Obese women can blame their mothers

According to a study, daughters of overweight mothers have a higher risk of becoming overweight.

Mothers have a huge influence on how much their children walk around during the day and what they eat, so those who are sedentary and eat less healthily can pass on these habits.

If mothers were overweight during pregnancy or did not eat a healthy diet, evidence suggests that they may also have ‘programmed’ their unborn child to be biologically at greater risk of obesity.

But now new research suggests these factors only affect daughters and not sons.

The researchers studied 240 children whose body mass index (BMI) and fat mass were measured at three visits when they were four, six to seven and eight to nine years old.

Their mothers and fathers had the same measurements taken on the third visit.

Fathers’ weight and body fat percentage were not related to their children’s.

But the more overweight a mother was, the more overweight her daughter was at ages six or seven and eight or nine.

Sons may not be affected by their mothers’ obesity in the same way as daughters because boys are typically more active and burn more calories than girls during childhood.

A more important factor is probably that girls are more affected by what happens to them in the womb when their mother is overweight.

The fat mass of the women was also linked to the fat mass of their daughters at ages six and seven and eight or nine.

The study concludes that obese mothers should be aware of the potential impact on their daughters and perhaps try to reach a healthy weight before conceiving.

dr Rebecca Moon, from the MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Center at the University of Southampton, said: “These results suggest that girls born to obese mothers are at high risk of becoming obese themselves, which does not appear to be the case for boys .

“We need to do more research to understand why this is in relation to families’ diet and exercise patterns and how female fetuses in the womb respond to what women eat during pregnancy.

“This also provides an opportunity to identify young girls who may be at higher risk of becoming overweight or obese, so we can address this early in childhood.”

Previous studies have found that obese mothers are more likely to have obese children, but have not typically looked at the difference between girls and boys.

The new study not only looked at girls and boys separately, but also analyzed the body measurements of children as young as three years old to capture changes in children’s fat content, which tends to increase more rapidly from the age of six.

The researchers scanned people’s body fat and calculated their BMI for greater accuracy, since BMI can make tight people whose muscles are heavy appear overweight.

The women’s BMI and body fat were not linked to their sons’ BMI or body fat at any age, based on data obtained from a health survey in the Southampton area.

However, there was a link between BMI and body fat in women and their daughters as they aged, which is important because obese children are more likely to become obese adults, with a greater risk of health problems such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and Heart problems.

If women can maintain a healthy weight before becoming pregnant and ensure their young children are active and eating well, it can help protect their daughters.

The study was published in the Endocrine Society’s Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism.