Your height makes no difference

[Thechase]

Seen a few threads now saying the op is only 5’3 if they were taller they wouldn’t be overweight. I’m 6’0 but have grown up this way like everybody else has grown into their body. I’m overweight by 1.5 stone but I never think we’ll it’s ok because if I was 5’3 I’d be obese

I'm really short. If you're short the NHS gives you an acceptable healthy range of around 2st, (although obviously depends on build, I know I would look quite chubby at the upper end and it's the weight I was the day I gave birth) if you're 5'8 there is a 3st variance of acceptable weight , if you're 6'5 it's about 4st!

It really is easier if you're tall, and I say that as a tall woman who struggles a bit with her weight. If my mum, who's 5'2, ate what I eat she'd not be a bit podgy as I am, she'd be obese. Most of my friends with similar BMIs to me have a lot fewer treats. Needing more calories to maintain is just clearly a nicer position to be in.

@Thechase

Seen a few threads now saying the op is only 5’3 if they were taller they wouldn’t be overweight. I’m 6’0 but have grown up this way like everybody else has grown into their body. I’m overweight by 1.5 stone but I never think we’ll it’s ok because if I was 5’3 I’d be obese

Spoken like a true tall person who literally has no idea what it's like being short and how weight gain is distributed when there's less of you.

I'm 5'0 and currently 7 stone 11.5, which is about 5lbs heavier than I like to be. If you were my weight, you'd be unhealthily thin.

I didn't 'grow into my body'. I was a pretty chubby teenager as a result of not enough exercise and a terrible diet (my mother thought nothing of microwaving four medium sized potatoes and serving them to me with so much butter they floated). I am the weight I am now because I am (mostly) careful with what I eat and exercise a damn sight more. I put on over a stone in the last two years because I let the old habits slip in, but am finally getting back to where I'm happiest.

You grew up, and kept growing until you reached the height you are, just like my 6'2 DH. But I stopped growing at 15.

As @Redcups64 said You try and maintain a weight at 8 stone (my fit brother weighed that at just 15 years old!) as a full grown adult!! It’s hard!! We have to eat less as we are smaller, doesn’t make us any less hungrier though that a full sized adult, but put on juts 5lbs and you can massively notice you have gained weight

I have a HUGE appetite. I can easily clear the same sized plate of food as my DH. More sometimes even. I eat big portions three times a day and will snack in between. But because of this huge appetite, I have to consider what I'm eating. I haven't got enough mass to make a weight gain of 7lbs unnoticeable. You're going to see it on me pretty quickly. On the other side of the coin, I'm over half a stone down since starting to watch my intake again and it's noticeable very quickly which is nice.

So the point of my post was regardless you know what your body does and doesn’t need to maintain a healthy weight and has nothing to do with your height. It’s the way I have grown so for people to say you don’t notice a 6lb gain you do I have clothes ranging in 14-18 and I certainly do not distribute it any better

It works the other way too. I’m tall and fat and have to lose about two stone to drop a dress size/be noticeably thinner. I work with someone short who announced she was on a diet because she could get into her old clothes if she lost 8lbs. Whereas I’m pretty sure I could lose 8lb in a fortnight if I really tried, and look exactly the same.

I was pregnant at the same time as a friend who is probably about 5'8. (I'm about 5ft) She was a few months behind me but said she'd put on 1.5 st from snacking by the time she was about 5 months pregnant. She barely even looked pregnant, just like she'd put on a few pounds. I put on less than 1.5st throughout pregnancy and looked like a space hopper on legs by the end of it.

Also at my ideal weight I’m a size 14, so when I gain weight I’m immediately plus size, but if I was short I’d probably be a size 8 at a healthy weight and 14 when obese, and still be able to find clothes easily.

This is a fair point, and a downside. The other big downside is that it's easy to feel bad about weighing 'so much' or being 'such a big size' even when it's proportionate to your weight - at university I felt hugely self-conscious about being two stone heavier and two dress sizes bigger than my friends even though I was as slim as them, proportionately - they used to share their size 8 clothes between them and I'd feel like a heffalump!

I still think it's easier to be tall than short when it comes to maintaining weight, though, overall.

Totally agree. My weight has varied by a stone or so for the past couple of decades - nobody really notices because I'm quite tall. If short friends put on a stone it is a great deal more obvious.

@Thechase

So the point of my post was regardless you know what your body does and doesn’t need to maintain a healthy weight and has nothing to do with your height. It’s the way I have grown so for people to say you don’t notice a 6lb gain you do I have clothes ranging in 14-18 and I certainly do not distribute it any better

It has everything to do with height. See all comments about hunger and portion sizes. We're still as hungry as tall people, but in order to not be hungry, we have to work harder to burn off those calories.

@Mothermorph

It works the other way too. I’m tall and fat and have to lose about two stone to drop a dress size/be noticeably thinner. I work with someone short who announced she was on a diet because she could get into her old clothes if she lost 8lbs. Whereas I’m pretty sure I could lose 8lb in a fortnight if I really tried, and look exactly the same.

I was pregnant at the same time as a friend who is probably about 5'8. (I'm about 5ft) She was a few months behind me but said she'd put on 1.5 st from snacking by the time she was about 5 months pregnant. She barely even looked pregnant, just like she'd put on a few pounds. I put on less than 1.5st throughout pregnancy and looked like a space hopper on legs by the end of it.

I do think that, most of the time and all other things being equal (obviously not if the tall woman has a specific condition, etc) pregnancy is a lot easier if you're tall just because it's so much more spread out over you and you have a bigger frame to carry it. I found it much easier to keep active than most of the short women I know who seemed to struggle just moving their bump about by the end. I genuinely couldn't understand what people were on about when they said they 'had to stop driving because the bump got in the way' until I realised that it was just that my legs were so much longer - I hadn't realised until I looked that short women end up with no lap at the end of pregnancy. My bump never stuck out as far just because there was more room on my torso, and I guess that's why I never got stretch marks and my stomach is pretty unchanged. I do think it's easier when you've got more space for the bump.

It does give you more leeway. However much of it is about how much we are used to eating, and it doesn’t take much more calories per day to start putting on weight.

We're still as hungry as tall people

I don't think this is true, though? Surely if your body needs 1800 you're hungrier after 1500 calories than someone whose body needs 1400 to fuel then for the day? The advantage is, though, that if you need 1800 you can blow 400 of them on cake without starving yourself for the rest of the day more easily than if you only need 1400.

Surely tall people are in general hungrier though, just as men need more calories as they are bigger and so have bigger appetites. I'm sure lots of short people can eat a lot but I do think that's partly habit and how you've trained your body over time. I can definitely eat as much as my husband at a one off meal but on a daily basis I don't need or want as much as him. I can't imagine the 6ft woman I work with is less/similarly hungry to my colleagues who are a little over 5ft, they surely have smaller appetites overall.

Totally agree with most other posters... If you're shorter, you have less to 'play with' weight wise... It'll be far more noticeable, far more quickly if you put weight on. And it's harder to maintain a slim body on a short frame. I'm 5ft 2 and my maintenance calories are around 1300 a day. My friend, who's 6ft 1, has a maintenance of 2300 a day. We're both as hungry as each other.

It's got nothing to do with 'what you're used to', it's just a fact

. I found it much easier to keep active than most of the short women I know who seemed to struggle just moving their bump about by the end. I genuinely couldn't understand what people were on about when they said they 'had to stop driving because the bump got in the way' until I realised that it was just that my legs were so much longer - I hadn't realised until I looked that short women end up with no lap at the end of pregnancy.

There was about 2" between my bump and the steering wheel when I had DC 1. I felt like I'd got a new, more spacious car the first time I drove after they were born!!😂

Height makes a massive difference.

Yes but I’m overweight by 1.5 stone but I never think we’ll it’s ok because if I was 5’3 I’d be obese I understood the OP to mean that your height is no relevance to her health and vice versa.

So say I'm 5'3 and obese. What's the point of her saying "that's ok, at 6'0 you'd only be overweight? It's not like I'm ever going to grow to 6'0. So height is irrelevant because it's her height and not mine.

I'm 5ft 2 and my maintenance calories are around 1300 a day. My friend, who's 6ft 1, has a maintenance of 2300 a day. We're both as hungry as each other.

Obviously you can't ever know how hungry another person is - perhaps your 'mildly hungry' is their 'starving' - but I find it very unlikely that your friend doesn't get hungrier than you on the same amount of food given that she needs not far off twice as much as you. I would guess what you mean is that you both fancy a treat to the same extent and I agree that this is tougher on you, as it's a lot easier to fit doughnuts into your diet if you've got 2300 calories to play with than if you've got 1300.

Just to throw into the mix that a 35” leg measurement on a 6’0 person doesn’t make them look like a frog or notable in any other way.

Hungrier or not, an adult McDonald’s meal is the same no matter what height you are. Fish and chips portions. A pint. The amount of milk in your coffee (which adds tons of calories throughout the day). All that is the same no matter what height you are.

Basically short people should just throw half their dinner away because it’s all based on 2000 calories a day which if I ate, I’d be the size of a house.

Exactly that. Portion sizes are a fucker. We’re brought up to eat what we are given and no one at all gives a short woman a half portion in a restaurant. It’s considered rude to eat half. And besides, I bloody love food. If I go out for dinner with my six foot friend or my six foot two dh, I am served the same portion size.
It’s bloody depressing to eat the same as your mate and end up obese. And bloody depressing to constantly have to mither about whether you should or shouldn’t eat something all the bloody time just because you are short.
As literally everything in the world is man-sized, short people are just assumed to be little fatties with no self control.
Tall people haven’t got a fucking clue.

I think what you're meaning is that if you look at percentage body weight.

If you are 5' and 10% over your ideal body weight, then it's the same as if you are 6' and 10% over your ideal body weight.

However the ideal body weight for 5' and 6' would vary by quite a bit.
Quick check and an ideal body weight at 5' is about 7stone.
At 6' it is nearly 11 stone.

So someone who is 3 stone overweight at 5' is over 40% too heavy.
Someone who is 3 stone overweight at 6' is around 25% too heavy.

It does make a difference. When I'm overweight people still think I'm slim because the weight is distributed over a bigger area. I'm six foot.

Are more short people overweight? Genuine question. Because if what lots of PPs are saying is true, short people would have to try considerably harder than tall people to have a healthy BMI and it would mean on average taller people would not be overweight to the same extent. Do tall overweight people have less willpower than short overweight ones? I'm not sure that's that case.

I know more short overweight people than I do tall ones.

But that could be because my family are all short and mostly overweight.