Conscious and subconscious negative attitudes within the health community (including physicians, nurses, and dieticians) toward the obese have been documented in numerous studies (Hoppe & Ogden, 1997; Maroney & Golub, 1992; Obberrieder, Walker & Monroe, 1995; Price, Desmond, Krol, Snyder, & O’Connell, 1987). More recently, Block, DeSalvo, and Fisher (2003) found that despite solid knowledge of the conditions associated with obesity, medical residents have a poor grasp of the tools necessary to identify obesity. They also have negative opinions about their skills for treating obese patients. They conclude that residency training programs must not only improve knowledge of obesity but also must address physicians’ negative attitudes.

These attitudes can be compounded by the fact that for more than 20 years clinicians have been using the term “good cholesterol” and “bad cholesterol” to describe medical conditions that, may leave people feeling that they are labeled as “bad” because of their elevated LDL cholesterol level. Indeed, even the NIH’s National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute uses these terms to describe the LDL and HDL lipoproteins. These negative attitudes do not go unnoticed, and they are often cited as a reason for avoiding medical care. Studies have shown that the most important factor in women postponing or canceling medical appointments was the fear of being weighed, and that increased BMI is associated with decreased preventive health services (Adams, Smith, Wilbur, & Grady, 1993; Olson, Schumaker, & Yawn, 1994; Ostbye, Taylor, Yancey, & Krouse, 2005).

Further, when patients are encouraged or referred to exercise, the same issues tend to repeat. A study of exercise science students found that they, too, possessed negative associations with obesity such as laziness and lack of self-control (Chambliss, Finley, & Blair, 2004). It seems that obese individuals are faced with conflicting messages – that they need to exercise to lose weight, but that they should not exercise because they are overweight. Who could blame anyone for avoiding exercise under these circumstances?

3. Distorted Cultural Norms for “Healthy Weight” Can Lead to Eating Disorders
When discussing obesity, many refer to the need to reach and/or maintain a “healthy weight.” Unfortunately, while the medical community may have a clinical definition of healthy weight (generally defined as a Body Mass Index within the range of 18.5-24.9), the public’s idea of “healthy weight” is often based on unrealistic images in the popular media. When the models on the covers of fashion and fitness magazines are regarded as the standard for “healthy weight,” too many individuals feel pressure to mirror this ideal at any cost. As Burns and Gavey (2004) remark in their study of bulimic women’s conceptions of “healthy weight,” ”healthy weight” cannot be unhinged from a cultural imperative of slenderness (p. 549).

The effects these norms have on health are most often observed in adolescent females. In a study of exposure to the mass media and weight concerns, Field et al. (1999) found that the majority of surveyed preadolescent and adolescent girls were unhappy with their size and shape. This discontentment was strongly related to the frequency of reading fashion magazines. However, concerns about these issues aren’t isolated to adolescents or women – increasingly, they affect men too. In fact, men comprise an estimated one million of the approximately ten million Americans fighting anorexia or bulimia (Crowther et al., 1992).

It is also important to note that the images promoted in popular media are most often of extremely slim Caucasian women. While these images are directed in advertising primarily to one segment of society – young, white, middle-class women – their pervasive nature has the effect of largely defining notions of beauty in our society. Indeed, standing in a supermarket checkout line, and recognizing the dearth of people of color or women over the age of 50 on the covers of popular magazines, gives one a good idea of the pervasiveness of such image marketing. In this sense, they present a particularly dangerous standard in that they promote a size unattainable by nearly everyone, while marginalizing those of different races or ethnicities as well.

Lastly, recent research has noted that norms and acceptability for body size vary by culture and race, with some groups being more accepting of larger body sizes. For example, Gipson et al. (2005) surveyed 200 black students at a historically black university and found that young black women are tolerant of a variety of body sizes. Our understanding of how these norms affect health is developing, but meanwhile the focus on obesity may not resonate with certain groups. As we learn more about the health behaviors associated with their attitudes, it is important to continue emphasizing the importance of nutrition and physical activity rather than slenderness.

Focusing on Weight Instead of Nutrition Leads Individuals to Adopt Popular Weight- Loss Diets Rather Than Eating Nutritious Food
On any given day, more than 25 percent of men and 45 percent of women in our country are dieting (Smolak, 1996), yet the United States continues to have the highest incidence of obesity in the world. Unfortunately, when obesity is the issue, people automatically focus on its opposite: weight loss. Playing into this mindset is the billion-dollar weight-loss industry which feeds more off of people’s desire to look better, than the desire to feel better. As the public succumbs to the pressure to lose weight quickly, a consequence is the rise (and fall) of popular diets that increasingly shift focus away from what is known about good nutrition.

Of course, the latest popular diet is the high-protein, low-carbohydrate craze. The creators of the Atkins and South Beach diets have together sold more than 13 million copies of their books. These diets promote weight loss through eating plans that almost inevitably lead to increased intakes of cholesterol, fat, saturated fat, and protein. While long-term data on the health effects of these diets is not currently available, leading health associations such the American Heart Association (St. Joer et al., 2001) and the American Dietetic Association, among others, have published statements warning about the various dangers associated with low-carbohydrate diets, including a potentially increased risk of coronary heart disease, diabetes, and several types of cancer. And perhaps even worse than the diet books are the diet pills that are marketed on TV and women’s magazines and promise miracle weight loss. But, at what cost is weight loss occurring if it increases the risk of chronic disease later?

Crowded out of this fad-diet excitement is the important message that a diet rich in fruits, vegetables and whole grains is associated with blood pressure control, cardiovascular disease prevention, diabetes prevention and lower risk of some cancers (Apple et al., 2003; Joshipura et al., 1999; Joshipura et al., 2001; Maynard, Gunnell, Emmett, Frankel, Davey-Smith, 2003; Terry et al., 2001). Even more outrageously, some fad diets warn against eating certain fruits and vegetables, such as carrots and bananas, because they have a greater effect on blood sugar than other fresh options. At a time when only one out of five Americans is eating the recommended five servings a day of fruits and vegetables (Produce for Better Health Foundation, n.d.), the public does not need another excuse to pass on produce.

Yet another issue is the effect that the focus on fad diets ultimately have on people who are obese or overweight. The promise of the magic pill or diet is quickly overtaken by the reality of slow, if any, weight loss and the mental health effects of “another failed diet attempt” (Yen, 2005).

Focusing on Weight Alone has Serious Consequences for Mental Health
Research affirms that obese individuals face a pervasive stigma. Stereotypes attributed to the obese include laziness, lack of self-control, low intelligence and noncompliance with health recommendations (Puhl & Brownell, 2004). These stereotypes are played out daily in the popular media and in unrealistic “before and after” ads that emphasize personal control as the primary determinant of weight (Geier, Schwartz, & Brownell, 2003).

In a review of the literature on ‘fat bias,’ Brownell and Puhl note that “the stigma of obesity is somewhat unique from that of other marginalized groups, in that obese people internalize societal anti-fat and pro-thin biases.” Obese people agree with society’s assessment that “…an imperfect body represents an imperfect person” (2003, p. 22). In a qualitative study of 113 obese African American women, Davis, Rovi, and Johnson (2005) found that obese women had significantly higher anxiety levels and poorer perception of their physical health than overweight or normal weight women. The toll that living with this stigma day-to-day takes on individual mental health is significant and often tragic, as evidenced by the fact that obesity is associated with increased likelihood of depression, suicidal thoughts, and suicide attempts (Carpenter, Hasn, Allison & Faith, 2002).

In recent years, newspapers, magazines, and the electronic media have covered obesity and overweight extensively. The “O” word – obesity – seems to be everywhere. Indeed, media coverage of obesity almost quadrupled from January 1999 to April 2005 in the U.S. (International Food Information Council (IFIC) Foundation, 2005). This intense coverage even led the Center for Consumer Freedom (2005), a restaurant and food industry supported group, to label the obesity coverage as “hype” and an “obesity-mortality myth”. Regardless of the controversy over the exact number of deaths associated with overweight and obesity (Kaisernetwork.org, 2005), clearly, the National Center for Health Statistics data shows the doubling of obese adults and the tripling of overweight young people (ages 6-19) over the last 30 years (National Center for Health Statistics, 2004).

Hidden in this confusing rhetoric is an important message that many will find startling: while there are real concerns related to 60 million obese adults and 9 million overweight youth, the single-minded focus on weight results in prejudice towards the obese and overweight and negatively impacts community health overall.

The truth is that despite the recent controversies surrounding the number of deaths attributable to obesity, it is a deadly serious health condition. It’s also true that many people are eating too much and exercising too little. Furthermore, people can and do die from obesity-related chronic diseases, and obesity can be a significant contributor to decreased quality of life. However, the persistent drumbeat of “obesity” oversimplifies a complex issue. It places blame squarely on the shoulders of the individual, without taking into account the social and economic influence of where people live, work, and play. In this sense, the O word discourages all of us from focusing on social ecological changes that could make significant lasting improvements to people’s nutrition and fitness.

While this focus on “obesity” and the implied individual behaviors (e.g., overeating, lack of exercise, etc.) distracts us from seeing the larger community picture, it also fails, often miserably, to improve the health of individuals. In fact, it may lead to mental health problems and, of course, the sequela of chronic disease. In addressing this, we need to acknowledge that while the word had a specific clinical definition; it does not have the same meaning within clinical practice — any more than in broader society. Instead, even in the clinical setting, “obesity” is often imbued with value judgments and biases that associate overweight not only with poorer health but also poorer character and lack of education.

Obesity Defined-I know You Want To Do It Your Way

I know, yes I know you are asking yourself,”what is the point here”? What problem am I trying to identify and what solutions am I representing?

I have been writing about Obesity for over two years and still find that most of you refuse to admit that you “Have It”. Most of you live from one meal to another and have very little energy yet, you have tremendous energy to defend your right to “do it your way”.

Denial is the best form of escapism. Defined:escape: an inclination to retreat from unpleasant realities through diversion or fantasy; “romantic novels were her escape from the stress of daily life”; “his alcohol problem was a form of escapism”.

Living a life of fantasy can be very rewarding for many yet very dangerous form others. Obesity in it’s purest form is only an admission of your unwillingness to accept responsibility. Now, their is a statement that reflects most of the people I meet.

Most of you have no energy to defend your cause. By living in a fantasy world you close the door to receiving help because you do not listen. Your mind is shut off from reality and your refusal to admit it is taking you to your grave.

Stop defending your inabilities to cope with your eating habits and start by listening with open ears.
If you are still alive, yes I am serious, their is hope in many forms if you just stop playing games and listen for a change. Alive is not a term used lightly here. Most obese people in denial are dead and just waiting to be buried.

If you do not accept responsibility, blame others and start defending yourself. Their is no shame if you can blame others or events or even foods.

I know you want to do it your way. How has it been working for you? Your way, if you are still obese after all the attempts you have made to become “normal”, is only another form of denial.

Obesity Defined-I Know You Want To Do It Your Way. Why?

When you are following the traditional Mediterranean diet your body will absorb all the natural and healthy nutrition that it needs daily, helping you to lose or maintain your weight and health. You will eat vegetables and fruit that have fiber, needed in your daily diet.

Most Mediterranean lifestyles are very simple, and lived at a slow pace of life. This helps with the idea of taking the time to cut and chop your meals instead of using a can opener for most of your meals. Sticking with fresh and natural foods. Cutting out canned and processed foods will help you become healthier faster. The additives in canned and processed foods are hard on your body. Even though they are quick and easy they will not give you the good nutrition that fresh fruit and vegetables will give you.

Olive oil is the main part of the Mediterranean diet, it is healthy in many ways. Other oils when used all the time can clog your arteries. Olive oil helps reduce cholesterol and will not clog your arteries. Changing your oil intake over to olive oil will help prevent a heart attack, stroke, many diseases, and cancer.

Eating healthy foods that are rich in minerals, essential acids, proteins, nutrition, and vitamins is how we should have always been eating. Having healthy foods in our daily diet is necessary for our bodies to stay healthy and fit.

White meats are more common in Mediterranean eating and they are healthier. Red meats does have healthy values in it. However a lot of red meat consumed each week can end up hurting you. Sticking to freshly prepared fish and chicken is a better eating choice for your health.

However, we still want to eat in moderation.

Many people say that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. That is true. One should never skip breakfast. Breakfast should be a prepared and healthy meal. Start it off with dairy and whole grains; then a very lean piece of meat such as ham. End your meal with a small piece of cheese or fruit. Be sure to to drink a large glass of water during your meal. There is not a better breakfast to start your day and fill you up with out filling you with fat and calories.

Mediterranean diet foods are mostly fruit and vegetables, beans, potatoes, fish and cereals that are high in fiber; and olive oil – the “Mediterranean gold”. You want to make sure that you are taking in the correct amount of vitamins and minerals in your diet. You can also add nuts that are rich in fatty acids, and berries high in antioxidants. When you include all of this into your daily diet you will feel better, healthier and more fit.

If that were true, however, why is this problem suddenly exploding onto the scene only now, but was never a problem for past generations?

Something is clearly not completely genuine about this proposition.

To paraphrase Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain): A hurtful truth has no value over a hurtful lie. Neither should be uttered. The man who speaks a hurtful truth, thinking to save his own life, should stop and think; that sort of life is not worth preserving.

Neither is it worthy living a lie, yet that’s just what science fiction, posing as science fact, would have you do.

The great deception of evolution — despite no real convincing evidence of it in nature or the fossil record (How many people on 9-11 faced with the choice of death sprouted wings and flew away unharmed?) — was just the beginning.

Now an entire generation has been trained to look upon scientists as “saviors” who will solve all our modern ills, even while they busily create new and worse ones every day.

Genetic research, in particular, has become the new “holy grail” of scientific inquiry and tampering.

Once upon a time, in the thirties and forties particularly, radioactivity was thought of in the exact same light, with all manner of admittedly “miraculous” properties being ascribed to it.

You wouldn’t know it from recent movies on the comic fiction “hero” based on a poisonous insect, but the story line originally — as late as the early sixties — was that the spider was radioactive, the same thing credited with creating another more monstrous but just as popular comic book, TV and movie fiction a lot more hulkish in nature.

At one time, in those days just after the assassination of president Kennedy, as a junior high school student, I wrote and drew my first and only comic book, the main character of which received super powers from a similar accidental exposure to a nuclear bomb test.

The reality of radiation poisoning, sickness and death never occurred to my immature mind, so steeped as I was in the mythic lore of pseudo-science taught and encouraged from every quarter in the decade of the space race.

Gamma rays, another form of solar radiation, was even credited with creating a certain phantasmagorical foursome in yet another comic book fiction of pseudo-scientific nonsense.

As I grew up I discovered many of the flaws in what was seriously taught as “science fact,” and by my senior year of high school — the year men supposedly walked on the moon for the first time — I was giving lectures before my earth science class on the impossibilities of evolution and proofs exposing it as among the biggest hoaxes ever perpetrated upon a gullible and eagerly receptive public.

You may well have a genetic predisposition to illness affecting one bodily organ or system over another, but this has absolutely nothing to do with the cause of the disease, which is invariably either some form of malnutrition, toxic poisoning, or environmental contamination.

Obesity, for instance, like heart disease or diabetes, runs in families that have the same dietary customs, learned and indulged by habit from childhood and rarely changed or altered in adulthood.

My own pre-diabetic hypoglycemic condition — following the same diet as my parents and grandparents (both parents and maternal grandfather became diabetic), and my siblings, several of which also became diabetic — cleared up over forty years ago and never returned, after I drastically overhauled my lifestyle and diet.

The only thing “genetic” about this condition was how the bad diet I once had affected my body at its weakest “link.”

It’s remarkable how easily I changed and avoided this “genetic predisposition” to diabetes, by simply changing my outer and internal environments for the better.

There is even recent evidence that electropollution, or dirty electricity emitted by electrical power lines, some computers, cordless and mobile phones, compact fluorescent lights, and even treadmills, can cause what Dr. Magda Havas (Trent University, in Peterborough, Canada) has labeled Type 3 diabetes (Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine).

Basically some people’s genetic makeup (and most likely diet also) predisposes them to being sensitive to electropollution from dirty electromagnetic fields (EMFs) — even from devices plugged in near them — which causes a diabetic spike in blood sugar levels.

Apparently the spike in blood sugar, other than strictly dietary in source, may be caused by the effect of electromagnetic pollution on the pancreas, by lowering its production of insulin, or possibly on insulin’s ability to deal with blood sugar properly.

This should not come as any surprise, considering the fact that the cells of your body all communicate with one another by means of minute electrical impulses, often in the microwave range.

It stands to reason, therefore, that certain levels of electropollution smog can have an adverse effect on whatever systems of your body are most susceptible to this pernicious but mostly hidden influence.

Electromagnetic radiation can also adversely effect your heart rate, estrogen and adrenaline levels, hormone balance, can damage your DNA, and causes stress that can result in cancer as well.

Statistics are just now beginning to trickle in linking long term cordless and cell phone usage with brain tumors, just as electric blankets and even alarm clocks plugged in and situated near where you sleep have also been implicated in increased risks of developing fatal cancers.

It has been long known — for more than thirty years that I am personally aware of — that high tension power lines are linked to a higher than average rate of leukemia and other forms of cancer in children.

Radar from airports and military bases has been shown to cause high cancer-incidence locales in those living within the range of these facilities, just as children of radar operators also have a statistically significant higher incidence of leukemia.

I know about this first hand, because my dad used to work for the FFA (Federal Flight Administration), before it became the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration), and one of his co-workers had a son about my age, I used to play with, who died of leukemia.

This is especially interesting, considering the fact that the children themselves are not exposed to the radar. Only their fathers are exposed on a daily basis, who then apparently develop a genetic abnormality as a result of this exposure, which is then passed onto their children in the form of a predisposition to this particular form of cancer.

Little wonder, as most of science spins its wheels looking in the wrong direction of the chimera called genetics, that no progress is being made toward discovering either the direct causes of the virulent diseases running rampant in our age, much less any actual cures.

Monkeying around with the genetic code, splicing in genes from species entirely foreign to a plant, animal or human, can only have unforeseen adverse effects, some of which will threaten the existence of all life on earth if not halted in time!

Amazingly, when you consider how evolution-tainted science today so despises anything smacking of religion, this was all prophesied long ago:

“For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now — and never to be equaled again. If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened” (Matthew 24:21-22; Mark 13:19-20).

Science comes from the Latin word scire, to know, meaning: “knowledge.”

Though some of that knowledge is good, a lot of it is pure evil (witness all the terrorist weapons of mass destruction now threatening to exterminate all life on earth hundreds of times over).

Science is the path mankind took when it first sinned, choosing the fruit of the tree of the knowledge (science) of good and evil over the tree of life (Genesis 3).

One of the worst mistakes of pretentious science today is the entire myth of genetic-caused diseases, and the false “savior” hope in genetics to somehow “save” us from ourselves.

Only once mankind is finally forced to turn its collective back on genetic manipulation and experimentation will society finally learn the incredible truth, that we truly are our own worst enemies, and that worshiping before the monstrous altar of modern science (industrial, military and especially medical and pharmaceutical) is what has been largely responsible for the explosion in so many deadly diseases in recent history.

Obesity is the most important factor that accelerates the onset of diabetes, particularly Type II diabetes. According to recent studies, 1/3 rd of the children born today will be affected by Type II diabetes which is primarily obesity induced.

Obesity is a contributory factor in not only diabetes which, in turn, increases the risk of blindness, kidney problems and limb amputation, it also induces heart diseases and strokes. Therefore, it is imperative for those who are either at pre-diabetes stage or have developed Type II diabetes, to keep a tab on their body mass-index.

Body-Mass Index

Body-Mass Index (BMI) is a number that tells you how much fat your body consists of as a percentage of body weight. The number is not 100% accurate, particularly when based only on height and weight figures, yet it gives a good estimate, good enough to help you in your weight reduction efforts.

Ideally, you should determine your BMI in consultation with your doctor. He can not only provide you with some additional insights about its meaning, but also advise you on how you should begin your weight loss program in order to make it sustainable.

Nonetheless, if you are in a hurry to know how much fat your body consists of, you can use online calculators, by searching the term BMI or body mass index.

If you have no patience even for that, use this formula to calculate BMI-

BMI = Weight (in kg)

Height2 (in m)

For an average adult, a BMI of less than 20 means underweight, 20-25 means normal, 25-30 overweight and over 30 obese.

If your BMI falls above 25, that is you are obese or overweight, you are in real danger of developing Type II diabetes. Remember, it may lead to several complications including heart and kidney problems, blindness, even loss of limbs through amputation. So, immediately set out with a plan to lose weight, preferably in consultation with your doctor, and religiously adhere to it. In this way, you will not only keep yourself safe but also contribute to a healthy, diabetes free America.

Body mass index

The body mass index (BMI), or Quetelet index, is a statistical measurement which compares a person’s weight and height. Though it does not actually measure the percentage of body fat, it is used to estimate a healthy body weight based on how tall a person is. Due to its ease of measurement and calculation, it is the most widely used diagnostic tool to identify weight problems within a population, usually whether individuals are underweight, overweight or obese. It was invented between 1830 and 1850 by the Belgian polymath Adolphe Quetelet during the course of developing “social physics”.[1] Body mass index is defined as the individual’s body weight divided by the square of his or her height. The formulae universally used in medicine produce a unit of measure of kg/m2. BMI can also be determined using a BMI chart, which displays BMI as a function of weight (horizontal axis) and height (vertical axis) using contour lines for different values of BMI or colours for different BMI categories.
Read more at wikipedia

We’ll take a look at what causes obesity in this article.

• One reason for this is that the amount of time the modern person is physically active has decreased. There is not much need for physical activity in a modern society. Modern technology has made life very convenient for us. Instead of walking, we drive. We spend a lot of time watching television and in front of the computer. The only reason we are active is when we consciously choose to do so, like engaging in sports.
• Another factor that contributes to obesity is the easy availability of food. When food becomes easily available, people can just reach out without thinking and start snacking. In addition, food portions are bigger. There’s no food shortage in a modern society so people just buy more and eat more.
• Metabolism rate in general has also gone down. Due to a lack of physical activity, our bodies have no need to keep up a sustained rate of metabolism. What this means is that less fat is burnt, and are instead stored in the body.
• There can also be medical reasons for obesity. Cushing’s disease, for instance, can be a cause. So can certain medications. In such a case, a doctor should be consulted as soon as possible. He will be able to advise what medications to take and what to avoid.

Barring medical reasons that cause obesity, in order to lose weight, one would be required to change his or her lifestyle. There is no avoiding it.

Unhealthy habits need to be removed, and good habits need to be developed.