21/08/2026
My mum and me c1965. I look at this picture and it reminds me amongst many other things of what seems to have gone wrong with our understanding of what constitutes basic good health. There’s my mum, tiny waist and slim. At this point she was 36, had 2 kids, never went to the gym, ate three meals a day, never dieted, never restricted. Was she just ‘lucky’? No I don’t think so, because I know she was overweight as a much younger woman. I put it down to the following: she was always active - not formal exercise, but constant movement - shopping, cleaning etc. She cooked from scratch everyday. She didn’t buy ultra processed foods. She ate a little of everything she liked but avoided excess - Sundays always saw a Victoria Sponge on our table. She drank plain tap water. In other words, mum moved all the time, she cooked and ate whole foods that her body could process. She probably walked somewhere after meals because she had stuff to do (she never learned to drive). She didn’t drink much alcohol or consume huge amounts of refined sugar. She had a set bedtime routine. To her it was complete common sense. But somewhere down the line we humans complicated everything. By the way, she’s 93 now and still slim. sense
