1970's/80's kids... how much did your parent/s talk about weight?

[Auberg]

I've lost some weight and my family back home (US) will see me at Christmas for the first time since losing around 3 stone. I'm going to message ahead and ask them NOT to bang on about it in front of my kids.

The fact that I'm doing this has made me ponder my childhood and the obsession with weight that my mom had, and still has. Literally every day there would be some mention of weight - usually that my mom felt fat/looked fat/needed to lose weight (she has never been above a size 10 UK). The fridge was stuffed with fat free everything and the bookcase was jammed with diet, low calorie cookbooks and exercise books.

I have three siblings - one has had disordered eating, one was obese, then dieted back to a healthy weight, and I've also been almost obese and anorexic at different points in my life.

Whenever I see my mom, she ALWAYS talks about weight. Always refusing food because she's got fat (right now, she's tiny, no more than a size 6/8 UK), 'letting' herself have a single bite of a cookie etc. I don't think I've ever had an adult conversation with her that didn't at some point go to her being fat/needing to lose weight. I was a little cross with her for telling my son that he looked wonderful after losing some weight (he wasn't particularly big before), and then she gets ratty because she was 'complimenting him' on being slim.

She's never called me fat - at my largest, she was always telling me how I had a beautiful 'voluptuous' figure: at my thinnest, she would make sarcastic comments about how I was 'being funny' about eating anything sweet and trying to goad me into eating more.

At home, we never talk about weight in relation to appearance to our kids, but if it comes up, we talk about the relationship between healthy weight and overall health. It always feels stressful seeing my mom and brothers because of how much they'll all be talking about weight and being slim etc around the kids.

I've started dreading seeing my family because of all this. Writing it down, it sounds fairly extreme, and I know my mom has probably had an eating disorder of some kind for decades, but was some of this just how things were for loads of people?

We're not particularly close btw - we're civilised and sort of socially affectionate - but we're not each other's best friend, so to speak.

Lord, that was long! Sorry!

80’s child. My mum would make comments that I was ‘getting fat’ when I was a teenager, in a playful way. Mother in law is terrible for competitive undereating - we’ll get a takeaway and she will insist someone has to share a rice or curry portion with her as she couldn’t possibly finish it all herself (which is fine but we want our own), she will then proceed to make comments about how big the portions are that we had and how we managed to finish it all. Any weight loss or gain is always commented on, to the point it feels that your worth is dependant on how much you weigh. I imagine that her own mother did the same.

My mum was obsessed with her weight back in the 70s. Luckily she never mentioned anyone else’s weight and none of us inherited her obsession. She was tiny, like Edith Piaf but she thought she was Hattie Jacques (no offence to either of those women).

My DM is still so obsessed with weight and talked endlessly at being fat despite being skinny (at the time). I don't wear shorts to this day as my mum told me for years that I didn't have the legs for them.

She is now much heavier. Heavier than me for the first time since I was around 13.

I said the other day "it must kill you that I'm thinner than you now". I knew I was being a bitch, but I just couldn't hold back.

I NEVER mention it to my children or talk about weight or discuss sizes etc.

All. The. Time. It definitely led to me growing up feeling like I needed to sneak 'bad' food and I had an unhealthy relationship with my body and food as a result. At one point I lost a very significant amount of weight and my mum went from telling me I needed to 'tone up' one day to telling me I was too skinny the next. And that was the moment when I realised that there would be no way to win her approval so why bother trying.

Even now if I eat anything they see as 'bad' she will sit and watch me eating in such shock that she just can't believe how much I eat, she'll comment on portion size (she and my dad both eat like wee birds) and if I have a biscuit with a cuppa she'll say "oh a biscuit- do you really need that?"

It drives me absolutely crazy and I hate when she does it in front of ds because I try very hard to raise him not to have the same hang ups about food. He's 2 and a perfectly healthy weight (confirmed by hv) and now she's started to voice her concern about his weight and how much he eats. I understand its her own unhealthy internal messages playing out but I wish she respected my boundaries with it more.

My mother was obese and constantly commented on my weight. Told me to watch what I eat as im getting fat etc. I was size 8 when she said this. Generally I'm a size 6/8 and I get comments on what I'm eating and careful you won't stay thin eating that! But when I'm larger post birth she makes no comments and if I make a comment on how I'd like to loose some weight she tuts and I criticism for that! I'm definitely unhealthy in my eating. I'm larger now but will slim down to very thin, I have a sister who is obese.

It wasn't just our parents though was it. We grew up in a time where Geri halliwell was called the fat one and Bridget Jones was 'fat' in her bunny outfit. I vividly remember being repulsed by that bunny outfit as she was so fat and now having had 3 children and a realistic understanding of the female body I'm disgusted with myself for that judgment. But that's what society taught us

Never. Clearly I've been lucky!

I'm a 90s kid but my mother was very health conscious (not a bad thing) and made lots of horrible comments about my weight when I was going through puberty (definitely a bad thing). She would make comments about people's weight/size all the time as it was just a normal thing then - even in the 00s and 10s magazines always had covers of celebrities with big red 'circles of shame' around their bodies. I grew up with an eating disorder as did many of my friends. I think we're definitely in a better place now when it comes to body shaming.

I was also born in 1972 and my mother was constantly on a diet - I remember the 'low fat spread' in the fridge (I think it was called Outline or Shapeline) which resembled yellow emulsion paint, and there was a salad cream too. Plus the Ryvitas and cottage cheese.

I gained weight as a teenager and whilst she did her best not to go on about it, she was obviously horrified. She remains bafflingly vain and judgemental about people's weight and their appearance, and I've told her repeatedly not to make bitchy remarks about other adults and what they're eating and drinking in my presence.

Also the performative 'oh I couldn't possibly eat all that, I don't know how you can manage an entire sandwich for lunch when you ate dinner last night' (and so forth), and the attributing of 'good' and 'bad' to not eating/eating and to any food that isn't mostly dust. I try to ignore it.

Fucking hell yes, my mum to this day is a size 4/6 my sister is a 6, (she has been unwell her while life)my brother is very slender.(he has addiction issues)I was a normal weight for my build but they kept comparing me to my sister. Then taking half the food portions off my plate and giving them to her.. it was horrible. She would be bought ice creams/cream donuts and I would be made to watch her eat. Developed anorexia in my teens, and again as an adult, weight yo yo my whole life till I got diabetes and started monjarou, ..I still feel like a heifer when I see them. My dad was worse..he was obese, however he would constantly monitor my food intake, 4 weeks after I had my 2nd child he told me I was still very fat and I should "watch myself " .. I cried all night as did my breastfeeding baby.
It's as though my whole worth is tied up to my weight for them, I've a great career, great kids but none of that is important bcz I'm a size 10/12 not skinny like them.

I don't remember my parents ever talking about it in the 1980s. However, my DS loves the Large Family books (elephants) by Jill Murphy and I picked up some second-hand for him recently and immediately had to get rid of 'A Piece of Cake', which is all about Mrs Large deciding she is fat and therefore the whole family has to go on a diet and eat nothing but salad all the time and they hide the cake (and then all secretly binge on it). This seems to have been mainstream and funny in the 80s.

My Dad called my mum fatty as a nickname despite her being a size 10 back on the 80s.

When he left her for a much younger woman she developed an earing disorder and still only eats one meal a day. It's really effected my attitude to my size and I have to work really hard not to pass it on.

Never.

My mum and dad both have an outward disgust for fat people. My PE teacher at school was a larger lady (looking back, very muscular as well) and my dad would always bring up how a fat PE teacher was an abomination. All my friends were referred to by appearance - the fat one, the chubby one, the tall one.
They are both very slim and my mum only ever eats soup when we go out for lunch, and pointedly won't ever finish a full meal or order dessert, she'll just 'try a bit of yours'.
When I was 14 I desperately wanted my belly button pierced like my friends. My mum said she would give me permission if I got down to a 24 inch waist because otherwise 'who on earth would want to see that'.
I now have a problem with binge eating in secret. My sister is a fitness fanatic and has a tik tok page about low calorie meals.

I was a small size 10 and was called a Ten Tonne Tessie !

My parents and in-laws remark frequently on people’s weights and did so in the 1980s. I really wish they wouldn’t.

90’s kid. But all the time.

My Mum does it now. I got a bit cross with her recently and asked her never to comment on my weight ever again. “What?” She said “even if it’s positive” I told her it’s NEVER positive. Her saying “you look like you’ve lost weight” is a thinly veiled way of telling me I was looking a bit fat.

She also tells my kids things are “fatty” “unhealthy” etc. They’re 3 and 5 - rather than provide food you don’t approve and then berate them for accepting and enjoying that food just don’t provide the food. End of. No discussion needed. Adults do the shopping.

I remember my Mum going on diet after diet and telling the whole house they were
too fat too. Me included. I remember being 8 and asking for a chocolate bar on holiday and being allowed one because I’d “worked for it” because I’d dieted for so long, every holiday/weekend she was allowed to binge eat because it was the holiday/weekend and so we could too.

When I was a teenager and did weight watchers and got to my goal she asked my weight and said “isn’t that still too heavy for you” and made it her mission to weigh less than me.

She would hold my clothes up out the dryer and say “these are big” “this would be too big for me” “what size is this” “an 8, youre never an 8, you need something bigger”

Every item of clothing I bought was declared “‘not over-big” I asked what that actually meant and she could never elaborate.

To this day she still tells me everytime she buys a jar of peanut butter. Every time. She then tells me when she has eaten it and tells me she shouldn’t have. It’s exhausting.

Well that turned into a rant but its really no surprise I binge eat and have issues with my weight and mentally around food.

She's never called me fat - at my largest, she was always telling me how I had a beautiful 'voluptuous' figure: at my thinnest, she would make sarcastic comments about how I was 'being funny' about eating anything sweet and trying to goad me into eating more.

And OP this too…! My Mum used to put cream in my drink and food etc when I was slim to “fatten me up” but then berate me for being bigger. I cannot remember a time where she told me I just looked right.

Oh and my MIL… she isn’t no slim Jim, yet tells all her kids whether they have lost or gained weight everytime she sees them and discusses everyone’s weight. It’s so boring. She is so so invested.

My mum rarely commented on my weight but she was obsessed with hers. This sounds awful but she'd often point to other ladies in public and ask me 'am I as big as her'

very rarely.
I wasn’t aware at the time but my dad apparently consulted the GP about mine and my brothers weight once. After our mum died my appetite massively reduced and I got too skinny, and my brother started to overeat and got quite obese.

as an adult, he has mentioned when I’ve had a dramatic weight change but not in a critical way. More out of concern.

he’s never been one to comment on weight generally.

80s kid. Weight mentioned continuously. I'm one of three and all three of us have had eating disorders.
I grew up knowing my worth was tied to my size and that my mum had a lovely figure until i came along and stole it from her.

My mum never mentioned it. She was quite thin and still enjoyed our incredibly unhealthy diet of chips with absolutely everything and loads of fried food.

We must be part of the same family 😁

All the time. Put on a diet at 5. I knew the calories in foods before my times tables 🙁