to wonder about obesity

[crashingwaves]

Please, please, PLEASE don't think that this is a fat-bashing thread, I hate it when people do that and I'd never ever do it myself.

The thing is, I love food, I do like nice food and I do overeat on occasions. My BMI is 'overweight' - I could do with shifting a stone - I'm most definitely not a size 8 smuggie person.

What I'm wondering about isn't even people a fair bit bigger than me. But really, really large people (I'm thinking around the 20 stone + region) Isn't it quite, well, difficult in a way to maintain and gain weight at that size, as you really would have to be eating an awful lot (unless a medical reason, I realise things like PCOS can contribute.)

I suppose I was wondering as my friend has a friend who is only 21 and weighs 18 and a half stone - to be honest I think she is in denial a little bit as she says things like "Oh I know I don't look this big" when to be honest she does - I understand that - but given that at that size it is fairly easy to make small changes and still lose weight, I guess I just wonder why people don't. That did sound quite bitchy and judgemental and I'm honestly trying hard to avoid that.

I can totally see how people get big, I've "been there" myself but I guess what I mean was when the scales hit 13 stone I thought "f*ck!" and went on a diet - surely if the scales hit 20 stone you would ...?

I probably deserve a flaming - can I just say mega apologies if I DO offend you as I honestly don't want to do that!

guys/girls:

it's all about want and changing habits.
LIKE op said 20 stone + you have to eat a lot of calories to maintaining this weight.
So start cutting down. It takes about 2-3 weeks to embrace a new habit. Do it one step at a time.

1. Drop the booz. Shock horror for most people in the UK now. How can they live without their self medication. If you are drinking often/daily it's simply too many dead calories. At the very least cut right down. Limit to one/teo nights a week (moderation as well) then go down to 1 a week, then 1 every 2 weeks. IF oyu can't go tee total. Can't do that...you may have bigger problems than being obese. (functional alcoholic?)
2. So now, cut out snacking. 3 meals a day. 20 minute window..that's it! NOT a thing in between meals. Forget all this marketing BS about healthy snacks. Drop them. No need for them. Lose the amount you eat. Can add upto 600+ calories or a lot more each day.
3. Now the weight is dropping off you like a stone and people are commenting how much better you look. IF not, you are simply not following steps 1 and 2. So either go back and follow 1 and 2 or give up.
4. now step 3. Go to 2 meals a day. 2 meals a day, no snacking, no booze. You will not be overweight for long.

Exercise: it's minimal. Good for heat health and the icing on the cake but it's actually not necessary. I see so many fat over weight people in the gym, jogging, playing tennis. They think "If i exercise it gives me the right to eat 4 ice creamed buns for a snack and a celebration beer or 4.
You cannot burn off a bad diet.

3,500 per 1lb of fat. True..but it is not linear. As a person gains weight their resting Met goes from say 1,900 calories a day to 2,100. A 20 stone person probably has a resting met. of about 2,600 cal's. i.e if they went done to 2,000 cal's they would drop a ton of weight fast. But as your weight goes down so does you resting MET. Nice problem to have.

You cannot. simply cannot get overweight without putting in the extra calories. Many reasons people do this but it's a fact. Cut the calories..drop the weight.

Good luck.

On this note. Obesity has become so common in the UK it's frightening.
I was having a meal in the pub last night (no booze/sweets..healthy sunday dinner) and what struck me was the amount of obese people in there. I'll bet 30%+ were morbidly obese. With another 40% very overweight.
What has happened to us as a nation? Why is it so acceptable now? I look at old programmes from say pre 1970 and notice how much leaner/thinner people looked then.
Something has gone wrong at an educational level in regards to nutrition. Are children taught about basic nutrition at school? How much they should be eating, proteins, fats and carbs? (talking basics here not pro. levels)
We used to take the * out of the USA for being so fat...i'd say we have caught them up! We need to wake up.

Obese zombie alert!!

ZOMBIE attention-seeker...