Magnitude and attributed reasons for adult weight gain amongst women at increased risk of breast cancer

BMC Women's Health

Table 5 Self-reported reasons for weight gain: peri/post- and premenopausal women

Reason	Peri/postmenopausal women (n = 188)		Premenopausal women (n = 211)
Reason	Number stating reason	% stating reason	Number stating reason	% stating reason
Children / Childcare / Pregnancy	93	49.5^a	131	62.1^b
Inactivity	84	44.7	82	38.9
Menopause / HRT	73	38.8	–	–
Comfort or boredom eating	64	34.0	89	42.2
Portion Size	60	31.9	70	33.2
Stress	44	23.4	66	31.3
Marriage / settling down	42	22.3	54	25.6
Work / Study	30	16.0	51	24.2
Bereavement	28	14.9	45	21.3
Depression	28	14.9	36	17.1
Alcohol	28	14.9	20	9.5
Takeaways / Ready meals	25	13.3	36	17.1
Lack of time to prepare food	21	11.2	34	16.1
Health problems / Medications	20	10.6	18	8.5
Giving up smoking	18	9.6	23	10.9
Food Preferences (own/family)	17	9.0	26	12.3
Cooking skills	4	2.1	7	3.3
Eating out	4	2.1	2	0.9
Cost of healthy food	3	1.6	7	3.3
Lack of sleep / tiredness	3	1.6	3	1.4
Carer	3	1.6	1	0.5
Social life / holidays	3	1.6	1	0.5
Contraceptives	2	1.1	15	7.1
Sweet tooth	2	1.1	1	0.5
Fertility treatment	1	0.5	3	1.4
Appetite / Hunger	1	0.5	0	0.0
Divorce	0	0.0	2	0.9
Hysterectomy / oophorectomy	0	0.0	1	0.5
Premenstrual hunger	0	0.0	1	0.5
Progesterone replacement	0	0.0	1	0.5

Excluding women missing percentage weight change (n = 32), women with percentage weight gain ≤5% (n = 12), women not giving reasons for weight gain (n = 72), women with menopausal status unknown (n = 6). Women could have been excluded for than one of these reasons. Participants could give multiple reasons for weight gain
^aIncludes all women but only n = 152 women known to have children. Of those with children, 93/152 (61.2%) gave Children / Childcare / Pregnancy as a reason for their weight gain
^bIncludes all women but only n = 174 women known to have children. Of those with children, 131/174 (75.3%) gave Children / Childcare / Pregnancy as a reason for their weight gain

ISSN: 1472-6874