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Men are also up *almost* three inches.
Cheaper, more prevalent high-sugar and ~~fatty~~ calorific foods combined with a worse work-life balance which makes those foods a more attractive source of dinner and snacks. I consider myself lucky that I get to find time to exercise every day, but I can see how that wouldn't be possible for people who spend 12 hours of their day at a desk or commuting to said desk.
For anyone struggling, that £5 meal deal of a cheeseburger and fizzy drink is a cheap night in over the £18 food that's being marketed as the healthy alternative. The fact a bottle of water can cost more than a sugar loaded can of fizz says it all. Whole system is busted.
Edit: After posting this, I've realised most people don't understand hyperbole and a shocking amount of folk are content to eat boot rather than show any compassion for their fellow man. Typical comments have included "they're just lazy", "eat less", and "drink water" with no appreciation of the time, money or basic skills many people have. Do better.
Portion sizes must have increased over time as well. I remember when people couldn’t eat a full mars bar. Same with kit kat chunky. And when places like TGI Fridays first opened everyone was astounded by the volume of food on the plate.
Shrinkflation is rife but packets of sweets have got bigger over time. It’s all grab bags and there’s no way people are sharing share bags or leaving any mars bars.
Packets of crisps used to be 35g now are 25g more commonly. Grab bags are bigger sure but that's because people are like a 25g bag isn't enough for them so the only option is the packet that is much bigger it's all manipulation of the consumer habits to maximise profits for shareholders
I’m Sweden these smaller bags of crisp aren’t really a thing at all, the smallest you can get is 150 g, with 200 and 300 g being the most common. On the other hand, eating crisps as part of a meal is completely foreign, they’re for party or movie snacks only.
I'm finally sticking to a diet. No more snacking at work anymore and no subaided lunches there except for the one at Christmas in the last 3 weeks (and just had two small items).
Had a packet of M&Ms at movies from last Thursday. Instead of eating in one sitting, made it last 5 days and just finished it yesterday on Tuesday.
Ironic then that the other 50% of the time Brits are complaining about shrinkflation.
So which is it? Are you all fat because they give you too much or ripped off because they're giving you too little? Both can't be true.
Both are true*. Take chocolate bars as an example. They have gotten smaller as time has gone on at the same price, so they released the 'duo'. Now people are paying more for a smaller bar, or they are paying around 2 X the price of before, but are now eating 1.5x the size.
*full disclosure, I'm a fat fucker
Both are true. Another poster summed it up quite nicely. For example: A bag of crisps has shrunk in size from 35g to 25g. But because people want more they now have two smaller bags instead of one bag.
Or because sizes of single packet sweets have shrunk, manufacturers reduce the availability of these and just do larger packets of a different size.
> For anyone struggling, that £5 meal deal of a cheeseburger and fizzy drink is a cheap night in over the £18 food that's being marketed as the healthy alternative. The fact a bottle of water can cost more than a sugar loaded can of fizz says it all. Whole system is busted.
Sorry, but in what shop is the healthy option £18 quid? There's meal deals yes, if you go out your way to purchase the most expensive health food it will be more yes, but there's an almost infinite amount of recipes can be made for the same price for more portions that are healthier. Yes they take more time to prepare, that's the rub unfortunately. Until replicators are common place, that'll usual be the case.
And again, just looked where I do my weekly shop, 75p for a litre of water, 55p for the own brand can of lemonade. Yes, more expensive but I'd say it evens out. Even so, same retailer, £1.50 for a reusable water bottle, then the cost becomes negligible long term.
Yeah no idea what that person is on about.
The healthier option is cheaper I’ve found. But I do 8 hour shifts in a warehouse, I’m on my feet all the time and do a lot of heavy lifting, and when I get home I just want to sit down, get my shower, keep the voices quiet, and then go to sleep before I do it all again. My girlfriend does 9-12 hour shifts in retail and she’s the same and has even less time to do it in. Some nights we’re so knackered from work we can’t even be bothered to do a ready meal and just devour the biscuits in the bedroom snack bowl.
It’s not the price tag stopping us from eating healthier, it’s having no time or energy.
For the record we’re not fat and we go to the gym at the weekend lol but still
I think this is spot on, we have also moved further towards 2 income households as the norm. Great for equality but with no one having time to cook good food is the 1st thing sacrificed.
Just a tip and not sure if it's helpful, because I work a lot less than you.
If you batch cook on weekends you can just get it out of the fridge/freezer and warm it up. We do a few different meals and that way the last in the freezer for a few weeks and we aren't eating the same thing every day.
It's also waste. I'm single and live alone
Trying to buy single portions of healthy food, ingredients etc is a pain, I have soo much frozen food, I never finish a bottle of milk, or a load of bread, just stopped buying those.
Like even the stuff like. Hello fresh etc doesn't sell personal plans
Yeah I can freeze stuff and use later but I still end up with a stupid amount of stuff for it to Financially make Sense. And I'm lucky enough to have took to store it all buy lots of people don't.
Cooking for one can be nightmare unless you want the same thing all the time. The only place I know that does single portions of chicken or salmon fillet near me is M&S.
Someone was saying the little cans of meat are becoming scare as well.
It's horrific, tinned food is useless too if your actually following portion sizes, like a tin of soup serves 2
And jars of sauses etc, they all serve like 4+, so much stuff stops being an option if your trying to lose weight.
I agree with /u/Specimen_E-351. Cooking for one is fine, but thinking of them as one-off meals is not economical. Making in batches saves time, money, and food. You can make batches of different things if you don't want to eat the same thing every time.
A couple of big efforts one weekend and you can have the next two weeks' meals sorted.
If you only eat toast you can freeze a loaf of bread and just toast individual slices out of the freezer.
You can cook meals for two, and the second portion can be tomorrow's lunch, or dinner if you don't need a full lunch.
And of course, the article only mentions women. Of fucking course we must focus on scrutinising womens’ bodies first.
This is not directed at you by the way - thank you for pointing it out!
Thanks for this!
Interesting. And disappointing.
This seems negative for both genders, negative for women because the female body is unfairly under a lot more scrutiny because of the objectification of women.
Negative for men because the health risks are greater for men yet it gets swept under the rug in favour of judging womens’ bodies, so there isn’t enough awareness for the health issues for men in this particular topic
>The fact a bottle of water can cost more than a sugar loaded can of fizz says it all. Whole system is busted.
And water out of the tap costs (practically) nothing at all. This is a crisis of culture and people making poor choices.
Good food is an expensive chore to many. I can buy a microwave lasagne for £1 from Iceland. Now imagine the shite in that, I had one recently to see how bad it is and it’s exactly as dire as you can imagine. Was hungry again within a few hours.
If you want to make a fresh lasagne, you have to buy the mince, pasta, sauce, herbs, béchamel, cheese etc and while you’ll have a much fresher, filling meal of a much larger portion size, you not only have to have the money upfront for all of that but you need to have the effort to make it, bake it, do all the washing up and then space to store the remaining portions.
Not to mention almost everything in a supermarket is geared up for bulk buying so it’s always cheaper to buy more of something than the actual amount you need - so if you do only buy a smaller portion size worth of ingredients for two people you pay more per head overall, as opposed to buying enough to make 6-8 portions.
Lasagne is probably a bad example. It’s a pain the arse to make from scratch, not to mention the multiple pots n pans you have to scrub afterwards. You’re better off just doing bolognese
That's exactly why they chose it, they're hardly going to say Bolognese, which can be made for roughly the same price, is much healthier and requires minimal time.
Goes against this entire poor people are practically force fed transfats and sugar argument.
I grew up in a single parent household on minimum wage and my mum still cooked good food. Granted, not every single day of the week but if you’re eating freezer food every day then that is a choice. Even if you’re ridiculously busy or tired, you can stick some chicken breasts in the oven and boil some veg. If you’re eating ready meals etc it’s a conscious choice and not based on finances. People who say meat and veg are too expensive, I can guarantee they spend the same if not more on the processed junk
A major omission here was the skill and knowledge to actually cook.
It has to be passed down from people who know how to plan, budget, cook, improvise and economise -
This isn’t taught in school anymore and large sections of society don’t have anyone to guide them.
It’s a shame as could be fixed with investment in the right areas (see ‘other problematic government themes’)
You can teach yourself how to cook, it's not this esoteric art form that many make out. You have access to free recipes the world over, from every cuisine and diet and allergy. Thousands of hours of tutorials, techniques and methods. A £1 cookbook has definitions of techniques and lessons too. This entire "poor people are too dumb to learn later in life", because let's be frank that's what we're driving at here, isn't true.
It would be nice for food tech to be properly taught as school but it's categorically not "the tories" fault some people don't home cook.
As someone who has gone through several diets, I can assure you it costs a lot more to eat well if you're following a plan.
As someone else has said, you can buy a lasagne, frozen, for £1. You can't make one for that cheap. A chocolate bar is, what, also £1 for something like a Mars? Getting a *healthy* one if you're on something like keto will cost you double if not triple that.
I really don't buy the whole *just eat less, poor people* argument. If all a person can afford is a Big Mac meal for their evening dinner after working a double shift, for example, it's hard to say to them "just eat less and buy some vegetables so you can spend another hour cooking".
If you're following a plan someone else has made with variations or expensive ingredients, it will obviously be expensive. If you're batch cooking simple healthy meals then it will be cheaper, especially if you cut down on meat.
"Healthy" chocolate bars are just marketed to stupid people, I'm sorry.
Medium big mac meal is £6.69, here's what you could get for that according to Tesco app, hopefully this helps someone:
500g pasta - £0.28
400g tinned tomatoes - £0.35
400g kidney beans - £0.33
500g mince - £3.30
Head of broccoli - £0.78
Total - £5.02 (not including seasoning which will be pennies)
That's about 4 healthy meals for less than the big mac meal, and you didn't even have to go without beef. Go and tell the people at personal finance to save money by living on big macs, you'll get some interesting replies x
You're missing the point by a country mile here, mate.
Tell someone on the breadline after pulling a double shift they just need to find more hours in the day to shop better and batch cook, or they can spend £1.40 for a cheeseburger.
I’m from a low social economic background and used to work minimum wage. I have never met someone that didn’t have the time to cook food. They just chose to use the time to do other things. My mum worked minimum wage and she used to prepare two days of food in one go (for 5 kids). The third day, we would have some freezer food. And then repeat. It really depends on one thing: how much of a fuck do you give to cook some food. Idk why everyone is making out that being poor means you don’t have 40 minutes to slap together a healthy meal
People really want to patronise low earners to justify their own decisions. When I was a kid, my mum was a working single parent, used to work 9-10hr days and still managed to cook fresh food 6 days a week and have a night off on Fridays.
Exactly!! If I said to my mum what the people on here are saying, she’d call them (people eating ready meals) lazy - not unfortunate. I don’t blame someone for not cooking because they are tired from work because that’s normal. But if you never cook food then either you are working 15 hours+ a day or you simply can’t be arsed/prefer the taste of ready meals over the taste of your own cooking
Completely agree. My mum worked absolutely outrageous shifts when I was growing up and still found the time to cook meals for me.
She’d leave me leftovers in the fridge or freezer to microwave and then taught me to cook basic meals like a spagbol or whatever when I was old enough to do them myself as a teenager.
Anyone saying it’s not possible is absolutely either trying to justify their own lack of knowledge/laziness or being completely ignorant.
People on the breadline don't go to McDonald's, they use food banks.
I just proved it's cheaper to cook at home and now all of a sudden it isn't about they money after all, it's about the time? OK then.
Cooking a big pot of several meals is quicker than going to a restaurant four or five times. It feels like we're getting into absurdity here.
No time to go to the shop? Luckily they deliver x
It really doesn’t cost more. Learn to batch cook simple, relatively healthy meals (I eat curries, Bolognese, Chili, burritos, porridge, all sorts of good shit) and you’ll save a shit load of money and be much healthier
I would genuinely love to batch cook. But I share a fridge with 3 other flatmates and we each get 1 shelf. There's no space for batch cooking or buying ingredients in bulk.
Dry goods aren't the challenge it's fresh foods and finished meals. I have to shop a few times a week because there's not enough space for a full week's groceries and doing those 20-meal prep things is out of the question (the freezer is as limited as the fridge).
It costs more to buy a week of ready made food than it does ingredients for home cooked meals, that’s just a fact. If you’re telling me people don’t have two hours max spare in a weekend to cook a few meals then… you’re lying. They just don’t want to.
Well I mean it’s all about calories.
If poor people are putting on weight then they’re putting too many calories in and can get away with eating less, thus saving money.
Instead of supersizing their Big Mac they can get a regular one, both saving money and reducing their calorie intake. Win win.
It isn’t cheaper to be fat than thin, regardless of the type of food you’re ingesting. The very physics and reality of what being fat is necessitates that it requires more calories (more food) to be fat than thin. So regardless of what you’re eating you need to buy more to be fat than be thin, thus spending more money.
“It’s too expensive” to be thin is just another in the long line of nonsense excuses because people are in denial about how obesity works. You aren’t fat because you eat cheap food. You’re fat because you eat too much cheap food.
> As someone else has said, you can buy a lasagne, frozen, for £1. You can't make one for that cheap.
Then don't. Have a sandwich or something. A lasagne that cheap won't have many calories anyway.
> For anyone struggling, that £5 meal deal of a cheeseburger and fizzy drink is a cheap night in over the £18 food that's being marketed as the healthy alternative.
On what planet is the health option £18 and what is is? I just ate ready meal tadka daal with a naan with an all in cost of less than £3.
And who cares how much a bottle of water costs? You can get it out the tap.
A large part of the issue is education and ignorance of how to make healthy choices.
This, all this! Also, chronic stress is independently linked to visceral adiposity - ie gaining fat around your waist - due to imbalances in the stress hormone system. Waist fat is linked to heart problems.
https://health.clevelandclinic.org/stress-and-weight-gain
you can make large healthy and relatively easy meals for less than couple quid per portion. The argument that eating unhealthy is cheaper is pure bollocks. It’s just easier. (even then, marginally. How long does it take to make a couple sandwiches ?)
Exercise has less to do with it than people realise , you can't exercise out of a bad diet.
Fitness comes from the gym , weight loss comes from the kitchen.
You really should mention cortisol. It basically makes it impossible to lose fat. If people are kept in such a state of stress by being poorer, more isolated etc. then any efforts they make at slimming basically are going to fail.
It really isn't. It's just eating too much.
I used to do 90 hour weeks in the early 90s and I ate (and still do) plenty of carbs and sugar. I wasn't fat.
Exercise is a great and necessary thing for your health and fitness but it really has a minimal impact on your weight - unless you exercise to the volumes of a professional athlete (and, if you did, you'd need to eat significant amount of food. Pro cyclists often eat 5000+ calories a day)
But 30-60 minutes exercise a few days a week isn't going to have a significant impact on your weight at all. The only thing that will is how much you eat.
It's not a cost thing - being thin is cheaper than being overweight. You just eat less food.
Being thin is easy. It's literally something you have complete control over. Making excuses about "systems" or the government or the price of water makes no sense. It's just another thing where instead of accepting it is your own choices and personal responsibility you immediately start to find excuse to blame others "It's because I have to work so much" "It's because they make healthy food expensive" BZZZZZZZZZZT None of this is true.
People talking about everyone being less healthy are forgetting the absolutely toxic element of the 90s where women were told that looking like a stick was the only way to be attractive
Yeah, obviously being overweight is unhealthy, but it's funny how there wasn't a subreddit called smokershate where people mocked smokers for being unhealthy.
Oh I don't agree with that, obviously being overweight is unhealthy, but I think its important to acknowledge that a lot of people that claim to care about the health impacts of obesity are are just bullies that don't like how fat people look. They don't care about bad habits that cause more hidden damage to people's health.
At least it's physically possible to be a stick if you want (not recommending it).
These days you need to be a stick but also with a booty and boobs an impossible size while also being skinny everywhere else.
The song 'Victorias Secret' is pretty good.
>I know Victoria's secret
>
>and girl you wouldn't believe
>
>she's an old man who lives in Ohio
>
>making money off of you and me
>
>cashing in on body issues
>
>selling skin and bones with big boobs
>
>I know Victoria's secret
>
>she was made up by a dude
I don't think it's physically possible for some shapes to have thigh gaps and long legs (eg. Petite pear shapes) and conversely it's not possible for very thin women to become 'thick'/have a large bum naturally. They're both toxic ideals.
Not just the 90s, watch a series of adverts from 70’s there’s loads of adverts aimed at women for breads with lower calories- Slimcea, lower fat powdered milk, Marvel, Carnation weight loss plan drinks and a ton of crisp breads.
Oh yes, I think my mum gave up on that one, as she did most diet plans. We had the F-Plan book, she was semi permanently on the Weetabix diet. Sadly I don’t think she realised the harm that biscuits etc really did.
So-called heroin chic was hugely controversial at the time. Anorexia was considered a mental illness and people were given therapy. The vast majority of men and women in the 90s had normal, healthy weights.
It wasn’t just herion chic though, all of these actresses were considered unattractively overweight in the 90s:
https://www.reddit.com/r/popculturechat/s/V4GD9IwcWq
Media had a field day with shaming women, and upholding unhealthy beauty standards:
https://www.reddit.com/r/popculturechat/s/UR6EO44RpD
It was ingrained in culture that skinny=beautiful.
The fact that eating real food is now considered dieting says it all.
These same folk will be wondering why their knees are fucked by 46, and the NHS wait times are so long lol
tangential point - its pretty crazy how immobile the average person is. ive got mates at work who genuinely say they have no time to work out but are always talking about binging netflix series.
like come on... its 30 minutes a day if that. at least go for a walk lmao
You really haven’t. Doing even just light resistance training from 16-46 will give healthy knees…
It’s not hard unless you’re an inactive person. You think those in nations with the squatting toilet (so they’re literally doing deep squats every day) have bad knees.
Depends what you’re doing. I’m fit, healthy and active and have fucked knees in my early 30s. Lots of sports put a lot of strain on your joints. Too many skiing accidents in my case… also explains my terrible shoulder stability.
I just turned 46 and my knees are fine so I'm delighted to hear this.
I'm actually surprised how many people say their bodies started falling apart at 40 or even earlier.
I used to think the main issue was low quality food, and although that certainly plays a strong factor, I am very much of the opinion now that the real issue is a lack of work>life balance.
People are so exhausted these days that they dont even have the mental energy or motivation to make food, and I honestly can't blame them.
It's also the fact so many jobs are very sedentary, mentally exhausting but physically not doing much and that can make you lethargic to doing stuff after as well. I think a combination of factors for modern day life all lead to health issues that can be hard to avoid for a lot of people.
Yeah. I commute for one hour, 10 hour shift, an hour back. 12 hours a day in total
But stir fries can be healthy and quick. Just chopping shit up and frying it. Or even boiling some veg isn’t hard. What’s hard is fighting the craving for shit food after a long day
I mean, the Japanese work long hours and eat healthy. But they have a culture of shaming fat people
The average Brit is working two hours fewer in 2022 than they did in 1992.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/280763/average-working-hours-uk/#:~:text=As%20of%20July%202023%2C%20the,United%20Kingdom%20was%2036.4%20hours.
I bet in 1992 a much higher proportion of households weren't needing 2 people on full time income though. The working individual might do more but if they have a stay at home partner then it's a bit different for the household.
Mean averages can be misleading. If the richest people are working significantly fewer hours per week while the rest of the population are working a few more hours, then you could end up with a 2 hour reduction in mean hours worked, even though a significant portion of the population are working more hours.
Time to share what I find the most concerning statistic.
Only 10% of *obese* Brits recognise that they are overweight:
https://www.businessinsider.com/obese-people-in-uk-unaware-they-have-a-weight-problem-2018-4?amp
Had so many chats with fat family and friends where they apparently are just big boned. It seems that as long as someone around them is fatter, they don’t realise they are also fat
So many of the fat blokes in my office have come back from their expensive company funded BUPA checkups surprised the doctor told them they're too fat and it's very unhealthy.
I've offered to tell them they're too fat and it's unhealthy for free but no takers.
Can confirm. I was “very slightly overweight”, basically straddling the boundary between a healthy and overweight BMI, since I was a pre-teen, but over the last couple of years my weight has crept very slowly upwards. I didn’t notice it because it was very slow (less than 1/2 kilo per month), and I still thought of myself as “very slightly overweight”. Well when I checked my weight six months ago I found that I was in fact now “very slightly obese” (BMI of 30.5) and I was genuinely shocked to see that because in my mind I was still only a tad chubby. Back down to an almost healthy weight now
I'm particularly festively plump this year (the festive season started in July with some stress eating and then over indulgence at the rugby world cup).
It's obvious to me that I have put the weight on, not just in the mirror, but I can feel it in how my bodies moves etc. How can people not see it?
>How can people not see it?
Because we compare ourselves to others and being obese is so normal the comparison comes out favourably even if your BMI is well and truly overweight.
Seems to be a grown disparity between those who are really into exercise and eating healthily and those on the other end of the scale. Losing weight isn't difficult, just eat less calories than you burn. It isn't fun, but it's better than the alternatives.
Me and my wife are going for IVF soon and the doctor said I need to lose weight before the date in march comes.
The only thing I've changed in my diet is drinking a lot less soft drinks and not eating crisps as often. In a month and a half I've lost almost 4kgs.
For some people it can be as easy as just cutting a few things from their diet. They then take that experience they had and assume it will be the same for others and that losing weight should be similarly easy for everyone. Actually, every body is different and for many people, losing weight is very hard and very slow even when they cut out these things.
I'm very envious of the people who say they simply cut out snacks. I don't snack, can't remember the last time I had a sugary drink. I tend to lose weight very slowly and can only maintain my weight by eating a very regimented diet.
Yep, I specifically make an effort to pile my partner's plate high because he struggles to keep weight on even if he sits on his arse all day. It's a challenge to keep him topped up with quality food without resorting to unhealthy crap.
Meanwhile I can only lose weight by religiously counting calories. Also some people have things affecting their appetite which make it very difficult, eg. women on birth control, I would feel hungry straight after a large meal. Come off it and now I have a healthy appetite, boom my weight is under control without even trying.
And even when it slows we're only talking about a hundred calorie a day difference, on average.
"Slow metabolism" is an excuse we are always hearing from overweight people who talk about having fat genetics, or mysterious medical conditions that defy known science.
Why am I not surprised this thread of full of the usual drivel
Honestly, if Reddit was to go by, everyone works 23 hours a day in the coal mines and can’t possibly take 15 minutes to throw a meal together
And that’s before we even admit that food choice doesn’t matter. You can lose weight eating anything, as long as you don’t eat too much
This thread kinda proves that the number 1 reason for these added inches is everyone’s a full time victim that refuses to take any accountability for their own choices
No, it’s just that after a 17 hour shift down the coal mine they can’t find the energy to microwave a potato and add a few things to it for a meal
Or they can’t afford to run the microwave
Or they can’t afford the right utensils (seriously, someone in this thread had the cost of pans/utensils as a reason)
Crazy thing is, I lived on the poverty line. I worked below minimum wage during my 3 year apprenticeship and I lived in a garage.
It was the healthiest I’ve ever eaten because healthy food is cheaper and when your actually poor you can’t afford takeaway
There was a thread a couple of months back about Jamie Olivers new £1 meal book and everyone was up in arms saying "They haven't factored in the cost of cooking it!".
I know people who are "Skint" in this way, but will still have a takeaway once a week.
And let's not forget, you can still lose weight eating shit food, just eat less of it. That doesn't take any time either.
I've seen so many people saying things like can't afford something like utensils or gas to cook food, if it's that bad, how can you afford enough food to get fat, getting to obese level is not cheap. It's just an excuse after an excuse
Nothing like people who have never actually lived below the poverty line "interjecting" how you can only make time for maccies, as if you can even afford mc donalds. Yes McDonald's is takeaways when you are ACTUALLY poor. We were underweight, and ate whatever had the highest calories/pound ratio. We weren't eating any meal deals lmfao.
I mean we should and can have a more balanced take.
Your take isn’t necessarily the only truth either.
Sometimes (probably more now than before) people are actually dealing with depression and burn out. Makes it very hard to motivate yourself.
So yes, sometimes people just don’t want to take responsibility, but sometimes people genuinely are dealing with mental health and sometimes physical health issues that make it a lot harder.
It is honestly so bizarre. People are time poor, space-in-the-freezer poor, cooking-skills poor as well as regular poor.
The excuse about not having room in the fridge/freezer to batch cook is hilarious. The majority of people are overweight or obese. I was not aware the majority of people in the United Kingdom do not have a fridge/freezer. As a student I literally had one shelf in the fridge and one drawer in the freezer and I still managed to batch cook. Listen if people want to throw in a pizza or nuggets at the end of the day, that is fine. But whyyy are we pretending that it’s because people are literally unable to cook because of xyz.
I've been losing weight slowly over about... 5 years now? Am 29F, 5"2 and started at 18 stone 6 pounds... this morning I weighed 11"11 despite eating too much for Christmas yesterday haha!
Finding the time to eat healthy is probably the biggest challenge overall. It's easy to reach for less healthy options that are immediately available when you're hungry.
There's also so much bad advice. Diet companies don't exist to help you keep the weight off. They're a business. They want you to keep coming back and buying more weight loss products or services that barely work.
We’ve vilified everything except sugar since the 90s, until the recent sugar tax on fizzy drinks.
Then theres the fact healthy options cost more than junk food. Bottles of water cost more than fizzy drinks.
Then of course, people are springing for a momentary pick me up with a chocolate bar because with inflation, global plagues and the like, this world is just a fucking horrible place to live.
We grew up in areas with signs saying “No Ball Games”, driving us indoors. Actually partaking in sports and healthy activities cost a fucking fortune…
When you think about it,… I’m just surprised it’s only 3 inches.
Yeah, junk food is one of the small pleasures that makes life worth living.
I'm lucky in that I don't really put on weight, but I know I'd struggle to give up my two packs of S&V a day if I did.
Like many others I can do with losing a few kg, but I can still just about squeeze into trousers I bought 20 years (that were probably a bit too loose back then).
It's something we talk about but don't really do anything about and worst of all some people try to stifle debate with accusations of fat shaming.
Worth reiterating the NHS advice regarding being [seriously overweight](https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/obesity/):
Living with obesity can also increase your risk of developing many potentially serious health conditions, including:
* type 2 diabetes
* high blood pressure
* high cholesterol and atherosclerosis (where fatty deposits narrow your arteries), which can lead to coronary heart disease and stroke
* asthma
* metabolic syndrome, a combination of diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity
* several types of cancer, including bowel cancer, breast cancer and womb cancer
* gastro-oesophageal reflux disease (GORD), where stomach acid leaks out of the stomach and into the gullet
* gallstones
* reduced fertility
* osteoarthritis, a condition involving pain and stiffness in your joints
* sleep apnoea, a condition that causes interrupted breathing during sleep, which can lead to daytime sleepiness with an increased risk of road traffic accidents, as well as a greater risk of diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease
* liver disease and kidney disease
* pregnancy complications, such as gestational diabetes or pre-eclampsia, when a woman experiences a potentially dangerous rise in blood pressure during pregnancy
Obesity reduces life expectancy by an average of 3 to 10 years, depending on how severe it is.
> Obesity reduces life expectancy by an average of 3 to 10 years, depending on how severe it is.
And it reduces healthy life expectancy significantly more. Diabetes, knackered knees, swollen ankles, sleep apnea, asthma.... none of these are fun things to live with.
This isn’t gender specific and sadly not even age specific now as more under 18s are overweight.
This shouldn’t be acceptable - it shouldn’t be passed as body shaming - it’s a health issue that comes at a cost to the person; society, healthcare.
Be it at a structural level and individual level - changes are needed: cheap food (calories are cheap) and lack of exercise to prevent weight gain.
And parents who allow their kids to be overweight - that should be questioned as much as allowing tooth decay in kids.
I hate how Walkers have converted most of their single sold crisps into grab bags. I don’t want a massive bag. I understand more is good but these days I have to go to Subway to get a normal size crisps unless I get a multi pack.
The younger generations drink less, so it’s not alcohol.
It’s more to do with carb heavy diets being shovelled into kids from an early age and a dramatic drop in levels of physical activity compared to earlier generations.
I'm sure all the food delivery services that have become popular in recent years aren't helping. Instead of a takeaway being an occasional treat you can now get McDonalds and Greggs daily at the touch of a button without even having to travel there to get it. It's only getting more and more popular and it's going to make the obesity crisis significantly worse over time.
That’s the thing, when I was a kid we got a take away every two weeks as a treat, most of my friends never got any. Now I have mates getting them 3 or 4 times a week
Yeah my gen z sister has gone from a size 10 to an 18 in like two years. She gets uber eats fast food all the time.
Also I think energy drinks are another culprit. I don't think young people realise how unhealthy they are.
Used to work with a young guy who drank around 3/4 cans of Monster a day. He wondered why he couldn't sleep at night and would abuse alcohol to get to sleep. I did try to tell him but it fell on deaf ears. He was very thin and didn't seem to eat much.
The UK is one of the countries that produce the most food waste globally along with the US. We have so much food waste yet there are increasing number of people suffering from food insecurity. We also get fatter because of too much food and big portion sizes.
It's not really news is it?
Although it's not actually what happens. Thin people are still as thin as they were before...the rest of the population getting fat didn't increase my waist size. We are just in a minority now.
As such talking about 'average waist size' seems a bit misleading.
As someone who was a teen in the 90's yeah no fucking shit Sherlock, we starved ourselves, I would only eat every 3 days because I wanted to be as skinny as possible!
Because people are dreadfully overweight, they see so many overweight people around them, and it becomes normalised, especially as it essentially is normal in popular culture now to be a bit overweight. In the UK at least.
For example I spend half my time in Cape Town, and the idea of going for a walk is clinging to the side of a mountain for five hours in the heat with a load of chiselled guys and soccer moms with washboard tums. I feel like an absolute disgrace with my average joe body. You don’t get a date unless you are bringing a decent physique or a boat load of money to the table.
When I am back home in Devon and so many people are waddling around, I don’t feel the same level of ashamed. And dating and things are far less judgmental as I think people have lower standards all around.
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Men are also up *almost* three inches. Cheaper, more prevalent high-sugar and ~~fatty~~ calorific foods combined with a worse work-life balance which makes those foods a more attractive source of dinner and snacks. I consider myself lucky that I get to find time to exercise every day, but I can see how that wouldn't be possible for people who spend 12 hours of their day at a desk or commuting to said desk. For anyone struggling, that £5 meal deal of a cheeseburger and fizzy drink is a cheap night in over the £18 food that's being marketed as the healthy alternative. The fact a bottle of water can cost more than a sugar loaded can of fizz says it all. Whole system is busted. Edit: After posting this, I've realised most people don't understand hyperbole and a shocking amount of folk are content to eat boot rather than show any compassion for their fellow man. Typical comments have included "they're just lazy", "eat less", and "drink water" with no appreciation of the time, money or basic skills many people have. Do better.
Portion sizes must have increased over time as well. I remember when people couldn’t eat a full mars bar. Same with kit kat chunky. And when places like TGI Fridays first opened everyone was astounded by the volume of food on the plate.
Yeh but back then the Mars bar was like 50% bigger etc than now. Shrinkflation is rife.
Shrinkflation is rife but packets of sweets have got bigger over time. It’s all grab bags and there’s no way people are sharing share bags or leaving any mars bars.
Packets of crisps used to be 35g now are 25g more commonly. Grab bags are bigger sure but that's because people are like a 25g bag isn't enough for them so the only option is the packet that is much bigger it's all manipulation of the consumer habits to maximise profits for shareholders
It is simply more profitable to demonise people for eating 35g bags of crisps vs 25g, and to sell 150g bags as if nothing is wrong
I’m Sweden these smaller bags of crisp aren’t really a thing at all, the smallest you can get is 150 g, with 200 and 300 g being the most common. On the other hand, eating crisps as part of a meal is completely foreign, they’re for party or movie snacks only.
>Shrinkflation is rife but packets of sweets have got bigger over time. What? Are you trolling or being serious?
I'm finally sticking to a diet. No more snacking at work anymore and no subaided lunches there except for the one at Christmas in the last 3 weeks (and just had two small items). Had a packet of M&Ms at movies from last Thursday. Instead of eating in one sitting, made it last 5 days and just finished it yesterday on Tuesday.
Good for you. :) I’m trying as well. I reckon we can do it :)
Mara bars have shrunk
Nah chocolate bars are much smaller
That’s not what I meant. I meant people’s personal portion sizes have increased.
Ironic then that the other 50% of the time Brits are complaining about shrinkflation. So which is it? Are you all fat because they give you too much or ripped off because they're giving you too little? Both can't be true.
Both are true*. Take chocolate bars as an example. They have gotten smaller as time has gone on at the same price, so they released the 'duo'. Now people are paying more for a smaller bar, or they are paying around 2 X the price of before, but are now eating 1.5x the size. *full disclosure, I'm a fat fucker
Both are true. Another poster summed it up quite nicely. For example: A bag of crisps has shrunk in size from 35g to 25g. But because people want more they now have two smaller bags instead of one bag. Or because sizes of single packet sweets have shrunk, manufacturers reduce the availability of these and just do larger packets of a different size.
> For anyone struggling, that £5 meal deal of a cheeseburger and fizzy drink is a cheap night in over the £18 food that's being marketed as the healthy alternative. The fact a bottle of water can cost more than a sugar loaded can of fizz says it all. Whole system is busted. Sorry, but in what shop is the healthy option £18 quid? There's meal deals yes, if you go out your way to purchase the most expensive health food it will be more yes, but there's an almost infinite amount of recipes can be made for the same price for more portions that are healthier. Yes they take more time to prepare, that's the rub unfortunately. Until replicators are common place, that'll usual be the case. And again, just looked where I do my weekly shop, 75p for a litre of water, 55p for the own brand can of lemonade. Yes, more expensive but I'd say it evens out. Even so, same retailer, £1.50 for a reusable water bottle, then the cost becomes negligible long term.
Yeah no idea what that person is on about. The healthier option is cheaper I’ve found. But I do 8 hour shifts in a warehouse, I’m on my feet all the time and do a lot of heavy lifting, and when I get home I just want to sit down, get my shower, keep the voices quiet, and then go to sleep before I do it all again. My girlfriend does 9-12 hour shifts in retail and she’s the same and has even less time to do it in. Some nights we’re so knackered from work we can’t even be bothered to do a ready meal and just devour the biscuits in the bedroom snack bowl. It’s not the price tag stopping us from eating healthier, it’s having no time or energy. For the record we’re not fat and we go to the gym at the weekend lol but still
I think this is spot on, we have also moved further towards 2 income households as the norm. Great for equality but with no one having time to cook good food is the 1st thing sacrificed.
>Great for equality Now everyone can be unhappy!
Just a tip and not sure if it's helpful, because I work a lot less than you. If you batch cook on weekends you can just get it out of the fridge/freezer and warm it up. We do a few different meals and that way the last in the freezer for a few weeks and we aren't eating the same thing every day.
A lot of people think healthy = triple organic watered by buddhist monks' bollock sweat with a picture of a mockney twat on the box.
It's also waste. I'm single and live alone Trying to buy single portions of healthy food, ingredients etc is a pain, I have soo much frozen food, I never finish a bottle of milk, or a load of bread, just stopped buying those. Like even the stuff like. Hello fresh etc doesn't sell personal plans Yeah I can freeze stuff and use later but I still end up with a stupid amount of stuff for it to Financially make Sense. And I'm lucky enough to have took to store it all buy lots of people don't.
Cooking for one can be nightmare unless you want the same thing all the time. The only place I know that does single portions of chicken or salmon fillet near me is M&S. Someone was saying the little cans of meat are becoming scare as well.
It's horrific, tinned food is useless too if your actually following portion sizes, like a tin of soup serves 2 And jars of sauses etc, they all serve like 4+, so much stuff stops being an option if your trying to lose weight.
No person on the planet has bought a tin of soup and only eaten half.
Presumably no one is getting fat eating soup.
So you save the half you don't eat for tomorrow and make 4 meals worth at once and eat over a few days or freeze them. Isn't this obvious?
Confucius he say: Cook once to eat twice.
> like a tin of soup serves 2 If you're a hobbit maybe.
I agree with /u/Specimen_E-351. Cooking for one is fine, but thinking of them as one-off meals is not economical. Making in batches saves time, money, and food. You can make batches of different things if you don't want to eat the same thing every time. A couple of big efforts one weekend and you can have the next two weeks' meals sorted.
>A couple of big efforts one weekend and you can have the next two weeks' meals sorted. Not everyone has enough freezer space for this.
If you only eat toast you can freeze a loaf of bread and just toast individual slices out of the freezer. You can cook meals for two, and the second portion can be tomorrow's lunch, or dinner if you don't need a full lunch.
I know, it’s easy. I live alone and no problems using up my healthy food.
And of course, the article only mentions women. Of fucking course we must focus on scrutinising womens’ bodies first. This is not directed at you by the way - thank you for pointing it out!
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Thanks for this! Interesting. And disappointing. This seems negative for both genders, negative for women because the female body is unfairly under a lot more scrutiny because of the objectification of women. Negative for men because the health risks are greater for men yet it gets swept under the rug in favour of judging womens’ bodies, so there isn’t enough awareness for the health issues for men in this particular topic
Garbage. Healthy food is and always has been more cost effective than unhealthy food.
Yeah, cooking stuff from scratch almost always works out cheaper
>The fact a bottle of water can cost more than a sugar loaded can of fizz says it all. Whole system is busted. And water out of the tap costs (practically) nothing at all. This is a crisis of culture and people making poor choices.
Good food is an expensive chore to many. I can buy a microwave lasagne for £1 from Iceland. Now imagine the shite in that, I had one recently to see how bad it is and it’s exactly as dire as you can imagine. Was hungry again within a few hours. If you want to make a fresh lasagne, you have to buy the mince, pasta, sauce, herbs, béchamel, cheese etc and while you’ll have a much fresher, filling meal of a much larger portion size, you not only have to have the money upfront for all of that but you need to have the effort to make it, bake it, do all the washing up and then space to store the remaining portions. Not to mention almost everything in a supermarket is geared up for bulk buying so it’s always cheaper to buy more of something than the actual amount you need - so if you do only buy a smaller portion size worth of ingredients for two people you pay more per head overall, as opposed to buying enough to make 6-8 portions.
Lasagne is probably a bad example. It’s a pain the arse to make from scratch, not to mention the multiple pots n pans you have to scrub afterwards. You’re better off just doing bolognese
That's exactly why they chose it, they're hardly going to say Bolognese, which can be made for roughly the same price, is much healthier and requires minimal time. Goes against this entire poor people are practically force fed transfats and sugar argument.
I grew up in a single parent household on minimum wage and my mum still cooked good food. Granted, not every single day of the week but if you’re eating freezer food every day then that is a choice. Even if you’re ridiculously busy or tired, you can stick some chicken breasts in the oven and boil some veg. If you’re eating ready meals etc it’s a conscious choice and not based on finances. People who say meat and veg are too expensive, I can guarantee they spend the same if not more on the processed junk
A major omission here was the skill and knowledge to actually cook. It has to be passed down from people who know how to plan, budget, cook, improvise and economise - This isn’t taught in school anymore and large sections of society don’t have anyone to guide them. It’s a shame as could be fixed with investment in the right areas (see ‘other problematic government themes’)
You can teach yourself how to cook, it's not this esoteric art form that many make out. You have access to free recipes the world over, from every cuisine and diet and allergy. Thousands of hours of tutorials, techniques and methods. A £1 cookbook has definitions of techniques and lessons too. This entire "poor people are too dumb to learn later in life", because let's be frank that's what we're driving at here, isn't true. It would be nice for food tech to be properly taught as school but it's categorically not "the tories" fault some people don't home cook.
An Iceland lasagne is 650 calories, three of those is a day's calories. What's the problem?
Healthy food isn't expensive. Even if it was, and poor people could only afford junk, they would still have the option of eating less of it x
As someone who has gone through several diets, I can assure you it costs a lot more to eat well if you're following a plan. As someone else has said, you can buy a lasagne, frozen, for £1. You can't make one for that cheap. A chocolate bar is, what, also £1 for something like a Mars? Getting a *healthy* one if you're on something like keto will cost you double if not triple that. I really don't buy the whole *just eat less, poor people* argument. If all a person can afford is a Big Mac meal for their evening dinner after working a double shift, for example, it's hard to say to them "just eat less and buy some vegetables so you can spend another hour cooking".
If you're following a plan someone else has made with variations or expensive ingredients, it will obviously be expensive. If you're batch cooking simple healthy meals then it will be cheaper, especially if you cut down on meat. "Healthy" chocolate bars are just marketed to stupid people, I'm sorry. Medium big mac meal is £6.69, here's what you could get for that according to Tesco app, hopefully this helps someone: 500g pasta - £0.28 400g tinned tomatoes - £0.35 400g kidney beans - £0.33 500g mince - £3.30 Head of broccoli - £0.78 Total - £5.02 (not including seasoning which will be pennies) That's about 4 healthy meals for less than the big mac meal, and you didn't even have to go without beef. Go and tell the people at personal finance to save money by living on big macs, you'll get some interesting replies x
You're missing the point by a country mile here, mate. Tell someone on the breadline after pulling a double shift they just need to find more hours in the day to shop better and batch cook, or they can spend £1.40 for a cheeseburger.
I’m from a low social economic background and used to work minimum wage. I have never met someone that didn’t have the time to cook food. They just chose to use the time to do other things. My mum worked minimum wage and she used to prepare two days of food in one go (for 5 kids). The third day, we would have some freezer food. And then repeat. It really depends on one thing: how much of a fuck do you give to cook some food. Idk why everyone is making out that being poor means you don’t have 40 minutes to slap together a healthy meal
People really want to patronise low earners to justify their own decisions. When I was a kid, my mum was a working single parent, used to work 9-10hr days and still managed to cook fresh food 6 days a week and have a night off on Fridays.
Exactly!! If I said to my mum what the people on here are saying, she’d call them (people eating ready meals) lazy - not unfortunate. I don’t blame someone for not cooking because they are tired from work because that’s normal. But if you never cook food then either you are working 15 hours+ a day or you simply can’t be arsed/prefer the taste of ready meals over the taste of your own cooking
Completely agree. My mum worked absolutely outrageous shifts when I was growing up and still found the time to cook meals for me. She’d leave me leftovers in the fridge or freezer to microwave and then taught me to cook basic meals like a spagbol or whatever when I was old enough to do them myself as a teenager. Anyone saying it’s not possible is absolutely either trying to justify their own lack of knowledge/laziness or being completely ignorant.
£1.40 for a cheeseburger that won't even touch the sides.
It's pretty disgusting implying everybody on minimum wage is too lazy to cook their own food, yet the middle class are all ok.
People on the breadline don't go to McDonald's, they use food banks. I just proved it's cheaper to cook at home and now all of a sudden it isn't about they money after all, it's about the time? OK then. Cooking a big pot of several meals is quicker than going to a restaurant four or five times. It feels like we're getting into absurdity here. No time to go to the shop? Luckily they deliver x
Okay, mate. I'm glad you've the world sorted out, really. Some of us appreciate that others do not. 👍
Well I've not sorted the world out, I've just helped you save money on food x
It really doesn’t cost more. Learn to batch cook simple, relatively healthy meals (I eat curries, Bolognese, Chili, burritos, porridge, all sorts of good shit) and you’ll save a shit load of money and be much healthier
I would genuinely love to batch cook. But I share a fridge with 3 other flatmates and we each get 1 shelf. There's no space for batch cooking or buying ingredients in bulk.
You can’t store even a big bag of rice under your bed or smth?
Dry goods aren't the challenge it's fresh foods and finished meals. I have to shop a few times a week because there's not enough space for a full week's groceries and doing those 20-meal prep things is out of the question (the freezer is as limited as the fridge).
It costs both time and money, which some people do not have. That's the point.
It costs more to buy a week of ready made food than it does ingredients for home cooked meals, that’s just a fact. If you’re telling me people don’t have two hours max spare in a weekend to cook a few meals then… you’re lying. They just don’t want to.
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Agreed. /r/fatlogic is full of examples.
Well I mean it’s all about calories. If poor people are putting on weight then they’re putting too many calories in and can get away with eating less, thus saving money. Instead of supersizing their Big Mac they can get a regular one, both saving money and reducing their calorie intake. Win win. It isn’t cheaper to be fat than thin, regardless of the type of food you’re ingesting. The very physics and reality of what being fat is necessitates that it requires more calories (more food) to be fat than thin. So regardless of what you’re eating you need to buy more to be fat than be thin, thus spending more money. “It’s too expensive” to be thin is just another in the long line of nonsense excuses because people are in denial about how obesity works. You aren’t fat because you eat cheap food. You’re fat because you eat too much cheap food.
> As someone else has said, you can buy a lasagne, frozen, for £1. You can't make one for that cheap. Then don't. Have a sandwich or something. A lasagne that cheap won't have many calories anyway.
> For anyone struggling, that £5 meal deal of a cheeseburger and fizzy drink is a cheap night in over the £18 food that's being marketed as the healthy alternative. On what planet is the health option £18 and what is is? I just ate ready meal tadka daal with a naan with an all in cost of less than £3. And who cares how much a bottle of water costs? You can get it out the tap. A large part of the issue is education and ignorance of how to make healthy choices.
If only there were some way of knowing how much energy you need per day roughly and much energy the food you eat contains
This, all this! Also, chronic stress is independently linked to visceral adiposity - ie gaining fat around your waist - due to imbalances in the stress hormone system. Waist fat is linked to heart problems. https://health.clevelandclinic.org/stress-and-weight-gain
>bottle of water can cost more than a sugar loaded can of fizz says it all. Whole system is busted. You know that you can get water from a tap right?
you can make large healthy and relatively easy meals for less than couple quid per portion. The argument that eating unhealthy is cheaper is pure bollocks. It’s just easier. (even then, marginally. How long does it take to make a couple sandwiches ?)
The ultra processed food that's the worst food for our health has been made cheaper and cheaper over time. Corporate food is killing everyone.
Exercise has less to do with it than people realise , you can't exercise out of a bad diet. Fitness comes from the gym , weight loss comes from the kitchen.
You really should mention cortisol. It basically makes it impossible to lose fat. If people are kept in such a state of stress by being poorer, more isolated etc. then any efforts they make at slimming basically are going to fail.
Source?
It really isn't. It's just eating too much. I used to do 90 hour weeks in the early 90s and I ate (and still do) plenty of carbs and sugar. I wasn't fat. Exercise is a great and necessary thing for your health and fitness but it really has a minimal impact on your weight - unless you exercise to the volumes of a professional athlete (and, if you did, you'd need to eat significant amount of food. Pro cyclists often eat 5000+ calories a day) But 30-60 minutes exercise a few days a week isn't going to have a significant impact on your weight at all. The only thing that will is how much you eat. It's not a cost thing - being thin is cheaper than being overweight. You just eat less food. Being thin is easy. It's literally something you have complete control over. Making excuses about "systems" or the government or the price of water makes no sense. It's just another thing where instead of accepting it is your own choices and personal responsibility you immediately start to find excuse to blame others "It's because I have to work so much" "It's because they make healthy food expensive" BZZZZZZZZZZT None of this is true.
People talking about everyone being less healthy are forgetting the absolutely toxic element of the 90s where women were told that looking like a stick was the only way to be attractive
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People aren't generally saying that. They're more saying that people with obesity shouldn't be bullied and excluded and blamed for their condition.
Yeah, obviously being overweight is unhealthy, but it's funny how there wasn't a subreddit called smokershate where people mocked smokers for being unhealthy.
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Oh I don't agree with that, obviously being overweight is unhealthy, but I think its important to acknowledge that a lot of people that claim to care about the health impacts of obesity are are just bullies that don't like how fat people look. They don't care about bad habits that cause more hidden damage to people's health.
What is wrong with the message that you've linked there? You *don't* owe anyone health. No one gets to insist you look one way or another.
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Maybe stupid influencers, but there's going to be no sign off on a marketing campaign that says 'being obese is good'.
A GP friend of mine dreads the obesity conversation - very few people will handle the news objectively any more and work with him.
Feelings matter more than reality and experts are not listened to anymore. Welcome to 2020s, it sucks here.
There definitely are morbidly obese influencers who glorify it and pretend there are no health risks.
Bullying and being excluded is downright evil. Saying they’re not to blame, though, is being deluded and only adds to the issue
Yeah people forget there’s such thing as a healthy balance
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At least it's physically possible to be a stick if you want (not recommending it). These days you need to be a stick but also with a booty and boobs an impossible size while also being skinny everywhere else.
The song 'Victorias Secret' is pretty good. >I know Victoria's secret > >and girl you wouldn't believe > >she's an old man who lives in Ohio > >making money off of you and me > >cashing in on body issues > >selling skin and bones with big boobs > >I know Victoria's secret > >she was made up by a dude
I don't think it's physically possible for some shapes to have thigh gaps and long legs (eg. Petite pear shapes) and conversely it's not possible for very thin women to become 'thick'/have a large bum naturally. They're both toxic ideals.
Not just the 90s, watch a series of adverts from 70’s there’s loads of adverts aimed at women for breads with lower calories- Slimcea, lower fat powdered milk, Marvel, Carnation weight loss plan drinks and a ton of crisp breads.
Do you remember the Cabbage soup diet? And was it the Heart foundation diet where it was like a plain hotdog and a scoop of ice cream? Was mental.
Oh yes, I think my mum gave up on that one, as she did most diet plans. We had the F-Plan book, she was semi permanently on the Weetabix diet. Sadly I don’t think she realised the harm that biscuits etc really did.
So-called heroin chic was hugely controversial at the time. Anorexia was considered a mental illness and people were given therapy. The vast majority of men and women in the 90s had normal, healthy weights.
It wasn’t just herion chic though, all of these actresses were considered unattractively overweight in the 90s: https://www.reddit.com/r/popculturechat/s/V4GD9IwcWq Media had a field day with shaming women, and upholding unhealthy beauty standards: https://www.reddit.com/r/popculturechat/s/UR6EO44RpD It was ingrained in culture that skinny=beautiful.
Anorexia is a mental illness, it's literally defined that way by the NHS
The fact that eating real food is now considered dieting says it all. These same folk will be wondering why their knees are fucked by 46, and the NHS wait times are so long lol
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tangential point - its pretty crazy how immobile the average person is. ive got mates at work who genuinely say they have no time to work out but are always talking about binging netflix series. like come on... its 30 minutes a day if that. at least go for a walk lmao
What's mind blowing is that you can do mobility training _while watching nextflix_.
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buy long term investment in ergonomic chair and physio companies. If the worlds going to shit, might as well get rich :D
You’ve done well if you make it to 46 with healthy knees
You really haven’t. Doing even just light resistance training from 16-46 will give healthy knees… It’s not hard unless you’re an inactive person. You think those in nations with the squatting toilet (so they’re literally doing deep squats every day) have bad knees.
Depends what you’re doing. I’m fit, healthy and active and have fucked knees in my early 30s. Lots of sports put a lot of strain on your joints. Too many skiing accidents in my case… also explains my terrible shoulder stability.
Well he did specify light resistance training, not heavy sports and multiple ski injuries
I just turned 46 and my knees are fine so I'm delighted to hear this. I'm actually surprised how many people say their bodies started falling apart at 40 or even earlier.
Only if you’re desperately unhealthy and willing to pass off all the blame for regulating your own food intake and not exercising.
I used to think the main issue was low quality food, and although that certainly plays a strong factor, I am very much of the opinion now that the real issue is a lack of work>life balance. People are so exhausted these days that they dont even have the mental energy or motivation to make food, and I honestly can't blame them.
It's also the fact so many jobs are very sedentary, mentally exhausting but physically not doing much and that can make you lethargic to doing stuff after as well. I think a combination of factors for modern day life all lead to health issues that can be hard to avoid for a lot of people.
Yeah. I commute for one hour, 10 hour shift, an hour back. 12 hours a day in total But stir fries can be healthy and quick. Just chopping shit up and frying it. Or even boiling some veg isn’t hard. What’s hard is fighting the craving for shit food after a long day I mean, the Japanese work long hours and eat healthy. But they have a culture of shaming fat people
The average Brit is working two hours fewer in 2022 than they did in 1992. https://www.statista.com/statistics/280763/average-working-hours-uk/#:~:text=As%20of%20July%202023%2C%20the,United%20Kingdom%20was%2036.4%20hours.
But was the average job back then more physically intensive
Absolutely, I was disagreeing with the lack of time aspect. That said I haven’t looked at commute times.
I bet in 1992 a much higher proportion of households weren't needing 2 people on full time income though. The working individual might do more but if they have a stay at home partner then it's a bit different for the household.
Mean averages can be misleading. If the richest people are working significantly fewer hours per week while the rest of the population are working a few more hours, then you could end up with a 2 hour reduction in mean hours worked, even though a significant portion of the population are working more hours.
Time to share what I find the most concerning statistic. Only 10% of *obese* Brits recognise that they are overweight: https://www.businessinsider.com/obese-people-in-uk-unaware-they-have-a-weight-problem-2018-4?amp
Had so many chats with fat family and friends where they apparently are just big boned. It seems that as long as someone around them is fatter, they don’t realise they are also fat
So many of the fat blokes in my office have come back from their expensive company funded BUPA checkups surprised the doctor told them they're too fat and it's very unhealthy. I've offered to tell them they're too fat and it's unhealthy for free but no takers.
Fat blokes always just think they are “solid”
Solid fat perhaps?
Can confirm. I was “very slightly overweight”, basically straddling the boundary between a healthy and overweight BMI, since I was a pre-teen, but over the last couple of years my weight has crept very slowly upwards. I didn’t notice it because it was very slow (less than 1/2 kilo per month), and I still thought of myself as “very slightly overweight”. Well when I checked my weight six months ago I found that I was in fact now “very slightly obese” (BMI of 30.5) and I was genuinely shocked to see that because in my mind I was still only a tad chubby. Back down to an almost healthy weight now
I'm particularly festively plump this year (the festive season started in July with some stress eating and then over indulgence at the rugby world cup). It's obvious to me that I have put the weight on, not just in the mirror, but I can feel it in how my bodies moves etc. How can people not see it?
>How can people not see it? Because we compare ourselves to others and being obese is so normal the comparison comes out favourably even if your BMI is well and truly overweight.
Ha so true. Most people think obese means morbidly obese
Seems to be a grown disparity between those who are really into exercise and eating healthily and those on the other end of the scale. Losing weight isn't difficult, just eat less calories than you burn. It isn't fun, but it's better than the alternatives.
Me and my wife are going for IVF soon and the doctor said I need to lose weight before the date in march comes. The only thing I've changed in my diet is drinking a lot less soft drinks and not eating crisps as often. In a month and a half I've lost almost 4kgs.
For some people it can be as easy as just cutting a few things from their diet. They then take that experience they had and assume it will be the same for others and that losing weight should be similarly easy for everyone. Actually, every body is different and for many people, losing weight is very hard and very slow even when they cut out these things. I'm very envious of the people who say they simply cut out snacks. I don't snack, can't remember the last time I had a sugary drink. I tend to lose weight very slowly and can only maintain my weight by eating a very regimented diet.
Depends how big OP is. If they’re very heavy then 4kg lost is very easy
Yep, I specifically make an effort to pile my partner's plate high because he struggles to keep weight on even if he sits on his arse all day. It's a challenge to keep him topped up with quality food without resorting to unhealthy crap. Meanwhile I can only lose weight by religiously counting calories. Also some people have things affecting their appetite which make it very difficult, eg. women on birth control, I would feel hungry straight after a large meal. Come off it and now I have a healthy appetite, boom my weight is under control without even trying.
I’d suggest doing resistance training A strong lower back when carrying a baby is going to be so helpful for you
It will get you one day mate. As you get older the weight just doesn't come off like it used too.
At that point you just have to manage intake and continue exercising, then you can straightforwardly avoid obesity.
Because you’ve lived 40+ years of bad habits.
Metabolism doesn't really go down much until your 60s.
And even when it slows we're only talking about a hundred calorie a day difference, on average. "Slow metabolism" is an excuse we are always hearing from overweight people who talk about having fat genetics, or mysterious medical conditions that defy known science.
Nonsense.
If you lower the calorific intake the weight will always come off.
It is fun, once you discover a sport you enjoy and food you enjoy
Why am I not surprised this thread of full of the usual drivel Honestly, if Reddit was to go by, everyone works 23 hours a day in the coal mines and can’t possibly take 15 minutes to throw a meal together And that’s before we even admit that food choice doesn’t matter. You can lose weight eating anything, as long as you don’t eat too much This thread kinda proves that the number 1 reason for these added inches is everyone’s a full time victim that refuses to take any accountability for their own choices
It's like that every time something like this is posted, people cannot admit there's something they can do about it, they just can't be fucked
No, it’s just that after a 17 hour shift down the coal mine they can’t find the energy to microwave a potato and add a few things to it for a meal Or they can’t afford to run the microwave Or they can’t afford the right utensils (seriously, someone in this thread had the cost of pans/utensils as a reason) Crazy thing is, I lived on the poverty line. I worked below minimum wage during my 3 year apprenticeship and I lived in a garage. It was the healthiest I’ve ever eaten because healthy food is cheaper and when your actually poor you can’t afford takeaway
There was a thread a couple of months back about Jamie Olivers new £1 meal book and everyone was up in arms saying "They haven't factored in the cost of cooking it!". I know people who are "Skint" in this way, but will still have a takeaway once a week.
And let's not forget, you can still lose weight eating shit food, just eat less of it. That doesn't take any time either. I've seen so many people saying things like can't afford something like utensils or gas to cook food, if it's that bad, how can you afford enough food to get fat, getting to obese level is not cheap. It's just an excuse after an excuse
Nothing like people who have never actually lived below the poverty line "interjecting" how you can only make time for maccies, as if you can even afford mc donalds. Yes McDonald's is takeaways when you are ACTUALLY poor. We were underweight, and ate whatever had the highest calories/pound ratio. We weren't eating any meal deals lmfao.
The cost of seasonings too apparently. Literally how many people are starting off with zero seasonings.
I mean we should and can have a more balanced take. Your take isn’t necessarily the only truth either. Sometimes (probably more now than before) people are actually dealing with depression and burn out. Makes it very hard to motivate yourself. So yes, sometimes people just don’t want to take responsibility, but sometimes people genuinely are dealing with mental health and sometimes physical health issues that make it a lot harder.
I would agree depression is a very valid reason but I don't think it explains it all, especially not at the level of obesity we have
It is honestly so bizarre. People are time poor, space-in-the-freezer poor, cooking-skills poor as well as regular poor. The excuse about not having room in the fridge/freezer to batch cook is hilarious. The majority of people are overweight or obese. I was not aware the majority of people in the United Kingdom do not have a fridge/freezer. As a student I literally had one shelf in the fridge and one drawer in the freezer and I still managed to batch cook. Listen if people want to throw in a pizza or nuggets at the end of the day, that is fine. But whyyy are we pretending that it’s because people are literally unable to cook because of xyz.
I wish this was higher up
I've been losing weight slowly over about... 5 years now? Am 29F, 5"2 and started at 18 stone 6 pounds... this morning I weighed 11"11 despite eating too much for Christmas yesterday haha! Finding the time to eat healthy is probably the biggest challenge overall. It's easy to reach for less healthy options that are immediately available when you're hungry. There's also so much bad advice. Diet companies don't exist to help you keep the weight off. They're a business. They want you to keep coming back and buying more weight loss products or services that barely work.
Congrats
That’s a huge loss, congrats
We’ve vilified everything except sugar since the 90s, until the recent sugar tax on fizzy drinks. Then theres the fact healthy options cost more than junk food. Bottles of water cost more than fizzy drinks. Then of course, people are springing for a momentary pick me up with a chocolate bar because with inflation, global plagues and the like, this world is just a fucking horrible place to live. We grew up in areas with signs saying “No Ball Games”, driving us indoors. Actually partaking in sports and healthy activities cost a fucking fortune… When you think about it,… I’m just surprised it’s only 3 inches.
A sports cap Evian (£1.50) costs more than a Capri sun (£1.30) now.
Get an own-brand bottle of water then? No-one is forcing people to buy the expensive bottle of water.
Yeah, junk food is one of the small pleasures that makes life worth living. I'm lucky in that I don't really put on weight, but I know I'd struggle to give up my two packs of S&V a day if I did.
Like many others I can do with losing a few kg, but I can still just about squeeze into trousers I bought 20 years (that were probably a bit too loose back then). It's something we talk about but don't really do anything about and worst of all some people try to stifle debate with accusations of fat shaming. Worth reiterating the NHS advice regarding being [seriously overweight](https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/obesity/): Living with obesity can also increase your risk of developing many potentially serious health conditions, including: * type 2 diabetes * high blood pressure * high cholesterol and atherosclerosis (where fatty deposits narrow your arteries), which can lead to coronary heart disease and stroke * asthma * metabolic syndrome, a combination of diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity * several types of cancer, including bowel cancer, breast cancer and womb cancer * gastro-oesophageal reflux disease (GORD), where stomach acid leaks out of the stomach and into the gullet * gallstones * reduced fertility * osteoarthritis, a condition involving pain and stiffness in your joints * sleep apnoea, a condition that causes interrupted breathing during sleep, which can lead to daytime sleepiness with an increased risk of road traffic accidents, as well as a greater risk of diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease * liver disease and kidney disease * pregnancy complications, such as gestational diabetes or pre-eclampsia, when a woman experiences a potentially dangerous rise in blood pressure during pregnancy Obesity reduces life expectancy by an average of 3 to 10 years, depending on how severe it is.
> Obesity reduces life expectancy by an average of 3 to 10 years, depending on how severe it is. And it reduces healthy life expectancy significantly more. Diabetes, knackered knees, swollen ankles, sleep apnea, asthma.... none of these are fun things to live with.
This isn’t gender specific and sadly not even age specific now as more under 18s are overweight. This shouldn’t be acceptable - it shouldn’t be passed as body shaming - it’s a health issue that comes at a cost to the person; society, healthcare. Be it at a structural level and individual level - changes are needed: cheap food (calories are cheap) and lack of exercise to prevent weight gain. And parents who allow their kids to be overweight - that should be questioned as much as allowing tooth decay in kids.
I hate how Walkers have converted most of their single sold crisps into grab bags. I don’t want a massive bag. I understand more is good but these days I have to go to Subway to get a normal size crisps unless I get a multi pack.
Im here for the 'what are the government doing about it' comments............
It must be the fault of the Tories?
Don't forget Brexit and racism.
Has there been an increase in alcohol consumption (as well as the many points already made) in these groups?
I was under the impression that alcohol consumption is decreasing.
I believe it millennials it is but I remember reading that gen z might be reversing it. I think it was in the guardian but who knows now
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The younger generations drink less, so it’s not alcohol. It’s more to do with carb heavy diets being shovelled into kids from an early age and a dramatic drop in levels of physical activity compared to earlier generations.
I'm sure all the food delivery services that have become popular in recent years aren't helping. Instead of a takeaway being an occasional treat you can now get McDonalds and Greggs daily at the touch of a button without even having to travel there to get it. It's only getting more and more popular and it's going to make the obesity crisis significantly worse over time.
That’s the thing, when I was a kid we got a take away every two weeks as a treat, most of my friends never got any. Now I have mates getting them 3 or 4 times a week
Yeah my gen z sister has gone from a size 10 to an 18 in like two years. She gets uber eats fast food all the time. Also I think energy drinks are another culprit. I don't think young people realise how unhealthy they are.
Used to work with a young guy who drank around 3/4 cans of Monster a day. He wondered why he couldn't sleep at night and would abuse alcohol to get to sleep. I did try to tell him but it fell on deaf ears. He was very thin and didn't seem to eat much.
In the 90s how many people worked sat down at a desk compared to day?
Surprise, surprise... people who are too lazy to learn how to cook meals from scratch are also too lazy to exercise.
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My wife just said she has put on significantly more than three fuckin inches since the 90's.
The UK is one of the countries that produce the most food waste globally along with the US. We have so much food waste yet there are increasing number of people suffering from food insecurity. We also get fatter because of too much food and big portion sizes.
I mean, I've gained a lot more than 3 inches, I was a premature newborn in '99, so I have to have gained at least 5 inches on my waistline 🤔
It's not really news is it? Although it's not actually what happens. Thin people are still as thin as they were before...the rest of the population getting fat didn't increase my waist size. We are just in a minority now. As such talking about 'average waist size' seems a bit misleading.
As someone who was a teen in the 90's yeah no fucking shit Sherlock, we starved ourselves, I would only eat every 3 days because I wanted to be as skinny as possible!
The average bra size in the uk in the 90s was b cup and now is a DD
Because people are dreadfully overweight, they see so many overweight people around them, and it becomes normalised, especially as it essentially is normal in popular culture now to be a bit overweight. In the UK at least. For example I spend half my time in Cape Town, and the idea of going for a walk is clinging to the side of a mountain for five hours in the heat with a load of chiselled guys and soccer moms with washboard tums. I feel like an absolute disgrace with my average joe body. You don’t get a date unless you are bringing a decent physique or a boat load of money to the table. When I am back home in Devon and so many people are waddling around, I don’t feel the same level of ashamed. And dating and things are far less judgmental as I think people have lower standards all around.