to consider my grandma’s theory on why we’re all fatter?

[bagelbreath]

My grandma swears up and down that although food and movement are obviously big factors to the massive weight gain of the country, heating is also very important.

While she lived in a cold house, wore stockings and dresses year round, and spent a lot of time outside, we all sit toasty in our well heated and insulated houses. Her theory is that it took lots of energy to stay warm then vs now.

Is it crazy? I kind of think it makes sense

I think this is one of the factors. Crisp packets are those massive ‘grab bags’ now. A cake is a massive muffin, not a little fairy cake.

And lack of movement. People drive everywhere. And being busy. Before I had kids I was a smug arse who walked or cycled everywhere. Now I am a working parent I drive as time is my most precious commodity. I just don’t have the time to walk or cycle. Those are now leisure pursuits, not my mode of travel.

There are a lot of factors. For one thing they would never have popped out for a McDonald’s in those days, they wouldn’t have ordered a takeaway on a Saturday night. They wouldn’t have stopped off at Starbucks whilst doing their grocery shopping like folk do these days.

On top of this, they walked everywhere. There was no 5 minute drive to the local coop - it would have been a half hour walk.

Id say this stuff is a bigger contributing factor than the heating

I think you literally need to be shivering in order burn significant calories so don't think granny's theory holds up, even if a large proportion of food intake goes into keeping the body at an even temperature.

Most likely processed foods. I think it's been debunked that we are less active now than in the past and exercise doesn't burn that much anyway.

Weight is all lost in the kitchen (medical conditions aside) so is most likely down to our diets. Too many ready meals and processed crap that's full of fillers/sugar to make them cheap. Sadly it hits the poor disproportionately, hence the larger numbers of obese.

I live on a very old house with single glazing. The inside temperature is pretty much the outside temperature. I've only put on weight since living here. So, no, I don't think she's right otherwise I'd be able to fit into my jeans 😂😂

Think it’s a combination of things. Coldness would have burned more energy, but it’s so much easier to consume excessive calories when processed crap is so widely available.

I don’t think it’s the main factor but she has a point, imagine going outside to the toilet in the winter with no heating (that’s what my Mum and Dad had to do). We didn’t have full heating until I was about 6 and I feel the cold a lot less than most people and hate being too hot,
keeping warm does take more energy. I never have heating on in the bedroom and wake up starving!

To be fair there is probably something in this. I lived in Canada for a while. I arrived in the summer and noticed ppl were much slimmer there. I thought nothing of it until the -45°C winter hit which lasted from November untill February. I lost A LOT of weight that summer and hadn't adjusted my eating habits at all.

Chocolate "share" bags. They were not about back in the days of no heating, nor were massive aisles of CHOCOLATE.

As dozens of posters have already said

Our frames are much bigger we are not simply fatter. My grandmother was 4ft 11 and I am 5ft 7. My lean body mass is 65kg and I am meant to weigh 65-75kg. My husband has such large lungs, he has to have two taken and blows over a900 peak flow. We are using an out dated system in bodies that are simply more advanced and bigger. Fatter is the wrong term.

Back then there simply wasn’t an unlimited supply of food on offer. We ate at mealtimes, very little snacking. There really was very little junk food.

I blame uber eats and technology

Good point Toria

Also the shops used to shut at 5pm or 5.30pm and on Sundays.

To the person who said there weren't huge chocolate aisles, no, but there were far more little sweet shops.

When I moved to Putney in 1981 there was one 7-11 on the high street. Sainsbury's opened late on Fridays only. Except for a couple of Indian restaurants there was one restaurant at the bottom of the hill, called La Forchetta and nowhere to get a cup of tea or coffee except for an old fashioned bakers. I used to meet friends at Juliana's in Notting Hill for tea.

Perhaps this is the Tory parties long term plan. Make everyone freeze, those that don't die off will get thinner from.keepong themselves warm thus reducing the pressure on the underfunded NHS from obesity related diseases!

And when giving ideas on how to keep warm, no one ever just says, "do ten star jumps," they only ever give ideas on how to keep warm whilst sat on their arses.

I think lack of labour saving devices got them all moving 👍

Your grandma is not wrong.
The colder you are the more energy you calories/energy you expend keeping warm/alive.
Google how many calories arctic & Antarctic explorers need to consume. It is insane if not obscene.
A big problem arrises when people can’t consume enough calories/energy, through food to fuel their bodies to compensate for the extra calorie/energy usage & many are struggling to feed themselves right now too.
If you can’t properly fuel your body it will go into starvation mode & critical systems will start to suffer. Yes you’ll initially use up fat reserves to keep your body going but when those reserves run out you are heading down a slippery slope to organ/body damage then starvation.

I was a child in the 80's and a teen in the 90's and there were loads of overweight people around, especially in the 80's. People look younger than they did then (especially when we're talking the 80's) and people in their 40's, 50's and 60's often look much fitter and more sporty than they ever did. Maybe there are more obese people now, but there seemed to be more overweight people/people who didn't take care of themselves back then.

Smoking used to be very common.

Junk food and the proliferation of it.

Massive weight gain started in the 1980s.

When junk food was made available to native Americans, they suddenly had a weight problem, whereas, prior to the introduction of junk food, they were a normal weight.

Sugar - white and deadly. There's a book about it.

I have similar theories about generational impact on eating and food. My grandparents were young adults during the war, and my parents born just after. I was forced, and I mean I was literally not allowed to move from my seat until I finished every single thing on my plate. Probably because sometimes they wouldn’t know when they were next going to eat and how much.

But yeah, there goes my intuitive knowing of when I’m full.

I think your Gran was right, The house I grew up in had no heating or double glazing apart from a fire in the living room, using the emersion heater was a performance, but the first thing we did when we moved into a similar house was put in central heating, hot water and double glazing. When it broke down one February, the cold felt punishing but I'd been more than used to it growing up.

I also think its to do with being more time poor than people were in her day.

There's more things to do, both as leisure and as work and we have to all fit a lot more into the day, so we use more appliances, convenience food, one-stop supermarkets instead of frequent visits to six different shops on the high street and driving/transport rather than walking etc...

I grew up without heating and had to wear dresses too. I was an over weight child. I wasn't allowed to play out, and ate sweets/crisps/chocolates. I honestly think too many kids aren't allowed to play out, or prefer to play on their consoles. Sedentary movement coupled with junk food/energy drinks are to blame for obesity.

If your grandmother is correct we'll have cured the obesity epidemic by next Easter OP.

Every cloud has a silver lining and all that...

It’s the snacking culture. People used to have 3 balanced meals a day. No snacks.
plus life was harder, carrying washing to the washouse, scrubbing floors and steps by hand, walking or cycling everywhere, kids played outside exercising all day when it was safe to do so. Food wasn’t processed.

I think she is partially correct. There were less labour savings devices and more reliance upon walking and public transport. A lot less sitting around as everything took a lot longer to do as well as the need to keep warm. But I think it’s mainly down to far less reliance upon fast food - take-always and ready meals. Home made food was tasty but it didn’t have all the additives that drive us to eat too much.