Can we have a sensible discussion about obesity without shaming?

[BalloonCityBaseline]

I started another thread which got my thinking; why is it impossible to start any discussion about obesity without someone bringing 'will power' and 'personal choice' into it?
I always find on MN there is sympathy for those with addictions, people in poverty, people who stay in shitty relationships but there is no sympathy for those who struggle with their weight. For one, weight gain is seen as a personal struggle (you made yourself fat) rather than thought of as society's struggle (what can we do to address this and help people?)
Let's not forget that every country in the Western world is having an obesity crisis right now, yes even the Scandinavian countries and the skinny French. Also not one country has successfully managed to reduce their levels of obesity? Why?
The number one reason that we have put on weight has to be the shift to processed food and how available and cheap it is. God it's cheap! Easter eggs are now 75p in Tesco, the other day I saw a row of school kids all walking down the road munching a whole Easter egg each. But what's the alternative? That 75p would buy you absolutely nothing in the fancy health food shop across the road, and six of them would have to club together to buy one punnet of blueberries in the same Tesco so what choices do young people have?
Fat shaming just does not work. The number one reason kids are bullied in this country is because of their weight, with girls being likely to be bullied for being overweight more than any other factor. Do these kids lose weight when the bullies scream at them day after day? No, they often self harm and some end up depressed adults who take that shame with them for the rest of their lives.
As someone who has lost weight recently for the first time in their adult life I feel it coincided with a time in my life when I felt happy, busy, fulfilled, motivated and in control, which felt like the first time in my whole life. When I speak to others on the same journey they tell similar tales. The whole 'I couldn't fit into an airplane seat and everybody laughed' Take a Break narrative just doesn't ring true for so many people I know. Happiness and acceptance is much more likely to put someone in a mindset where they can change their eating habits and take control.

I'd be happy to hear other thoughts.

Cheese and carbs for life in my home🙈
I always make sure to work some into my day. Even if it's just a bit. Actually got used to the portions now and realised that it's survivable. But ouch tho.

I am obese because I have Binge Eating Disorder.
There is no eating disorders help available where I live.
I binge on healthy foods.
I exercise daily.

Also I never eat pizza or pasta...

Maybe that's what it should be or maybe it's food companies choosing to feature very small portions to minimise the calorie content.

It's exactly that. And also there's the traffic light counts on the front of the pack, where depending on what proportion of a daily recommended allowance one portion is - so fat, sugar etc. are represented by green, amber or red. By making the 'portions' they recommend so much smaller, they can have the traffic lights per portion at green with maybe one or two amber. If their portions were more representative of how much people actually eat, most of them would be red.

There's only one ready meal we eat regularly, and it's actually quite a healthy one, but DP and I polish off one between us and don't feel at all stuffed, whereas the pack says it serves 4, which wouldn't be much more than a mucky plate each.

Part of the problem with the conversation about obesity is the refusal to accept that not all obese people are lazy and greedy or can't cook.

Just using me as an example. I'm 5ft and weigh 13 stone 9 lbs. This places me at 37 BMI. According to all the online calculators under the sun I need around 1700 calories just to survive if I'm sedentary (which I'm not).

In reality I live on between 1000/1200 carefully measured home cooked food across 2 meals a day, never eating later than 7pm.

I run 3 times a week (I can overtake walking people for the sneering folk), on the days I don't run I walk a fast pace 5k a day.

Yet I'm lucky if I lose 1lb in a month.

If I eat more than 1200 calories I gain weight.

I'm a size 16 same as my mother...but I'm 2 stone heavier than her.

Nobody ever believes me, I'm either in denial, lying or massively under counting my calories (I weigh and measure everything).

I know that by making healthy food options and exercising regularly I'm doing right by my body but being labelled as "obese" and everything that's associated with that just makes me want to reach for the pizza. The shame and blame needs to be removed from the obesity conversation, the shift absolutely needs to be about making better choices for your body and removing the focus on BMI and the labels that come with it.

Fortunately I've had my "epiphany" that I just need to accept my life needs to look like this. Hopefully one day I'll only be overweight but I wouldn't bet money on it even if I continue like this forever. Until then I get to endure the sideways glances a best from medical professionals or outright assertions that I'm a sub human who is just lazy, greedy and selfish for being obese.

RunHobbit - have a look at the BBC's calculator to establish how many calories you need to maintain. At your weight and height you need about 1700 to maintain, so eating fewer than that should result in a loss, that's just physics. If you're eating far fewer and still gaining, is it possibly an underlying medical condition?

@RunHobbitRun

Part of the problem with the conversation about obesity is the refusal to accept that not all obese people are lazy and greedy or can't cook.

Just using me as an example. I'm 5ft and weigh 13 stone 9 lbs. This places me at 37 BMI. According to all the online calculators under the sun I need around 1700 calories just to survive if I'm sedentary (which I'm not).

In reality I live on between 1000/1200 carefully measured home cooked food across 2 meals a day, never eating later than 7pm.

I run 3 times a week (I can overtake walking people for the sneering folk), on the days I don't run I walk a fast pace 5k a day.

Yet I'm lucky if I lose 1lb in a month.

If I eat more than 1200 calories I gain weight.

I'm a size 16 same as my mother...but I'm 2 stone heavier than her.

Nobody ever believes me, I'm either in denial, lying or massively under counting my calories (I weigh and measure everything).

I know that by making healthy food options and exercising regularly I'm doing right by my body but being labelled as "obese" and everything that's associated with that just makes me want to reach for the pizza. The shame and blame needs to be removed from the obesity conversation, the shift absolutely needs to be about making better choices for your body and removing the focus on BMI and the labels that come with it.

Fortunately I've had my "epiphany" that I just need to accept my life needs to look like this. Hopefully one day I'll only be overweight but I wouldn't bet money on it even if I continue like this forever. Until then I get to endure the sideways glances a best from medical professionals or outright assertions that I'm a sub human who is just lazy, greedy and selfish for being obese.

I'm not saying I don't believe you, but as the previous poster said, something's not right. There is no way you shouldn't be losing weight on 1000 to 1200 calories a day.

@NoIDontWatchLoveIsland

Plenty of parents with big jobs who manage it.

The ones I know who do place time with their children at a lower priority to exercise/physique.

I can't/won't do that. I competed for my university in two sports, love swimming and cycling and did mainly sport based holidays for 10 years before having children, I really do wish I could do more but my children's needs come first. I'm not strapping my toddler inactive into a pram so that i can go running, we walk together so that she gets the exercise she needs. Yes it's not the workout I need to be thinner than I am but it's more important to me that she grows up fit and healthy not a fat kid strapped into a buggy so that mummy can do a pram workout.

Diet is more important.

This is one of the most bizarre excuses for not exercising I have ever heard. Your DC is not going to be " a fat kid strapped into a buggy" nice attitude Just because you did a run a couple of times a week with a jogging buggy ?

Moonlightflitwick I read Binge eater as Bingo eater

I'm the same as RunHobbitRun and I can prove that it's true

I ate 1500 calories a day for 2 years - ended the 2 years at about half a stone less than the beginning- excruciatingly slow weight loss

As you can imagine I was hungry almost always

I did aqua aerobics 3 times a week (I have conditions that counts me out of almost exercise)

My very sympathetic surgeon WHO BELIEVED ME said he'd met loads like me who didn't overeat (he gave loads of reasons for it) - and referred me for surgery

I had a sleeve gastrectomy 6 months ago

I now eat 800-1100 calories a day

I am NEVER hungry (it's so amazing )

I am losing one pound a week every week (yay! )

That's 500 calories a day deficit times 7 days = 3500 calories - which equals one pound of weight loss

I had my follow up and he said very simply:

"We just proved you were right" 🤷‍♀️

If you are menopausal, pretty sedentary, can't really exercise then eating more than 1500 calories is going to likely make you put on weight

And it's REALLY FUCKING HARD to be hungry all the time - I think I cried with hunger, frustration and rage a hundred times in those two years

So of course people are going to be overweight

I do agree it's a very complex issue often simplified.

I do think genetics play a part, I'm currently reading Andrew Jenkinsons Why We Eat Too Much. It's really interesting.

I've been underweight, normal weight and very overweight. I definitley feel that after I had my children I couldn't get away with eating the rubbish foods I used to. That's why I never assume slim is automatically healthy. I ate rubbish and was still slim.

For me personally it's a combination of emotional eating, using food as a reward or a guilty pleasure, I sort of get a sugar high.

I am also an advertisers dream. I won't have any intention of buying say an Easter egg but if they put it at the front of the shop with an offer price on it I will probably pick it up!

I don't think we realise sometimes just how much gets sold to us subconsciously.

Fat shaming doesn't work IMO. People know they are fat. People know that there are increased health risks.

It has to be an approach that covers multiple aspects.

And like @LaurieFairyCake I am also having a sleeve gastrectomy after years of yoyo dieting. I cannot wait.

Eerrrr because will power and personal choice are the only things that will stop you becoming obese.

@chocolateorangeinhaler err have you read any scientific research recently. Calories in Vs calories out is vastly being seen as not accurate.

This is one of the most bizarre excuses for not exercising I have ever heard.
Your DC is not going to be " a fat kid strapped into a buggy" nice attitude
Just because you did a run a couple of times a week with a jogging buggy ?
grin
Templetrees

As I said I already run 3 times a week and work full time. I'm explaining why I really can't fit in more.

Calories in Vs calories out is vastly being seen as not accurate.

Well not for everyone... That's the problem with this topic, isn't it

Some people have an eating disorder, whether that being eating too little or too much and these people need help and psychological services via the NHS to address this.

However, if you take out the above people, there are a heck load of people who just eat too much crap and don't do any exercise, and do not take any responsibility for their own health. Coronavirus made me see that my health is actually my own responsibility and I cannot rely on the NHS to bail me out, I have to help myself. I can't avoid some diseases and illnesses, but I can avoid diabetes type II and some others, which was where I was heading. DH and I were both 2 stone overweight and had lost all our fitness from our 30's. During this latest lockdown, we have both lost 1 stone and a bit each and worked out 5 times a week, and made adjustments to our diet. We are in a much better place than we were 3 months ago.

Calories in Vs calories out is vastly being seen as not accurate.

That is true, after all there's close to 5000 calories in a pint of petrol but no matter how much you drink, it won't make you fat.

harvardmagazine.com/2016/05/are-all-calories-equal

That 75p would buy you absolutely nothing in the fancy health food shop across the road, and six of them would have to club together to buy one punnet of blueberries in the same Tesco so what choices do young people have?

Sorry OP, but I don't believe for a second that these teenagers have no choices other than eating a whole Easter egg. Defeatist statements like this isn't doing anyone any favours. What about a handful of nuts, a chunk of cheese, a yoghurt? Probably not things your average teenager would choose over chocolate, but they're still making a choice. Same as most people do with respect to what they eat.

I agree that for complex reasons it may be easier for some to resist the chocolate and make a better choice, but it's still a choice.

How much chocolate is in a 75p Easter egg? I doubt it’s going to be a massive deal on the background of a generally good diet.

@PurpleDaisies

How much chocolate is in a 75p Easter egg? I doubt it’s going to be a massive deal on the background of a generally good diet.

It's predominantly palm oil for that price

It’s a tough one, you have those who have emotional issues that eat to comfort, it never gives hugs tho.
Those who are nutrientionally ignorant and calorie unaware, a few with n’édictons conditions, and side effects of meds.
We tend to supersize portions too wrongly.
I was obese in menopause over ate trying to give myself energy ( was 12st 6, at 50, now 10st 8 at 58, was 10st 5 at lowest and 5’4)

Found it. 30-40 g. These are the size of a creme egg

pictish

Your story is very inspirational x

I'm not sure it's the prices of the foods but agree with the sentiments... whether people are obese or anorexic it doesn't take much to show some empathy.

@rawlikesushi

A GP friend told me that her overweight patients are appalled by the idea of being hungry. When she tells them that it is normal to feel 'pleasantly hungry' in the run up to a meal, she feels it is often something that they've never considered. I wonder whether this is a pattern started in childhood, where a child saying they feel hungry is immediately fed.

Very good point.