Where did the fat come from (0 - 13 years)

Phew, far too many photos, couldn't make up my mind which to use.  How did I manage to gain so much weight.

I was lucky as I believe I had a charmed childhood!  I was happy and healthy with plenty of access the the countryside and independent play.  At the age of 7 we moved into the country and attended the local village school with small classes; notably where the cooks prepared all the meals from scratch (including the tomato ketchup). We were were taken on plenty of trips, and holidays and participated in extra-curricular activities.

'Always hungry'     At same time as we moved apparently the interest rates suddenly shot up to 16% - finances were stretched!  My parents started living 'The Good Life'  which they continue now to a certain extent.

Our home wasn't on a proper small holding scale since my parents had professional careers, but otherwise just about everything we ate was organic and mostly home grown.  My father also had a shotgun so we had the odd pigeon or rabbit too.  We raised sickly unwanted lambs that the local farmer didn't want, plus chickens, ducks and home grown vegetables.  We were expected to share the chore of maintaining the garden and animals - something I enjoyed. 

My parents made fresh bread every evening, but I do recall being extremely jelous of my friends fluffy white bread.  My mother didn't posess a frying pan and we certainly rarely had shop brought fruit squash, fizzy drinks or sweets - my parents being particularly pretty strict about this.  This was partly directed by financial need but also in the 70s my mother had a seed of uneasiness about 'what was in the food' in relation to hyperactivity and additives and frequently referred to her E - additives reference book.

Above & below with sister I'm the eldest 

Our parents attempted to bring us up in a television free environment and made several attempts to throw out the offending object, however fortunately (or maybe not) for us our grandmothers took pity on us undid all parental attempts to banish the box and control sugar.

So from reading this I'm sure you'd agree not yet someone who was going to develop a serious obesity problem in adulthood!  What happened?

Comments

[dkottke]

I really like your site, which I just found after finding www.cavemanpower.com. Thanks for posting about your efforts and progress. It's truly inspirational!

(Do you know about Art Devany's site? www.arthurdevany.com)

[DoingTheCaveman]

Thanks very much, dkottke. It's going to take a while I think, but it's a regime that's maintainable. It would be great to inspire someone else to discover that this is a simple diet that does work - Matt at www.Cavemanpower.com I certainly find inspiring and I'm sure he will motivate and support many more into this lifestyle change in the future.

Thanks too for link or Art Devany's site I hadn't stumbled on yet. He does certainly seem to be an unusually well 70 year old.

[AllHeart]

Regarding where the fat came from. Your childhood was definitely not the cause of this, but may partially have influenced it. I know of a lot of people who lived a similar childhood who are now very overweight and I think it is to do with a few mindsets that were imprinted on them during the hard times.

1. Always eat everything you get because it cost a lot of money and work to get.
2. Don't waste anything, thrifty mentality. Even if it's unhealthy it's still food and if you don't eat it you won't eat anything.
3. Obscenely incorrect dietary advice (which is still just as rife today).

These things, especially the thrifty mindset (which is very understandable given the times they grew up in) has impacted and continues to impact on their way of living and eating.

Just a few thoughts for you.

[DoingTheCaveman]

These thoughts hit the nail on the head as I certainly don't blame my parents as we had an Enid Blyton type of childhood, but this makes me wonder why my weight control ran away from me.

1. Yes there's definitely a relationship with wastage, I do hate to throw out food, particularly meat.

But it seems that in just the last 20 years attitudes towards food have changed and it's become easily disposable. The problem was when things became plentiful I didn’t seem to be able to hit the stop button; the discipline evaporated (or maybe the discipline was there, but the rule was you don’t waste food)

Actually being frugal with food seems to be unknown to most. I’d love to again put more energy into obtaining my own food, from my memory it’s very satisfying collecting a warm egg and having it for breakfast.

2. It’s funny you say that; my parents would never have held food back from us, but we wouldn’t have pudding if we didn’t eat dinner and boy did I like pudding! But I did have one very close friend whose parents were extremely Victorian. What she didn't eat for dinner would be represented to her cold for breakfast, lunch and dinner the next day until it was consumed, and she wasn't allowed anything until it was.

3. You don’t necessarily question advice when it’s coming from good authority, but I did become fed up when I would follow a diet strictly only to be treated with disbelief when it didn't work.

Stepping away from the advised diets has really opened my eyes to current dietary advice and how industry led it is. I now cannot belief that when I saw a dietician before I was diagnosed diabetic I was told me to ‘fill up on pasta’. Probably the worse advice I could possibly have had. Treatment of diabetes seems to be more about managing a problem (which I liken to controlling a class of rowdy kids rather than actually teaching them). Treating uncontrolled blood sugars with medication rather than a dietary solution, since that’s almost impossible given the food we currently have constantly pushed at us.

Sorry it's a bit long my precis skills are poor!

[AllHeart]

It's great that you recognise these things. Especially the 3rd one and that you are now working on altering your eating patterns (I hate the world diet, as I feel that is short term. Eating well should be for life, not for a few months to get a certain result then back to junk again.) to treat/cure a problem, not just treat the symptoms but not the cause like most modern medicine. Your comment about the dieticians advice is a perfect example of how skewed the modern view of healthy eating really is. The food pyramid is a sad joke, 6-11 serves of breads/cereals per day!!! Might as well inject sugar and fat directly into your veins. I love that you are learning and growing and thinking for yourself now. More people need to do this and find their own truths about things. Well done.

[DoingTheCaveman]

Thanks so much for your encouragement. This is certainly a lifestyle change, although I do still enjoy my non-edible modern luxuries! I accept that this has to be a eating pattern to be developed for the rest of my life to live the life, but the quality of life will so much better!!.

Looking at the pyramid even after only 4 months of this 'lifestyle' it would be a chore to eat so much - 5 fruits & vegetables, meat, dairy ontop of that the cereal - phew - I'm now perfectly satisfied with a piece of fruit and a few nuts as lite lunch and don't go hunting for food inbetween meals as I was before.

'The food pyramid is a sad joke, 6-11 serves of breads/cereals per day!!! Might as well inject sugar and fat directly into your veins'.

Hehe, I do really do like this – I think I will have use it as my favourite quote on my facebook profile, I’m sure my dieting friends will be bemused enough to provide me the opportunity to pass it on.

[AllHeart]

Hehe. It would actually be funny if it wasn't so painfully true and that most people live by that lie called the "food pyramid". Feel free to use it.

[DoingTheCaveman]

Thanks, painful, with far too many victims led to believe a personal weight issue is soley down weakness of character.

[AllHeart]

Very true. There are countless thousands, perhaps even millions, that are overweight thanks to the current dietary guidelines (aka food pyramid) and are thinking they are eating correctly. This means they are looking at any and all other reasons, usually landing squarely on genetic disposition. This "unchangeable" reason leads them to devaluing themselves and thinking there is something "wrong" with them. Also it gives them a false way out and allows them to blame it all on the parents.

If they were to undertake real truthful eating patterns and some exercise, which most of these people are already doing and feeling even worse about themselves when the exercise doesn't work, then they would see consistent change to their bodies over time.

I have said it before and I will always say it; Of all the "genetics are to blame" diagnosis there are probably only 1% of those that are really to blame on bad genes. It's exactly like the extreme over-diagnosis of ADHD in children today.

Just my thoughts.

[DoingTheCaveman]

Yes if the pyramid, as it stands, wasn’t foisted on us most people wouldn’t even slip into chaotic eating patterns in the first place.

Oh no, I mustn’t get started on ADHD as I’m experiencing this first hand with the neighbours from hell; banging, thumping and running around above my apartment until the early hours of the morning. I can accept normal play of course, they don’t have a garden - their mum is apologetic but states she has ‘lost control’. However the children (8 & 11) are awake every single night (school night or not), often causing disturbance until 12 – 2 am.

The sad thing is they’ll probably be doomed to a future of Ritalin and stereotyping, when it’s simply down to the fact they have no idea of their boundaries, are bored, exhausted and so high on sugar and junk food (they’re bouncing of the walls, quite literally).

Exercise, I’ve touched on this in my next mini post, see what you think…