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When I retired I was 47 and weighted 260. My wife would take me out everyday after retirement to just walk. I was amazed at how tired I was getting after just a half a mile. But, I kept after it. It took several months and then I noticed that I had lost 10 pounds. Over the next few years my attitude changed and I began exercising more and eating less, during this time I developed a higher tolerance for discomfort and pain and was able to work through the point where I would have just quit years before that.
Now 15 years later, I weight 215 and am walking 4-5 miles a day, but I could walk 10 miles a day if I had the time. I eat only half of what I had been eating.
Here's the most important thing to remember about losing weight, it's the mental issues that have to changed before any weight loss can be maintained.
I have only known one obese person while I have been an adult. I used to work with him and eat lunch with him at least 1 time a week. He only eat salad at lunch, but every time he got the salad he also coated the entire salad with dressing. But when we would have a conversation, he would always say that he only eat 2000 calories a day. His salads were more then 2000 calories, but he has convinced himself that he was eating healthy.
He had to quit working because of weight associated health problems. It was really sad because he was a very good person and proficient at his job. He was 43 when he had to quit.
I too knew an obese co worker. He's now dead. He dropped dead, in his bathroom, in front of his children, at age 34. He was 585 lbs. They had to use a crane to remove him from his home. They couldn't find a coffin big enough for him and had to literally shove him in one. Didn't make for a nice viewing.
He ate himself to death. He chose his path and his path was eating. He was warned numerous times by his drs to stop eating, to get healthy, to make changes. He had free access to weight management programs that teach you how to eat, what to eat and how to read labels. They don't use surgery, drugs or quick fixes. He didn't want any part of it...he wanted to continue to eat his 6000 + calories a day and call it good. He knew what he was doing and he chose to die instead of live. He left behind a wife and three little kids who watched their father drop dead in front of them because he wouldn't stop eating. Not, couldn't, but wouldn't.
He lost and gained the same 350 lbs in the 5 yrs I worked with him so I know he knew he could do it.
Obese people by him eat for a variety of reasons and need more than medical care or diet/nutrition care. They need emotional care...they need to find out WHY they use food as comfort. He refused therapy, again it was free to him, because he felt his weight was fine.
So while 'eat less and move more' is true for most people wanting to lose weight...you need to and therapy for the obese...they over eat for a reason that goes beyond 'I just like food'
I have only known one obese person while I have been an adult. I used to work with him and eat lunch with him at least 1 time a week. He only eat salad at lunch, but every time he got the salad he also coated the entire salad with dressing. But when we would have a conversation, he would always say that he only eat 2000 calories a day. His salads were more then 2000 calories, but he has convinced himself that he was eating healthy.
He had to quit working because of weight associated health problems. It was really sad because he was a very good person and proficient at his job. He was 43 when he had to quit.
Perhaps you don't understand the definition of obesity.
"Nebraska now has the 20th highest adult obesity rate in the nation, according to The State of Obesity: Better Policies for a Healthier America. Nebraska's adult obesity rate is currently 30.2 percent, up from 20.1 percent in 2000 and from 11.3 percent in 1990."
Obesity is curable. As long as you burn more calories than you take in, you will not be obese. Why obese people feel the need to defend their obesity is beyond me. Get up, exercise, put down the sugar and fat, and watch the pounds come off. Every obese person I know is lazy and eats like crap. They are sick because they are obese, not the other way around. They douse their salads in dressings after topping them with bacon and ham and think that they're eating healthy just because there's a little bit of lettuce.
So true - I remember when I was a teenager in the 70's my sister and I going to the mall and seeing an obese person and saying "I would never let myself get that way". Jump forward 25 years and I was 5'1" tall and weighed 153 lbs. due to baby weight I never took off, hypoglycemia and fibromyalgia plus working full time with small children. I craved sweets after dinner and was eating way too much pasta.
I finally joined a gym in my mid 40's, went 5 times a week, did cardio and weights, cut out all sugar and most carbs and dropped to 128. It can be done but too many people are stressed out, don't want to cook a decent meal when they get home so they bring in fast food or some other processed food, then they have cake and plop down on the couch to watch TV for a few hours before bed. They have a Starbucks coffee with a Danish and call that breakfast. Lunch will be more fast food with a large soda. Is it any wonder so many Americans are overweight?
Losing weight is hard. Too hard for a lot of people. Too hard for my brother who has been told numerous times to lose weight or die soon. He has already had a couple of small strokes. He is miserable most of the time. He over eats crap, its as simple as that. He is also never going to lose the weight because for him its easier to be miserable than to put in the work.
I agree with the OP in general. Some people, notice I did not say everyone, nor did I even say most people, do permanent damage to their body's metabolic signaling by becoming obese, and they are incapable of ever getting back to a healthy body type without using pharmaceutical or surgical aid.
A lot of faulty logic in this thread, McBain of course being the most egregious. Just because you know someone, or a hundred someones, that lost a lot of weight by doing X does not mean that X will result in weight loss for everyone.
I agree with the OP in general. Some people, notice I did not say everyone, nor did I even say most people, do permanent damage to their body's metabolic signaling by becoming obese, and they are incapable of ever getting back to a healthy body type without using pharmaceutical or surgical aid.
A lot of faulty logic in this thread, McBain of course being the most egregious. Just because you know someone, or a hundred someones, that lost a lot of weight by doing X does not mean that X will result in weight loss for everyone.
Well I'll contest that.
X= less calories in compared to what the body is burning.
I guarantee you that if 10 obese people landed on a desert island with minimal food to eat, (X) they'd all drop weight. If there were 100 people did the same thing, they'd all drop weight.
They'd all be carrying around loose floppy skin where their fat was, but they would no longer be obese.
X= less calories in compared to what the body is burning.
Except that once your body's metabolism starts slowing down, it also starts burning fewer calories. You also don't seem to understand that calories aren't all invested the same. There is a difference between losing weight and losing fat. The trap obese people are stuck in is that their body by default is use to investing calories into building fat instead of spending it as energy or building muscle with it.
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Originally Posted by gouligann
I guarantee you that if 10 obese people landed on a desert island with minimal food to eat, (X) they'd all drop weight.
Yes, but here is what you guys don't seem to understand. Losing weight isn't the same as getting back to normal. I already mentioned this in the OP. There is a problem of diminishing returns when it comes to fat loss. Cut calories and you lose some weight until your body adapts by slowing metabolism (which in obese people is already slow to begin with). Cut more calories and you lose some more weight but at a slower pace because of lowered metabolsim, until that also stops as your body starts slowing metabolism even more. Cut even more calories and you will lose some weight again but even slower etc. At some point you just hit a brick wall where cutting calories no longer works. The reason some people find it so easy to lose weight is because they have genetics and metabolism that is friendly towards weight loss. It's not merely because they are super hard working (though they often are as well).
Quote:
Originally Posted by gouligann
They'd all be carrying around loose floppy skin where their fat was, but they would no longer be obese.
Wrong. They would be considerably less fat, but they would still be obese safe for the ones that have good genetics for fat loss.
A lot of faulty logic in this thread, McBain of course being the most egregious. Just because you know someone, or a hundred someones, that lost a lot of weight by doing X does not mean that X will result in weight loss for everyone.
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Soooooo much of that is wrong.
That is literally the ONLY thing I have said in this thread. The LOLZ is real.
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