Are we to FAT in the USA?

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Please change the subject to reflect proper grammar. “To Fat” should be “Too fat.” That grammar is killing me lol. But to answer the question, yes absolutely we are way too fat/obese in the USA, home of the super size happy meal.
‘too’ fat it is.
 
I’m writing from Mexico, and I was surprised that we hit #1 on obesity, particularly childhood

I was looking for a support group, Overeater’s Anonymous, here in my city, couldn’t find one! The one that was here seems to have closed down, I think due to lack of interest.
Sooo everybody there likes being fat? Le’t exercise people!!! 😃
 
As a fat woman, I want to share a few things that most of you probably do not know and will never experience. They are in no particular order.
  1. I had weight loss surgery a few years ago after YEARS of struggling. I am still obese. Do you know that many women after this surgery can only eat about 1000 calories a day without gaining weight? That is not much. Personally, the only proteins I can now tolerate are the higher calorie ones, such as cheese and ground beef. The second month afterwards I only lost 8 pounds – and that was with eating probably no more than 800 calories a day. It’s not always a simple formula.
  2. Many people, especially women, have tried diet after diet. Dieting can lower your metabolism so that it is MUCH harder to lose weight.
  3. You can be guilty of the sin of gluttony even if you are built like a supermodel. Don’t we all know someone who can eat whatever they want and not gain? That doesn’t mean it is ok for them to eat grossly huge amounts of food.
  4. For a really big person, exercise is very hard. Hard on the joints, and hard on the emotions. I know we are not supposed to care what others say about us, but it is hardly an incentive to exercise if you are subject to rude comments at the gym or while out for a walk. Also, most exercise instructors are not knowledgeable about how to modify exercises for a larger body. My city has a women-only fitness center with special classes for large women, taught by a 300+ pound certified aerobics instructor (and yes, she can kick butt and the certification is a national and respected one). However, that is not common. Also, it is much harder for a large person to have a good job and make enough money to join a gym. I am somewhat of an exception, as I happened to be promoted by a couple of very open-minded bosses. Most people assume I am stupid, although I was a National Merit Scholar and went to college on close to full scholarship. There are very few exercise videos that are made for larger people, and even walking can be hard if you have a work schedule that doesn’t give you much time at home during daylight hours. Probably very few men, and even fewer women want to walk at night.
I am VERY comfortable in my own body, but it took me years to get this way. I just wanted everyone to know a little of what life is like for a very large person.

Yes, fat people can make excuses for eating too much, but I think most of us sinners make excuses for the sins we commit. I know I do.
 
I don’t know what to make of all of this and I don’t really know if it is bound by geographic boundaries. I know many fat Europeans, Mexicans, South Americans, Asian’s, etc. Also, on the coasts, especially the west coast of the US there are not very many “fat” people in comparison to the middle of the country. Here in the midwest people are incredibly overweight. Almost to the person! I have lived in different areas and the more health concerned an area is, the fewer overweight people there are. Moving from the west to the midwest I have gained about 20 pounds in a year. The nearest “heathfood” store is 1 hour away and every “big box” store has the same junk. Not only that but there are not really any single owner restaurants where I live. Just miles and miles of Mcdonalds, Arbies, BK, etc. Even the sit down restaurants are junky and franchised.
sounds pretty greasy.
 
Yes

The high quality foods costs much more like fish, lean meats, vegetables, fruits. People need to eat less but eat better foods and then they will be able to eat.

American eat alot of low grade food and I am not talking about McDonalds as you can eat their salads and apple slices. If you’re paying $15+ for a meal at a restaurant, people overeat. It’s choice.
I agree, but the problem is, we’re not home to cook the “high quality foods” like fish, lean meats, etc.

And men and women who are working full time and taking care of children just don’t want to spend the time to sit down and plan balanced menus, then shop for the healthy foods, apportion them into appropriate containers to preserve their freshness, and then prep and cook them, serve them, and (yucko!) clean up after all that!

It’s easier and gives more family time with the kids to just go out to eat. 🙂

Some people would say that families should work together to prepare the food. What a sweet idea. It might work in some homes, but I think in most families, this would very quickly become a stressful and messy situation that would do the family more harm than good.

My personal theory about obesity in the U.S. is that so many families have both parents working full-time, or that many families are single-parents homes with the one parent working full time. It takes TIME to prepare and serve healthy food, and when parents are working full-time, the time is in short supply. It’s just less stressful to go out or to send out or to buy fast foods at the grocery store that you KNOW the kids will actually eat.
 


And men and women who are working full time and taking care of children just don’t want to spend the time to sit down and plan balanced menus, then shop for the healthy foods, apportion them into appropriate containers to preserve their freshness, and then prep and cook them, serve them, and (yucko!) …

My personal theory about obesity in the U.S. is that so many families have both parents working full-time, or that many families are single-parents homes with the one parent working full time. It takes TIME to prepare and serve healthy food, and when parents are working full-time, the time is in short supply. It’s just less stressful to go out or to send out or to buy fast foods at the grocery store that you KNOW the kids will actually eat.
you got a point there!
 
My wife is a paid scientist for one of the big 5. And the demonetization and rhetoric that some have against these companies have no scientific basis and really is just fear mongering. By invoking the “evil” monsanto, you are tipping your hand and showing your bias, not your knowledge.
Yes, i am biased against corn syrup and sugar being in almost everything. and i never called them evil…

Now on to the topic at hand:
I will say i am fortunate in that we raise our own beef, chicken, eggs of course, and have plenty of lean venison. i dont go out to eat more than about once a month, i live an hour from anywhere. i have a large garden in the summer and just planted a small fall garden, i usually only eat 2 meals a day (after morning chores and after all is done for the day) and yet still fight with my weight. i get plenty of exercise with the farm and chasing down rampant goats. i think there is a lot more than just overeating causing the US weight average to increase as it has and our health is suffering because of it.
 
As a fat woman, I want to share a few things that most of you probably do not know and will never experience. They are in no particular order.
  1. I had weight loss surgery a few years ago after YEARS of struggling. I am still obese. Do you know that many women after this surgery can only eat about 1000 calories a day without gaining weight? That is not much. Personally, the only proteins I can now tolerate are the higher calorie ones, such as cheese and ground beef. The second month afterwards I only lost 8 pounds – and that was with eating probably no more than 800 calories a day. It’s not always a simple formula.
  2. Many people, especially women, have tried diet after diet. Dieting can lower your metabolism so that it is MUCH harder to lose weight.
  3. You can be guilty of the sin of gluttony even if you are built like a supermodel. Don’t we all know someone who can eat whatever they want and not gain? That doesn’t mean it is ok for them to eat grossly huge amounts of food.
  4. For a really big person, exercise is very hard. Hard on the joints, and hard on the emotions. I know we are not supposed to care what others say about us, but it is hardly an incentive to exercise if you are subject to rude comments at the gym or while out for a walk. Also, most exercise instructors are not knowledgeable about how to modify exercises for a larger body. My city has a women-only fitness center with special classes for large women, taught by a 300+ pound certified aerobics instructor (and yes, she can kick butt and the certification is a national and respected one). However, that is not common. Also, it is much harder for a large person to have a good job and make enough money to join a gym. I am somewhat of an exception, as I happened to be promoted by a couple of very open-minded bosses. Most people assume I am stupid, although I was a National Merit Scholar and went to college on close to full scholarship. There are very few exercise videos that are made for larger people, and even walking can be hard if you have a work schedule that doesn’t give you much time at home during daylight hours. Probably very few men, and even fewer women want to walk at night.
I am VERY comfortable in my own body, but it took me years to get this way. I just wanted everyone to know a little of what life is like for a very large person.

Yes, fat people can make excuses for eating too much, but I think most of us sinners make excuses for the sins we commit. I know I do.
All of this is so true.

I have to comment on the joint pains. I’ve had painful knees all my life, including when I was a teenager and weighed 105 pounds at 5’8". I’m pretty certain it’s because of my flat feet and pronation of the knees.

I wish I had been able to understand when I was younger just how serious the consequences would be for weight gain. I was always so healthy and active, and I walked a few miles every day, even after put on 50 pound, then 100 pounds. I did aerobics classes and Jazzercise and had so much fun doing it, even though I was bigger. Even though my knees hurt, I just assumed it was a continuation of the same pain I had always lived with.

Then it got much worse. My posterior tibialis tendon in my right foot broke, but I didn’t know it, and thought that my feet hurt because I was too fat. I walked even more and took up the elliptical–both the worse thing I could have done (other than running, which I couldn’t have done even if I tried). After several years, the foot was so deformed that it didn’t look normal. It hurt so much that I had to leave work by 1:30 in the afternoon (instead of the 3:30 p.m. quitting time), and I would go home and put my foot up and swathe it in ice packs.

When I finally got the diagnosis of the broken posterior tibialis, I had a five-hour surgery and four months off work to repair it.

And the whole time I was limping on that right foot, the brunt of my weight was being carried by my poor left knee, which was rapidly becoming bone on bone–classic osteoarthritis.

Now I can’t do a lot of the things that a fat person could normally do to lose weight. I can’t run, and I can’t really walk very far. I can’t do any kind of dancing–even a slight twist to the knee is quite painful. I can do water sports, but I hate the water just like a Cat. I can use a stationery bike (our city isn’t really safe for biking outdoors). That’s pretty much it. And I can lift weights, very very carefully with my left leg.

Anyway, I agree with this poster that many fat people can’t just get off their lazy butts and get some exercise.

I also want to point out that not all thin people are healthy. Many of them have lab results that place them a few feet away from the grave.
 
Definitely people in the US are too fat. Portions are way too big for a lot of people. A soda in the 50s used to be 12 oz or less - now we have all these supersize drinks. Does anyone really need a 32 oz. soda? No matter what anyone says, many people are responsible for not watching their weight and making bad food choices. To say that fast food is cheaper, well it may be, but then you have to wonder where your priorities are. Meals can be prepped ahead of time on the weekend to cut down prep time for weekday dinners. Children will quickly learn to eat what is set before them if that’s all they get. Yes, exercise is hard if you have already let yourself go to the point of being very obese. So you start with walking if that’s all you can do. Just because fresh, healthy food cost more doesn’t justify buying the junk instead - again, where are your priorities? You can learn to like water, plain or with a little lemon or lime in it instead of drinking soda. And yes, I speak as a person with some extra pounds on me and I take 100% full responsibility for it.
 
I agree, but the problem is, we’re not home to cook the “high quality foods” like fish, lean meats, etc.

And men and women who are working full time and taking care of children just don’t want to spend the time to sit down and plan balanced menus, then shop for the healthy foods, apportion them into appropriate containers to preserve their freshness, and then prep and cook them, serve them, and (yucko!) clean up after all that!

It’s easier and gives more family time with the kids to just go out to eat. 🙂

Some people would say that families should work together to prepare the food. What a sweet idea. It might work in some homes, but I think in most families, this would very quickly become a stressful and messy situation that would do the family more harm than good.

My personal theory about obesity in the U.S. is that so many families have both parents working full-time, or that many families are single-parents homes with the one parent working full time. It takes TIME to prepare and serve healthy food, and when parents are working full-time, the time is in short supply. It’s just less stressful to go out or to send out or to buy fast foods at the grocery store that you KNOW the kids will actually eat.
👍

We went to cooking soups with lots of vegetables. It helped but still it is difficult. When you have left overs and no one will eat them, you eat them because you don’t want to waste them.:doh2:
 
Definitely people in the US are too fat. Portions are way too big for a lot of people. A soda in the 50s used to be 12 oz or less - now we have all these supersize drinks. Does anyone really need a 32 oz. soda? No matter what anyone says, many people are responsible for not watching their weight and making bad food choices. To say that fast food is cheaper, well it may be, but then you have to wonder where your priorities are. Meals can be prepped ahead of time on the weekend to cut down prep time for weekday dinners. Children will quickly learn to eat what is set before them if that’s all they get. Yes, exercise is hard if you have already let yourself go to the point of being very obese. So you start with walking if that’s all you can do. Just because fresh, healthy food cost more doesn’t justify buying the junk instead - again, where are your priorities? You can learn to like water, plain or with a little lemon or lime in it instead of drinking soda. And yes, I speak as a person with some extra pounds on me and I take 100% full responsibility for it.
I agree for the most part but those skinny little leprechauns drink PINTS of Guinness with a higher calorie count per oz. than Soda. 😉

(a pint is 16 oz) So two pints (a likely scenario) would be the equivalent of a “Big Gulp”

Plus we Americans like this little thing that is expanded water called ice. (apparently the rest of the world is not as scientifically advanced to know what happens to H2O when it gets below 32F they dont even know what a Fahrenheit is! And they do not know how amazingly better everything tastes with ice. Even water) It takes up most of your cup. So while a 32 Oz Drink in Europe would be considered big, since I ask or put in myself extra ice, my 32 oz drink is really about 12-16 oz of soda. (that could just be my rationalization…;))
 
… i usually only eat 2 meals a day (after morning chores and after all is done for the day) and yet still fight with my weight. i get plenty of exercise with the farm and chasing down rampant goats. i think there is a lot more than just overeating causing the US weight average to increase as it has and our health is suffering because of it.
After our 40’s I think that we’re not able to burn off fat as we use too. :o
 
Nobody is perfect. I am a trying to loose weight, but there are worse things in life- if you try to be a good Catholic and are living a decent and moral lifestyle in accordance with the teachings of God and his Holy Church you are fine. There are no fat and thin people in the Kingdom of God, but those who do his will and love him and loves others!
 
um, it doesnt need to be in everything. are you a paid spokesperson for Monsantos???
You didn’t answer my question: If it isn’t bad for you, then why does it matter if it is in everything?

Monsanto? Really?
 
Not true. You can buy a big bag of tater chips for $1.50 or two medium apples for the same cost. Or you can buy the bag of yucky little apples for $3.00, but they’re so hard and bitter, you’ll end up throwing them out for the squirrels to eat. Or making pie out of them, with lots of sugar to cover up the bitterness. (Yummy, pie!)

Soda is 25 cents/12 oz. (on sale–the real brands, not the off brands), while milk is 75 cents for 8 oz. In some parts of the country, milk is even more expensive.

In the Midwest, fruit and veges frankly look pretty bad in the middle of January. They’re all shipped in from overseas and look like they’ve spent many days on a ship. Yuck. Chips are always fresh and yummy.

You can’t buy bags of carrot sticks in a vending machine.

I’m not saying that we should spend our money on chips, soda, and snacks. I’m just stating that for many families, the fruits and veges are too expensive for what you get.

I’ve often asked our hospital cafeteria (I work in a hospital) to switch the prices on the healthy foods vs. the “unhealthy” foods. e.g., Charge $1.50 for the bag of Fritos, and 75 cents for the bowl of fresh fruit. Or charge $1.50 for the piece of broiled fish (the size of a fish stick), and $4.00 for the big hamburger.

They just smile at me. They’ll never do it.
Again, I don’t know where you shop but fruit and vegetables are very cheap compared to “unhealthy” food. In my city, a pound of bananas is $0.50, a pound of apples $1.00. A bag of chips costs about $3.00 to $4.00. Soda is $3.00 to $4.00 for a 12 pack. You can get a 24 pack of bottled water for like $2.00.

But all of that is irrelevant considering eating “unhealthy” food doesn’t make you obese. Overconsumption of food is general makes you obese.

I’m from the Midwest and fruit and vegetables are very fresh here. Heck, there is tons of farmland within walking distance of my house.
 
Again, I don’t know where you shop but fruit and vegetables are very cheap compared to “unhealthy” food. In my city, a pound of bananas is $0.50, a pound of apples $1.00. A bag of chips costs about $3.00 to $4.00. Soda is $3.00 to $4.00 for a 12 pack. You can get a 24 pack of bottled water for like $2.00.

But all of that is irrelevant considering eating “unhealthy” food doesn’t make you obese. Overconsumption of food is general makes you obese.

I’m from the Midwest and fruit and vegetables are very fresh here. Heck, there is tons of farmland within walking distance of my house.
Processed junk food is usually cheaper per calorie than fresh fruits and vegetables. For people who are limited in their food budget, they will pick the foods that give them the highest caloric bang for their buck. It’s not necessarily the best move health-wise, but it makes sense from a human behavior standpoint - maximize what you have with the resources available. Our biology has not caught up to the current food conditions.

I am not sure if you are aware of the SNAP challenge, which encourages people to live as if they were on food stamps for a month. The nationwide average allotment for a person on food stamps is $4.50/person/day. I live in Pennsylvania and because I know how to cook, as well as having the time to shop and use coupons, our family can eat extremely well on that (our grocery budget is actually about $3/person/day). But when you live in an area where fresh produce is incredibly expensive (ever been grocery shopping in NYC?), with limited transportation, time, and ability to cook, that’s not going to work out well.

I’m not trying to make an excuse for anyone’s bad choices, but I am trying to point out that it’s not as simple as saying, “Well, I can do it, so why can’t you?” I grew up in a household where the only vegetable we ate with any regularity was iceberg lettuce. I had to learn how and when to buy produce, and then how to use it up or preserve it before it went bad in a way that I was going to like. I had the time and resources available to figure that out.

Not everyone does. Your posts come across as shaming, as if everyone who doesn’t do what you do is stupid or lazy, and that just isn’t the case at all.
 
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