Yes there is: laziness.
Both when it comes to physical activity and in making the right choices when it comes to eating. Why cook a healthy dinner when you can watch a movie while you cook a frozen pizza or microwave a “Hungry Man”.
Thing is, though, something like dodgeball isn’t really all that great for exercise-my friends and I would get out on purpose, then go sit on the side of the gym and chatter.
Another problem, I’ve found, is that what I’ve THOUGHT was healthy food turns out not to be. I think it would be an interesting thread where we discuss what food IS good for you. Now we’re finding out that orange juice isn’t so hot, and that “an apple a day” isn’t the magical cure all.
(Along those lines-are peas good for you veggies, or just empty calories? Because I love green peas-especially with carrots!)
Also:
I love peas. Love love love. Nothing on them, either. Just fresh from the pod or even frozen.
Mmmmm…that’s good to know! More peas!
Thanks for that link, Ginger-it’s a good one.
I never said it was impossible, nor did I say it was an excuse to be fat. I’m simply pointing out that people are often really quick to dismiss that people sometimes do have medical conditions that make it difficult to lose weight. I’m well aware of how hypothyroidism works, being one of the people in my family who has it. Mine is Hashimoto’s, and every once in a while my thyroid decides to kick in again and there’s a huge difference. I can lose 10 pounds like nothing. Any other time, it takes me forever to lose that amount. I can’t seem to find a doctor who’s willing to let me go on the Armour, even though I’ve heard great things about it. They all tell me it’s too difficult to get the dosage right. Right now I’m on levothyroxine. I used to be on Synthroid. I can’t believe it made you gain that much weight that fast. :eek:
I’m a little :dubious: towards the people who are shocked! and horrified! at the disaster! of people even being able to finish a high-calorie ice cream item. Yeah, it’s very unhealthy, but anyone who’s ever had any problems with food can attest that it’s damn easy to pack away large amounts of calories very quickly. A hearty, “normal” meal (i.e. not necessarily healthy, but not one you’d bat an eye at) can very easily be more 1500 calories. I’m not advocating that, but I’m certainly dubious of those who claim to be agog at the feat of gluttony. :rolleyes:
Pretty much. Most of the time, I think, it’s when you’re just sitting on the couch, snacking, and not even paying attention to what you’re eating.
I’ve noticed too that I developed a habit of snacking not out of hunger, per se, but sometimes just out of boredom. “Oh, we have doritos!” That and sometimes those high-calorie foods aren’t that filling or rich anyways.
As I said in the OP, I fully recognize that some people have thyriod disorders that could prevent them from losing weight. At the risk of making an ass-umption, I am pretty sure that those people are in a very small minority, and for the vast majority of the morbidly obese, the only health problem preventing them from losing weight is their own obesity.
But all of this detracts from my main point: Stop Feeding Your Kids!!! Don’t let them get into the horrible habits of Xbox + McDonald’s that are going to stay with them their entire lives.
How does a thyriod disorder prevent them from losing weight?
I think this, (though I disagree with the harsh “what? you all morons or what?” tone of it), is the crux of the matter regarding obesity in America.
But do people really honestly think it’s JUST food and/or ignorance of nutrition alone that is responsible for our nation’s serious lack of fitness?
I’m so sick to death of the oversimplistic, and overwhelmingly USELESS mantra “eat less/exercise more”. Do people really honestly think that it is lack of kunderstanding of that little gem of knowledge? (heavy sarcasm).
It’s funny, I remember seeing a comedian who’d been hugely obese at one time and had gotten down to a normal size. One of his new “unfat” jokes was something along the lines of “Who knew? It really IS as simple as 'eat less/exercise more”. But RIGHT on the heels of that he immediately contradicted himself with “of course I never could have done it if I hadn’t gotten to the bottom of my emotional issues FIRST, it wasn’t what I was eating, it was what was eating ME”.
IMHO…Bingo!
Let me repeat that. Gotten to the bottom of his emotional issues FIRST. That is, BEFORE learning how to tweak the diet and exercise routine. And if you read any of the before and after success stories of people who’ve taken it off, and kept it off. That is KEY to their success and often the first thing they addressed and overcame before they were able to finally be successful in losing the fat and keeping it off.
Americans, even obese ones (or perhaps especially obese ones) work their asses off. (not literally of course, or we wouldn’t be villifying them). A poster put it perfectly when talking about her cat “here’s a snack kitty, substitute food for love”. Of course the poster was being facetious, but that is a huge (sorry pun not intended) facet of the obesity problem in America.
Too much emphasis is placed on the American dream and trying to get ahead (hence working nine thousand hours a week), make all that money and keep up with the Joneses and WAY too is little placed upon our emotional wellbeing, and more importantly being loved.
As long as people try, and fail, to fill that void of loneliness, insecurity, lack of success [insert emotional void of choice here], there will be obesity (along with all of the other addictions that exist, but don’t necessarily show up as dramatically on the outside of a person).
That does NOT mean that I don’t think there exist people who are just plain lazy gluttons. But 60 % of our population? And it’s supposedly ALL caused by just gluttony and sloth? Or worse, people who don’t get that “eat less/exercise more” mantra? I don’t buy it.
They do get updated.
SIL’s a doctor and her English blows goats. When she was finishing school 6 years ago, she had to write a paper sumarizing research on kid’s sizes. Half the articles had been published in English, so she asked me to translate those for her. I got the whole folder, including the articles published in Spanish and charts indicating “expected behaviours and sizes for babies of different ages” in 1974, 1985 and 1994. The first one was based on studies done outside of Spain; the others were based on Spanish data and had had new data added to them as it became available.
The sweeteners in diet drinks produce diarrhea, if drunk in the amounts the soda-only people drink. They also make the liver work harder than regular sugar does (which is probably not a very good thing, you’re taking your body’s main chemical factory out of balance).
Waaaaaaay healthy, yessir.
The thing is this. Obesity on such a wide scale must have wide-ranging causes. To castigate fat people for their perceived moral failings simply strikes me as being very Republican.
(I can say the R-word in the Pit, can’t I?)
Heh.
Very wide ranging.
Yes, I’m going to hell.
Or a few simple causes, that huge numbers of people participate in. Such as, eating larger amounts of food every day and getting no exercise. Food is more plentiful than it was in the past, portions are getting larger. Fewer and fewer people have jobs that actually make them use their muscles. Children spend less of their time outside playing.
You may be right. Or this might be a case of group think.
Huh?
What strikes me as odd is that on one hand, obesity is a pervasive health problem in this country compared with 50 years ago, but on the other hand there are also more gyms, exercise equipment and a general “fitness craze” that didn’t exist 50 years ago. It seems like we’re in the strange situation where as a society we are obsessed with working out and staying in shape, but at the same time we’re fatter than ever before.
What possibly could be your point?
That I was “lazy” after I blew out my ACL and lateral meniscus? That it wasn’t the case that every time I ran over half a mile my knee would swell up like a grapefruit?
I think this is the worst thing you can do. I can’t find the article, but there was recently a study that linked obesity with a lack of sleep. I don’t remember how the two were related, but it’s apparently verty hard to lose weight if you don’t get enough sleep. Also, the later a kid stays up, the more likely he is to snack.
Perhaps she was referring to the ability to lose 25 pounds, which you said took you a year?