<p>padad, I was not even for a second msking fun of you. I actually admire you for resisting the lure of the idiot box.
On obesity–I am fighting to lose about 20 punds, and I can tell you it is not easy. But I am less than sympathetic with those who have gradually become morbidly obese strictly due the obscene amounts of food they put in their mouths. I am also pretty sure that if I weighed 500 punds I would not expect the person next to me on an airplane to give up their space. That’s just rude, no matter how big you are. I do not judge people based on their body size; everybody has a different backstory, which may include depression, disease, etc. My own mother needs to lose weight, but she has severe mobility problems and exercise is difficult for her. But even she goes to the gym twice a week and does what she can. As a nation we need to make healthier choices; walk, eat smaller portions, choose more apples and fewer chips. We need to make sweat, not excuses. No one mskes you order the double bacon cheeseburger and large fries. And we need to offer each other encouragement, and realize people come in all sizes. Got to go–</p>
<p>A timely article from today’s cover of the L.A. Times:</p>
<p><a href=“In France, fat makes an entrée”>In France, fat makes an entrée;
<p>The French are becoming fat too.</p>
<p>
zoosermom:
I don’t consider myself overly large but I admit that I’ve done this before when I was the last one on a plane that only had a few center seats left - I’ve scanned them to find the ones with the smallest people next to them. At least I confine myself to my seat once in it although it probab;y annoyed someone who thought they’d lucked into having an empty seat next to them.</p>
<p>On the flip side I’ll admit to doing something else also - if I have an empty center seat next to me I try to encourage boarding passengers to sit elsewhere by putting my jacket or book on that seat and not making eye contact with the boarding passengers. This technique doesn’t always work.</p>
<p>Curmudgeon, if a nurse or doc really feels differently about her patients based on their mode of disease transmission, it is time for her to go! I worked as a nurse & honestly did not see that attitude. I’m sure it exists, but I think it is rare. (I hope it is!) I had several self destructive patients, particularly heroin addicts on our detox unit, who would sneak out for a fix. Some were highly contagious with scabbies & cared more about the fix than the health of the floor full of other patients. It was part of their illness. I had end-stage AIDS patients in various levels of mental deterioration. Often argumentative, escaping out of reverse isolation TB rooms to complain about the televiaion. Again, part of their illness. Patients weighing over 500 pounds, too large to weigh & complete a physical assesment. Too large for a wheelchair. On especially large patients, simple procedures, like urinary catheters, can pose new challenges. It can be backbreaking, too. But if a nurse or doc or tech can’t say “There but for the Grace of God go I,” it’s time to find a new career. Part of a nurse’s job is education, however. I hope patients realize they are not being judged when “prying” questions are part of the interaction with helathcare providers. They have to know if patient behaviors reulted in the disease or condition simply as a way to prevent it in the future.</p>
<p>As to the 5% figure…What your study did not state was whether or not the healthy program was being followed any longer. If it were, the weight would stay off & more weight loss would follow. It’s darn hard! It’s tough to be around the hummingbird metabolism folks & realize they really aren’t food-focused, but why am I? Everyone of us knows what to do to stay at a healthy weight. It’s the discipline to do the right things that some of us lack. (Raising hand here.)</p>
<p>“zoosermom:
I don’t consider myself overly large but I admit that I’ve done this before when I was the last one on a plane that only had a few center seats left - I’ve scanned them to find the ones with the smallest people next to them. At least I confine myself to my seat once in it although it probab;y annoyed someone who thought they’d lucked into having an empty seat next to them.”</p>
<p>I just want you to know that you’re my hero for admitting that you do that. I have no problem with sitting next to a large person (or small for that matter) who mostly confines him or herself to the seat. I’m also sensitive to others’ feelings. If the person is large and tries to be considerate, I’ll move over to give some extra space. I can fit in less than a seat, but often people just flop next to me and SPREAD. There was a man the other night who was my size and spread his legs so far I know he had to be uncomfortable. I don’t want to know what statement he thought he was making, but I really wanted to call him a liar (it couldn’t be that big).</p>
<p>
WOW! I can’t believe you actually said this! The overweight/obese people that I have known are usually FASTIDIOUS about personal hygiene. If you all would just substitute the word “foreign,” “Black,” “Hispanic,” or “poor people” in all of these negative comments, maybe you’d see how horrible these statements are.</p>
<p>This thread seems to be divided into sinners (overweight, drink or smoke etc) and saints (thin athletic types). </p>
<p>Well, I think I’d rather spend my time with the sinners rather than the saints here – my experience has been that they are FAR more tolerant and understanding of other people’s weaknesses, and just more fun. I really have no interest in spending time with perfect people. They are just plain boring, imo.</p>
<p>I also wanted to add that I was a sorority girl in college. We had pretty girls, and some not-so-pretty girls. Girls who were model-thin and those who weren’t. But I certainly don’t remember this kind of cattiness. Who knew?</p>
<p>
Make sure you never ride the subway or commuter trains in Japan then - you’d be impinged upon by lots of people albeit mostly thin ones.</p>
<p>Re: sjmom2329 #166</p>
<p>The perfect people just aren’t listening. Theyre too perfect too consider anyone else’s feelings.</p>
<p>OOPS! I did it again! I forgot to have compassion for perfect people! Darn!</p>
<p>There has got to be a genetic component to weight. I grew up with too many people who were larger than normal and were suberb athletes- did much more than I ever thought of in my wildest dreams. There I was, little willowy non-athlete who could eat and eat and not gain a pound. My mom was 5’10 and weighed 110 when she got married. (I was 5’7 and between 100 and 110 when I got married, and couldn’t get into her wedding gown.) My dad was pencil thin. I know for a fact that I have it easy in life compared to many people, weight-wise.</p>
<p>And once you’re overweight, the body adjusts and it becomes even more difficult to lose weight. In-shape people are like human calorie burning machines. Overweight people have to live on a starvation diet to get anywhere- and then the energy level gets even lower, which makes exercise even harder. Heck, it makes living, working, and being happy hard. I’m not saying it’s impossible, it’s just much more difficult for them than the thin people. So it’s sort of like the person with a 160 IQ saying to the person with the 80 IQ- hey, if you just study your behind off, you can get a 2400 SAT score too.</p>
<p>sjmom, MBK: Are you or are you not claiming that the massive increase in obesity rates over the last 25 years has more to do with factors outside of people’s control than to do with their own choices?</p>
<p>All I’ve really been saying this whole time is this: obesity can be controlled. Not always totally controlled, and it’s always tough, but it can be done. If someone doesn’t have the time, money or willingness to control it, I’m not going to spend my time judging them, or giving them hell over it, but I’m also not going to treat them the same way I would treat someone, with, say MS, a degenerative disease that a person has essentially no control over.</p>
<p>Weight loss will never be easy, never. But it’s also not impossible. And frankly, this attitude of “obesity is inevitable and impossible to fix” is only going to lead America down a path of increasingly obese population. I don’t really want to think about the outcome of that.</p>
<p>curm: I figured the statement was something like that. Basically, what that’s saying is that only 5% of people have the willpower, support, money and time to be able to maintain a healthy lifestyle (assuming they weren’t already) for 5 years. That doesn’t surprise me in the least.</p>
<p>doubleplay: Yes, I think that’s the idea.</p>
<p>zoosermom: I PM’ed you with an apology.</p>
<p>to all: There was a time when lepers were isolated. No one had any idea it was a bacterial infection; it was considered the sign of a moral weakness.</p>
<p>What if all of you who are so sure that it’s food wake up tomorrow to find researchers identifying the hormone whose improper production and/or absorption causes obesity? Leptin is currently under consideration for this role. </p>
<p>Will you remember how sure you were that obesity can be solved by excercising and not eating too much?</p>
<p>I have had a problem with weight my entire life, well only after I was three and had a tonsilectomy. This lost me the love of my mother who is a perfectionist. She put me on an immediate diet at three. I lived in a household in which she and my brother ate bags and bags of potato chips and yodels and I was not allowed. Other kids went trick-or-treating for candy; I went for UNICEF. By this strenuous watching of my weight I stayed within “normal” limits for most of my early adulthood. Perhaps I was 10 - 15 lbs. overweight, but there really wasn’t any more I could do because I have exercise induced asthma. I have been in oxygen tents, so I don’t take this lightly.</p>
<p>Then after having my children something changed in my body, and they came up with a steroid spray to control my asthma somewhat. I needed to use it because as a mother of young children and a college professor I was so busy I really needed to breathe.</p>
<p>I don’t know if it was the kids or the steroids, but I kept eating less and less and gaining and gaining weight. No one can believe how little I eat, and it’s the good kind of food, too. I don’t care if you don’t believe me. You’re right though, I don’t exercise. My doctor says I can’t do aerobic exercise. I do do Yoga and lift weights.</p>
<p>Somehow I have to hold my head high, go to work, buy clothes, attend weddings etc. knowing the family will be talking behind my back. I would avoid the family functions but my kids clamor to go.</p>
<p>You’d think young community college students would be biased against an obese teacher, but just this week kids from three different classes (several from each) made a special effort to stay after class and tell me how wonderful the class is.</p>
<p>I am lucky I was born small and pretty so people don’t seem to worry about sitting next to me anywhere. Still, after reading this thread I am so glad my son selected Williams and not UChicago where I would have had to take a plane to visit him which, I am doing next week for his 18th birthday. I do worry that he will be embarrassed by me in front of his friends, just as I do with my daughter, though they both are so loving that they tell me this is ridiculous. I did consider not having children so I would not pass this on. My grandmother was morbidly obese and my first cousin who has inherited the same genes as I has made this decision.</p>
<p>I am so happy for them that one weighs 105 and the other 125 so they won’t have to suffer as I did and do. I did bring them up to me active and to make healthy food choices. One has been a semi-professional ballet dancer and the other wants to pursue fencing and runs like the wind. Neither of them suffer from the asthma either, so maybe these genes will die with me.</p>
<p>It’s not much of a consolation that in a time of famine I would survive and all you people with working metabolisms would not. I don’t want to be there alone, even if I were thin then because there was no food at all.</p>
<p>Doubleplay, of course there is a genetic component to weight. Not just how much, but where it is concentrated. I doubt the superb athletes you speak of were obese, however. There is a large range of healthy body types & wieghts. I’m sure we all know very thin people who are not healthy, tire easily, & have no stamina or cardiovascular conditioning or strength. Muscle tissue is always desirable, and it burns many calories to maintain itself. I will never be convinced that obesity is inevitable, but I would welcome a more realistic body type depicted in the media. It seems the larger we grow as a society, the thinner our “ideal” image becomes.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20070820/obesity-virus-more-bigger-fat-cells[/url]”>Weight Loss & Diet Plans - Find healthy diet plans and helpful weight loss tools;
Yep, this thread is all about blaming the victim. I’ve seen thin people eat everything in sight while lounging on the couch (my kids), and I’ve seen overweight people have oatmeal with skim milk for breakfast, a salad for lunch and a similar dinner who can’t lose a pound. (my BIL)</p>
<p>The most disappointing thing about this thread is that I expect more from the type of people who post on CC. It’s usually pretty well-educated parents, who have raised children to young adulthood, who find CC. You’d think that that experience alone would make for greater understanding of human differences.</p>
<p>Mythmom- Hugs.</p>
<p>I am really sorry that people some people have said such nasty and hurtful things on this thread.</p>
<p>“I am really sorry that people some people have said such nasty and hurtful things on this thread.”</p>
<p>So am I, especially since I started the thread with an eye toward discussing whether “civil rights” were specifically for blacks or whether the obese (we’ve already discussed gays) could also use the term and movement.</p>
<p>1of42 and others: One more time: It’s the lack of compassion. That’s the issue. If you and others have an issue with inconsiderate overweight people, how about shifting that to having an issue with inconsiderate people and leave it at that?</p>
<p>How can you possibly read mythmom’s story and not have compassion for her struggle?</p>
<p>Regarding one’s contol over obesity - I agree that obesity can be controlled. Almost anyone who’s obese could potentially control it. If they set themselves on a desert island with only water and a low daily limit of food almost all obese people would lose considerable weight. They’d even probably keep it off if they were confined there.</p>
<p>That’s another of my extreme examples. This condition of obesity isn’t black or white. It isn’t simply one coming to the realization that they happen to be obese, deciding not to be so any more, and then easily being able to reverse the condition. The points I raised weren’t that being obese is beyond the control of an individual or inevitable but rather, that people need to realize and consider that there’s a range of difficulty people have in being at a ‘normal weight’ and it depends in some cases on physical reasons, in some cases psychological reasons, and in some cases habit/lifestyle reasons. I agree that an obese person can work to reverse the condition but depending on what the underlying reasons are as to why they have the condition it can be difficult - perhaps much more difficult than it would be for others of us. </p>
<p>People come in all shapes and sizes, in widely varying genetically determined backgrounds (tall, short, black, white, disease free, laden with diseases, very thin, not so thin, abilty to cope mentally, mentally unstable, etc.) so as such it’s logical to conclude that the effort of maintaining an ideal weight will range from very easy for some peolpe to very difficult for other people to everything in between.</p>
<p>I’ve known people who went out of their way to consume as many calories as they could in order to try to come up to a normal weight since they were underweight. I’ve known others who could easily eat 2-3 times as much as some others and still maintain a normal weight. Yet others are overweight despite not eating more than one of normal weight. And yes, others consume far more calories than anyone should and end up obese. The difficulty is in understanding ‘why’ they consume so many calories. Is it simple lack of self-control? Is it gluttony? Or could there be more to it than we realize? Could there be some underlying genetic, hormonal, psychological or perhaps environmental conditions that are compelling these people to overeat? There are drugs that if anyone were to take them they’d immediately start gaining weight even though they’re consuming the same calories as before. This is more proof that things like body chemistry affect one’s weight.</p>
<p>The obese people I’ve known have all wanted to lose weight. Some have gone to extreme measures to do so including having surgery (sometimes not successful). These people know they’re overweight (they don’t need anyone to ‘remind’ them), they usually know they’re overeating or eating the wrong thing, they’re suffering because of their weight more than most of us have ever had to yet they still have a difficult time controlling it. The question is why and the answer is complex and varying with the variation in people and environments.</p>
<p>“The most disappointing thing about this thread is that I expect more from the type of people who post on CC. It’s usually pretty well-educated parents, who have raised children to young adulthood, who find CC. You’d think that that experience alone would make for greater understanding of human differences.”</p>
<p>Yes. How is it possible? Most of us wouldn’t be wasting our time addressing such petty reactions and mean-spiritedness, but how can this be with the supposedly intelligent and educated?</p>
<p>Great post, mythmom. Way to stand up and be counted. Takes guts to step-up when they are shooting at you. A lot of guts. Be proud of yourself for facing your dragons heads-up. IMO, it’s the only way to fly.;)</p>