Obesity Crisis: Theres not much we can do.

[Justforfun000]

Hell. I'm one of those people on the opposite end of the spectrum. I'm naturally slim and I WISH I had an obesity problem.
Do you know how much easier it would be to REFRAIN from eating then it is to have to stuff yourself continually to put on weight? I used to work out fairly regular, and that put my 5'10 frame at around 155lbs at the most. The last two years I got lazy and didn't go at all and I shrank down to between 140 to 145 lbs.

Doesn't matter that I probably eat almost twice as much as the normal person, I'll still stay at that fucking ridiculously low weight. I hate it!
Granted I've got a naturally small bone structure so it's not as bad as it sounds, but I still don't feel "normal". The last couple of weeks I've bit the bullet and started working out again, and I've been taking Periactin which is an antihistamine that stimulates appetite and I've started to rise up again, but you should see how much I'm eating NOW.

All in all I get so pissed off that most other people have the "problem" of weight gain. I'd give anything to be on the other side of the fence. You know what I hate about being skinny? Unlike being fat, people think it's perfectly ok to comment on it and not think it's rude to be hurtful. On top of that, there is always an unspoken, (and sometimes spoken) assumption that you're sick. As in Cancer or Aids.

That's the other infuriating thing. If I ever get stressed during a period of my life and am not eating as much, a 5 lb loss looks much more obvious on me. It's always temporary, but I still get the "Have you lost weight? You look thinner than normal."

Fucking hate it. I wish there was more info on how to slow your metabolism for those that are cursed with the opposite problem. At 37, shouldn't it have started to by now?

[Big Orange]

Jesus-titty-fucking-Christ, Justforfun000, I wished I had the same metabolism as you and millions of other people would be glad to be naturally thin - I'm one of those people who doesn't overeat as such and walk around places, but still find it piss easy to put on weight and find it next to impossible to be truly slim, even after six solid months of changing my diet and going on ten mile walks two times a week (and still be called a "fat fuck" by idiotic Chavs who drive around in cars, chain smoking). Now I'm struggling in just to keep myself merely "stout" instead of clinically obese (think that mindreading LA cop from Heroes). Sharing a house with chainsmoking mum for two decades doesn't help matters either, even though she opens a window and she keeps it in the kitchen (but if I get cancer I know who I'm going to blame). I still think smoking is inherently more harmful than being overweight or obese, since you can shift weight out of your body but you cannot shift tar out of your lungs...

[Justforfun000]

Jesus-titty-fucking-Christ, Justforfun000, I wished I had the same metabolism as you and millions of other people would be glad to be naturally thin

Yeah, but it's easy to believe so on the other side of the fence.
I hate it just as much as you probably hate dealing with excess weight.

Why can't we all just be mesomorphs? *sigh*

[Norseman]

Jesus-titty-fucking-Christ, Justforfun000, I wished I had the same metabolism as you and millions of other people would be glad to be naturally thin - I'm one of those people who doesn't overeat as such and walk around places, but still find it piss easy to put on weight and find it next to impossible to be truly slim, even after six solid months of changing my diet and going on ten mile walks two times a week (and still be called a "fat fuck" by idiotic Chavs who drive around in cars, chain smoking). Now I'm struggling in just to keep myself merely "stout" instead of clinically obese (think that mindreading LA cop from Heroes). Sharing a house with chainsmoking mum for two decades doesn't help matters either, even though she opens a window and she keeps it in the kitchen (but if I get cancer I know who I'm going to blame). I still think smoking is inherently more harmful than being overweight or obese, since you can shift weight out of your body but you cannot shift tar out of your lungs...

Hah! Try jogging two to six miles a day (depending on weather), and working out ten to twenty minutes a day afterwards! It still doesn't work.

The only time I managed to go down in weight was when I did six mile walks, every day (in roughly 1 hour 15 minutes), no matter what, AND watched my diet obsessively, so I ate 500-1000 calories less a day than I need according to the weight schemes. After six months of that I had lost 25 pounds.

After that I hit a rock wall, no matter what I did, no matter how much I dieted or exercised, my weight wouldn't nudge an ounce.

If you still wonder about my exercises I ought to tell you that my doctor is satisfied with my activity level. That generally takes some doing.

And if you want to know why read this: Genes Take Charge, and Diets Fall by the Wayside

So why are people getting fat now all of a sudden? Well how about this, food is so cheap and plentiful that if there is any genetic predisposition for obesity you WILL gain weight!

Incidentally if you had a propensity for gaining weight you'd go insane with hunger if you tried to "simply REFRAIN from eating." The flipside isn't true though, it's always easy to GAIN weight, just eat a lot of ethnic food (usually obscenely fat).

[Turin]

and smoking/obesity is just part of it.

I don't know. For what it's worth every day I walk home I see a lot of construction workers and almost all of them seem to be fat asses and they all hang around the smoking pit on breaks and talk with the guys lighting up a cig. I wouldn't be too surprised if almost all construction workers took in second-hand smoke/or smoked/or ate the same shit food on breaks that their fat friends do, if they don't mostly smoke or are fat already.

Also construction workers are constantly exercising all the time, straining their heart with heavy lifting.

As an architect, I spend a lot of time around construction workers, and I can tell you most of them eat like shit and their smoking rate is pretty high. But, as you say, they obviously get a lot of exercise (unless they're union! ). There's another factor that's missing there, however, which is that a lot of construction workers have really awful working hours and their sleep cycles are fucked up as a result; by the time I get to a site in the morning, I'm typically talking to guys that have already been there since 4am, or whom worked overnight and will be heading home after I'm done with them.

Disrupted sleep cycles have been tied to obesity. So construction workers are an outlier.

[Justforfun000]

The flipside isn't true though, it's always easy to GAIN weight, just eat a lot of ethnic food (usually obscenely fat).

Oh no it's not! Trust me, even with help from the drug I'm taking, it is NOT easy to put it on. Genetics are a powerful enemy!

[Norseman]

The flipside isn't true though, it's always easy to GAIN weight, just eat a lot of ethnic food (usually obscenely fat).

Oh no it's not! Trust me, even with help from the drug I'm taking, it is NOT easy to put it on. Genetics are a powerful enemy!

TWADDLE! Eat 10 000 calories a day (easy enough) and you WILL gain and keep weight.

[General Zod]

The flipside isn't true though, it's always easy to GAIN weight, just eat a lot of ethnic food (usually obscenely fat).

Oh no it's not! Trust me, even with help from the drug I'm taking, it is NOT easy to put it on. Genetics are a powerful enemy!

I almost have a similar problem as Justforfun. I've put on a few extra pounds in the last year or so, but that's largely because I've been sitting around doing almost little to no physical activity (even though I should work out more). But thanks to my rather high metabolism fat burns off quickly enough to keep me from getting super obese. I probably don't weigh more than 160 right now, and I can't recall ever being over 170. (I used to weigh 135 when I was actively working out regularly about 5 years ago).

[Justforfun000]

TWADDLE! Eat 10 000 calories a day (easy enough) and you WILL gain and keep weight.

You can only eat so much food. You'd get sick. Besides, even IF I managed to do so, a week eating normal again would drop me right back to where I was. My body has this idea where my perfect weight should be and it's a good 20 lbs under where I'd like it to be. Unfortunately. The only thing that will change it significantly is working out. I've demonstrated that, but I have to keep it up or it's shrinko time.

General Zod Wrote:

I almost have a similar problem as Justforfun. I've put on a few extra pounds in the last year or so, but that's largely because I've been sitting around doing almost little to no physical activity (even though I should work out more). But thanks to my rather high metabolism fat burns off quickly enough to keep me from getting super obese. I probably don't weigh more than 160 right now, and I can't recall ever being over 170. (I used to weigh 135 when I was actively working out regularly about 5 years ago).

My sympathies. Even sitting around without activity does nothing for me. Actually, It'd be scary to think if I'd be skinner if I was highly active. Ah I may be just body dysmorphic a bit though. I still LOOK toned and lightly muscular and people who see me with clothes off all say I look fine, but it doesn't to me. I just want to look average.

[Ender]

Nothing you can do about it? I get my ass up at 5 every day to run and then work out every day after I get put on liberty. Motherfuckers can kiss my ass, put your feet on a treadmill and you will shed pounds. It will be hard, but it will happen.

[Vendetta]

People have to want to lose weight. Most people don't, because it's effort.

Also, beyond a certain level of bifferdom running, normally or on a treadmill, is just going to fuck your knees up before it gets you thin. You need to do something lower like swimming or cycling that requires either venue or equipment that costs money.

[General Zod]

People have to want to lose weight. Most people don't, because it's effort.

Also, beyond a certain level of bifferdom running, normally or on a treadmill, is just going to fuck your knees up before it gets you thin. You need to do something lower like swimming or cycling that requires either venue or equipment that costs money.

There's always gym memberships, which can provide cycles and other machines for you for significantly cheaper.

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

People have to want to lose weight. Most people don't, because it's effort.

Also, beyond a certain level of bifferdom running, normally or on a treadmill, is just going to fuck your knees up before it gets you thin. You need to do something lower like swimming or cycling that requires either venue or equipment that costs money.

There's always gym memberships, which can provide cycles and other machines for you for significantly cheaper.

As I alluded to earlier, try to organize a workplace 'gym pool'. If you guys can make carpoooling work, you can make this work; and likely everyone will be happier and more productive for it.

[Darth Wong]

Nothing you can do about it? I get my ass up at 5 every day to run and then work out every day after I get put on liberty. Motherfuckers can kiss my ass, put your feet on a treadmill and you will shed pounds. It will be hard, but it will happen.

This is a huge mythology. Yes, you can shed pounds with exercise, but it's no substitute for diet control. Weight loss begins at control of diet, and people who can't control their intake will never lose weight no matter how much they exercise. For one thing, people always seriously underestimate the amount of exercise necessary to burn off the effects of a high-calorie diet. For another, people who can't control their diet almost invariably eat more when they exercise, thus negating any weight-loss effect.

And finally, the "eat plenty of food, but get lots of exercise" ethos just doesn't work with a lot of lifestyles, such as the workaholic executive or the devoted parent. Sure, you can always say "make time", but that's a zero-sum game. Any time you devote toward a heavy exercise regimen must by necessity be taken away from other things you do. It's healthier to eat less and get light exercise than to eat a lot and try to put forth a Herculean effort to burn it all off.

The exercise-focused weight-loss ethos is a product of a consumption-driven society. Eat more, exercise more, buy more, spend more.

[Lagmonster]

The exercise-focused weight-loss ethos is a product of a consumption-driven society. Eat more, exercise more, buy more, spend more.

It's also a product of trying to have your cake and eat it too; it's easy to plan out in your head an indulgence of your vices followed by hours of rigorous exercise which, in practice, turns out to be indulging in your vices followed by shrugging and saying you'll work out tomorrow.

[Covenant]

A lot of it comes from a lack of understanding of the basic math of weight control. Weight is fairly long pendulum, and it swings slowly, but you can do the math (3500 calories to a pound) and figure out how much less you need to eat.

Exercise can be hit or miss (I have great success with it, others have none) but diet control is far more concrete. People who treat eating as some mystical process are doing harm to the entire idea of eating, whereby you put energy into your body and it gets burned later. There's no such person as the "I can be moderately active, and not eat hardly anything, and still be fat." That person would be a wonder of science--the incredible Non-Starving Man. If you were out in the wild for a given amount of time without food, you'd get thin.

Starvation is obviously not the answer, but people don't need the huge calorie counts they get each day. It's a war between intake an appetite. Appetite is a bit of a bitch, since it has nothing to do with need, but one solution is to work on all fronts to get your results. Increase your exercise by an hour of walking or jogging a day, nothing huge, to increase your calories-used-per-day by 500. Good for your flexibility and cardio too! Then eat a little less. Feel free to splurge on a few things, in moderation, since those are the things that keep you on the diet.

I'm a big fan of eating a bowl of Campbell's Chunky Soup for lunch. They're tasty, satisfying, and only 200 or so calories. Progresso makes some cans of soup that are even less.

And seriously, people don't realize how much snacks kill you. Starchy snacks like pretzels or fatty ones like nuts are not a good snack food. Even apples have a calorie count, so you can't gorge yourself on anything except carrots or lettuce or stuff thath as the same calorie count as chalk.

[Big Orange]

I can easily put an hour long walk into most days and if I keep off the chocolate (which has strong narcotic properties - pure poison) I would shift a stone of so well within a couple of months and I've done it many times before in preventing myself from becoming genuinely obese. I heard that being either midly skinny or even mildly overweight causes no real health problems, unless you're either far too thin or far too fat (a lot of people get to those extremes through psychological eating disorders like anthorexia or prada willy syndrome).

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

I can easily put an hour long walk into most days

Good for you. Walking an hour is a good if beginner-level amount of exercise.

and if I keep off the chocolate (which has strong narcotic properties - pure poison)

I honestly don't know whether to laugh extremely loudly or repeatedly forcefully hit my head on my desk till bits start breaking off. Where's your evidence for the assertion that chocolate has 'RAR Strong Narcotic Properties RAR!', and what exactly is your standard that a substance has to meet to get this highly technical rating?

I would shift a stone of so well within a couple of months

What?

and I've done it many times before in preventing myself from becoming genuinely obese.

Yo-yo dieting is also bad for you.

I heard that being either midly skinny or even mildly overweight causes no real health problems,

This isn't about being ten or fifteen percent overweight, this is about being at least 25% on up to maybe ten times that! Less than 20% overweight is usually referred to as 'pleasantly plump', not 'beached whale' or 'land walrus'!

unless you're either far too thin or far too fat (a lot of people get to those extremes through psychological eating disorders like anthorexia or prada willy syndrome).

What are you saying? Learn to spell!!

Also, here's an article saying in summary that it's likely not all psychology, but neurochemistry!

[The Yosemite Bear]

actually coffee and choclate are at their core stimulants/diuretics, thus a low sugar choclate will cause you to loose weight. hell those ensure choclate shakes have sugar alcohols that your body just can't digest, enough pseudo endorphin that it feels good going down, and enough caffine that it just runs through you.

[Broomstick]

"Ensure" the brand does NOT have caffeine beyond what is normally in the chocolate flavoring, which is minimal. Nor does it have "sugar alcohols" - sucrose is the primary sweetener.

Now, there ARE other "nutritional" shakes, usually posing as "energy drinks", that do have shit like that in them, but the one brand you mentioned isn't among them.

Read the fucking label next time.

[Justforfun000]

Broomstick Wrote:

Now, there ARE other "nutritional" shakes, usually posing as "energy drinks", that do have shit like that in them, but the one brand you mentioned isn't among them.

Read the fucking label next time.

LOL. It's so true that sometimes people jump on the bad-food bashing bus a little too zealously. We have to remember that many offerings are in the shade of gray.


You know folks, the truth is that calorie counting, and proper proportions of carbs, fats and protein all have their place in a healthy diet, but the truth is that in the long run you have to deal with genetics as your main overlord. We are born with a specific body type that in one scenario has been broken down to 3 very nebulous body types. Ectomorphs, endomorphs and mesomorphs.

In reality, people fit a shading withing the spectrum of them all, but they're a fair enough goalpost to give an idea.

What you eat is what you are combined with what you think and do. As simplistic as that sounds, it's probably the best summation of the main factors. Those who naturally put on weight and want to be a cut muscle-bound son of a bitch needs to work out like crazy to enhance the size of their muscles and then SERIOUSLY watch their diet in order to cut their body fat to a low percentage so the muscles show through.

Those who are ectomorphic like myself have to eat life a fucking pig and do especially hard strength workouts that focus on 6 to 8 repetitions of weight lifting. It's necessary in order to stimulate the growth of muscle fiber. In ectomorphs they need to shade towards extra effort and less reps in order to kickstart their body to grow. Cutting is their last worry. (For those unfamiliar, bodybuilders do a bulking cycle which puts on a lot of fat along with general quallity weight and THEN have to do a specific program to cut their bodyfat low.

Ultimately it's a tough game. We are mainly at the mercy of our genetics. We can alter them quite significantly, but they are never truly CHANGED. I could work out for 30 years of my life and a mesomorph could pop in the gym for the first year and outpace me like nothing. It's the way it is.

[The Yosemite Bear]

All I know is that
1. choclate in it's raw form contains caffien (it's closely related to coffee)
2. I think I mentioned that the several times I've tried that one particular brand it goes right through me.

[Broomstick]

1. Then choose a flavor that doesn't have chocolate in it.
2. It's not sugar alcohols causing it, but some other ingredient may cause you a problem. In which case, don't use it.

[Darth Raptor]

I'm going to echo Mike on this particular point: The effects of exercise on weight loss are dramatically overblown. Exercise is good for you, no doubts there, but its positive effects are felt in other areas of your health and fitness. Increased strength, better stamina, improved flexibility... These are all benefits you can look forward to. Weight loss? Not so much.

Leaving aside the issues of appetite (and the societal factors Ein has been justifiably railing on), it's much more effective to control caloric intake. But another important point that many people forget/ignore: Diets are NOT temporary. If you want your new, slender figure to be permanent, the changes you make to your diet must also be permanent.

The good news? It gets easier. It seriously, honestly does. There are tricks you can use, but in the beginning there's a fair amount of Will checks involved and those, unfortunately, cannot be avoided. But endure your new, permanent diet long enough, and it becomes a habit. One just as firmly-entrenched as your old junk food addictions used to be. You won't even miss the Wendy's grease burgers anymore after a while. Stick to foods with low glycemic indeces (as they take much longer to digest than starchy crap) and you can kill your appetite problems in the face.

To those with naturally slow metabolisms: I feel your pain. I have a very sluggish, almost reptilian metabolism. I've also struggled with psychological eating disorders in the past (I've been obese, anorexic and bulimic, in that order). I now control my weight with a proper diet. I eat VERY little (in terms of calories) while getting plenty of other nutrients. For my size and level of activity, my daily portions appear ridiculously small to an outside observer. Myself at age 17, who could eat an entire pizza and drink an entire 2-liter bottle of soda in one sitting (no shit) would have agreed, but I'm actually satisfied with a single slice and a small glass of fruit juice these days. It's completely doable.

And another thing: Don't envy people like Zod and Justforfun. In fact, I pity them and wouldn't trade metabolisms with them for the world. While they may be able to eat all they want without getting fat, they pay a heavy price in free radical production. Their metabolisms are SO fast, they oxidize their very DNA, which accelerates the onset of aging. To these folks, I can only advise looking for ways to slow their metabolisms down, and to get some antioxidants.

[Medic]

TWADDLE! Eat 10 000 calories a day (easy enough) and you WILL gain and keep weight.

You can only eat so much food. You'd get sick. Besides, even IF I managed to do so, a week eating normal again would drop me right back to where I was. My body has this idea where my perfect weight should be and it's a good 20 lbs under where I'd like it to be. Unfortunately. The only thing that will change it significantly is working out. I've demonstrated that, but I have to keep it up or it's shrinko time.

Seriously, where are all these calories gonna come from? Depending on the food, a stupid increase of protein just makes you shit a brick every other hour, you'd damned well better increase fiber intake to compensate or I imagine it can't be good for your intestines, and if you intake so much more food to compensate liquid intake has to keep pace...

That's a recipe for pissing and shitting once every hour, having a food diet approaching a small cellphone bill, it's effects only last as long as I commit to it cause the moment I pull back I'll deflate like a balloon and the positives are gonna be some aesthetic increase in muscle / fat, perhaps a slower metabolism which would be nice (though I don't really know) but unknown (to me) consequences of just putting my digestive system through an overdrive mode for a long term. I'll bite the bullet genetics shot my way but maintain as healthy and balanced a diet as possible. I'll still eat more than others can afford to and not gain the weight but right now, I'm physically active enough between PT every morning and my normal duties that that's merely PRUDENT given my body's metabolism.

And another thing: Don't envy people like Zod and Justforfun. In fact, I pity them and wouldn't trade metabolisms with them for the world. While they may be able to eat all they want without getting fat, they pay a heavy price in free radical production. Their metabolisms are SO fast, they oxidize their very DNA, which accelerates the onset of aging. To these folks, I can only advise looking for ways to slow their metabolisms down, and to get some antioxidants.

Someone had to say it. Oh and I'm in this category if anyone is. I can understand women more than men wanting an uber-metabolism cause of cultural expectation but overall it's a never-ending and never-progressing fight. Think about it, eating less is will-power intensive, against appetite. Eating more and tailoring workouts towards bulk is RESOURCE (time, food, money) intensive, and has to be done to keep weight up if that's what one so desires, and lapses can strip progress very fast.

Also a high-metabolism can lead to unhealthy eating habits and a lazy lifestyle that means being rail-thin is no indicator of good health. Hell, look at plenty of retired athletes, many of which have the idealized high-muscle, low-fat body type -- better yet again than people like me -- balloon after their career ends. Overconfidence is built into that type of metabolism and the same type of will-power-intensive efforts has to be exerted to counter this in ADDITION to the resource-intensive efforts to obtain some sort of idealized stature, more muscles, less bony, etc.