I saw the following article in the NYT about “Celebrity Weight Battles”. Now vanity is something I know about. 🙂
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/31/fashion/31fat.html?hpw
Important points from the article:
“Many experts counsel obese patients to lose about 10 percent of their weight rather than aim for an ideal number. For a 300-pound person, that’s 30 pounds.”
“About seven years ago, Dr.David A. Kessler, a former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, was watching Oprah Winfrey’s show as a woman berated herself for eating even when she wasn’t hungry, calling herself “fat” and “ugly.”
It’s no wonder she ate compulsively, Dr. Kessler said. His new book, “The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite,” looks at how the brain, beginning in childhood, is stimulated by foods loaded with fat, sugar and salt.
“Celebrities perpetuate the idea that we have a handle on this, that we understand what is driving our behavior,” Dr. Kessler said. But resisting certain foods “is not an issue of willpower. This is not about shame and humiliation.”
I also read some interesting research by Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, which concluded that a parents influence on their children’s eating habits was much less than thought.
http://www.jhsph.edu/publichealthnews/press_releases/2009/wang_parent_child_dietary_intake.html
“Child-parent dietary resemblance in the U.S. is relatively weak, and varies by nutrients and food groups and by the types of parent-child dyads and social demographic characteristics such as age, gender and family income,”
“Factors other than parental eating behaviors such as community and school, food environment, peer influence, television viewing, as well as individual factors such as self-image and self-esteem seem to play an important role in young people’s dietary intake,”
There many components to the issue of weight and obesity. Health should be the focus, appearance seems to take center stage. My guess is that this obsession with appearances is more of a cultural problem, and even when a parent tries to instill healthy eating habits in their children, outside influences are just as much a factor.
Most of my childhood I was told I was too “skinny”. I am 5’10” and weighed 130 lbs when I went into the Army, 1965. I stilled weighed about 135 until I was in my 40’s. I then put on about 40 lbs over the next 15 years.
When I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes I was 175. I had no choice but to change my eating habits. I lost about 1 lb a week until I went down to 155, I have pretty much stayed at that weight since. The key is while I did dramatically drop carbs from my diet, I lost weight gradually.
Our bodies do not like to be shocked, and losing 50 or 100 lbs too quickly is very bad for your health. Yo-yo dieting is probably worse than doing nothing and staying “overweight”.
I suspect the billion dollar diet industry understands the psychology that drives this unhealthy obsession with appearance better than anyone.
As long as we listen to idiots like Oprah Winfrey, and Kristie Alley, for our health advice I doubt there will be much progress on the healthy eating front.
My hope is in our evolving a better brain. However, as long as we continue to feed our brains all the sugar, fat, and salt, that we do, we may be in for a very bleak future.
Any suggestions as to the best way to change our diets and our unhealthy obession with appearance?
22 comments
Comments feed for this article
May 31, 2009 at 11:44 pm
tam
great stuff ed. ooo – just noticed “stuff ed” put together is “stuffed”. ha! the irony.
anyways… i love reading your thoughts.
we are way too obsessed with appearance. i wholeheartedly agree.
we tell our kids to be mindful of moderation. dont deprive, cuz then you binge. and thats not good either. we encourage exercise and all exercise together.
other than that – i dont have any good advice. thats just what we do.
June 1, 2009 at 12:11 am
edfromct
Tam, is “stuff ed” some subconscious comment on what I like to think of as brilliant prose? 🙂
I know you have some good health food, like okra, in your fridge. Although I am not sure what food group Oreo’s come under. 🙂
I like the idea of the whole family doing things like exercising together.
I guess all we can do is teach our kids good judgement and hope for the best.
June 1, 2009 at 2:10 pm
Rain
Hi Ed, we are obsessed with weight and appearance because the media puts so much emphasis on it. Of course everybody wants to be beautiful and acceptable, but the picture of what beautiful is almost unattainable.
I try to lead a healthy lifestyle by exercising and eating healthy (by making conscious choices to not eat certain foods) It’s always a battle, especially when eating on the run.
But one thing I have learnt is that if you feed your body lots of sugar and fat it will crave ots of sugar and fat constantly. And if you start to eat healthy, it might be a terrible struggle for a coupleof days but after that your body stop craving the stuff it doesn’t get.
So that’s helped me a little…
June 1, 2009 at 4:49 pm
edfromct
All the studies I have read agree with you Rain. Our bodies can grow to crave fat & sugar, just like any addiction. However if we starting a meal plan including only healthy foods, our bodies body will adjust.
I will guess the diet of your Bulls champion rugby team has a lot more protein, and carbs, than sugar in it. 🙂
June 1, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Indian Lake Papa
Whatever you do to lose weight, keep several things in mind:
1) Doctor’s care if you are serious.
2) Slowly! Do it slowly.
3) Eat small portions.
4) You are doing it for yourself – no one else.
June 1, 2009 at 4:58 pm
edfromct
Papa, you have all the steps right.
I put on my extra weight because my job required me to travel a lot. I was eating in hotels and restaurants. Their portions are double what my body required.
Your last point is also a good one. Too many people suffer from a poor body image because they believe what their peers, and the media, say.
June 1, 2009 at 5:06 pm
Sara
More frequent and smaller meals throughout the day and switching out or omitting unnecessary ingredients. For example, any recipe that calls for butter can use olive oil instead, and you can use it to taste instead of whatever’s slated in the recipe. Although as fats go – and you do need *some* fat in your diet – using natural butter in home-cooked meals is *far* better for you than whatever processed fat might be in packaged meals.
Another easy omission: I find that cheese usually gets lost in most sandwiches among the other ingredients, so if you can’t really taste it anyway, might as well leave it out to begin with. Same goes for pastas.
People think fats and salt are needed for flavor, and while they do indeed add flavor, a diverse spice rack will offer a healthier and intensely more interesting punch in the flavor department. Never underestimate the power of pepper, garlic and chili powders… :-9
June 1, 2009 at 5:39 pm
edfromct
Hi Sara, I didn’t realize you were back in blog land. I will have to catch up with your always thought provoking post.
When I was diagnosed with type two diabetes I consulted a nutritionist to help me develop a healthy meal plan. She made all the suggestions that you have.
Using the right, fresh, spices add a lot more flavor to a dish than salt.
I also found that as I added these healthy flavors to my meals, I eat more slowly, to make the enjoyment last.
My biggest adjustment was to eat smaller portions, and eat more slowly.
I have not found a tasty substitute for butter, one food vice I have not been able to get rid of, along with the occasional donut. 🙂
June 1, 2009 at 6:55 pm
Debs
Next post please…LOL…. 😆
June 2, 2009 at 12:11 am
edfromct
Just remember we are all beautiful in the eyes of your God. 🙂
June 2, 2009 at 1:35 am
lovewillbringustogether
Oh Boy – you sure go for the ‘BIG’ topics in your posts huh? 😉
While i could say much about the whole post it has all been said before and your other posters have all made positive contributions to that ( well, with one exception 😉 ) so i’ll go straight for the q:
We’re all different with differing background experiences body types so there is probably not going to be just one ‘best’ way for all. 🙂
i would think the BEST single way to adjust your diet is to limit your choice.
part of the reason for the current obesity epidemic is the amount of choice we have of high calorie, low cost foodstuffs in our society.
Everyhwere you go you can get over-large portions of over high/fat/salt/sugar/carbohydrate/chemically processed/super-refined ‘foods’.
We tend to find it ‘easier’ to eat a ‘fast’ hamburger with cheese and bacon, smothered in special sauce and cooked in canola oil than finding a drive through greengrocer’s to buy an apple or orange as a snack – why is that??
Society (people who want to sell a product with more regard for the profit they can extract from you than the health and wellbeing of their customers) ensures we have ‘freedom of choice’ in the foods we eat but only promotes those that hold our tastebuds and habits captive to addictions.
Why do almost all fast food chains/restaurants offer us fried potatoes but not mashed or boiled ones?? What is harder to eat a cup of ice-cream or a cup of mashed potato? If we were to enjoy the mashed potato how much butter and salt would need to be added to get us to prefer it to a bucket of fries?
to improve your diet choices – limit the choices available to you – if you live an an American (Western) City you are going to need lots of luck in that.
As for a way to overcome our unhealthy obsession with appearance ( or disattisfaction with how we are compared to those promoted a ‘normal’ or ‘ideal’, mostly by Hollywood/fashion industry).
Psychiatric Help! 🙂
lots of it and sponsored by a government who actually cares for your wellbeing more than their own.
learn to be less judgemental of yourself and others?
learn what is healthy and what is unhealthy?
Value your body as a temple you are offering to God? (Bigger does not equal better) 😉
i won’t hold my breath.
i might exercise more and learn more still. 🙂
<B
June 2, 2009 at 7:10 pm
edfromct
Parents can limit the food choices their children have at the dinner table in their home. At school the choices available in the cafeteria can also be limited. However, once a child starts going off on their own, to the mall, etc, than the whole world of fast foods, and vending machine candy, is at their finger tips.
As you say in “western” society there is no way we can limit the food choice available to any one. The best we can do is educate our children, and ourselves, about the consequences of an unhealthy diet.
We could more strictly enforce truth in advertising about the claims food companies make about their products, but given this is a billion dollar industry that is unlikely to happen.
The same principal applies to allowing the Hollywood/Fashion Industry to dictate what our bodies should look like.
The more confidence we have in our selves, the less likely we are to allow peer pressure to dictate our choices. All a parent can do is try to instill that confidence in their child, and hope for the best.
Free will does have it’s price. 🙂
I do think of my body as a shrine, but now it looks more like some ancient ruins. 🙂
June 3, 2009 at 5:23 am
lovewillbringustogether
🙂
one exception to what you wrote – i never said we could not limit our choices in Western Society (Cities more than small country towns).
There has already been ( largely thanks to the English TV Chef Jaimie Oliver) a success in UK school canteen kitchens limiting crap snacks and replacing them with healthy alternatives to better educate our ( their) kids about food nutrition/choice.
It comes down to two things – a desire to do better for our kids than our parents mostly have for us ( i speak on an ‘average’ here not specific individuals who might have had good parents in this regard) and someone running with that desire and making something HAPPEN.
I believe it can be more easily achieved at a local community level than a global one – we mostly agree what we want for our kids and the type of community we want to live in ( healthy – in all respects). it just comes down to a bit of community spirit and organisation and INSISTING that places that do not offer healthy meals either do so or face the wrath of siad community.
You don’t HAVE to have a burger joint in your street (or the next one – or the ‘local’ Mall) if you don’t want it – Speak Out!! Tell Society what you DO want and believe in and if something is undermining your wants DO something about it.
I’m not saying it will always be easy – just worth it in the long run. 🙂
<B
June 3, 2009 at 5:46 pm
edfromct
Here in the US many local school boards taken steps improve the foods offered in their cafeterias.
California banned vending machines, a source of revenue, in all their public schools.
Resources like the the Internet provided all the nutritional information for anyone who takes the time to look. Labels on food products contain much more information than they use to.
We seem to have two segments to our population. Those following healthy food, and exercise, habits, and those who are just getting fatter. Maybe natural selection will result in a healthier population at some point in the future.
June 4, 2009 at 3:45 am
lovewillbringustogether
i agree – our society will often ‘divide’ along two or more ‘lines’ – part of the perils of living in a “Democracy’ where the majority rules and Politicians want to please everybody so they don’t alienate a voter i guess? 🙂
Corporations know quite well the value in ‘divide and conquer’ 😉
I do see some hopeful signs however.
maybe you are having an effect on me? 🙂
<B
June 4, 2009 at 12:34 am
danielle
oh boy. this is for sure an area that we need to be more intentional about. we always have great intentions until we hit the grocery store. 😦
we do only buy organic milk. we do not buy pop.
sweets are my weakness.
we are trying to buy more healthy, but still satisfying snacks. i’m always jealous of those who eat very healthy – and do so with such ease and pleasure.
grr.
June 4, 2009 at 3:56 am
lovewillbringustogether
Danielle – i have a ‘sweet’ tooth ( the one that is not fully decayed yet 😉 )
Sugar is ‘the enemy’ – or at least ‘refined’ ( isn’t that such a ‘sweet’ sounding word – so ‘refined’??) sugars are.
Sugars are everywhere – often in disguise ( lactose, fructose, glucose as well as the ‘evil’ sucrose) 🙂
Learning to detect and overcome the more refined ones is an essential part of having a ‘healthy’ diet.
Most of us learn that too late from our parents – ‘get em while they are young’. It is the food corporations ‘motto’ and it should also be ours! 🙂
Once they (we) become addicted to – or simply ‘used to’- the taste of pure refined sucrose it is so hard ‘going back’ 😦
It’s like an alcoholic – they can live perfectly well for weeks, years without a drink and then one little ‘taste’ and WHAM – back off the wagon – it never leaves us alone.
I fool myself i can get by on just a ‘little’ – a little chocolate, a little cordial, a little slice of pie now and then – a cake here one day, a danish here the next but one, but they ALL ADD UP 😦
Hi – My name’s love and i’m a sugarholic…
<B
June 4, 2009 at 9:36 am
danielle
“Hi, Love!”
June 4, 2009 at 10:55 am
lovewillbringustogether
haha 🙂
( I thought there’d be more of us? 😉 )
<B
June 4, 2009 at 6:57 pm
edfromct
Since being diagnosed as a diabetic, and having change my diet, I don’t miss sweets as much as fatty bakery products like donuts, and pies. I can still eat pies, but only a small piece, and the occasional donut. The problem is one donut tends to multiply to six. 🙂
I also have not been find an adequate substitute for butter.
June 11, 2009 at 12:07 pm
Sara
Well, at least with bread anyway, dipping it in olive oil with a *little* salt, pepper, and oregano is just as tasty as spreading it with butter. Especially crusty bread.
June 11, 2009 at 7:25 pm
edfromct
Sara, I do sometimes substitute olive oil for butter with bread. One of my favorite meals is crusty sourdough bread, with olive oil and peppers.
For cooking I have found nothing that compares to butter.