Why can't we discuss how fat we've all become?

[Nodinnernogift]

Obesity is becoming the norm. Why aren't we allowed express concern or any views that are less than celebratory about this?

I mean seriously why?

If whole parts of your country were in the grip of a meth addiction we would be allowed have a discussion about it.

National campaigns to stop people smoking are applauded.

Look around you. Look in the mirror. We are all getting bigger and bigger. It reminds me of when people would visit the US in the 80s / 90s and come back with tales of huge people and massive portion sizes.

Does nobody care? It's like the Emperors New Clothes. I don't get why it's a sacrosanct topic.

Yabu - it's nobody's business
Yanbu - it's fine to address this as a societal problem

For a few people there are medical or trauma reasons.

but you can’t deny that as a society we’ve got bigger.

the food industry has to take a lot of the blame.

But people, including me, make poor food choices. An obese girl I work with was astonished to be told by the nurse that she needed to stop drinking 8 cans of energy drink a day.

my very intelligent boss was drinking about 3 energy drinks a day and has type 2 diabetes. He’s overweight.

2 other bright people I work with are overweight….but snack on chocs and biscuits all day.

I’m a size 14, lost 2 stone last year by eating less (I was very slim till I hit late 30s) in my 50s, and the GP very clearly told me I still need to lose another stone and a half.

I am fit, but I’m fat.

and it’s all become normalised.

My best friend is like this. Exactly like this. People would always ask her for weight loss tips and she'd look confused. She never worried about it and gave it no headspace

It made me wonder if we all moved into a utopian society where weight was not a topic would unnecessary food and overeating lose all it's allure.

I'm going there...

The link between screen time and being overweight in children. My partner comments quite often 'why are there no children in the park...that's where we were all the time as kids'.

So often I've seen young children on days out at places you'd naturally be active instead plonked down on a screen. It's heartbreaking.

I used to be like this (less so as I’m older) and know a few people who are. People in this situation tend to discuss it with each other and recognise each others habits

frequently the compulsive behaviour is simply directed elsewhere other than food, so they’ll be something else, or a few things, she’s thinking about instead.

its often a form of anxiety- sitting down in one place and just eating the food instead of rushing around doing stuff doesn’t come naturally

so although she’s thin, it’s highly likely she doesn’t have it all worked out. She’s just different.

eating disorders are also a lot more common than people think. I knew my very thin SIL for 20 years before I realised she had an eating disorder- before that I fully believed her complaints about her thinness and pretence that she can’t put on weight- not because she’s a liar, but because she believes this too so it’s very convincing.

Im one of the few people who has realised though, neither my partner, in laws or joint friends have. Some have known her since primary school.

I read all your posts until I posted myself you to me come across as judgemental.

Nah, this has been going on for 20 years.

What’s the solution though?

For a start, you’re going to have to kick BMI out of the equation, as it’s a totally blunt instrument, developed as a weigh of measuring undernourished teenage boys, if I remember the history podcast I heard correctly.

Going by BMI, you’d have me as overweight. I’m a -god forbid- size 12-14 as well.

On the other hand, I exercise every day. A combination of weights, running, yoga, exercise bike, walking, swimming. One or two of these, every single day.

I don’t drink. I eat healthily - lots of fruit and vegetables, nuts, seeds, etc. I cook from scratch and grow my own.

I’m coeliac, so not a lot of bread and cakes.

I do have a sweet tooth, so I do indulge a bit too much. That’s because I’m an emotional eater due to childhood trauma. On the other hand, I’m human.

Blood pressure normal, haven’t been to the gp in years. Have a private prescription for HRT, so costing the NHS very little. I do take Citalopram, so there’s that. But in the scheme of things, I’m not a drain on resources.

So where would I fit in? According to my BMI, I’m part of the problem. But I don’t need educating on health and nutrition, or exercise, so what would the solution for this overweight fatty be? Wire my jaws shut until I get to the correct BMI?

I think a lot of people talk about diets and how losing weight is 80% about diet, which is probably true. But I think not enough is being said about maintaining weight. It is so much easier if you have to walk a lot.

Living in London, I do 10 000 steps without even trying to. I don’t lose weight from doing that but I don’t have to be super careful about my diet to maintain it.

It is 8.50am and I have already done well over 5000 steps just dropping my daughter to an activity this morning and coming home. That is despite a part of that travel being on the tube. If I lived in the country, I would have driven and got no exercise at all.

I have watched the programme it is deeply uncomfortable for me due to exactly all those experiences . Not due to them being overweight.

I am a qualified level 4 integrated counsellor myself I've had years worth of therapy and some is working , but like I said it's slow. Currently I'm not able to pay for me and I'm not considered overweight enough to get more than one of those 9 week so-called CBT courses and that won't do much.

I spend 3 years with a TA therapist and this was a huge part of why.

Slowly slowly..

This is another issue I don’t think people are discussing (because the conversation is SOOOO BASIC)

lifetime. So we can leave thin people alone right? What about in 20 years time when those same thin people are fat?

that’s what happened to all the old people whose golden age half the posters are harking back to. They’re not better programmed, better brought up or better educated, they’re fat now, in their older age.

so is the problem fat people, or is it everyone in society? Because most thin people will get fat, in time. As it stands today they have all the tools to be thin. So what changes for them?

@Jacarandill

Sometimes being overweight isn’t the most pressing issue. I’ve heard countless stories of women in particular being put at risk and GP’s/health care professionals putting it down to being over weight, myself included.

I had sepsis last year - your temperature is because you’re overweight (needed emergency, life saving surgery)

I had debilitating gallbladder pain - you’re overweight (needed emergency, life saving surgery)

My friend has an eye infection - GP put it down to being overweight and forced her on the scales

The list goes on

Of course being overweight exacerbates other conditions - but it’s always used as the first excuse/reason to not investigate further, in my experience. Hence why I avoid seeking medial help until I’m on the brink of death

I perceive this is a constantly discussed topic in social fora & all forms of media.

Up until a year ago yes we were all getting bigger.
Now almost everyone is hopping on mounjaro or ozempic.
If anything big people are about to go extinct, the more people lose weight the less big people and the remaining big people will feel really self conscious as there are less others so will be more motivated to lose weight

You can't compare WLIs to insulin fof T1D fgs!

For most people there are other ways to lose weight such as a better diet, exercise etc.

No matter how much of a better diet and exercise someone with T1D does they are never going to reverse their autoimmunity. In fact, no matter what they do they will have T1D. The insulin is literally keeping them alive.

It's not about being superior, it's about value for money and putting a sticking plaster on obesity is not value for money imo.

In fairness, I did one of those admin jobs when I first left college in the early 90s.

9-9.45am; somebody brought the post bags up by trolley and left them by the lift. We then carried the sacks to the other end of the floor and stood for an hour, opening, organising and pinning the papers together. Somebody then attached claim numbers to the ongoing claims correspondence (standing up), sorted for each handler and carried the papers to them. Somebody else created new files (standing up) and distributed those.

At the same time, another person would go around the floor with a heavy steel trolley collecting claims files from the day before and haul the trolley into the lift before entering the filing floor, where they'd spend the next 3 hours literally climbing the shelving, bending down to floor level, go to and fro to place the files in the correct sections. Each file weighed getting on for 1kg, they were only split into file #1 and file #2 if they were over 6kg or roughly the thickness of 3 reams of A4 as the file covers wouldn't fit neatly at that size.

As the admin, you'd get the list of drinks to fetch from the 4th floor and have to walk downstairs (it was deemed too risky to have hot drinks in the lifts - I reckon it was the pale beige carpet they were worried about most, but some underwriters did have a habit of bundling into lifts without checking) carrying them, doing multiple trips. You weren't allowed to eat in the office at all and could only drink at 11am or after 3pm (which was also the time that staff were allowed to smoke in the office).

For lunch, you could either walk into the town centre or roughly half a mile to the company building that had the staff canteen, where you could get a freshly cooked meal that always included vegetables and fruit for 65p and unlimited soup and drinks.

The afternoons entailed stuffing envelopes (standing up), then carrying the bags down to the Post Room for franking before returning to collect the in-house memos and courier packs. If the last internal had been missed for a local office/department, you'd have to run it over yourself to any of the other buildings in town and if the daily booked courier had already been, you had to walk the packages over to the contracted firm by the station.

Still had it easier than the secretaries; they were all under constant supervision from the office manager and weren't allowed to talk or leave their typewriters without her permission. And, tbh, there weren't any overweight female staff because they wouldn't have been hired in the first place if they didn't have a figure that the interviewer liked.

And, tbh, there weren't any overweight female staff because they wouldn't have been hired in the first place if they didn't have a figure that the interviewer liked.

Indeed, and the photographs of them are then used as evidence that everyone uses to be slim and beautiful.

I’m obese. I’m trying to lose.
There are several problems. We need to offer more help to people to lose weight like the stop smoking stuff and Alcoholics Anonymous. For the vast majority of people who are obese they know they are obese and they hate it. If it was that easy of eat less and move more we wouldn’t have the problem we have. What would help me? I’m not sure. I think I use food as a reward and as comfort. Perhaps some counselling would help.
I would like to go to the gym but memories of the humiliation of PE lessons stops me. I just couldn’t take the embarrassment. I like to go on long walks so I am trying to do that more. I also have a treadmill at home which I go on whilst watching TV. I’d like to learn how to do weights as I am of an age where I think it would benefit me. I would love it if there was a gym near me for fat people where there was an absolute guarantee of no judgement.

my weight hasn’t been helped by well meaning people lying to me saying I am not fat or I look great when I am a size 16/18.

@Superhansrantowindsor put the weight topic aside for one moment and look into fitness classes, group training, dance yourself fit, aqua aerobics. Or else hire a PT to help you in the gym. Not just to lose weight but because being fit feels great!

And who is to say you don't look great at your current size?

I live in a small town and up until a year ago almost every adult I knew was chunky. Now half of them are on weight loss jabs. No exaggerating here.

There still needs to be a nutrition campaign, weight isn't everything and a lot of the people i know are still eating the same food just in smaller quantities.

Vitamins and iron and stuff

Wow.

But that’s the point - I want to do those things but I’m just far too embarrassed. I’m too self conscious that people will be looking at me all red faced and sweaty and unable to keep up. I just haven’t got the confidence to do that. I’d go home and have a mars bar to cheer me up!

Most people there will look the same. Check out a few places and ask around. See if you can make an appointment to come and look around.

No government that wants to stay in power will implement fundamental policies and practical measures to tackle the issues. Otherwise the tough joined up policies and practical measures include:

1. Bans and restrictions. Tackling the ultra processed food industries. Refusing any American trade deal that wants to bring their unhealthy ultra processed and low nutrition foods into our supermarkets and homes.
2. Funding more physical activities into primary schools and reversing disastrous Margaret Thatcher’s policy which lead to disappearance of school grounds. It’s sad to see lots of overweight and obese primary school children in the mornings. Holidays in Europe and you can easily identify British people vs other Western European nationals by body size.
3. Investing in transport Infrastructure for the rest of the countries cities and towns that will take more people out of cars. This will stop the drift towards Americas car dependent society.
4. Planning permission to tackle the poor quality housing in the UK which indirectly causes overweight and obesity e.g. lack of safe outdoor spaces, lack of recreational facilities.

The joined changes are just too difficult to implement without becoming unpopular or upset a lot of vested interests. Whole societal change will be required to address the underlying causes of overweight and obesity. It’s just easier to suggest it’s individuals fault and dispense the weight loss jabs and just pray they work.

There are some really great YouTube options ( not saying you should be embarrassed of course - but I find exercising at home more convenient).

A lot of the child obesity is down to hysteria about kids being hungry. It’s normal to be hungry at times, particularly before meals but there is almost panic about it/ immediate accusations of neglect. This leads to constant snacking.