help of metformin occasionally I have gradually lost 60 pounds - I still have about that to lose to be at a weight I believe I will be comfortable at but Ihave to do it carefully because it is so easy to switch back to my old 'dieting' obessessive/not eating behaviour.

Only eating regularly and good, whole foods can help you lose weight for good.
MOST IMPORTANTLY - only by destroying your/your child's body's natural homeostasis by eating non-foods and/or dieting can you get to the sort of weights which are truly unhealthy. IF ONLY someone had said to my mother - if youkeep her healthy she CAN'T become obese - but then, to my mother, obese was anything over 8 stone - sad but true and another issue.

[britjojo]

Thank you for your reply. It's good in a warped way to know that I am not alone, to know that someone else understands the feeling of watching others eat around them at a tender age, but being told that no, you are too fat. All you get is a piece of chicken breast.

I am not sure that I will ever truly leave this behind me. To this day my eating habits are bad, and I only really try to make them better for the sake of my daughter. I know that she will grow up with the eating habits that instil in her now, and that now is the time to get it right.

She is a very light eater, and she still nurses at 23 months. I think that this is the best way for me to start her on the right track because I believe that this is how we were designed to be-she will wean when she is ready. She's a big girl-90% for weight, but also for height-perfectly proportioned. Her size tells me that her diet is good enough to have her growing well and that since she is not disproportionate, that it must be fairly optimum.

Incidentally her favourite food is broccoli. I wish you well in your fight to leave those memories behind. That will be far harder than losing 60lbs.

[Vik...]

As it happens I'm 17, still living at home and my parents selectively starve me. I'm always feeling like I'm gonna pass out... and right now they're all sat in the living room eating a plate of chips. It's been like this for a few years, and I always looked forward to school because I got free meals (my parents are also unemployed with no good reason... but thats another matter) so lunchtimes at school used to be when I could eat.

Now I'm at college I don't get meals provided... sometimes if I have a quid I'll buy something, and sometimes I'll steal some food from the cupboard. SOMETIMES my dad buys me chocolate, which seems to be 1/2 of my whole diet... the other half being bread.

My parents never buy fruit or veg and i SERIOUSLY crave it... I would seriously kill for a decent cooked meal right now with chicken or fish, salad/veg, rice/pasta/potatoes.... anything warm and healthy actually. But my MUM doesn't like fruit/veg/chicken/spicy/too chewy/brown (like brown bread) etc... so we never are allowed any of it.

I don't know why she starves me in particular, and not even herself. Shes been told shes classed as "Slightly Obese", she has high blood pressure and cholesterol. But she always used me that I'm fat (I fluctuate between 9 - 9 1/2 stone, I'm 5'6", UK size 12) and shes always saying that she hates me too... so is it a hate thing or a weight thing? Because I know she certainly COULD feed me... she gets enough of the tax payers pound to do so :mad:

[kazscom]

I have to say that I am so shocked reading these stories.I am a mother and I try to get my kids to eat a mainly healthy diet.My motto is everything in moderation so aswell as fruit and vegetables my kids are given ice cream and chocolate.I think that this is a power issue.

[Noxic]

My parents made me eat healthy, I didn't get snacks if I didn't eat my dinner, but that is a little unfair for you. Putting you on the diet? There is enough research now to prove that diets do nothing, at least this can help kids now and in the future.

[websurfpro]

This is a bad mistake, the child should not be forced to eat something if he does not like it , he should have a diet of course but not a get fat diet , this is very unhealthy.

[LW75]

My children (now grown) were all very slender as children and teenagers. Two remained very slender. One (now in his twenties) has gained some weight around the middle recently - but at this point I don't see it as my doing.

Other than making sure I always kept only high-nutrition food and drinks in the house, I never saw food as a big issue when they were little. I let them have "sweeties" at birthday parties and for holidays, and I'd buy the the occasional candy bar or package of animal cookies when we were out at the store.

I tried to teach them that "sweeties" and other junk were fine to have occasionally and not something to be banned, but that the "regular" food we kept in the house was always healthy. I didn't present a complicated picture of food. I'd just say, "If its good for you we'll keep it in the house. If its doesn't offer nutrition we aren't keeping it in the house."

People don't develop over-eating habits as a result of the occasional candy bar. Its what they do on a regular basis.

I think if mothers don't over-feed their children and generally just make sure the food in the house is decent food it usually works out well. Mothers don't have to deprive children of food. My kids grew up to have pretty decent eating habits. (Even the one with the few extra pounds has only gained that because of a few too many iced lattes during the work week.)