Something started me thinking about girls and eating this evening.

[BertrandRussell]

I have a 14 year old boy. As all the received wisdom, and Mumsnet agree, he EATS. Constantly. He is always hungry. He is wiry and fit and strong and does not have an ounce of fat on him. His dad says he remembers how incredibly hungry he was at this age, and how his mother struggled to feed him and his brother on a limited budget. When you mention teenage boys,people smile indulgently and share empty fridge anecdotes. It's just how it is.

But 4 years ago, I had a 14 year old girl. Presumably if it's all abour. teenagers and growing, she was just as hungry? But she didn't eat like her brother does. She had a good appetite, and enjoyed food, but I bet if she had got herself a bowl of cereal an hour after dinner, I would have queried it. I would have pointed out that she had just had dinner, suggested she had an apple or a drink. And nobody ever does the fridge anecdotes about girls.

So what's considered OK and is indulged for boys isn't for girls. Girls are supposed to control their intake. Maybe even put up with being hungry? Is there possibly something here about why girls eat secretly, are more likely to have eating disorders.....? I've just thought of this, so it's. Bit disjointed. Does anyone have any thoughts?

"I'm surprised that on a personal level a feminist can't simply think "stuff and nonsense " and ignore what society thinks."

How wonderful to be so strong and self aware. I am in awe.

I am struggling a little with this at present. DD is 9 and beginning puberty, she has begun to have a little fat collecting around her tummy (always been bang on 50th weight, 70th height). I am starting to say no to snacks and extra food when she is asking, and have upped the exercise she does (extra two sessions per week, so sporting activity/games 5/7 days). She is hurt by this, and sees it as me being mean to her, which obviously is far from my intentions. My difficulty comes in having DS who is 6, and has always been underweight (50th height but 5th weight since 18mo). He doesn't like many foods, very restricted diet in variety and quantity, and we often encourage him to eat more.
We have done all the explaining why expectations are different for each, but she still sees reduced snackage as a punishment.
We want her to remain healthy, but it's very hard to maintain healthy attitudes to food, particularly when all through her life other people have commented what a good eater she is (because she genuinely likes fruit and veg, and because she will try anything). She really likes food, loves the tastes etc.

I definitely agree with you OP, girls (generally) receive a different message about food than boys.

Personally, as a teenager I was very slim, even skinny. I did a lot of ballet and dance so I was active. I ate a lot, but as I got older, maybe around 14 or 15, I remember becoming aware that my friends didn't eat as much as me, and that I was looked down on for taking a second biscuit or whatever. I basically internalised the message that I was getting from society generally, which was that eating a lot is something to be guilty about.
I have never had an eating disorder, but my eating was disordered, IYSWIM. I counted calories and I weighed myself pretty much every day for my late teen years. Interestingly, the thing that helped me break out of that obsessive cycle was becoming a vegetarian when I was about 19. I informed myself about protein and carbohydrates and the need for x amount of calcium/iron/whatever a day. And when I started looking at food from a nutritional point of view rather than how many calories were in it, my whole perspective changed. It was the first time in my life that I was eating to be healthy, rather than to lose weight. And I think that is the problem, generally girls are taught to eat to lose weight, and boys are focussing on gaining muscle etc. You can see this in that a lot (not all, but a lot) of girls and women would be able to give you an approximate number of calories in any given food. An apple? 70. Bag of crisps? About 250. Boys and men (IMO) are very, very rarely aware of the amount of calories they are eating.

Sorry, she's not upset about extra sport, she loves that! Just reduced snacks/ tighter portion control.
DH says he notices things so much more now he has a DD, and thinks much more about food and what he's putting into his body.

How wonderful to be so strong and self aware I know you were being sarcastic -but yes it is.

Perhaps not seeing everything, including whether I'm "allowed " to have an extra biscuit, as a patriarchal conspiracy helps.

I can't seem to copy and paste the middle part of what you wrote there bertie but wow I had absolutely no idea anyone thought like that!

I eat "like a man" or I eat what I want, as much of it as I want whenever I want. I get pleasure from eating have expensive tastes and am not about to deprive myself because society my mother tuts at my 'fatness'. (Which is more to do with my sedentary lifestyle than my diet.)

When I spend a lot of time with other women, say on a weekend away, I notice how completely different my diet is from theirs and how different my attitude to food is. Eg I eat 'manly' food like steaks, burgers, eggs but don't eat sweet 'girly' things like chocolate or biscuits.

I wasn't particularly socialised as a girl when I was growing up (my parents wanted a boy and treated me like the son they never had) and I think my relationship with food now comes from that.

I have dcs of both sexes now and even though I'm a feminist who has tried my hardest at gender neutral parenting I'll admit that I do offer dd sweets more than her dbro. I also more consciously worry about her putting on too much weight as I know how society treats overweight women especially during the difficult teen years.

As to the calorie requirements quoted above I don't think these are innate. A body with a higher muscle ratio needs more calories to maintain its weight. Boys are encouraged to be more active even from infancy so they become more muscly so need more calories.

It's not just calories though- girls need more iron (periods) and calcium (osteoporosis) and vit c&d to absorb these in their diets than boys. But ironically they probably consume less red meat & dairy which would be good sources of these because they are pressurised away from these 'high fat' foods so they can be slim. So appearance overrides health and parents are party to these trends.

So I think this is a big feminist issue.

If you have had parents with good sense it's easier to think "stuff and nonsense". Others aren't so fortunate and need to work out how to contradict the messages they have absorbed.

ALass- do you really see no difference in the way men and women view food? Or in societal expectations of men and women around food? Do you think, for example, that in the 6th form of a boy's school you would find a significant number of boys smoking to avoid eating? Does a man ever say "ooh, I really shouldn't" when offered a biscuit?

I pay more attention to my dd's eating as she is slightly overweight according to the chart. I limit snacks and encourage more fruit. No fizz and I water down juice. I do not make a fuss as I do not want to damage her self esteem. I would do the same with my ds if necessary.

As a child and teen I was skinny. I had a sweet tooth, caring little about meals. Dd has not inherited my build and is more stocky.

I do recall my peers at secondary school being amazed that I could help myself to biscuits and snacks at home - they had to ask their parents. Maybe their mothers were watching their weight too.

I understand where Lass is coming, from I think.

Tbh it's taken me quite a few years to realise how many people, and yes especially women, have strange relationships with food. I love food and cooking and eating out. Other people not enjoying their food and being odd about it didn't impinge much on that!

Curious - I agree that girls/women are able to wheel off the calories in many foods. My dh has no idea how many calories are in anything. He wants - he eats. I want then calculate if it is worth the calories - usually not!

The shrinking women poem sounds very much like my family. My mum was from a family where her mum gave the men and boys more food, grandma and the girls usually didn't have meat on their Sunday lunch and would fill up on Yorkshire puddings, so that grandad and her brothers had plenty and also enough meat for sandwiches for their lunches, if any of my uncles were still hungry after eating then my mum or her mum would take food from their already smaller portioned plates and give to the uncles or my grandad.

I think it came from a mix of poverty, living on rations, and an understanding that because the men were the ones paying for the food due to working in the mine then they needed the fuel more. My gran and grandad weren't overweight, but all my mums male siblings are and my aunts are small. Similar happened on my Dads side of the family, they weren't as poor as my Mums side, but men were served their food first, got seconds if they wanted,then the my gran and her daughter would have what's left, I think for my Dad's mother, feeding her "boys" well was a source of pride for her, it's made her a good wife and mother in her circle's eyes.

So when I was little, I got smaller portions than my dad and brother, because it's what my mum was learnt, and my dad was raised to expect it, I didn't bother questioning it,despite being hungry sometimes, because visits to grandparents reinforced this, esp when I and my female cousins had to wait for the men to eat and also have seconds before we ate. Might be coincidence and totally unrelated but my brother and all the men on both sides are overweight yet eats as much as he wants carefree, wheras I'm underweight but get comments about my "figure" if I dare go for a second burger. Food was often used as a treat for me, wheras a necessity for my brother, I got sweets if I did well at school for eg, my brother would get them from Dad because he was a growing lad. (Brother always shared them with me though)

I tried talking to my dad about it before he died, asking how did he think his sister felt eating last and did he not think to save some of the nicer food for her, and he was genuinely offended at such a suggestion, claiming men don't like fat girls so he and his brothers probably did her a favour anyway. I'm embarassed at how normal I thought it all was.

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

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".

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.

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 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 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.

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

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 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!

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.

Depends on the sport. Gymnasts, in my experience are just as likely to have an unhealthy relationship with food as 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.

Oh goodness yes, agreed re gymnasts and dancers