Something started me thinking about girls and eating this evening.

Actually, I noted the other day, DS has started rugby at 5, but with the world cup on now, DH is an ex rugby player and talking to some of the other dads, they were talking about if it was 'healthy' for most boys to be trying to acheive that bodyshape - basically, it's considered a bad thing for children to be weight lifting and trying to put on a lot of muscle when their bones are still growing as the heavy muscles effect how the bones grow, this is obviously an issue more for boys as boys are still growing at a much older age than girls, but while still growing, teenage boys are not just working out a little, but trying to create that massive shape at really very low level clubs.

It struck me as it's something I've only heard parents of girls who dance or are gymnasts talk about in the past.

It does really depend on the sport - few girls dancing would be 'naturally' that thin if they didn't control their diets and exercise routines to get that bodyshape, but also just look at the international rubgy players now, very few will naturally have that bulky bodyshape either - that's a lot of training and protein heavy diets for a long time.

I guess it's more noticable because girls do stop growing a lot younger, but also stop playing as much sports so don't burn weight in the same way. Plus it's interesting, I hear people talking about their DS's emptying the fridge , but their DD's emptying the buscuit barrel/snack foods. My DCs are only 5 and 2 now, but DS definately has a much less sweet tooth than DD.

It could be less sugary foods looks like more 'bulk' - as said upthread, you can get 300 cals from one chocolate bar, but that doesn't look like a lot of food, whereas a ham sandwich is also around the 300 cal mark (or less) and would be viewed as more like 'another meal'.

According to the chart linked to, an 18 year old boy needs 700 calories more than an 18 year old girl. That's a whole large extra meal a day.

At the same time there are massive issues around girls and food. I don't think we've worked out how to address food issues to a group susceptible to malnutrition, eating disorders and obesity at the same time.

I think wrt sport it really depends on the nature of the activity - obviusly some are much more body-fascist than others, and also anythign involving a weight limit like lightweight categories can be very problematic.

But all the serious teenage athletes I know are definitely not just chucking in calories because they know they'll burn it off, they are careful about ensuring they get the right mix of protein, carbs and vegetables. They eat a lot, but it's all high-quality stuff. I spend a lot of time baking cakes and cereal bars that are heavy on fruit/nuts/seeds/oats - it's definintely not about eating crap just because you can.

Did anyone say they would still comment on a girl's consumption? The OP said that she might have if her daughter ate the way her son did ,which seems an odd thing to say as there are usually posters on here saying they want to treat their daughters equally.

But actually, I think we react exactly the same admittedly overthinking middle class paranoid way as our friends who have a plump older boy with a skinny younger sister That's a fair point.

I thought about sport =healthy attitude to food. Not really for the examples given and also shovelling in lots of calories because you know can burn them off doesn't seem a particularly healthy attitude either.

lancie it's tricky.

I have been comfortable with not mentioning my DD's good consumption because she is thin. Were she not, I might have had to address it even if I were concerned how that might impact upon her on other (negative) ways.

Interestingly, some people have said they would still comment on principle.

I dunno.

I did wonder if we were being vastly sexist in trying to keep a wary eye on what DD (always nudging overweight) was eating, relative to her brothers (one very underweight and unwilling to eat, one skinny but healthy who can eat for Britain).

But actually, I think we react exactly the same admittedly overthinking middle class paranoid way as our friends who have a plump older boy with a skinny younger sister.

Like if we went to an all you can eat buffet, I probably wouldn't even notice how much people were eating. But with normal meals my tendency is to want to save leftovers. I love having a fridge full of leftovers. It makes me feel really secure and happy.

Which bit lightbulb? If it's the "gap between satiated and overfull" then I have been thinking and I think that's more of an after effect of poverty than an actual moral idea about food. Because I realised that when I am sure there is ample food, it doesn't bother me. But when somebody overeating means others will get less, or means that shopping/cooking has to be repeated sooner then it makes me feel really anxious. That's not gendered (except that I tend to notice men doing it more than women), it's just an overhang I think of being anxious to have enough food.

I wouldn't necessarily agree with sport creating healthy relationships with food. My mother is an athlete and she has a horrible eating habits. She eats far too little to support her exercise because she doesn't want to get "bulky" and she ends up sick all the time.

I also recently got into weightlifting and the diets some weightlifters are on (men and women) are horribly restrictive and obsessive.

My family has always grown their own fruit, veg, eggs and meat and we were comfortably off

It was very little to do with actual need, and more to do with it not being "done" for girls and women to show that they had needs - it would be considered selfish

Oh goodness yes, agreed re gymnasts and dancers

I hated sport , thought it was boring and pointless and avoided it wherever possible , still do

Possibly the fact my mother couldn't be bothered cooking for any of us, so it was up to my grandfather and me to make do for ourselves and my little brother, helped. My grandfather loved good food and I expect going from not well off in his childhood to comfortably off meant he wasn't going to be rationing it for anyone.

Possibly also we grew a lot of our fruit and vegetables and our own chickens and dairy cows might have factored in.

Sport is definitely the way to overcome the bad attitudes to food. My cousin's kids do high level sport as well No134 and they have a very sensible attitude to food because as you say it's fuel for their bodies.

I have missed out on all this. I have always eaten like a pig, asked for seconds and pudding seconds too, and I've probably been happily oblivious to any judgements or dirty looks. Benefit of being slightly socially unaware I suppose!

The thing about the family income relying on men doing physical work - don't forget that the family also relied on women doing very physical work too, it was just less likely to be (directly) financially remunerated

I don't think the biological stuff (tv population level) is in question here, it's just where it is being used to justify different treatment of boys and girls that is disproportionate to their actual differences in needs, and can do lasting damage

My teenage dd does very high level sport (2 training sessions a day kind of level) and their official daily energy requirement is 4000 calories.

Her teenage brother is probably on not much less, even though he's not quite so active, but is still growing like a weed.

So I do have frequent opportunity to gawp at the sheer quantities of food consumed in our house, especially when they're home all day over the holidays. I'm lucky inasmuch as I'm an equal opps food-gawper, but I know this is unusual. Dd's squad are very matter of fact about their bodies, they are weighed regularly as part of monitoring their performance, and they are completely unselfconscious about it because they are so used to seeing their bodies as high-performance machines.

I think this is a great attitude to be able to have, and sad that so few girls are able to stick two fingers up at society judging them on how they look rather than how they perform.

Inicked and Curiouser it is shocking from our modern perspective isn't it?

My Grandma told me that when she was pg during the war, she was entitled to extra meat rations. But usually had to give them to her Dad (she lived at home until the war was over) as "he was a man and had to go to work"

My teenage brothers definitely ate more than me: they would demolish rounds and rounds of toast after school and then eat a proper meal afterwards. But they are much bigger than me (both 6' as adults, I'm around 5'5") and played a lot of sport (I'm not sporty at all, although fairly active. I don't remember there being many opportunities to do sport if you weren't sporty when I was kid - for either boys or girls?)

Also I (like a lot of girls I think?) had stopped growing by my early teens, whereas my brothers were just hitting their growth spurts.

So I am pretty sure that some of this is biology.

I understand what you mean about societal pressures. I have friends who are obsessive about calories and low fat/carb/whatever is in fashion this week. I don't really eat like that or have a sweet tooth but have always been a healthy weight. I don't see many, if any, men who give diet the same level of attention.

With my own dcs, we've never really done snacks much - they know they can grab an apple after school if they feel peckish. The youngest is definitely having a growth spurt at the moment and is hard to fill up. I would certainly be keeping a watchful eye if I thought any of them were overweight, as it is they are all slim. This is regardless of gender. I want them to grow up with a healthy relationship with food.

Inicked that is really shocking. I suppose if you are living in poverty and your income relies on the men doing heavy work then it makes sense, but it still seems really shocking. Not only that the men get bigger portions, but that you had to wait for them to finish, and have seconds, before eating is astonishing.

You people would love to go through pregnancy in France, where you are expected to show up at the obstetrician's office once a month to be groped, prodded ("checking that the cervix is closed"), weighed, and told "Careful what you eat, or you will be fat and miserable after the birth".

Reading some of these, is it any wonder women are more prone to eating disorders, especially binge eating?