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Why are you so fat?

There's an enormous difference between being FIT and being HEALTHY.

Many, MANY top athletes have horrific HEALTH problems - high blood pressure, arthritis, tendonitis, hole in the heart, varicose veins, mild brain damage from high-impact running (yes, really), high cholesterol etc. etc.

But there are plenty of slightly overweight people who have perfect blood pressure, cholesterol and are aerobically very able, to put it mildly. Carrying the extra weight is an extra burden that affects performance, but this is not the same things as ability to do work - indeed, their CV function is often better than lighter people, they just have to carry more around.

I don't think there are many people that have genuine metabolism problems, but there are certainly variations. What IS very variable, is appetite, and modern research has shown that for a LOT of people, this is what the problem really is.

And it's no good saying, 'well, just don't eat as much' because you might as well say to a 15-year old heterosexual boy 'don't think of girls so much' - it ain't gonna happen.

I've been in great shape and I've been in the frame of mind of the OP in the past - but until you've been there, done that, you can have no idea how difficult it really is for some people, by the time you add the burdens on time of family, job, then throw in a few injuries and lots of stress and the oh-so-simple job of fitting in 40 minutes workout, 5 days a week and cooking something healthy instead of something fast, actually becomes surprisingly difficult to find the willpower for.

It's a problem, and everyone has a share in the responsibility of it - but given that SO many people have a problem with it, is it REALLY just a simple case of individual responsibility, or is it that combined with the need for a fundamental change in culture?
 
Joebar4000 said:
There's an enormous difference between being FIT and being HEALTHY.

Many, MANY top athletes have horrific HEALTH problems - high blood pressure, arthritis, tendonitis, hole in the heart, varicose veins, mild brain damage from high-impact running (yes, really), high cholesterol etc. etc.

But there are plenty of slightly overweight people who have perfect blood pressure, cholesterol and are aerobically very able, to put it mildly. Carrying the extra weight is an extra burden that affects performance, but this is not the same things as ability to do work - indeed, their CV function is often better than lighter people, they just have to carry more around.

I don't think there are many people that have genuine metabolism problems, but there are certainly variations. What IS very variable, is appetite, and modern research has shown that for a LOT of people, this is what the problem really is.

And it's no good saying, 'well, just don't eat as much' because you might as well say to a 15-year old heterosexual boy 'don't think of girls so much' - it ain't gonna happen.

I've been in great shape and I've been in the frame of mind of the OP in the past - but until you've been there, done that, you can have no idea how difficult it really is for some people, by the time you add the burdens on time of family, job, then throw in a few injuries and lots of stress and the oh-so-simple job of fitting in 40 minutes workout, 5 days a week and cooking something healthy instead of something fast, actually becomes surprisingly difficult to find the willpower for.

It's a problem, and everyone has a share in the responsibility of it - but given that SO many people have a problem with it, is it REALLY just a simple case of individual responsibility, or is it that combined with the need for a fundamental change in culture?
Click to expand...

Excellent post, Joebar. All true what you say. I agree particularly with the last paragraph, which echoes a point I made in my very long post.

I wish that people would be a bit more understanding of the complexity of this issue. Then again, I wish a lot of things.
 
i think ive been there....i was extremely fat and my parents jsut said it was genetics....its hard for me to stay model lean and for most of the year i dont....endomorph, ectomorph bla bla....i went from one extreme to the other and am now at a place i like but i have to work hard at it. Once real life starts i know i cant keep this shape and will jsut be thin and lean....40 minutes is doable...
run outside your house for 20 minutes. cook up some chicken breasts and whole wheat bread in 20 minutes. I understand alittle about stress..Ive had 18 units while working 30 hours/ week for a few months...lost alot of stregnth and size but still managed to get my cardio in and keep the diet clean.
 
i think the first step in all of this is buying a good helath book.....one that i recomendis (dont laugh) The Bodysculpting Bible for Men/ Women. Read it and try do it. Youll see how little time it really takes....being bodybuilder big or hollywood sexgoddess gorgeous is a full time job that I expect of no one...but eating right and running a bit everyday is something that everyone can do
 
kickstand said:
i think the first step in all of this is buying a good helath book.....one that i recomendis (dont laugh) The Bodysculpting Bible for Men/ Women. Read it and try do it. Youll see how little time it really takes....being bodybuilder big or hollywood sexgoddess gorgeous is a full time job that I expect of no one...but eating right and running a bit everyday is something that everyone can do
Click to expand...

I agree with you 100%, really, I do.

It's a vicious circle that runs both ways - if you eat too much, you don't feel like working out, you feel blah, you eat more, you get fat etc. etc ad nauseum.

If you start working out and eating right, you feel more energetic, therefore you feel like working out more, etc. etc.

Unfortunately, the modern lifestyle makes it far easier for healthy habits to be interupted than unhealthy ones.

I think the health problem is a potential future enormous burden - what happens when the current overfed/underexercised generation starts dropping down dead from heart attacks at age 40? Where will senior management skills come from if there simply aren't that many senior people around?

That's an oversimplification, but the health costs from what is happening now are potentially a far larger burden than the next generation along will be able to support - we're already running into spiralling health care costs.

I agree with you in principle, really I do - but berating people to 'just do it' understates how interwoven with the Western lifestyle eating to excess and lack of exercise have become - it goes beyond personal responsibility into a fundamental change in attitudes that the populace as a whole must get on board with - work to live, not the other way round, and eat to live not just for fun.

How to do this I dunno. I was hoping (despite my other misgivings about him) that Arnie was going to galvanize things a bit - bring back decent PE in schools, have decent dietary education etc. etc. but my guess is the lobbyists from the food industry and the lawyers beat down any idealistic notions he had about getting at least California's teenagers into healthy habits.
 
Re: Re: Why are you so fat?

Valgar said:
Surprisingly, I find this oddly comforting.
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I find this VERY comforting. I would hate to have someone with this mentality after me...:barf
 
I smoke like a chimney, drink like a fish, and eat like a pig and can't gain weight to save my life.

I eat at least 3 meals a day and usually 4 and snack all day long, my lifestyle is somewhat active and that's the only thing that explains why I'm not 300+ lbs

On a related topic, I hang out at Rock Bottom a couple times a week out on the patio which has a couple handicapped parking spaces, almost every time I sit there I see fat people with handicap placards on their cars and they seem to able to walk just fine and it appears the only reason for the placards is because they're fat. This pisses me off to no end :mad
 
I just asked my wife if I needed to lose a couple of pounds.

She wanted to know why I was asking, so I told her about this thread.

She told me no and took a picture for me to post.

I think she's right. I mean, for an ex-supermodel, I'm still pretty hot.



























grumpy_nappy.jpg
 
This is a phenomenon that I discuss with the wife all the time... She is constantly (though respectfully) comparing European women to American women (she's leaving the men out of it)

European cuisine is LOADED with creme's and fatty sauces and loads of things to "bulk up" on and her simple answer is that European women eat fattier foods, but seem to eat much less quantity opting for what she calls the flavor quality.

Not that European women have any more will power than their American counterparts she's also toyed around with the idea than much of it is also cultural as in the interaction of men and women and the value that each places on the "perception" of the other sex.

Women in the US are far more independent (in general) with many more avenues for not only social, but monetary advancement. She thinks this is a double edged sword if you believe that body weight is a critical issue because the same sort of flexibility and opportunity to excel individually also fosters a feeling of "who cares what you think I look like" in a measure that far outstrips European women.

Both my wife and her Sister are very slender, as are almost every one of their European Friends... It seems as though the accepted method is to start putting on weight in the very advanced years... But she also observes that her female friends are far more tied to their husbands/boyfriends attitudes of how women "should" look then anything she has seen in the States.

Before one tries to put one group in front of the other, they need to also carefully measure the underlying reasons for the differences... One may call the tendency toward being overweight for women in the US as an "ugly" component, but should also realize that there is a very dark side to European attitudes and perceptions about "beauty" and the underpinnings of repression that they spawn that many European women would love to be free of...

I'm not sure if its true, but many "skinny" European women (according to my wife) envy the independence and "moxie" of American women to be able to choose so freely about what they look like and still have every advantage to excel... The tendency in Europe is to have a much more ironclad connection between a woman's "success" and how they look... Oddly enough, very much like there is a connection to advanced business success in the US and your ability to play golf...

I hope I paraphrased her thoughts correctly...

Feanor
 
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Jakemate said:
I just asked my wife if I needed to lose a couple of pounds.

She wanted to know why I was asking, so I told her about this thread.

She told me no and took a picture for me to post.

I think she's right. I mean, for an ex-supermodel, I'm still pretty hot.

grumpy_nappy.jpg
Click to expand...

does anybody else think that this guy looks vaguely like Lizard, facially :confused :laughing



:later
 
VTRweasel said:
I smoke like a chimney, drink like a fish, and eat like a pig and can't gain weight to save my life.

I eat at least 3 meals a day and usually 4 and snack all day long, my lifestyle is somewhat active and that's the only thing that explains why I'm not 300+ lbs

On a related topic, I hang out at Rock Bottom a couple times a week out on the patio which has a couple handicapped parking spaces, almost every time I sit there I see fat people with handicap placards on their cars and they seem to able to walk just fine and it appears the only reason for the placards is because they're fat. This pisses me off to no end :mad
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Careful not to jump to conclusions. These people could very well have a medical condition that's left them disabled, and have become fat as a result.

This happened to a good friend of mine. She hurt her knee very badly in a fall, and couldn't walk for six months, and still can only hobble with a cane. She gained weight as a result, but her handicapped sticker/status is NOT because she's fat.
 
Janna said:
Careful not to jump to conclusions. These people could very well have a medical condition that's left them disabled, and have become fat as a result.

This happened to a good friend of mine. She hurt her knee very badly in a fall, and couldn't walk for six months, and still can only hobble with a cane. She gained weight as a result, but her handicapped sticker/status is NOT because she's fat.
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A lot folks have thyroid problems and other health issues related to meds and surgery.

My Mom gained about 75 lbs in a 4 month period. The doctor said she was depressed because of a recent death in the family. Wrote her a script for prozac or something. She wouldn't take them, went to two other doctors. What was really wrong with her = Thyroid problem. Wasn't functioning. Doc put her on Synthroid. Problem solved.
 
Re: Re: Why are you so fat?

Janna said:
Everywhere I look, I see people who can't write. You people can't spell for shite. It's unpleasant for the rest of us, and I don't want to read what you write and post. Don't you know how to write proper English, or do you just not care? Just get the Bedford Handbook and The Elements of Style.

It's not even that hard. I took a few classes, doublechecked words I was unsure how to spell, and basically just paid a little attention. Don't worry about getting geeky... just drop some of the grammar mistakes and tone up your spelling and punctuation a bit. It's so important to improve your mind, and then your writing will look so pretty, and people will think you're intelligent, and offer you better jobs so you can buy yourself things.
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You rock Janna. I just may copy and paste bits of your wisdom in replies to random MySpace messages I get, like:

WHATSUP GRRL UR HELLA PRETTY HIT ME BCAK LETS TALK SOMETIME, MAYBE HOOK UP FOR A DRINK OR 2, LATA

How can I not fall for such poetry?
 
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