I have to say I agree with you, freelance. After many adult-years of struggling with my weight, it was a startling revelation when I realized that my idea of over-eating was very very different than what normal-weight people saw as over-eating. I started playing very close attention to the "normal" people when I would go out to eat with them and there were striking differences.

I would order a salad, eat the entire thing. Polish off a couple pieces of bread, eat my entire entree and then get dessert and eat it all. I would walk away from most restaurants bloated, overly-full and uncomfortable. In contrast, when we go out with my mother-in-law, who is the same height as me, but 20 years older, she would eat her entire salad, maybe 1/2 of her entree, skip the bread totally and then split a dessert with her husband (she would normally only eat a couple bites of it). Many times, she would order a salad and soup and have a few bites of dessert.

I had a girlfriend in college is was rail thin and she used to brag about "eating anything she wanted and never gaining weight" - in fact, she ate a lot of candy bars, but little else. We'd order a pizza, she'd eat one slice. She'd order a sandwich and eat less than half of it. Sure, she ate a lot of junk, but she didn't eat a lot.

You know, it's interesting. One of my sisters is rail thin (85 lbs, 5' 2", 16 going on 17), and it's half natural half not. She gets full very, very easily, but she also has a problem stopping when she's eating something she loves. So what she does is she doesn't eat the trigger foods. She's very healthy, works out, but just makes sure she eats in a way that's good for her. She doesn't overeat because "it's a special occasion" or anything. She hates being too full, and if she eats certain things she'll eat too much, so she avoids them.

Another of my sisters is also naturally thin, although more in normal range (5' 2", 21, about 115-120). She eats a lot of junk. Almost all junk actually. And she does overeat sometimes. She can put away a whole box of cookies on her own, but it takes her a few days and even then she won't eat much else. Sometimes she'll eat 4 pieces of candy, a sandwich, and then have a bowl of soup and a slice of some dessert and for her, that's eating way too much. She'll naturally eat lighter the next day. She doesn't even notice.

It's fascinating how "naturally" thin people work. I've never, ever worked that way. Lucky me, I'm the only girl who has fat problems. Oh well.

<<She gets full very, very easily.>>

To me that's THE key difference between "us" and "them."

<<She can put away a whole box of cookies on her own, but it takes her a few days >>

I wouldn't call it "eating a whole box of cookies on her own" unless she accomplishes the deed in minutes or hours!

<<She'll naturally eat lighter the next day. She doesn't even notice.>>

Another very important difference.

F.

I still contend that it varies by individual. When I go out, I will eat several pieces of bread, my whole salad, my whole entree, and an entire dessert plus wine. I'll sometimes even eat another dessert and split a second bottle of wine with my boyfriend. I can eat a lot. But I hold myself accountable. I consciously eat carefully for the next several days, and I make sure to get my workouts in. That is how I have stayed a normal weight my entire life. So, while people I know would probably call me naturally thin, I actually work hard at it.

Some people do get full faster. Some people do self-regulate without being conscious of it. But others can eat a lot more than you would expect, but are also always aware.

<<So, while people I know would probably call me naturally thin, I actually work hard at it.>>

It's true that you've stayed thin, but you're not "naturally thin" in the sense that I mean -- eating 3,000 calories per day and not gaining weight. I'm not saying that every thin person has a small appetite, I'm simply suggesting that people who claim they can eat whatever they want whenever they want without gaining weight (assuming they're telling the truth) tend to have small appetites. Or as others have pointed out, "whatever they want" is different from whatever I want. I don't believe there are people who weigh 120 lbs and can eat 3,000 calories day in and day out without gaining weight.

Freelance

F.

Well no, the majority of 120 pound people probably can't eat 3,000 calories a day and maintain their weight. If they're a very muscular 120 pounds they might actually need those 3,000 calories to maintain. Muscular people tend to need to eat more to maintain or build muscle mass.

I'm finding that I'm a bit of an exception to the rule here. I've been told that a formerly obese person needs to eat 15-20% less than expected to maintain his or her weight. Putting my stats into calorie calculators and knocking it down 15-20% leaves me at around 1800 calories a day, give or take.

So I ate that much...and wound up losing several pounds. I'm probably more muscular than the average 119 pound person which may leave me actually needing to eat over 2000 calories to maintain my weight. I'm sure my age comes into play too, but I'm not seeing the slowed down metabolism effect that I thought I would and I suppose that all the strength training I did during my weight loss and now has made it so I need to eat more.

I was naturally thin for 21 years.

Food. Weight issues. Exercise <- never crossed my mind. Never thought about it. I have no idea how much I ate, what I ate, etc. It isn't a thought to a "naturally thin" person.

The sorts of things that people talk about on here (people who have had weight struggles) generally don't come up in the mind of a naturally thin person (speaking as someone who has 'been there'). It just wouldn't even be a thought. It's hard to explain.

My point is really that it is very difficult to know who is naturally thin. I eat more than anyone I know. Many people would assume that that is because I am naturally thin. In reality it is probably much more the fact that I have lifted weights for 20 years, am hugely into exercise, and regulate my food intake despite having very high-calorie days.

Other people pick at food when they are around others but eat more when they are alone. And still other people really do always leave food on their plates—which then begs the question, which of these people is naturally thin and which is undereating?

"Naturally thin" is an amorphous concept. The people we think of as naturally thin are thin for all manner of reasons. Which kind of eater they are only they really know—and sometimes they aren't even being honest with themselves.

<<I watched a program a while ago on an experiment where a group of very thin people were fed huge amounts of food for about one month with strict conditions on level of activities they could do. ALL of them put on weight at the end of the month (not more than 5kg though). >>

Wow, what an interesting experiment!

F.

The same goes for aging, really. I was a thin kid. In the 70s and early 80s I knew only one kid who wasn't. (I remember him because he took his own life rather than continue to face the ridicule of his peers every day.) But as I grew into an adult, I didn't have a child's metabolism anymore. I had to become much more aware of what I was eating to keep the weight off.

So many people who were thin as kids end up putting on weight eventually. Whether that is because of decreased muscle mass and movement as they age, the stress of being an adult, making adult decisions, and eating more as a means of comfort, or other factors, it is a fact.

All along those people had limits to what they could eat. They just didn't reach them as kids.

Today? Kids still have higher metabolisms than most adults. Unfortunately, they don't get outside as much as they used to, and they don't eat what they did 30 years ago either. There is no question in my mind that a lot of kids who would have appeared "naturally thin" 30 years ago are overweight today for these reasons.