To think that people pretend not to understand obesity

There's a saying "you can't outrun a bad diet"

I run regularly (4-5 times/week) I eat chocolate even more regularly (every day)
I think its predominantly luck rather than running that allows me to do that and remain a healthy weight

Oh my God. How ignorant are you that you think overweight people eat high sugar high fat food?!
Such an almighty judgement.
I'm 3 stone overweight. That makes me obese.
I do not eat high sugar high fat food.
Here's what I ate yesterday:
Breakfast - nothing
Mid morning - nothing
Lunch - nothing
3pm - 2 slices wholemeal seeded bread with 2 boiled eggs
7pm - chicken breast, harissa paste, brown rice, long stemmed broccoli
Drinks - 3 mugs of tea with soya milk + 8 glasses of water
That's it.
This is how I eat every day.
But I'm still 3 stone overweight.
My back is still covered in rolls of fat.
The back of my neck is still covered in a thick layer of fat.
I still have fat that I can grab hold of in my armpits.
I still have an apron of abdominal fat.
Yet I know mumsnet will be filled with people refusing to believe I eat this much if I'm 3 stone overweight.
People who aren't obese have no idea of the miserable reality we are living with.

That isn’t what I’m saying!!!! They aren’t just fatties at all, I honestly believe a lot of people who are obese and try to lose weight and struggle to lose weight (medical conditions aside) have other issues similar to addiction, but with food. I obviously didn’t make my point very well.
My point being I hate losing weight I find it so difficult but I force myself to diet and I trudge through, sometimes well and sometimes not so well. The OP asked it obese people try hard enough, well if they cut calories and exercised they would lose weight. So if they struggle cutting calories and are drawn back to food I believe it is more related to addiction. I think this is something that needs to be dealt with ok order it help the obesity epidemic.
hopefully I have made my point better now.

Do you qualify? If so, go for it!

UPFs are a massive issue. They make cheap junk food addictive. The more UPF people eat the more they want. In my area it’s very clear the socio economic divide. People craving food resorting to all sorts to no avail

With respect, it is easier to maintain a healthy body weight/ bmi when you are fit and healthy. I respect your reply and I think everyone would agree here that avoiding the ultra processed foods is a good move and will certainly help you stay healthy in the long term, along with the exercise.

Battling conditions that sweep in and change your body and brain chemistry (without any warning, or asking permission or anything! 😭) and dumps you into fat storage mode you cannot control or switch off is brutal. Same as @PinkArt (pretty sure it was you Pink, further up thread) I also had to have my gallbladder removed and think this was another spring board to more gains and another barrier to weight loss. All the things I did to lose weight before just didn’t work any more. It did nothing, even with strict concerted effort and discipline. It. just. would. not. shift 😞

I feel like the healthy size 10/12, happy energetic lady I used to be, who enjoyed cooking and experimenting with dishes/ different healthy recipes from scratch and getting out, running, cycling, gym classes etc was abducted 5 years ago. She was bound, gagged, blindfolded and dumped off a bridge. She’s dead. I was body swapped into a body of disease. It has stripped my life to the marrow. Even the weight gain and inability to lose it is nothing compared to the pain levels, loss of mobility, cognitive function and my happy mind being swapped for a clinically depressed brain that is struggling to cope and pushed me close to suicide. I am on multiple medications everyday and frankly, I am scared. I do not want to die, I love my kids, I want to stay but the depression gets so bad it is frightening and I cannot find my way out. Got so close to giving up I couldn’t live with the pain. I am in a better place now, but it’s still there, like a poison I can’t flush out. I am hoping hoping there is still a way to a healthier and less pain ridden life, weight loss would be great and I have hope that may come but if not I still have to find a way to reclaim any health I can. Sorry that is probably an over share, I am hopeful things will get better but this has been the hardest thing I’ve ever been through.

The more posts l read like this, the more l want to try mounjaro.
Was out with a friend today who weighs 8 stone - telling me her mother in law is on WLI and she just doesn't get why she doesn't just eat less and move more.
How would someone who weighs 8 stone even begin to understand

People who exercise are more likely to eat better than people who don't. Exercising boosts your mood and reduces stress which helps a lot when it comes to making good food choices. I used to eat when sad or eat when stressed, now I run. It works better for my mood and is obviously better for my weight. I used to pig out a bit in the evenings now I make time for some mat pilates or joint stabiliity exercises, I never feel the need to eat afterwards. So for me I definitely don't feel that it is a myth, moving more isn't just about calories burnt it's the choices that moving more leads to.

A study was done a couple of years ago to test this theory about calorie usage. Two groups of people were fed the same diet. One group was sedentary, the other very physically active (miners I think). Over the space of a given amount of time they were monitored and there was no difference in weight at all. So the mantra of 'move more' is a bit of a myth. Each pound of fat is the equivalent of 3,900Kcals, which would be a significant calorie deficit on a day to day basis

You totally missed my point. I’m not being rude, it’s called honesty. I don’t find it easy at all, I didn’t say it is easy anywhere in my post. It is extremely difficult, I find it very dfficult. But I do it, as hard as I find it, so I don’t become obese. The whole point of a weight loss industry is it makes money by helping people lose weight, don’t patronise me!
as I’ve said I understand food is an addiction for some people which is a different thing entirely, all the weight loss programmes in the world won’t help unless it tackles the addiction.

I’m only 5ft2 with a slim build. I do not eat most ultra processed foods, supermarket bread, cakes, pastries, pasta and potatoes 95% of the time. I do eat rice, homemade bread, dark chocolate and lots of fruit, veg, pulses, eggs, meat and fish. If I ate like most people I would put on a lot of weight which is easy given my height, and I really don’t want to as I do a lot of running and I want to keep as fit as possible as I head into my 50s and further into menopause.

I weigh myself most days to keep within a kg or two of my goal weight. It sounds miserable and restrictive but it’s not for me, it’s my way of life! I don’t know if I’m able to do this because I don’t eat a lot of ultra processed foods, or because I don’t get food noise, or because I have no conditions that may affect weight gain.

@Lollipop81 You realise saying 'no disrespect' and then saying something really disrespectful and rude, and wrong, doesn't magically change what you've said to something respectful, or correct, yeah?

If weight loss were as easy as you seem to think (ie, as simple a matter as it is for you), we'd all have done it, there'd be no weight loss industry, no billions of pounds spent on developing medications to treat a variety of related issues...

So just maybe.. its not actually as easy as you think. Has that crossed your mind?

I met an obese woman on a holiday with 2 other women friends. This obese woman ate constantly and had packs of M&Ms and Skittles in her handbag which she said she needed because her blood sugar might dip too low. She wasn’t diabetic. She clearly overate. Similarly, I worked with a woman who would eat sweet from her handbag all day long.

Maybe obese people haven’t had healthy eating modelled to them, or don’t understand the concept of a calorie deficit? Eating sweets all day would blow any diet out of the water.

Also, plenty of thin people like chocolates and desserts too, they just don’t eat them because they don’t want to gain weight. It’s self discipline.

The pharmaceutical companies were already doing very well from the consequences of the failed narratives about obesity. It's a win win situation for them. They've long done very well out of humans being a species who evolved in scarcity and for whom the tendency to become obese easily has been an advantage until very recently.

No disrespect but people who are obese obviously don’t try hard enough as they wouldn’t be obese.

'No disrespect, but... You're all just shit and lazy and stupid. I can manage it so why can't you useless fatties.'

No disrespect but people who are obese obviously don’t try hard enough as they wouldn’t be obese. My weight is within the normal BMI category but does go up and down. I have to work really hard to make sure it doesn’t go too high and to lose weight. It isn’t easy I know.
Having said that I do think some people are food addicts, and need work on the mind as other addicts do.
Good luck with your weight loss, hope it goes well.

Correct about the food industry. Once you know this though, I find it quite easy to make decent choices. But you need to be aware of this first and understand what that really means and what consuming healthy food really is. It’s so warped in the UK with the supermarkets/branding/packaging/advertising.

Good luck op!

i started in January and it’s the best thing I’ve done for myself in years

Getting half way through a meal and actually feeling full was such a crazy experience people who know what it’s like to feel full and stop eating won’t understand this always on empty setting

ps I have always cooked from scratch and avoid alcohol and junk I stick well within the recommended calories for my height and age - for me it’s totally hormonal my diet hasn’t changed just less of it and now I stop eating by 7pm with no anxiety or urges TOATAL GAME CHANGER!!!

go for it!

I hope the people on these weight loss drugs get to stay on them for life because honestly they seem to have no idea about the reality for most people who stay slim. The idea that it is just lucky and they just got unlucky by being fat.

It's so disempowering the idea that for the most part we don't have control over our bodies. I am saying this as someone who has a chronic illness that was bad luck. I can still work within the cards that I was dealt to keep as healthy as I can. Of course it can be really bloody hard. I hate doing mobility exercises everyday just to have a body that still functions below most but I crack on. I hate that it makes running so difficult and that others who have put far less effort than me into it can perform better but I still crack on. We aren't all on a level playing field but most people do have it in their power to make changes for the better and to take some control over their health without needing to pay for expensive medication. It's pretty handy for the pharmaceutical companies that this narrative that people are helpless to control their own weight has come about at the same time as these wl drugs.

I’m obese and as a child my dad used to tell me my only problem was weak arms. As in they were too weak to push myself away from the table. He was a bugger. But he possibly has a point. I just bloody love eating. It’s my favourite thing to do. It just is.

Lots of people have no idea if they do have a health condition though. I still don't know for sure if I do other than using logic and Dr Google. Insulin resistance would explain my weight gain and why I've responded well to mounjaro but I don't know for sure. And until the last year I'd never even heard of insulin resistance, to know if it might be the issue.
What to do know what that no matter what I did 'right', nothing was working and my weight kept moving in the wrong direction. There will be many, many people in that position. Neither of us have any idea how many people are just lazy fatties who don't know carrots are good for them and how many people have all sorts of low level but potentially very fucky health stuff going on.

Ok, I should have said “no one without underlying health conditions can gain wait by eating the right amount of the right food”. I should have guessed that the tiny minority that this applies to would jump on my post. You just realise that you are in the minority though? The obesity epidemic isn’t because millions of people have suddenly developed insulin resistance or the handful of other extremely rare physiological reasons for weight gain.

I’ve been taking Mounjaro since July and I love it. It has changed my life, mainly because I am not obsessed 24/7 with thinking about food. I never realised how much time I spent craving it - it dominated my day & I craved restaurant standard food all the time. The mental peace alone & feeling normal about food is worth gold. For context, I was suffering with a form of arthritis that left most of my body, particularly hands in agony all day. Just getting in & out of bed was painful, so cooking was out of the question & so was any form of exercise. This was due to an autoimmune disease. On top of that I was very close to becoming diabetic, so I went on it to avoid that, as it would only make my other health condition worse. I was reluctant to take it at first, but it’s the best thing I’ve done

It can work both ways though- I’ve yo yoed between size 10 to 20 from the age of 14. I’ve had very disordered eating habits and a completely fucked up attitude to food. I’m obsessed with my size, weight and food for three decades (I’m mid 40s). It’s mental torture. But because I’ve managed to stay between a size 10-14 for the past few years, people on these very boards tell people like me that what we go through isn’t so bad and we don’t understand what it’s like to struggle, because we’re not “obese”. A bit of understanding could go both ways.

This is why even though I have managed to get my weight down to a healthy BMI (without WLI), I still see myself as a fat person disguised as a normal weight person , and as far as I am concerned I always will be.
People tell me that I should be proud of myself, but I think that is dangerous as it will make me complacent. It sounds weird, but the sense of shame for having once let myself get to that state is what keeps me on the straight and narrow.
I have done it by breaking the link between food and pleasure, so I only eat very plain, bland foods. I know that if I were to eat one thing that I actively enjoyed rather than feeling meh about, I might not be able to go back to my diet again, and I have worked too hard to let that happen.