The fatting of America.

[tgibson3770]

Everywhere you look, obesity is there. I am not advocating to be a food policeman, but we need to start making a voice in our land. People do not like being overweight. But certain foods are addictive and the public needs to be educated on proper unbiased nutrition. Meat and dairy products and foods that are fried are absolutely in no way beneficial to the human body. The human physiological system is completely adaptable to a total vegetarian diet. But with the refined sugars and fatty foods that poison our body and cloud our minds, addiction sets in deep and becomes 'nearly' impossible to break the bonds.

I am challenging every nurse to take up the baton on this one. If we, health care professionals cannot make the first stand on the nutrition value of America, then the general population have little to no hope.

How about it? Educate, rejuvinate, permeate.

[av8er7]

After reading many posts on this topic I'm compelled to ask, "does not the fast paced lifestyle that most of us live play a factor in the junk diets we have all grown to depend on?" After all, the little time we give to our self-care is perhaps the major culprit. Does anyone agree?

[Cattitude]

it took me about 2 years to lose 96 lbs. pounds i had gained from eating a lot of unhealthy, fatty, junky food. and not exercising. it had also taken me about 2 years to accumulate this weight as well. eating as an emotional response to a bad sitaution in my life at the time.

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[color=#483d8b]however, losing it definitely improved my body and my mind considerably. i know why i gained the weight, i never tried to justify it with rationalizations or excuses. i stepped on the scale frequebtly while i was overweight so i would know exactly how much i was gaining. i faced up to my choices.

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[color=#483d8b]many, many overweight people are in denial. they underestimate how much they weigh, and how much they are eating every day. i read an article not too long ago where they did a study on this, people underestimated daily calorie intake by quite a bit. my own obese pt's do it. so what is the solution? like any other health problem, can't make them get well. i just know that the majority of obese people do not want to be that way.

[nursemike, ASN, RN]

After reading many posts on this topic I'm compelled to ask, "does not the fast paced lifestyle that most of us live play a factor in the junk diets we have all grown to depend on?" After all, the little time we give to our self-care is perhaps the major culprit. Does anyone agree?

Definitely. My "drive-thru diet" wasn't a bit helpful. And who has time to exercise, what with work, household chores, and surfing the internet for hours at a time?

[mvanz9999, RN]

Definitely. My "drive-thru diet" wasn't a bit helpful. And who has time to exercise, what with work, household chores, and surfing the internet for hours at a time?

Are you being sarcastic? I hope so.

Exercise is part of daily routine. If I "don't have time" I just don't do whatever it is that prevents me from exercising. I'm not going to be a lot of good if I'm dead.

Simply not true. The majority of people at the local Old Country Buffet or Chinese food buffet are obese, most of those are morbidly obese. The majority of people I see in the local produce isle are not obese. One only needs to observe the contents of food shopping carts of obese people to see the real problem. But its not diet alone. These people do not get regular, vigorous exercise.

Shoot them no, but I also find it difficult to have empathy for them when they come looking to medicine to fix what they have done, then refuse to be compliant with the prescribed Tx modalities.

I feel the same way. YES it's hard. YES it's work. YES it's sacrifice. But you don't get to be 400 or more pounds overnight or accidentally. It's actually quite rare that a medical condition causes obesity, although that's what the obese would have you believe.

I eat about two meals a day, and they aren't large meals, either.

That's the problem. You should be eating 5-6 meals a day, not two. I know obese people that only eat one meal a day. Bad for the metabolism.

It's denial to assume people are fat because they are unhappy and overeaters and have emotional problems or some other kind of personal defect.. Sometimes a person is fat because they are FAT. And anyone who needs a Hercules table has bigger issues than food. People that fat are usually that fat because of a medical condition beyond their control.

I don't buy that for one second. If they've got a medical condition, it's likely because of obesity. People are not fat because they are fat, they are fat because they consume more calories than they need. It's not that hard to do. If you eat only 50 calories extra per day (1 slice of bread maybe?) than you use, that packs on 10 lbs of fat a year.

Americans are intensely lazy. That's all there is to it. When was the last time you saw a fat Amish person? I never have. Why? Because they shun modern conveniences. They do hard physical labor all day.

[cabkrun]

Have to agree with mvanz on this one. Rarely there may be a "medical" cause, but it's not the norm. Both my brothers are fat. The younger one has spent the last who knows how many years "self medicating" because there absolutely HAS to be something wrong with him to cause him to be fat, other than the fact that he eats fast food nearly every day, hasn't exercised in years, etc. Americans generally are lazy, yes. We have become addicted to our automobiles. It's a pretty sad statement when you see someone get in their car to drive to another parking space a block away, or to the grocery store that, if lucky, is a 10 minute walk.

I am not nasty towards obese people. If nothing else, I feel sorry they have gotten that way. Yet, I won't buy the excuse that they are somehow so different than anybody else that can maintain their weight at an appropriate level. It was rare to see a fat kid when I was growing up. Now, you see them everywhere, being fed chocolate croissants and large hot chocolates at the local Starbucks by their fat parents. There isn't a medical reason at all for this. Some of those Starbucks drinks have over 700 calories. It really is calories in vs. calories out.

[tatarn2b2007]

It's amazing to me that everyone thinks ALL fat people are lazy. I am a bigger person, but I swim at least 1000 yards every other day and spend an hour at the gym on most days of the week. I work a part time job in finance, prn as an aide at a rehab facility, and go to nursing school all at the same time. I have only turned my tv on once in the past 4 months and that was due to a snowstorm last week. I am certainly not lazy. A lot of people I work with actually tell me I should be lazy just one day a week to relax. I say no way. Also, I see a lot of fat people at the gym and I applaud their efforts. I do agree there are a lot of fat lazy people, but not all fat people are lazy. I know plenty of thin to average size people who don't do a minute of exercise and watch 3-4 hours of tv/night.

[LydiaNN]

It's amazing to me that everyone thinks ALL fat people are lazy. I am a bigger person, but I swim at least 1000 yards every other day and spend an hour at the gym on most days of the week. I work a part time job in finance, prn as an aide at a rehab facility, and go to nursing school all at the same time. I have only turned my tv on once in the past 4 months and that was due to a snowstorm last week. I am certainly not lazy. A lot of people I work with actually tell me I should be lazy just one day a week to relax. I say no way. Also, I see a lot of fat people at the gym and I applaud their efforts. I do agree there are a lot of fat lazy people, but not all fat people are lazy. I know plenty of thin to average size people who don't do a minute of exercise and watch 3-4 hours of tv/night.

Not everyone thinks that. Not even everyone on this thread thinks that, as evidenced by multiple posts to the contrary. I also don't think a lack of physical exercise makes a person lazy. I don't get to work out as much as I would like, but I also work about 50 hours a week and am getting my master's. I'd laugh at anyone who calls me lazy. Turning on the TV for a little escapism every night helps me destress.

[Jo Dirt]

I know that LuLu Roman from Hee Haw has a thyroid condition that has caused her to be obese all her life. I know a man who weighs 500 pounds. Sure, with high fructose corn syrup and all that junk there are plenty of gluttons who gorge themselves sick and yes, they look like Porky Pig. You can go to Wal-Mart at any time and see lots of evidence of that. In fact, I saw something several years ago that not only made me angry but made me realize how parents can kill their kids with kindness. I pulled up to the grocery store and saw this kid, he was maybe ten, he was rotund and portly, wearing slip on shoes and as he waddled out to his mom's mini van I noticed him carrying a big bag of M&M's. Not just the larger snack size you get at the check out, but the kind you have to go to the candy isle to seek out. I never wanted so much to go smack his mother. I just thought it was child abuse.

And my college nutrition instructor (at a big university, not the vo-tech or community college) even says that people are built different and not everyone is mean to be lean and thin. I know this to be a fact from personal experience. I was very active and athletic as a child but stupid people like my own family, not realizing how it could affect a teenage girl called me "chubby." You know how chubby I was? I was at my height I am now (5'2") and I weighed a whopping 122 pounds!!!

No, the problem is not eating two small meals a day. If I were eating two meals of a whole Pizza Hut pizza for one meal and a supersize quarter pounder meal from Mcdonald's at the other I can see where that would be a problem. But I don't. I am more sedentary than I should be, and I can see that as a problem. Also, being 5'2" and small-medium boned I can't take in as many calories as a lot of people can. But as my instructor says, not all people are built to be thin.

Just like some people can eat and eat and eat the worst junk and not gain an ounce. Don't try to tell me this isn't true because I deal with this daily with my father-in-law and my husband. It's easier to blame people for being gross and fat because then we don't have to accept that some people are just built the way they are because it is beyond any real control they have. And it takes a lot of nerve for someone who has never had a real weight problem to judge people who do and assume they know what their lives are like. But I don't see that changing anytime soon. And this may be a shocker to people but there were fat people in the world before there was "junk" food.

And it is so easy to point the finger at the obese because their issues are more visible than the thin person who won't quit smoking or follow their diebetic diet. For some reason, the world has much mroe sympathy for them.

Fat people are the most discriminated against minority in the world. Maybe we porkers should load up and go to Asia where they admire fat people? My mom's friend is fat and when she went there people were coming up just to touch her because they thought she was pretty and rich. Hey, I could go for that, but we may have to take a ship or else the plane might be skimming the treetops with all our weight.

Gee whiz.

[Jo Dirt]

It really is calories in vs. calories out.

That is exactly right. Which is why it doesn't matter if you eat 2 meals a day or 6.

[VivaLasViejas, ASN, RN]

Folks, this discussion seems to be degenerating---again---into a finger-pointing contest. This is unproductive and creates anger and bad feelings. Therefore, I am closing the thread for a "cooling-off" period so that staff can review it once again.