Just curious -- how did you eat when you were a kid?

[alto]

I've been thinking a lot lately about the causes of obesity. I know we're all different. There's baby weight, and creeping middle age weight, and crisis gainalot weight, and just plain ole beer belly. But food is different now, and so I wondered...

How did you eat when you were growing up? Was there a lot of junk food around? Did your parents try to teach you good habits? Did you have a scheduled dinner time, a dining room?

Just an informal poll.

I grew up without junk food -- a soft drink with lunch on the weekend was it. My aunt, who did the cooking, made everything "from scratch." She also boiled the hell out of vegetables and cooked meat to the shriveled stage. Fat was limited -- 2 pats of butter at dinner, and she blotted off excess fat before serving. (She was a nurse.) Deserts were often fruit, although she 'baked" every Sunday, and that meant a cake or a batch of cookies. I took packed lunches to school -- a sandwich, cookies and fruit. A snack was put out for me after school -- again, a few cookies.

Unfortunately, she also made wonderful biscuits, and I developed a bread-and-butter (or biscuit-and-butter) habit.

I walked to and from school a mile a day and was overweight -- by their standards. I don't think I really was. I have huge bones and weighed 160 then. But I felt as heavy as I really am now.

I haven't eaten like that since. When I got to college, I started thoughtless, unscheduled eating.

What about you?

[RCFletcher]

Hi Alto!

What an interesting post! I grew up in the 50's in post war Britain. We were pretty poor and there was sugar rationing and not much in the shops.

I seem to remember lots of vegetables. Meat and four veg (includoing potatoes) was standard on Sunday. Some sort of pie made from the left overs on Monday and so on. In general lots of veg. and bread with nearly everything. We didn't often get desserts.

There was no processed food or frozen food or the semi-prepared stuff you get today.

Mum fried in lard and we had real butter on our bread.

I was as thin as a rake but I think we ate well...better than kids today in fact.

Where I live today (Belarus) the diet is similar to the one I ate as a child...and almost nobody is overweight.

What went wrong?

Regards,

Robert :wave:

[agonycat]

There was hardly any junk food in our house growing up. Dad was a meat/potato kind of guy. Meals were balanced for the most part. Of course as a kid I didn't like a lot of the "adult" foods.

I was actually pretty lean as a kid. You would find me climbing trees, riding bikes or playing football with the guys. I didn't gain weight until I hit my thirties and then it was a 8 year eating free for all binge. (unhappy times).

Now since I have found low carb eating my habits have pretty much returned to what they should have been all along ;)

[DoubleD]

I had cold cereal for breakfast everyday... and on weekends ... I would often have a second breakfast (get up early and feed myself and then join the family for breakfast). Once in a while there were pancakes or something on the weekend... but it was cereal mostly. I actually LOVE cold cereal (such variety!) but I can see now that it was a major carb overload first thing in the morning. I continued that throughout my adult life with the exception that I have always made a formal Sunday breakfast since my child was born... where we sit down together as a family and eat together - usually eggs and bacon etc... or pancakes/waffles.

I literally fended for myself for lunch. Either school lunch if I had the money... or packed my own lunch. Guess how nutritious that was?! I tried my best but I was a kid. My mother had six children and I was the last... she pretty much was tired of all of us kids by the time I arrived and left my raising to the oldest girls... who DID not want that responsibility. After school I came home to my older siblings... and again fended for myself. I honestly don't even remember eating anything after school. Dinner was a sitdown meal and I ate reasonably well by most current nutritional standards. My mother also boiled the heck out of vegetables to the point that they were unappealing. Main dishes were often casseroles - because they were easy and satisfying.

Comfort foods in my family are Ice Cream, and Pastrys - particularly big old cinnamon rolls.

I think the more important question is... what do I do for my daughter? I am determined she has an active parent in her life (unlike my childhood). She get's a good breakfast every morning - with variety. She is not Low Carb... but I work hard to make sure that she get's the majority of her carbohydrates from vegetables and whole grain sources. She eats the school lunch every day - but she has choices and she actually chooses the chef salad often and always takes the orange or apple. Dinner is always a sit down meal and I have always worked to provide a "balanced" meal for my husband and daughter. Now that I am low carbing... they get what I am having... with the addition of a carb side dish of some variety. I do this by adding english muffins to their breakfast, or a baked potato with dinner, or a side dish of noodles alfredo etc. I have noticed lately they are actually not eating alot of carbs in comparison to what they used to eat.

Sorry for the long post. Kind of therapeutic to think about this and put it into words.

[Zuleikaa]

I've always been a classic carbohydrate addict. Growing up was hard in a family of eight with all the boys tall and thin and the girls all size 2-6. I was a 14 at age 10.

We were poor and so ate a lot of meal stretchers, i.e. starches. Just what a carbo addict needed to get bigger and bigger.

Knowing my own problems with carbohydrates, when I had my daughter I brought her up without a lot of sugar and limited her starch servings. She never had sugar water as a baby or even candy until she was almost 5 and someone gave her a lollipop without asking me. Consequently, though she was a solid big girl, she never really had a weight problem or a sweet tooth. She later did develop a weight problem because of birth control pills, she just blew up. When she got off those she still cannot get rid of the extra 50 lbs they gave her. I keep trying to get her to try LC but since she saw me yo-yoing all those she she doesn't even want to go near a diet for fear of getting even bigger.

[DebPenny]

I grew up in the 60s and 70s. Most of the time we had dinner together as a family. Breakfast was sugary cereal and milk, my favorites were cocoa puffs and cocoa rice crispies. We had packed lunches, sandwiches and fruit and chips, until highschool then we were on our own and could pack a lunch or eat at the cafetteria, and they were as bad then as they are now, nutritionally speaking. My favorite lunch in highschool was chilitoes -- a single-serving package of fritoes slit along the side and then chili poured in.

Our dinners were usually meat and veges with a starch (pot roast, spaghetti, swiss steak). We didn't have much bread though. We also didn't have desserts often. Our pediatritian told Mom that, if she wanted to give us desserts, she should give them to us at the beginning of the meal. So we didn't have them. And now I don't miss them. ;)

But in the summer we had homemade ice cream dinners and strawberry shortcake. And we had ready access to sweets from the small local grocery down the street, Benny's, run by Mr. and Mrs. Benny.

I have two brothers that I spent a lot of time trying to keep up with (as in contests to see who could eat the most at dinner). I was actually kind of a tomboy. I was the only girl and I didn't get along with other kids my age (a long and different story).

When I hit puberty late at 14, I could no longer pack it away and stay thin. I'm pretty sure insulin resistance hit with PCOS. I was a pretty good synchronized swimmer, in the running for the "A" team, and my coaches started getting on my case about my weight, they were rather cruel about it, so I quit.

That's when I started dieting; various fad diets and Weight Watchers, which I did fairly well at, but as soon as I stopped, of course, I gained it all back and more.

I gained weight in spurts, when I graduated high school I weighed 160. After my one year of college I weighed 180. When I got married at 26 I weighed 200. When I got divorced at 28 I weighed 220. I topped out at 245 a few years after that and decided to stop dieting, but I "watched" what I ate, i.e. cut out as much fat as possible. I spent about 15 years at pretty much the same weight and thought I was successful, except for one try at WW again, big mistake. Then I finally found low-carbing!

It's all a story of "if I'd known then what I know now." But I know now what I know now and am finally controlling my weight and health. Whew! As usual, Alto, I overdid my reply.

;-Deb

[alto]

Not too long at all, Deb :) I've read all of these with interest "No processed foods," "no junk foods" -- but also lifelong carb addicts. We're a mixed bunch :)

More, please!

[Belle]

When I would get up in the morning, my grandmother would make me french toast or a big breakfast of bacon or sausauge with eggs. Sometimes she would make me biscuits (homemade)with cream gravy with sausage in it. For lunch, I would eat at school. For supper, whatever my grandmother made. I grew up in West Texas, hence the south cooking. Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, pies, homemade fudge starting the day after thanksgiving in every room in at least 2 tins on every table. I was not fat, because I was in athletics. I didn't get overweight until I had my kids and stopped exercising. Basically all the good carby stuff.
Belle

[Swt_T]

Oh wow! I think I could write a book on eating habits as a child, but I'll try to make this as short as possible.

As a young child (grew up in 70's & 80's) I lived with my grandparents and father. My grandmother was the only one that cooked ( and BAKED!) Living in Southern Illinois, she fried everything! Always with batter of course. And let's not forget those homemade pies, cakes, and all those other sinful things.

I was made to finish everything on my plate ( even if I didnt like it) that they gave me. I never had say in what I wanted to eat. A weekly root beer float was a great treat. Since I was so young, and living in the country, and being a tomboy, I kept very active. So I stayed thin!

Now when I reached 11/12 and when me and my brother got home, this was left for each of us for a after school snack -- 1 snickers bar, 1 bag of chips ( no not the small one either, more like a med size one, perhaps the big grab size ) and let's not forget the good ole' can of Coke.

At this time I also had lost most of my energy to go out and be active. (Due to that wonderful thing that happens at this time of age to us girls ) And began to pack on a few pounds, going from 110 5'1 to 130 pounds.

I moved to live with my mom at age 13/14. This wouldnt be much better for me. At my mom's lived 10 people!! So when grocery shopping came around, I had a feeling that I better eat (and eat alot) cause I never knew if there would be a time that I wont find any food. I didnt seem to gain too much from this, but I also lived in the city at this point and gained many friends, and was never sitting at home. Always walked everywhere!

Upon moving out of my moms at 16 I lost weight, down to 120. Then PREGNANCY, well that's what brings me to date --- I gained 80 lbs. during that pregnance (12 years ago!) and have never been able to get it off.

Swt_T

[Dec.Angel]

I ate a low carb diet and didn't know it! My family didn't have a lot of money so breakfast was usually an egg or often nothing. Lunch at home was usually a hamburger patty and a lettuce salad, on Sunday's we had roast with lettuce salad. Every once in a while we had fried chicken. At school though, lunches were real carby, but I often ate lunch at home since I lived a block from school. Dinners were usually tomato soup and a bologna sandwich or just soup. We had absolutely no soda, no milk, no cheese, no processed foods, no junk foods at all.
No wonder I had no trouble staying at 115!
It wasn't until I got married that I ever ate chips, cookies, donuts, lots of bread, all that processed, sugary, junky food.

My son ate no processed carby foods until he started school. Then he got really carb addicted. We never had junk food around, then school came along and that's all he wanted. We're eating much better at home now. Fruits, vegetables, proteins, etc.

[Karen]

I know you didn’t ask for my life story alto, but here it is!

I suppose we ate in a way that was "normal" for the time. Three squares, no junk food and we only had ginger ale with spaghetti dinner. Milk was a beverage. So was juice. I often had hot cereal for breakfast and sometimes cold.

Maternal grandmother cooked for us and mother cooked on weekends. I started cooking when I was around nine.

We almost always ate in the dining room until we got a little older and grandmother would feed us before the parents got home. When we all ate together, the TV was shut off. We had dessert only on weekends.

Christmas was a grand flurry of cookie baking. I loved it. I could sneak cookies, within reason of course.

I was never a fussy eater and it was supported by my two grandmothers who would feed me artichokes, zucchini, eggplant, avocadoes and other "exotics" of the day.

Something kicked in when I was around ten - puberty! I was constanly ridiculed at school and I started using sugar as an escape mechanism. I became a "sugar sneaker". There would always be sweets in my pockets. My allowance went to RC Cola and chocolate bars. I was also very active with volleyball and track and field. I went golfing with my father.

So I was an overweight girl with boobs by the time I was eleven. I was severely judged by my family and peers so I just ate more. I was plagued by ear infections, allergies and my hair started falling out. I was taken to all the various specialists when what I really needed was a shrink.

My mother gave me diet pills. I became bulimic. Some survival mechanism kicked in and I stopped barfing. But the ED did not leave.

I low-carbed by hearsay the summer going into high-school – I just severely restricted bread, sugar, potatoes, etc. - and dropped weight. I also felt fantastic.

The weight stayed off and through my teens. I was vegetarian, then macrobiotic. When I was twenty, I discovered alcohol! Then Italian food! We ate and drank like pigs. At 26 the pounds just started to pack on. There was a brief affair with food combining while in Mexico, and again I felt really energized. I stopped drinking around the age of 30 and switched back to sugar.

I continued on the “who gives a s***” approach to eating into my forties. Hey, I could cook really well. It was almost all of my identity. I lived and breathed it. One part of me didn't care, and another part was in search of the Holy Grail. I never thought about "dieting".

Low-fatted for about a year. Mother dies, dog dies and husband went off the deep end. As the relationship quickly crumbled, I discovered low-carbing. Wow! I’m an addict. So, after 6 month of LC, I realized that the best approach would be one of personal recovery.

Looking back, everything seems so obvious to me now. I was always waiting – and actively pursuing - the key to unlock the mystery of why, why, why? But I was blind, scared and arrogant.

I’m feeling much better now! :D

Karen

[Lisa N]

Even though we could afford to eat better, my mom just didn't enjoy cooking so we ate a lot of frozen dinners, frozen pot pies, spaghetti and takeout food (pizza, fried chicken, fish and chips, etc...). If she did cook, it was usually light on the meat, heavy on the starches (potatoes, noodles or rice). Breakfasts were instant oatmeal, toast or cold cereal (Captain Crunch was my favorite). I didn't start getting eggs for breakfast until I learned to cook them myself when I was 10. We ate lots of boxed potato mixes and canned veggies (mostly corn and peas). To this day, I can't stand either of them and won't even bring them into the house. Our school system didn't have a cafeteria and once we got past elementary school, we packed our own lunches. Our school did have doughnut sales twice a week and I usually got two of them at a time (yup...I was a sugar addict even back then!).
The only time I was thin was a few years in high school where I was active in 3 different sports and pretty much starved myself to stay thin..before and after those years I was overweight and put up with a lot of teasing from my peers about my size, even though I was in reasonably good shape physically and quite athletic.
So....I pretty much grew up on a classic junk food diet.

[Misty]

We rarely had junk food in our house. It was the way junk food was treated. When my sister and I would help around the house or in the yard, we were rewarded with a trip to the Dairy Queen. When we stayed at our grandparents they'd always have homemade caramel corn and cookies waiting. We never had dessert, that was saved for special occasions.
My mom was always on a diet, so I learned pretty good eating habits at an early age. I also became obsessed with my weight at an early age because I heard her talk about how she needed to lose weight. She watched her calories so I learned about portion sizes when I was pretty young.
I wasn't overweight until I moved out and bought my own groceries. All of the good eating habits were out and the junk food was in. I lived on frozen pizza, cereal and ice cream. The first year I was on my own I gained about 40 pounds. I don't know if I was rebelling or just making up for something I felt I missed out on.

[alibubble]

I grew up in the 70's England.
I remember Strikes, the 3 day week and quite often having to stock up on Bread, milk and basics otherwise they wouldn't be available. No oil/petrol therefore, no deliveries !! We also ate by candlelight whilst listening to the radio.
Breakfast was Cornflakes, Rice Crispies or a boiled egg, sometimes scrambled...full-fat milk. Fried breakfast at the weekend was a treat.
Lunch was at school and was revolting...I'm sure this is where my eating problems started. "The poor children in Bangladesh would love to eat this"....was the message..."Let them have it" was my response as a child.
Dinner was always meat and 2 vegs and potatoes. We ate bread and butter with everything. I hated red meat, I still do but if I didn't eat it I went hungry so I would go off to the local shop and buy...sweets & crisps..with my pocket money.
We only ever had deserts at weekends...which we would bake with mum ie. bread, biscuits, cakes. She left us to it so we'd add chocolate, cream, icing all sorts...we were being creative and as kids we loved it.
Apart from sweets that I sneaked from the shop we had no junk food as it is today....my mum picked fruit on the local farm during the summer months, so we lived on cherries, apples, gooseberries and strawberries.
I was very athletic, was a member of all the team sports, played tennis etc. I still exercise regularly.
I have 2 sisters and a brother.
My brother and 1 sister are like my mum, naturally slim, my sister still lives on Chocolate, she's 38, had 3 kids and is very slim.
Me and my other sister are like my dad, have always had to watch what we eat.....even though we were all brought up on the same diet etc.
Genetics? Who knows......

Ali

[AmberinIN]

My mom and I looked at this subject a while ago. :D

From my first foray into the food world, I was a low carber. I wouldn't eat the bun on my burgers and hot dogs, I preferred mustard over ketchup, I wasn't a fan of french fries, and I loved meat and salad!

Our family ate a meat, potato, and veggie for dinner. I was big on the meat and veggie, but used to try to get away with as small of a portion of potato as possible! I wasn't big on spaghetti (unless it was meat sauce, which made up most of my meal!). Our family didn't drink anything but diet soft drinks and caffeine free when my mom could get it. My breakfasts were a mix of eggs and bacon or sausage or whole grain cereal or oatmeal and once a week sometimes less, pancakes or waffles. Lunch was sandwich or something, chips and fruit or veggie, although it was always meat and cheese on the sandwich and I couldn't care less if I ate the chips.

It wasn't until high school that I started drinking Mountain Dew and it took me a while to get used to it. I was about 130 lbs. and very muscular.

Then I got married and had kids and started following the low fat diet. I hated eating after that. I am now getting back to normal and enjoying eating what I used to.

It's funny that I knew how to eat as a child, but couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong as an adult! :rolleyes:

:wave: Amber

[lkonzelman]

My dad still hides food even though there are no kids in the house to eat his chocolate.

He used to wake us up the morning after they (mom and dad) went out and say they bought us the most fantastic chocolate cake and it WAS delicious. Like they had to tell us!

In my family .. the biggest food issue was due to my little sister who is retarded (although very high functioning) being diagnosed very young with hyperactivity. Ritilin (know I spelled that very wrong) practically put her in a coma. So we took her off and put her on a no artificial colors or flavors diet which really cleared that up (NOTE FOR PARENTS OUT THERE THAT WANT TO TRY A HEALTHIER WAY THEN DRUGS). Anyway... no soda, fake juices, candy, anything food with pretty colors in the house.

So I used to dream of when I was older and could have sugary cereals (my favorite was Super Sugar Quisp -really dating myself here) and so so many things...

Well I became a real closet eater when I started to working (11 paper route, 12 tee shirt store...). I always had a weight issue and was always dieting in public but had chocolate every day of my life until 9/28/02. My sister (other younger sister) would cut school with me and we would bake and eat a cake or have a large pizza with extra cheese and pepperoni. We later lived together and continued our habit of over eating and add that to a really BAD relationship that ended like a bad Oprah story and I finally grew to over 260 lbs.

Anyway... got sick of hating myself and started exercising and low fat dieting in my mid twenties. It worked for a while and lost 80ish pounds but was never able to get under a size 16 AND I WAS ALWAYS HUNGRY.

Finally... 10 years after my initial large weight loss I found Atkins and with much optimism plan my WOE for Life... ;)

[Atrsy]

My parents were married in 1924, before the depression and they survived it by farming and growing food for their family. By the time I was born, my parents were living in town and my father had a job in a metals plant. I was number six of seven children. We were an average family, not poor, but not wealthy.

My mother was a good cook and always had wonderful baked goods for us. Breakfast was often mush, fried scrapple, or pancakes--you get the idea. Lunch was often a sandwich or sometimes just canned corn and tomatoes heated and poured onto a slice of white bread. Dinner was meat, potatoes, veggies and often preserved fruit for dessert.

There were no fast food places when I was a child and our town didn't even have a restaurant. We only had soda when we were sick or if it was someone's birthday. On Saturday nights my sisters would often make a treat--homemade potato chips (we never bought them--don't even know if they sold them), homemade fudge, pull taffy, doughnuts, etc. Special occasions were a time for ice cream.

I guess even then I loved carbs because my favorite food memories are big cinnamon buns fresh from the oven, hot apple pie with milk and sugar, black walnut cake, etc.

We had some fruit trees and my mother canned hundreds of quarts of fruit and vegetables. I remember she always had at least 100 quarts of peaches, but she canned grape juice, elderberry and other fruit jams, sour cherries, pears, corn, peas, beans, etc. Our cellar was full of jars of preserved foods in the fall. We had very little to buy at the grocery store other than meat and staples. I really don't know how she did all this with seven kids.

I didn't really start to diet until my last year in college. That's when I found the Royal Canadian Air Force Diet, which was LC. Several years later, Atkins came out with his first book and I've been doing that on and off ever since.

Carol

Sorry this was so long--but I have had a very long life so far!

[Kristine]

Wow, excellent thread. I look forward to reading pages and pages of this. :) Interesting how different it all is, with reference to time and geography.

I was child of the 80s in suburban Toronto. My mother, bless her, was maybe 10% June Cleaver, 90% Eighties-SuperMom. This translated to Nice Sunday Dinners where the only vegetables we ever ate were peas, corn and mashed potatoes. That was our healthy food for the week.

...but what did we eat the rest of the time? Whatever sugar cereal had the coolest prize in the bottom of the box. Whatever new-fangled junky lunch treats were advertised, and my brother and I begged for. McDonalds and Burger King. Kool-aid (water was for taking pills. We never drank it, otherwise.) Mr. Freezies. Pixie Stix. Milk with Brown Cow. Wonder bread. Oreos. Canned pasta. Ice cream for 'bed-time treat' every night.

Oh yes: my brother and I, from a kid's standpoint, had it made.

(It might be useful, at this point, to mention that my mother is an overweight compulsive overeater. We got whatever junk food we wanted, since it was 'for us', then it would be 'okay' for her to buy and eat.)

Once I was old enough to babysit, then eventually get a part-time job, I ate gooey, hot, grossly-underbaked cookies from the school cafeteria for a second breakfast (after the first at home, which was usually PopTarts.) Lunch was pizza or fries and gravy, followed by candy from 7-11. Dinner was usually Fend-for-yourself: Kraft Dinner with ketchup (I could pack away a whole box.) Or microwaved pseudo-food. Many delivered pizzas.

So in a word, the answer to the question, "How did you eat as a kid," is <b>POORLY</b>. Nothing but junk, from an LC perspective.

Ah, the 80s. To be a kid again. :( In heaven, there are no vegetables...

[MelindaL]

My father was really into gourmet cooking and was always in the kitchen. My mom had no clue how to cook so after he died we lived on take out chinese and Pizza Hut. I always ate anything I wanted, drank more Mountain Dew than you'd think humanly possible. Doritos are still a total drug for me. They don't even taste good but I can polish off a bag in no time.
My weight was never really an issue untill after my first son was born, all of a sudden my eating habits caught up with me. The foods that I miss most arn't even things that TASTE good, it's the whole comfort food thing. Macaroni and cheese with ketchup in it. Pizza. Grilled cheese.
I'm trying to teach my boys how to eat, weaning them off of prepackaged stuff and off of sugar.

[asugar]

Very interesting thread.

My mother was a stay-at home mom (just about everybody's mother was in those days) and she took her job (feeding us) very seriously. Our meals always had a special "fussed with" quality about them. For instance, I don't think she ever served a hamburger without toasting the bun and making sure there was lettuce, onion, etc served with it. Certain things always went together, too. Simple hamburger meals weren't really all that simple. There was always home made french fries and home made baked beans served with the hamburgers. When we had spaghetti, it was never served without garlic bread and tossed salad. Pork chops were always served with baked apples, ham was always served with twice baked potatoes. She would scoop out the potato and mash with velveeta cheese and butter and rebake with paprika on top. I remember how pretty the radish roses set on sliced cucumbers that she had run a fork over looked. There was always a pitcher of ice water on the table, too. Each and every dinner was served very elegantly.

When she made my school lunches, she went all out and I always had the most beautifully packed, delicious lunches of any kid in school. My tuna salad (the tuna salad always had celery, onion, and mayo) sandwiches would be on toast and there was always lettuce on them and there were always 2 of them, even when I was in the first grade. Back then, I probably only ate a half of the sandwich, but once I hit puberty, I was eating both of them wishing I had more.

My house was the land of plenty as far as food went with one exception.................sweets. We always had sweets in the house, but I had to beg for them. I was never allowed to just go out into the kitchen and grab a cookie or two. The only time I got all the candy I really wanted to eat was on Easter, Halloween, and Christmas. One Easter, I ate so much candy I threw up. Looking back, I know I wasn't lacking for sweet treats, but it's more a matter of "forbidden" kisses tasting the sweetest. When I had my own kids, as long as they weren't overweight and their teeth didn't rot, I let them have their fill of sweets.

Sunday mornings my father always served my mother breakfast in bed. I would help my father make the tray pretty by either picking flowers or coloring pictures. My father would also make us kids breakfast on Sunday mornings and I loved it b/c it was always pancakes or waffles served with sausage or bacon. My father used to make the pancakes in the shapes of different animals, too. Looking back, I'm not sure how perfect the animal pancakes were, but when I was a kid, I thought they were perfect.
asugar :wave:

[yvonne326]

There was never a lot of "desserts" in my house and I think the only "snack" that I ate lots of was Potato Chips and salty-type snacks. Being from a European household, dessert was never a course (meal) except during the holidays.

My mother cooked well....always had veggies and salads and soups. BUT my mother always allowed me to eat as much as I wanted...and that caused me to be a chunky adolescent. I lost that weight during puberty and was average up until I was about 18 when I started to gain weight little by little.

My mother was slim and petite, my dad always had a weight problem as an adult and both sets of grandparents were "chunky".

[TeriDoodle]

Well, i dunno about you guys, but I vote for ASUGAR as having the best house in the neighborhood!!! Talk about June and Ward Cleaver!! Wow!

My early childhood was very similar....my mom is a great southern cook and we always had large meals consisting of spaghetti/salad, chicken fried steak/mashed potatos, fried chicken, roast beef, ham, sirloin steak, tuna casserole, etc....always served with a green vegetable and a starch....and hot dinner rolls, of course! She packed my lunch until I was 14.... a hearty sandwich, fruit, chips and cookies. Breakfast was cereal, waffles, eggs/bacon, or oatmeal.

My dad passed away when I was 8...and we moved to Houston when I was 9. Mom was a FREE woman! We ate at the local cafeteria probably 3x week and she cooked the rest of the time. I was overweight always after the age of 8.... always by about 30#.

By the time I hit high school, she was dating and I had my friends... we at dinner together maybe 3x week. How I survived on the food I ate in high school I'll never know: Breakfast: waffles or pop tarts. Lunch: Cafeteria food was disgusting except for the hot rolls...I had 2, with a Dr. Pepper. For my after-school snack I'd have Cheetos (the SUPER large bag) and Dr. Pepper....I'd eat cheetos until the Dr. Pepper was gone. I worked at a restaurant and I'd make myself a grilled cheese for dinner. Surprise!! Diagnosed with hypoglycemia at 17!! I regulated my blood sugar with M&Ms and peanut butter crackers.

I lost weight in college....walking 6 mi+/day and malnutrition do that to a person. I lived on Cheerios, Vietnamese egg rolls from the street vendors, and yogurt. Of course, massive amounts of alcohol, burgers, pizza and mexican food were a frequent part of my weekly fare. When I got married I hadn't a clue how to cook a thing, but I weighed 130!! I learned how to cook from and like my mother......... guess what? I was always 30-40# overweight after that!!

[silkenluck]

Interesting thread!

I'd have to say in our house we ate pretty heathfully. No pop/soda, usually no baked goods sweets, no junk food.
Looking back though - carbs at every meal, carbs were the filler. I think we had bread with almost EVERY meal. Bread with soup, bread with pasta, bread even with potatoes! And when we had money - butter. Oh my love for hot fresh baked bread and a slather of butter. It started early! Looking back our portion sizes were a bit off too. When money was good we ate a lot of meat, but we also ate a lot of starches and starchy veggies. We always had people around too - and my mother fed them. Basically if you didn't pile your plate up the first time there wouldn't be any left later if you happened to get hungry. Unfortunately I was also taught I had to clean my plate. No wasting food. Thus started an early cycle of putting way too much food on my plate - and forcing myself to consume it all. IN my adult years it became easy to consume it all.

I was never really overweight per se as a child - but I was chubby and painfully aware of it. Combine that with my shy and sensitive nature and EVERY comment about my body as innocent as it may have seemed - was a dagger slash through my psyche.

My mother has been concerned with her weight, I think, ever since she got pregnant with my sister. I've always looked up to my mother as the essence of poise and beauty. Growing up she was always well dressed, perfect make up, perfect hostess, smart, intelligent, the works. The problem is she didn't always see it - or rather she felt she was faking it. I don't think she truly believed in her heart that she was beautiful, intelligent, and a wonderful hostess. I love my mother dearly but her own self image problems - they definitely affected me negatively. I grew up with her words "It's just baby fat you'll grow out of it".

Well then my parents decided they wanted to become missionaries. My access to food was severely restricted. I didn't LIKe the food that I could eat (there was lots of it to eat) so I just didn't eat it. I ate very little - probably about 1000-1100 cals a day, mostly steamed veggies and fresh fruit when I could get it, sometimes rice for days (ugh). Still i was extremely physically active and I did indeed 'grow out of that baby fat' except my own body image was so warped at that point I didnt even know it.

At this point in my life (age 13-17) I did go out of my way to exercise and try and 'tone up' but I wasn't actively limiting my food. I was still in the situation that if you didn't eat it when you saw it - it would be gone.

Around age 16 I think I was even underweight at one point but I still didn't know it, I also had no clue that because I was at least a half a foot taller than my friends that I should correspondingly weigh more than them. They weighed 115 lbs - I felt fat at 135 (I'm 5'8) at one point I managed to get down to around 125 lbs with very little body fat - my waist was 24 inches and my hips were 34.

At age 17 we moved back to Canada. Land of food abundance and relatives stuffing sweets and goodies in front of you :) The 'eat it now or it will be gone' habits kicked in. All this good tasting food - especially bread with butter - wow I was in heaven. Still I don't think I was eating a grossly huge amount probably most days around 1800-2000 calories - when family would visit - 2500. I also gained 60 lbs in almost 6 months. I went from 125 to 175 in almost no time. I blamed it at the time on eating more and not exercising anymore. (but 60 lbs in 6 months????) I never really clued in to the fact that I probably shouldn't have gained it that fast and that something might actually be medically wrong with me.

The last half of my senior year of high school I managed to bring my weight down to about 160 lbs. I was trying to eat less than what I had in the past.

The next stage of my life was university and all that fun of being a poor university student - including believing my doctors when they told me I must be subconsiously forgetting about what food I ate (because otherwise I'd be losing weight not gaining) And that I was tired all the time because I was fat - and my joints ached and my periods were screwed up because I was fat. Probably the only good thing I learned during that period of my life was that I had grown up eating good foods for the most part - just too much of them. The one thing I didn't learn and I wish I had - that the food pyramid is ALL WRONG for me. At least I know now. After being diagnosed with PCOS and insulin resistance, and sleep apnea... I have the answers to a lot of my questions and no - it wasn't all just because I was fat. What was wrong with me was causing me to be fat - and to menstruate irregularly - and a whole other host of problems.
I'm still slowly lowering my carbs - I haven't been able to go cold turkey yet. But just lowering them and choosing to eat non starchy veggies more often than starchy ones - those small changes alone. I've finally managed to lose weight - and break through my 15lb 'stall and quit' mark. I've lost 22.5 lbs since my diagnosis back in July - and I'm not stopping here!

[Barbiedoll]

Hello
My mother didnt allow me to have any sugary snacks at all. My grandmother would get me from school and take me to McDonald's for happy meals and then to the store for junk food. I remeber my favorite was peanut butter cups and deritos. YUCK!!

Other than that we ate meats and veggies. All homade foods nothing pre-packaged. I have not had a weight problem until I was married and made my own meals. I lost control then. I am quickly learning I have to eat better. :roll: :roll: :help:

[SlimShAdY]

I ate basically the same way for the like the last 21 yrs (well, untill 2 yrs ago when I discovered low carb..)

I never touched fruit (except for grapes and apples) or vegetables (except for corn). I always ate Cereal and bagels on a daily basis! Especially as a kid, I'd eat Resee Puffs or even Total a few times a day... (figuring it was healthy cause of vitamians LOL)

It was just me, my mom and my brother who is 9yrs younger then me so my mom never really made dinner because we'd all be eating different things and stuff. (to this day still do lol) I used to get Mcdonalds almost everyday while he was eating baby cereal. :D Our house was/is always filled with soda, koolaid, juice, cereals, breads, Pasta (since its the *fastest* and *easiest* thing for her to make) , Frozen pizzas, cans of soups, hotdogs..And my fav, Icecream! (When I was like 11 I used to eat a half gallon within 3 days..EWW! haha I got fat for that but I lost it quickly) I never really ate cookies and chips or any of that kind of boxed junk..Pfft. That crap wasn't good enuff for me! More like homemade brownies, Hershey bars and M&M's and cookie dough. lol.


Never really any healthy foods ... :o :o

[tlcdoula]

This is a great question... a friend and I were talking about this the othe rday..

I don't blame my mom for my weight problem, I know what she was doing was what she thought best...

She had me on a diet since I was about 9... She was over weight for much of her life and lost about 100 lbs... during her loss we all had to eat what she was eating... so grapefruit for breaky.... poached chicken for dinnner... salad for lunch with no dressing.... Of course my dad ate other food but since I was a chubby child she wanted me to lose the weight... It even went as far as going to diet center with her to lose 10 lbs.... and guess what my reward was when I got to my 10 lb mark??? FRIES can you belive it... the center gave me a gift certif for fries...

So most of my life we didn't have real sugar in the house, no junk etc.. so I would find it and hid it.. causing the horrible carb problem I have now... Im sure of it....

When I was about 12 my mom said she would buy me a horse but I had to lose 20 lbs that time... I can't say I ever did lose the 20 lbs.. because by then I was babysitting and making money to sneak food...

I belive that my weight problems have all strained from this.... it was like the forbidden foods were the ones I had to have... and I still fight with this on a daily basis...

My children are both every slim for their age.... not an inch of fat on them and I don't limit what they eat.. of course we don't have junk in the house but if they want a treat when we are at the store then I usually get it for them... I don't want them being deprived of food and ending up like I am..

sorry for the novel..

tawnya

[asugar]

One thing I forgot to mention in my post above is that I was never forced to eat anything when I was a child. My mother did insist that we at least try a taste of something new, but if we tried it and didn't like it, we didn't have to eat it. We didn't have to clean our plates or eat all of our vegetables either. If I didn't like what she was serving, she would make me something like soup and a sandwich instead. My poor mother made lots of soup and sandwiches through the years b/c half the time it wasn't a matter of not liking what we were having..........it was more a matter of we'd rather have something else. I don't know why she didn't just hand us menus. :D
We were never sent to bed without dinner either. Food was never used to punish or reward us. When I had my own children, I never forced them to eat anything either. I know parents mean well when they force their children to "clean their plates" but it has always bothered me when parents do that. As an adult there are a few foods that I don't like (not many) and there are also times when I am just too full to eat another bite.
asugar :wave: