I'm wondering if weight measurements have changed sometime in the past 100 years

[Sparrow]

Originally Posted by Soliloquy

One thing I know as fact, from talking with my mom and her friends, in the 1960-70s pregnant women were often shamed into near-starvation diets by their obstetricians. My godmother was only allowed to gain TEN POUNDS in her pregnancies and she was thin when she got pregnant. The day she went home from the hospital she weighed 15 lbs less than her pre-pregnancy weight.

My paternal grandmother said her doctor had a fit because she gained 20 lbs in her pregnancy. And my grandmother was underweight when she got pregnant because she had spent the previous year nursing her terminally ill mother. That was 1943.

So if birth weights are increasing compared to THAT, I'm not surprised.

My mom left the hospital with me at 108 lbs. she's 5'4!

My babies were 6 lbs 15 (induction at 38 weeks),
7 lbs 3 oz (spontaneous labour on due date) and 6 lbs (induction 37 weeks)

I also look at their discharge weights to be more accurate for my first and 3rd as I was on IV FLUIDS (so 6 lbs 7 and 5 lbs 10)

My first two are boys and then my little
Girl!

---------- Post added at 09:22 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:19 PM ----------

I'm 5'2 and have ended each pregnancy at 153 lbs. BUT I started my pregnancies at 117, 124 and 108 lbs. weird.

[MaySunflowers]

People were smaller at birth on both sides of my family.

My husband was 9lbs and his two brothers were 11lbs each.

We'd surely need more widespread data to assume babies used to be bigger or not in general.

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[Aerynne]

I found this article with graphs about birth weights over time in different cities.

http://archive.unu.edu/unupress/food...E/UID03E09.HTM

[Mother of Sons]

When I was pregnant with my first I gained weight so abnormally rapidly that the dr told me that if food tasted good I shouldn't eat it. He weighed 7 lbs 11. (I had two at this weight) With my last I weighed less at the birth than pre pregnancy. I had gestational diabetes and they told me she would be huge. She was 6 lbs 12. My smallest was 5 lbs 12.

I'm not sure how much weight gain has to do with anything or if there is a pattern at all.

[MaySunflowers]

Originally Posted by Mother of Sons

When I was pregnant with my first I gained weight so abnormally rapidly that the dr told me that if food tasted good I shouldn't eat it. He weighed 7 lbs 11. (I had two at this weight) With my last I weighed less at the birth than pre pregnancy. I had gestational diabetes and they told me she would be huge. She was 6 lbs 12. My smallest was 5 lbs 12.

I'm not sure how much weight gain has to do with anything or if there is a pattern at all.

Same here. With my first I had HG and weighed 5lbs less at 9 months pregnant that I did before, my baby was 8lbs.

Next time I had a normal pregnancy, gained weight that nearly all went at birth and my baby was 7lbs 1oz.

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[twentysixcats]

Originally Posted by Soliloquy

One thing I know as fact, from talking with my mom and her friends, in the 1960-70s pregnant women were often shamed into near-starvation diets by their obstetricians. My godmother was only allowed to gain TEN POUNDS in her pregnancies and she was thin when she got pregnant. The day she went home from the hospital she weighed 15 lbs less than her pre-pregnancy weight.

My paternal grandmother said her doctor had a fit because she gained 20 lbs in her pregnancy. And my grandmother was underweight when she got pregnant because she had spent the previous year nursing her terminally ill mother. That was 1943.

So if birth weights are increasing compared to THAT, I'm not surprised.

Huh that's interesting. We have an OB here who has a reputation of being fantastic for giving high risk moms a chance to birth vaginally. (Example, my friend who had a triplet vba2c.) However, he is very obsessed about mother weight gain, and has no problem heaping on the shame. (From what I've heard. ) He's older (in his 60s, maybe 70?), so I wonder if that is from the era of his training?

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[ValiantJoy07]

Originally Posted by Soliloquy

One thing I know as fact, from talking with my mom and her friends, in the 1960-70s pregnant women were often shamed into near-starvation diets by their obstetricians. My godmother was only allowed to gain TEN POUNDS in her pregnancies and she was thin when she got pregnant. The day she went home from the hospital she weighed 15 lbs less than her pre-pregnancy weight.

My paternal grandmother said her doctor had a fit because she gained 20 lbs in her pregnancy. And my grandmother was underweight when she got pregnant because she had spent the previous year nursing her terminally ill mother. That was 1943.

So if birth weights are increasing compared to THAT, I'm not surprised.

Yes this. My Mom was only allowed to gain 20# (and she was a tiny 105) with my older 3 siblings. For me and my younger brother she switched to a homebirth friendly OBGYN who encouraged her to eat well and not worry about the weight and she gained more like 50lbs with us. I was 7lbs on the dot and my brother was 8lbs 12oz. (All the others were 7lbs and change).

[ArmsOfLove]

My first child was 9 lbs 1 oz and my grandfather was 11 lbs something. I don't believe they were weighing them differently. Prepared homebirth is safe and from what I've heard larger babies are safer to birth. Many babies today are born early through induction.

and, yeah, the weight shaming in the 70's was ridiculous! my mom said she ignored them and ate what she wanted but she was tiny anyway -- and they still gave her a hard time!

[Soliloquy]

I also spoke with one woman who was encouraged, by her OB, to continue smoking because smoking prevented big babies. This was in the late 60s or early 70s.

[Leslie]

Originally Posted by Soliloquy

I also spoke with one woman who was encouraged, by her OB, to continue smoking because smoking prevented big babies. This was in the late 60s or early 70s.

I remember this (that was sort of still going on when I was little). Smoking also kept the mother's weight down.

[Sparrow]

Originally Posted by Soliloquy

I also spoke with one woman who was encouraged, by her OB, to continue smoking because smoking prevented big babies. This was in the late 60s or early 70s.

An old friend's MIL was encouraged to START smoking in keep her stress down because she had 3 under 4 and a husband in the navy. Thirty five years later she was a chain smoker!

[Soliloquy]

[ServingGrace]

I agree with the poster that said that when people ate healthier more natural foods and plenty of fats they were more equipped to give birth to larger healthier babies. I believe their is a relationship between diet and bone structure, including the structure of the pelvis. So it would probably b safe to assume that well nourished familia would produce more robust babies. Now I wonder if two siblings one on a SAD diet and the other on a whole foods traditional diet would have a noticeable difference in th size of their babies. I had no clu about women being encouraged to not gain weight during their pregnancies in the past. Was this primary from the fortunes onward to seventies? Perhaps it was also a reflection of the lack of food during the Great Depression and wwii?

[Aerynne]

Originally Posted by ServingGrace

I agree with the poster that said that when people ate healthier more natural foods and plenty of fats they were more equipped to give birth to larger healthier babies. I believe their is a relationship between diet and bone structure, including the structure of the pelvis. So it would probably b safe to assume that well nourished familia would produce more robust babies. Now I wonder if two siblings one on a SAD diet and the other on a whole foods traditional diet would have a noticeable difference in th size of their babies. I had no clu about women being encouraged to not gain weight during their pregnancies in the past. Was this primary from the fortunes onward to seventies? Perhaps it was also a reflection of the lack of food during the Great Depression and wwii?

I'm thinking back in the days before vitamins were discovered and rickets was so common that if pelvises (pelves?) were malformed, people would need to keep their babies smaller.

It's really not the case that everything was great before industrialization and that after now nutrition is terrible. Vitamin deficiencies were common and caused real problems, like people with rickets as children growing up with malformed bones. Where I live, iodine in the soil is naturally very low so people had goiters (and cretinism in their children). Now that we ship food in from everywhere, we don't have to worry about that, even without iodized salt. Industrialization of the food supply has certainly created some problems, but it has also solved some problems.

[Soliloquy]

The encouragement to have small babies started when women were automatically sedated for birth. The women were heavily drugged at the start of labor and then sedated closer to the birth. The babies were drugged and couldn't do their part, either. Forceps were the norm. In those situations, smaller babies were easier to get out.

Growing up, I had a friend with a scar on her temples from forceps.