To not know whether people are getting fatter or thinner?

[giantwaterbottle]

I am trying to lose weight (again!) and I can't figure out whether people (in the developed world) are getting thinner or fatter. I keep reading that the population is obese/getting fat but then it seems like their are so many gym bunnies and slim people around (although I will say this is mainly on social media/TikTok) but there seems to be such a weight loss/health kick about where everyone looks tiny and fit, and is wearing corsets and amazing cosmetics and just generally looks amazing, but is the opposite the reality? And if so how do people feel about this!? Does it make you want to just give up before you even begin? I don't know..I can't figure it all out. I do think when I go out I see quite a lot of larger people but also loads of young very slim and fit people.

You only need to look at the contests on TV quiz shows to see that the general public are getting fatter

Tv adverts have started to use overweight children I’ve noticed. The Christmas themed song one for the holiday company and then I saw one this morning where the dad is doing some dance with his daughter and she is fat. Like others when I was at junior school there was one overweight child in the year. Like others have said though, seventies and early eighties food was awful, we also didn’t have the calorific drinks that are half your calorie intake for the day.

People are getting fatter. Yes of course there are lots of slim people around but they're just normal (as in the weight people should be). If you look at photos from the 1940s you'll see that everyone was slim. Compared to them it seems that most people are now overweight.

People seem to be very fit and toned muscle obviously using a gym or obese.

When I think back to the parents when I was a kid none were fat, but none were a physically toned as the gym bunny's now.

@emmathedilemma , but I don't think anyone wearing a size 16 is going to be in the healthy BMI range.

There will be plenty of women wearing a size 16 who are in the healthy BMI range. Size 16 isn't big, unless the wearer is short.

I'm about average height for a UK woman and would definitely not be in the BMI healthy range, but if I were, say 5'10, I might well be

I’m5’9 and would absolutely be overweight at current size 16.

people have totally lost touch with reality on this

I guess it also depends on which shops size 16, a Topshop 16 maybe no but a generous M&S 16 you must be obese (yes I am a fatty in a M&S 16)

Our basic frames are certainly changing. If you compare dress sizes of those who completed puberty pre-80’s to those now theres a noticeable change in shape and size of even slim people. Thats largely due to better nutrition. Malnutrition in childhood and puberty leads to a more delicate frame. A famous example is Audrey Hepburn. Although the effects on food shortages from WWII ended with rationing the habits didn’t such as portioning and cooking methods (and also contributed to the reputation the UK has for crap food).

Actual obesity is high and rising. Sedentary lifestyles don’t help the existing problem of an abundance of calorie laden foods.

I also have a pet theory that central heating has impacted obesity levels. Bodies burn a fair amount of energy keeping warm.

The seeds were sown for the obesogenic society we have today in the 1980s and 1990s.

DD1 is slimmer and a couple of stone lighter than I was aged 16 in 1992. DD2 is light and taller than me. Probably helps that they don't have chocolate and crisp vending machines in school any more, plus a tuck shop, plus an ice cream van selling sweets that comes in every day!

They won't because too many people say it's fat shaming if you dared to say they aren't a size 10. We have made it this way, plus by saying that being overweight or 'curvy' is normal and should be admired. You should love your body and yourself, but it's almost like people want more fat people around. The average age that people die at is not going higher now, it will likely start decreasing soon. Then people might start realising that what they've done is wrong, but it will be too late for many by then. They'll already have died.

I know I'm overweight, so I'm going to the gym and eating healthier. If you can't afford a gym, you can walk or jog outside, that costs nothing. It's not easy at all, but forgot the benefit of living longer, not having aches and pains through arthritis and maybe even needing surgery, it's worth it.

I was about the same weight (9st) from about 16 to 24. Walked or got train everywhere.
Train was 15min to station, 15mins to work. So hours walking a day. Full fat coke and Mars bar with lunch 😋

I moved jobs bought a car and gained a stone in 3months before I ditched my coke and Mars. I stopped gaining but have never lost that stone.

I got the shock of my life when I saw some childhood pictures from the 1970s of a barbecue party my parents had.

You see, my parents’ friend was ABSOLUTELY ENORMOUS and my sister and I would have to run away as we got the giggle when he took his top off one glorious summer barbecue as he was SO fat. Ditto his wife. And to a lesser extent, their young adult children.

And now I see the pictures in 2022, the ABSOLUTELY ENORMOUS man seems merely overweight, his wife normal, the adult children slim and my parents, me and my siblings unhealthily stick thin.

I was stunned to see how much my perceptions have changed. Over time and I was not even aware they had

I walk more than that every day. I am not 9 stone!

It wasn't just smoking that kept people slim in the 70s. Lots of people didn't smoke in any case.
Portions now are huge compared to then. Eg a few years ago on Mumsnet someone posted a picture of a small sponge cake, probably a 6inch cake that would have been divided into six or eight portions in the 70s. There was much sniggering from posters about how they could eat that themselves in one go or have at best two portions.
And yes, supermarkets stock aisles full of jumbo-sized bags of snacks because the demand is there. They wouldn't stock them if they weren't popular.

As a child in the 60s and 70s it was rare to see a bigger person - they were usually older women ("grannies") but they weren't all that big compared with now. Most people were skinny compared to now. Look at old photos of groups or crowds and you'll see it too. Food was a lot simpler and there weren't the snacks, plus it was more regular to walk everywhere you wanted to go. It worries me that any talk of size is met with cries of fatshaming - the current situation cannot be good for people.

Yes - and as a child of the 1970s, there was no such thing as eating between meals or a fruit bowl for snacking on. It was usual to get hungry before meals and just have to wait until meal times. (Mind you, you also finished what was on your plate)

We grew up without a car, walked miles, and played out everyday, as well as swimming, cycling etc, we would be out for hours at quite a young age, no mobile phones, and just go home when hungry, no snacks inbetween meals, by meal time we would be ravenous. Also we seemed to do more PE at school which l loved esp cross country running, not sure they do so much of that now.
We were all skinny as rakes.

This makes me sad, and it sounds like you don't have a very positive relationship with your own body - to proudly declare that you will be on a diet 2 weeks after childbirth doesn't make you sound healthy, it makes you sound the very opposite. After childbirth you should want to focus on your beautiful new baby and doing nothing but having snuggles. It never crossed my mind to go on a diet 14 days after giving birth (and I say that as someone who weighed less after labour than I did before I was pregnant as I have always looked after my body, so no, I'm not a fatty before you go down some kind of superiority cul de sac).

Instead of going on a diet, maybe concentrate on being healthy and recovering

A lot of people, while the right weight, were unhealthy in the 1970s to 1990s - most men over 40 looked like Mr Peanut. A round belly on skinny legs.

I can't see us getting thinner as a nation any time soon. People have to work more to keep up with a general standard of living, life is stressful, and processed, easy meals are cheap. I try to meal plan and cook from scratch but after a long hard shift I regularly fall back on frozen, processed meals.

I do think the body positivity movement is terrible for society in general. I am in the obese BMI range but I am a size 14 which is under the UK average size 16. I know I am unfit and unhealthy (I have been making changes over the last month and lost a small amount of weight) but will be told by family members that I don't need to make changes and I am fine as I am. We will all be eating ourselves into an early grave whilst our perception of "normal" size changes to stop us fattys from being offended.

@DrunkAndAlone2 apologies, the 2 weeks timeframe you gave in your post was when you are due to give birth - apparently you intend to get back dieting "straight away", which is even worse

I do think there needs to be a bit more balance in the way people in general talk about weight issues. There's a real cultural problem in the UK of not saying things directly but talking behind backs and I don't think it helps. I'm overweight and I know that none of my friends would ever tell me that to my face, or imply it either, out of politeness. I wouldn't say it to them either. That's not the case in lots of other (thinner) countries where it's more normal to be honest and direct and not taken as deliberate nastiness. I'm not saying we should adopt a culture of open fatshaming, but I think we are very much more sensitive to plainspeaking here which is not helpful. Obesity is very much treated as an issue of personal accountability and it clearly isn't- its economic and societal. That means that the government and also communities are the only way of treating it effectively, which won't happen if everyone is too polite to say 'well, yes you could lose a stone' when their friend cough, I asks if they look like they've gained weight.

I think the long hours & commutes people have don't really help. It makes people just want to bung in the oven something pre-prepared.

Hours must play a part in it.
Look at nurses for example they are in a fairly active job, and understand healthy eating so in theory they should all be 1970s stick insects. But a very high percentage are overweight / obese.

It has to be something to do with the food they are eating. 12 hr shifts plus commute, must play a part in it.

People are getting fatter, most definitely.
I am 49. When I was growing up in the 70’s my Grandmother was told by her doctors that she was very overnight, when in fact she was a size 16, that was seen as big in those days.
I don’t remember many very overweight people at all and if you look at archive films on YouTube, of people going about their business, shopping in towns etc there will be virtually no obese people, of course they existed but were not the norm like they are today.
The rise of quick and easy UPF obviously hasn’t helped alongside the excessive consumption of alcohol and constant snacking and grazing people do now.
When I was growing up, most of my friends mums were SAHM and would have the time to prepare meals from scratch.
If you are fairly young and growing up in these times when obesity is seen as normal you won’t have any concept that this is a new phenomenon and really not how a healthy human body should be.
Obesity seems to be glorified now (especially on SM), it’s as though it should be accepted as the norm. We are heading for such a huge health crisis in the next decade or so, it’s so very worrying.

Obesity is a socioeconomic issue as much as it is a health issue. Children are such a clear marker.

My child is on the smaller side for their age, always has been but I also encourage eating well and being active.

My stepchildren (it’s only been truly apparent since we all began living together), less so. Free for all of crisps, chocolate, full fat fizzy drinks, double helpings of adult sized meals. The eldest is in year 6, weighs more than I do and can more than any adult male I had previously met. Another is similar. Only the youngest is busy and active, eating normal portions etc. It is clear this is an area my partner and I differ in, which is a tricky line to tread.