Diets and stuff
Dec. 27th, 2018 05:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lathanyI was reading a post yesterday about parents and calories. It reminded me of a experience of my own - although somewhat different from that of the poster. And I thought that, as it’s about to be the season of dieting, I’d share it.
When I was at school I was overweight, the fattest girl in my class. So, I was on a diet from roughly age nine to age eighteen. My parents agreed I needed to lose weight - both were also on diets - and I entered the world of counting calories. It didn’t work too well and, until I reached university, I was constantly depressed about my weight and about all the negative comments I got. However, going off to university was when things changed. And, about a decade or two after I graduated, I put all the pieces together and worked out why.
There were two big reasons for the change. Both are somewhat linked to my mother taking up running in her early forties - pretty much as I hit my teens. Back at the start of her running career, I mean for the period that I was at home as a teenager, my mother progressed from fun runs to marathons.
As keen runners will know, running does interesting things to the rest of your schedule as you have to fit the runs in - particularly anything over ten miles. It plays havoc with meal scheduling. Combined with this, my mother was the cook of the family. At the weekend she would tell us that dinner would be at 1pm and then she’d go out for a fourteen mile run. She’d get back just before midday and have breakfast. 1pm would come and go and, about 1:30pm I’d get myself something to eat as I wouldn’t have eaten since a much earlier breakfast time. Then around 3pm, dinner would turn up. We had a plate-clearing policy and so I’d eat all that as well. This is the first of the two big reasons - I was eating more than three meals, particularly at the weekend.
The second big reason was something I mentioned near the start of my post. That my mother was also on a constant diet. The reason for this changed when she started running from wanting to look thinner to wanting to be thinner to run better times. And, consequently, whenever she dished up a meal, she always dished herself the smallest portion. However, size is a relative thing and so when she was hungry - usually following a long run - all the portions would consequently swell so that the smallest would satisfy her. And that “clear your plate” policy hit again here.
All this meant that when I left for university - and being away from home for thirty weeks of the year - I lost a stone without any dieting. When I moved to London after I graduated - I lost two more stone.
These days, I do keep an eye on what I eat and drink (I find I need less per day than when I was younger). All the early calorie counting is useful for this as I know what I’m consuming. It was also useful for the post-twins diet I went on to lose a couple of stone about fifteen years ago before going back to work. But I’ve never gone back to the depression of my teens.
Also, finally, I’d like to think that, had I gone back home after university, I might have become smarter about the situation. Taken over more of the cooking (which I also, much later, found out that my mother hated doing), ignored my mother’s announced times and gone with my own better judgement, had separate meal times and/or fought back much harder against the portion sizes and the clear plate policy.
It’s how long it took me to realise that strikes me now.
When I was at school I was overweight, the fattest girl in my class. So, I was on a diet from roughly age nine to age eighteen. My parents agreed I needed to lose weight - both were also on diets - and I entered the world of counting calories. It didn’t work too well and, until I reached university, I was constantly depressed about my weight and about all the negative comments I got. However, going off to university was when things changed. And, about a decade or two after I graduated, I put all the pieces together and worked out why.
There were two big reasons for the change. Both are somewhat linked to my mother taking up running in her early forties - pretty much as I hit my teens. Back at the start of her running career, I mean for the period that I was at home as a teenager, my mother progressed from fun runs to marathons.
As keen runners will know, running does interesting things to the rest of your schedule as you have to fit the runs in - particularly anything over ten miles. It plays havoc with meal scheduling. Combined with this, my mother was the cook of the family. At the weekend she would tell us that dinner would be at 1pm and then she’d go out for a fourteen mile run. She’d get back just before midday and have breakfast. 1pm would come and go and, about 1:30pm I’d get myself something to eat as I wouldn’t have eaten since a much earlier breakfast time. Then around 3pm, dinner would turn up. We had a plate-clearing policy and so I’d eat all that as well. This is the first of the two big reasons - I was eating more than three meals, particularly at the weekend.
The second big reason was something I mentioned near the start of my post. That my mother was also on a constant diet. The reason for this changed when she started running from wanting to look thinner to wanting to be thinner to run better times. And, consequently, whenever she dished up a meal, she always dished herself the smallest portion. However, size is a relative thing and so when she was hungry - usually following a long run - all the portions would consequently swell so that the smallest would satisfy her. And that “clear your plate” policy hit again here.
All this meant that when I left for university - and being away from home for thirty weeks of the year - I lost a stone without any dieting. When I moved to London after I graduated - I lost two more stone.
These days, I do keep an eye on what I eat and drink (I find I need less per day than when I was younger). All the early calorie counting is useful for this as I know what I’m consuming. It was also useful for the post-twins diet I went on to lose a couple of stone about fifteen years ago before going back to work. But I’ve never gone back to the depression of my teens.
Also, finally, I’d like to think that, had I gone back home after university, I might have become smarter about the situation. Taken over more of the cooking (which I also, much later, found out that my mother hated doing), ignored my mother’s announced times and gone with my own better judgement, had separate meal times and/or fought back much harder against the portion sizes and the clear plate policy.
It’s how long it took me to realise that strikes me now.
