The Key To Your Waistline: Your Mother’s
Posted by: Nikki Dowling
Filed in:
news
2:50PM, Monday July 13th 2009
Wondering who to blame for your battle with the scale? Your same-gender parent—in other words, your mom if you’re a chick and your dad if you’re a dude. A study has found that overweight mothers are ten times more likely to have obese daughters, and tubby fathers are six times more likely to have portly sons. So why is this finding so interesting? Because it suggests that it’s not straight genetics that determine your girth—it’s more likely learned behavior. Fascinating, no? [News AU]
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yasminzar
wrote on July 13 2009 @ 03:08 pm: [report]
1) This picture is asctually making me really nauseous.
2) My mom is 5"9 and 115 lbs. I’m 5"5 and NOT 115 lbs. FAIL.
likeOMGkbye
wrote on July 13 2009 @ 03:11 pm: [report]
omg please dont tell me that. my mother has the middle aged “always looks pregnant” tummy and I definitely DO NOT WANT.
chouette
wrote on July 13 2009 @ 04:01 pm: [report]
I’ll second yasminzar- definitely bigger than my mother, and always have been. I like food, she doesn’t so much care. Oh well.
Sugarmandy
wrote on July 13 2009 @ 06:56 pm: [report]
Unfortunately in my family this theory is pretty much true. If you look at pictures of my entire family tree, all the woman; mothers, grandmothers, aunts, and cousins. We look pretty much identical, we are all skinny, on the shorter side ranging from 5’1” to 5’6” olive complexion, and frizzy unnatural wavy and I’ll say crazy looking dark brown hair. It gets so bad sometimes times when looking threw family albums any picture not label are thrown in a box to be dealt with later. Except all of us woman who have had one or more children, after that we become very overweight. I was a little twiggy thing 120 lbs, till I gained 50 lbs with the birth of my son and now two years later my weight has bounced down to 120 and back up to 140. I agree our eating style has something to do with, in a huge Italian family no one has a clue what the tern “portion control” really means. What a potion isn’t the size of a dinner plate who knew.. But I eat the same amount, almost the same recipes but now my metabolism is shot, so that extra helping of manicotti goes straight to my a$$. Now my boyfriend is a twiggy sorta man, and so is his father. So I can see that link, but he eats probably 10 chocolate bars a day, 5 Twinkies, 6 nutterbutters, and two muffins. If it’s located in the little Debbie section of the super market he eats it daily. I have to force him to eat like a human being and not a teenager. But he weighs less than I do, and he can fit into pants I don’t even want to look at anymore. I hope it’s genetic and he stays skinny if not when he’s metabolism takes a dive were going to need a forklift to move him.
writergirl
wrote on July 13 2009 @ 07:03 pm: [report]
Not my mother and I. I take after my dad’s side of the family. Now, put me with that side—and yeah, it is true. But her and I aren’t built even remotely close to the same.
lirael182
wrote on July 13 2009 @ 07:16 pm: [report]
My little sister and my mom look alike, lighter hair, tall, more on the thin side. I look just like my dad, short, a little overweight, and much more Italian. So this might be true for some, but I think both parents play a role.
sadie
wrote on July 14 2009 @ 06:50 am: [report]
Much smaller than my mother but I work at it. We have vastly different diet and exercise habits.
Lynn
wrote on July 14 2009 @ 08:48 am: [report]
Interesting. I definitely think it’s probably a “learned behavior thing” once you take out factors like medical conditions. Because you grow up thinking that your mom is beautiful and your dad is the epitome of a man - and who wouldn’t want to be just like that?
I Go To 11
wrote on July 14 2009 @ 11:57 am: [report]
@ sadie: Me too. Thing is, my mom used to be into aerobics back in the day and was built like I am now. However, over the past 20 years or so, she’s taken to excuses as to why she “can’t” control her weight. This is despite the fact that when she actually chooses to work at it, she succeeds, but the last time that happened was when I was in high school (so we’re talking 10 years ago or so). She doesn’t have the healthiest eating habits and says she’s too tired to work out (even though exercise energizes you), or too stressed, or doesn’t have time, etc. Thankfully, I’ve taken a cue from my dad and have gotten into running and eat a semi-vegetarian diet to combat that.
becktasm
wrote on July 14 2009 @ 12:09 pm: [report]
See, I always thought that my mom’s obsession with staying slender was what gave me all my insecurities and struggles with my own weight. She’s always been thin, and I’ve always been curvy. The thing is, though, she has the same build as I do, and actually eats very little to stay slender, while as I have a healthy appetite and eat when I’m hungry. Clearly, I did not learn any of her “oh, I’m not eating dinner, I snacked while I was cooking it” habits.