to wonder if your loved one was very obese why would you feed them crap

[McHappyPants2012]

i watch alot of programmes about very obese people. They can't move or take care of themselves. So why do the people who are supposed to be looking after them continue to give them foods so high in fats and sugars.

Cogito, of course there is a difference between a child and an adult. How would you like your dp telling you what's good for you?

What do you mean by "dependent" here? Simply that they cannot get food themselves, etc?

I knew a woman that was very very overweight (size 32 or so) and she decided to go on a diet as she wanted to lose weight. She lived at home and her mum filled the fridge with pies and pasties to 'help' her as they had veg in them and were healthy. Neither of them knew about actual healthy eating, they just assumed any veg = healthy not realising that veg encased in pastry = unhealthy.

Same as a boy at school was overweight so his mum used to pack him a slimfast shake in his lunchbox - with his lunch! So he was having effectively two lunches (I suspect he had one with his breakfast as well).

That's really sad Truth.

"Feeders" is an actual term for those people who chose to feed the morbidly obese person in their "care". It is not uncommon for them to also have profound emotional issues.

In a much smaller way, you see this a great deal with people who have hugely fat pets. The say that they over feed them because they "love them so much" and that they can't deny the pet a treat or pleasure. It is a very similar mentality for "feeders". It is rarely a healthy relationship & very often if the morbidly obese person does ever manage to lose sufficient weight to move around again, the relationship breaks down. There has been quite alot of research done on this - but it is difficult to address, because quite often the "feeder" will be the sole carer and it would be a serious care issue if they were removed in the short term.

"How would you like your dp telling you what's good for you?"

If I was morbidly obeses and bedridden, I would hope that a caring partner would be looking out for my welfare & trying to assist in my recovery rather than colluding in keeping me ill.

"What do you mean by "dependent" here? Simply that they cannot get food themselves, etc?"

Being immobilised by a condition which makes someone 100% reliant on others creates dependency, yes. This is matched by the responsibility of the carer not to do harm. If the dependent person's wishes would harm them, I don't think the carer is obliged to accept that.

But if you were a bedridden morbidly obese person you wouldn't be the person that is posting now. So you have no idea how you would react.

'Feeders' is a dreadful term. Designed to dehumanise.

It's all gone a bit mad.
We have stick thin models who have to virtually starve themselves in order to stay the correct size to model clothes for the 'perfect' figure and we also have Miss Big Beautiful Woman pageants which seem to be encouraging obesity. I hate seeing stick thin models. Why can't models just be of an average size 12/14? I don't know anyone who is a size 6. But then I don't think obese beauty pageants should be encouraged either.

I also knew a couple of women who were friends (I lived with one of them) they were both morbidly obese, one had Chrons (?) and lactose issues but would eat a family sized trifle with a pint of custard/cream in one sitting (with predictable results given the health problems) and they would order massive pizzas to eat, or go to a take away and get fried chicken or some such every night.

They were 'feeders' for each other really as they egged each other on, they did try to encourage me to eat more than I needed but as I was already overweight I didn't want to get any bigger (actually lost weight while there as I couldn't eat in quite the same way as previously!)

It was really sad as they were using each other to normalise the amount of food they ate and the size they were, they kept calling me skinny when I was an 18! It was like they had completely lost all sense of what was a reasonable amount of food to eat and what food to eat.

"But if you were a bedridden morbidly obese person you wouldn't be the person that is posting now. So you have no idea how you would react."

I have a very good idea. You don't have to be morbidly obese to have experienced illness and dependency on others. Laid up last year with a serious bout of food-poisoning I might fancy a bacon sandwich but I'd have been horrified if the person supposed to be looking after me had brought anything but water.

No. Not the same at all Cogito.
You were temporarily ill.

My mum is obese (now size 26 but previously her biggest was about size 36.) she has been able to work throughout so feed herself during the day, is capable of driving etc so it is impossible to police what she eats.

She also binges. If there are no cakes or biscuits she will eat a loaf or two of bread (as she did when she stayed for hte weekend and I had carefully not bought any junk food). If there is absolutely nothing else, she will eat fruit and then claim she's been really good because bananas are healthy. 20+ bananas in a day - not so much.

She won't seek help (unless it offers a very quick fix which doesn't change her habits in any way) and the GP says as she can walk, swim a bit and drive it isn't an issue that he needs to deal with.

As she enjoys swimming, my brother and I have entered a triathlon next summer with each of us doing a leg (mum swimming, DB cycling, me running). She has upped her swimming and is very very slowly losing weight but it does seem to be the first time she has managed to stick to anything.

Just noticed an earlier post about anorexics. I don't think they can legally force-feed anorexics without a court judgement, unless the patient has been sectioned.

Force-feeding is a treatment, and most of the time, people can always refuse treatment.

I don't know what the legal status is, regarding giving someone soup instead of cake, but I think it could be dodgy if the carer's a non-household member. If lady A gives her sister a list of what she wants for dinner, and the money to cover it, for example, and the caring sister substitutes everything, if you see what I mean?

Yes, functional people who have learnt healthy coping skills would want that LaQueen. But then those people would hardly get themselves into a situation where they need a gang of builders to take down a side of their house.

That's a great thing you're all doing azazello. She's probably keeping up with it because her kids are doing it with her. Really lovely.

"The obese people I know just eat alot, and eat fairly constantly once it gets past about 4pm." Really 2Rebecca ? All of them?
I have lost 2 and a half stone since Christmas and am still technically ovese according to BMI (starting to get into size 16 clothes now, so don't necessarily look it) and that description has never been true of me. I have always eaten a fairly healthy diet and my portions haven't been huge. What I didn't do was exercise. I do now, and the weight is coming off. It doesn't help discussion like this if people have preconceptions and prejudices.

I got big by eating very big portions of fatty carbs eg chips, pizza, crisps, bread and butter plus sweet snacks like cupcakes and chocolate.
It's the portions that are the real issue though. You forget what a normal portion should be. I don't hate my body, But i need to lose weight for a weight related medical condition but it's up to me to gain or lose. It's MY body!

I can kind of understand how it happens. DM was an alcoholic and towards the end of her life she was frequently in hospital. When she was discharged DF would collect her from hospital, drive her home stopping at a shop on the way to buy her more alcohol. I did ask him once why he did this, it was after DM had nearly died, and he basically told me that he did it for an easy life. If he didn't buy her alcohol she'd be absolutely vicious towards him and he didn't want to deal with all that. Perhaps something similar happens in some of the families of obese people, giving in to the demands for unhealthy foods is easier than standing firm and staying no.

Eh? How do you think they got obese in the first place - from occasional treats?!

I have a medical condition. I store fat beneath my skin. Nobody knows why, it's just an unfortunate, though (thankfully) not life threatening problem. It makes it extremely hard, although not impossible to lose weight. I am certainly struggling with losing the giving up smoking weight I have gained this year.
Please don't make judgements about overweight people unless fully armed with the facts.

Dawndonna, I hope you don't think this rude (I certainly don't intend to be) but we all have fat under our skin (subcutaneous fat). It is there as a 'shock absorber' and also stores energy. We also all have visceral fat which is the fat deeper inside our bodies, around our organs. Of the two types, subcutaneous is easier to 'lose' through exercise as it stores energy.

Perhaps I have misunderstood the way you have explained your condition though.

I haven't seen much judgement on this thread about overweight people; rather about the people who help keep morbidly obese people the way they are.