Now at the end of the fast food chain one in three of us adults are obese and one in 10 children have a puku that puts them in the category of being called a "fatty boom bah" at school.
I remember growing up around skinny kids, especially in our own family of 11 tamariki where food was a precious commodity, lovingly prepared by a mother who grew heaps in her garden and a father who foraged for kaimoana as a profession.
So we had lots of fresh kai and we lived life playing outside - not in front of the tele or iPad.
I also remember the quick defence response by parents when a fatty boom bah was singled out in the playground, as kids do then and now.
"Oh she's just big boned darling" or "she has an eating disorder and her metabolism is out of sync".
Fatty boom bah, little Lotta and lard-arse were some of the tags given to the overweights when I was growing up. But I now know "big-boned" is just an excuse for over eating and laziness.
I am overweight and it's my own fault even though I joke about being a light eater - as soon as it's light I start eating.
It has nothing to do with going on a diet and everything to do with what I eat, how much I eat and how often.
Kids can be cruel when it comes to slinging off at obesity and we as parents can at times be even crueller by not doing anything about our kids' weight when it is staring at us from across the kitchen table.
When we allow them to tuck into kai we all know will add inches to their puku and take away immeasurable amounts of their self-esteem, it can be as cruel as the criticism they will receive because of what we are feeding them.
Furthermore, if obesity is the epidemic that makes Aids look like a runny nose, then sugar makes heroin look like cough medicine - and our kids are addicted to it.
Addictions, in one form or another, make or break us. I know this first-hand and now as the clock ticks past 60 it is food that is my final frontier to conquer. If I can apply all that I have learned from giving up all drugs including alcohol and nicotine over 10 years ago, then getting a new "warrant of fitness" for my overweight body is priority one. It has been 25 years since the scales told me the truth and not a "phone number" so now my game plan for conquering obesity is to apply the one day at a time rule of addiction by keeping an eye on my "puku-points" - aka calories.
Hopefully this will give me the warrant of fatness I am longing for.
Raw food, like my ancestors ate, is the key for me and putting down the spoon and picking up the sandshoes and pounding the pavement is as simple as I can get it - one day at a time. There is no hurry and there is no need for a radical regime of kai that tastes like cardboard. Stay out of the middle aisles of the supermarket, forage for kai that is plentiful and grows fresh and freely in my backyard, and most of all I am enjoying the journey of getting my energy and health back. And thus far it is working from one year ago when I was 107 kilos to today when I am 102 - and oh for that sweet day when my weight will not be a telephone number any more.
broblack@xtra.co.nz
Tommy Wilson is a best-selling author and local writer.
