Is a size 14 big?

Trouble is in that era it made me feel fat for being 10 to 10 and a half stone and a size 10/12 in clothes at 5'7" when actually I was super healthy and fit with great muscle tone had nothing to worry about. Particular when I could never get my legs in Levis as a teenager, it was awful, everything was cut for sparrow legs, not someone healthy and athletic. I felt I had to be thinner in my 20s and had to work very hard and eat very little to get down to 9 and a half stone, and I even went down to 8 and a half at once point (and was a UK size 4/6) because I thought my legs were still too muscular. It probably didn't do my metabolism any favours at all when I then put weight on having kids and have spent the last 20 years trying to get down to even normal BMI.

I'm so glad DDs don't have so many of those super skinny underweight gazelle legged only role models around and are happy being a slim healthy weight and fit and strong, and don't think that ten stone= fat.

Well, in the old days: 6 XS, 8 S, 10 M, 12 L 14 XL. Don’t know if this still holds but that’s how it is in my head…

I bet your mum would be delighted that you’ve put that on the Internet.

I'm a size 14 at 5 foot 7 and I'm overweight.

I entirely agree. I am someone who gets classed here as 'teeny tiny'. No, I am a normal, healthy weight, albeit finding it harder to maintain it in my 50s., but have always been a 6-8 and a healthy BMI. At a 10-12, I am fat, at a 14, obese.

I have a good appetite, but have always had to put up with people telling me I need a feed and to put on weight. No one likes being called massive, yet it seems to be ok to quite literally belittle people for not being overweight.

Size 16 may be UK average but that does not make it a good average or a healthy one. Especially as vanity sizing makes a 16 what would previously have been at least a 20. I was sorting out clothes for my mother recently. I found jumpers of hers from several decades ago labelled as a 20. She is a modern day 24. Those jumpers looked liked doll's clothes compared to her current wardrobe.

14 is definitely not large. I wear 14, sometimes stray in to 16 but I'm not large.

It's totally subjective and depends on height and general shape, how you carry the weight etc. as to whether you look 'big'.

You're a good height so I suspect you'll carry the weight pretty well. My tall friend wears 14-16 and I'd never have guessed she was 14-16 as she doesn't have a noticable tummy, or flabby legs/arms.

For me, I'm only 5ft 2' and I was recently in size 12 clothing, and that had me in the middle overweight BMI category and I did look like I was carrying more weight than I should be. When you're short there's just no where to hide it! I've lost some weight and in size 10 but only just back in healthy category. I really need to lose a bit more, and tend to look a decent size (as in slimish but certainly not skinny) at 8st 10ish.

At 5'7" for me the difference between a size 14 and size 10 (at which I will be at BMI 23) is a couple of stone in weight and only a few inches in terms of the space you take up in the world.

At a size 14 I take up far less space than the average man on a train or aeroplane and can comfortably sit in a normal seat without spilling over or spreading my shoulders, arms or legs around, and I can easily buy comfortable clothes to fit and look nice in. Yes, I am losing weight for my health and I feel better being lighter, but the actual size I was a few months ago was nothing anyone else should be angry or upset about.

I have friends with young adult daughters and they like to gush about about how they are 'skinny minnies' and size 8, as if they are little sparrows. Themselves being plump menopausal women, I guess it's all relative. But I know these girls and while they are slim compared to so many of their peers who are frankly obese, they're not exactly what you could accurately describe as skinny. 30 years ago they'd have been slightly on the heavier side of average.

You only have to look at photos of people back in the 50s through to the 80s to see that almost everyone looked exceptionally slim compared to now, and the younger they were the more noticable it is. Women getting properly fat before they'd had children was virtually unheard of. As a teen and young adult in the 80s I was always one of the fatter ones in my friendship group, but looking back at photos I know I'd be buying a size 8 today, if I were that age and size now. The difference is, I'd be one of the 'skinny' ones.

Before the nineties, if you needed to buy anything above a size 18 (and remember an old size 18 would be more like a 14 now) you'd have to go to Evans Outsize, as it was called then. It was pretty much the only option available.

Places like Etam, Chelsea Girl, the early days of Next etc, would not stock anything that would fit anyone bigger than today's size 14 because there wasn't enough call for it. That really puts it into perspective, doesn't it, what has happened to us in just 30 years?

I remember getting weighed and measured at the doctors when I was 20 and he wrote 'obese' on my notes. I weighed about 9 to 9.5 stone and I am 5' 3".

That's not true at all, I am a size 14 and comfortably in healthy range for BMI. Not everyone is 5'2".

I think a 14 is quite big, but only because I am the same height as you and weigh about 58kg and am a size 8. I have been 5kg heavier and a size 10 and I start to look a bit plump. But, I have a tiny frame so don't carry weight well. I can imagine someone with a bigger frame carrying it better.

I really feel this. Exactly the same here. And yes, sometimes I feel ok and other times I think, fucking hell, need to lose weight.

OH joked that I should use the cigarette diet I used as a student, but I’m not overweight enough for the weight to be worse than the fags 😂

I don’t think it’s possible to attribute a thought process to an entire society. Inevitably some people will have lost sight of it, others won’t. That’s the main reason I find the statement such an irksome cliche.

However, I would also suggest that some people tend to conflate greater acceptance of larger sizes and availability of clothes in those sizes with ‘having lost sight of what a healthy weight is’. To me the concepts are very different because one is about health and the other about social perceptions and stigma.

I dont think aiming for a healthy weight means we need to be shredded, does it?

Well as I said happiness matters. So if you increase to a size that signficantly impacts your health and ability to do things independently then most likely your happiness will start to decline, hence it starts to matter.

Also it's ridiculous to say acceptance of fat is toxic. You do realise as we age our metabolism changes, and combined with the increased responsibilities means most people put on weight? Shall we beat ourselves up at this point, or spend the little remaining energy and resources we have trying to strive for a shredded body?

Sizes are very variable these days. I have size 14 jeans I can fit in to and size 18 jeans that I can't.

I think it depends where you buy your size 14 from

I'm a 10/12 but if I buy a 14 from Primark it fits ok. If I buy from M & S its too big

I think sizing is very dependant on how much fabric is used !! And different brands cut their cloth differently imo

It's like bras.....actually don't get me started on bloody bras! I'm a 32F at M & S and they fit me perfectly. I've stopped buying bras elsewhere as I'm not a 32F anywhere else!

Truthfully, I think we know if we're too big. Asking the question doesn't make us any smaller !

I weigh 10 stone 3 and I'm 5 ft 9.

If I put on 7 pounds, I know I'm too big (for me)

Are you 2ft 0? Yes 14 is big

Are you 6ft 2? No 14 is small

do you ever wonder how much your boobs weigh and contribute to your overall weight? I often wonder this as mine have got bigger and bigger since having kids (had last one 13 years ago). I’m fed up with them as they prevent you from wearing some lovely thIngs

I'm a size 16 but I'm 5'10''. My goal is a 14 and I have huge boobs so tiny sizes don't work for me (I was an 8 for a year at 25).
I'm classed as overweight now having lost six stone.
Try a stone off over a few months if you feel it will make you more comfortable. It took me three years to lose my weight but I did it for my health.

How big you look definitely depends on who you surround yourself with. And yes statistically if your friends gain weight, you are more likely too.

It’s overweight. I’m the same height and look big at size 14. I’m overweight currently. If you compare yourself to those around you, you might not feel big, but that’s because so many people are overweight.

But you’ll look big in a “slimmer” country such as Italy or Denmark.

Size 14 isn’t large but it’s probably not relevant anyway. We only really feel confident when we’re happy in ourselves and we all have different points where that happens. I’m like you and am happier at a certain weight or look (I stay at size 12 at all kind of weights) but I know I look and feel different at each of these.
ive been feeling like you for many months and failing to get traction with the weight loss, often getting confused by the varying weigh loss bad fitness advice out there on socials.
Tgis week though I’ve made a change and a bit has come off every day. I’m using MyFitnessPal to stick to my weight loss calorie amount, and walking every day at least 12000 steps and drinking a tonne of water. I am pretty much hitting my protein target too which is 140g by having a protein shake for breakfast, chicken or tuna and egg salad for lunch and soemthing like chilli with 120g rice for tea. I don’t eat anything else in between. I’m also trying to lift weights 3 times a week. This has all coincided with me starting to take perimenopause supplements which have made me feel like my old self again. I suppose that’s exactly what’s important to me these days- feeling like myself.
weekends are a challenge for me but I’ll only drink gin and slimline tonics at a bbq and meet and salad. I’ve got enough of a deficit going to accommodate those this week.
its a tough thing to get back into but nothing will make me feel better than feeling myself again I realise x

Do you think it’s true then?

I'm 5'7" and I've lost just over a stone recently and have gone from a BMI 29 to 26. Size 12s are roomy and I feel great but I didn't feel or look massive at a size 14.