Are there any excuses?

Zodikosis

Can people always lose weight? "Can" is a funny word. Is it theoretically possible in all circumstances, assuming the person is a generic blackbox? Sure. Are there real barriers that push that goal outside the boundaries of some people's abilities due to their unique circumstances, personalities, past experiences, and physiologies? Yeah, definitely. Even if losing weight is simple in its details, it's by no means easy. Most people consider it an accomplishment for a reason.

I know that there were points in my life where, due to medication issues and mental health problems, it would've been impossible for me to lose weight. Not in the literal physiological sense, but in the sense that I couldn't even come close to handling the emotional, mental, and physical stress that comes with attempting to lose weight. My life was already kind of flying apart without that added task. At one point, I was on a particular SSRI that made me gain a ton of weight (20 lbs in a month, at one point -- I'm 5'1" F, for the record). The pill itself doesn't make you gain weight by any sort of magical biochemistry -- but it did make me crave sugar intensely AND it made me not give a damn about literally anything (seriously, anything. I went skydiving while on this medication and during the entire flight up + fall, my reaction was "meh...ok". I think I creeped out the instructor with my total lack of anxiety).

So yeah, in a way, some excuses are valid to me. Not in the sense that there's something physiologically stopping you (that's pretty rare), but there are lots of good reasons why weight loss isn't a priority to someone at the current moment. They may have bigger issues. They may not have the right mindset yet. Who knows? Who am I to judge?

murp4069

I think that there are times in a person's life where adding the stress of losing weight is too much to reasonably handle, and if that is the case, then that is a legitimate "excuse." And frankly, everyone handles their ish differently so who am I to judge? Now, when I see people on My 600 lb Life who do nothing but lay in bed all day demanding others bring them piles of food, I do not have much empathy. I don't believe there is any excuse for that. Yeah I know like all those people were molested as kids, but my sympathy runs thin when you are bedbound due to your weight and make no effort to get help or be a productive member of society.

But when I see someone who has an overwhelming life professionally and personally, I can see how adding weight loss to their life might be too much. It's not easy. It's scientifically easy, but mentally it is not necessarily or always easy. When I first started working on losing weight, I also wanted to quit smoking. I failed at quitting smoking over and over again during that time. But after about 6-9 months, once I had tracking down pat and had fallen comfortably into new routines for my weight loss, I was able to really focus on quitting smoking and was successful. Along with the stress of my job and home life, I mentally just could not start both of them at the same time and be successful with both. I had to put my focus on one and then the other.

gracegettingittogether

I just wanted to point out that it is a misconception to say that Being overweight requires overeating once you are there.

Because once a person IS overweight, they do not have to overeat to stay there- they just have to eat at maintenance to stay there.

Losing weight, what we have been talking about from the original post, is extra effort. So when we talk of people losing weight, we’re talking about people using energy to do so. And why would any of the above force people not to do that?

Because people are human, not robots or gods. People do not have unlimited energy, either physical or mental.

Heck, I’ll just quote something about it, to help illustrate. “When actively exhibiting self-control, individuals expend internal resources that are believed to be finite (Vohs and Faber, 2007). As such, many researchers contend that the energy cost associated with self-control is drawn from a pool of internal resources that are capable of being exhausted (Aspinwall and Taylor, 1997; Baumeister et al., 1998; Muraven et al., 1998; Muraven and Baumeister, 2000; Vohs and Heatherton, 2000; Baumeister and Vohs, 2007).” (From https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5124711/)

Which boils down to people having a limited amount of will power, so everything you use some of that will power for is one less thing you can use will power for later. ( there are more than one study one this, if you care to explore the topic).

Exercising uses self control and so does dieting, obviously.

But so does forcing yourself to study every night for school. So does putting up with a crap boss so you can pay for food for for your kids. So does working three jobs just to make ends meet. So does dealing with bigoted comments every single day without losing it and punching some jerk in the face, if you belong to a minority. So does keeping yourself from an addiction for someone who has abused alcohol or drugs in the past. So is keeping it together when you are in charge of a disabled relative or a sick kid. So does dealing with daily pain and illness. And on and on and on.

If someone’s mental and physical reserves are used up just surviving what they need to survive, they have nothing left for yet another stressor like losing weight.

Do you truly believe that everyone, in every walk of life, in every circumstance, has such unlimited personal resources that throwing another stressor into their lives is a healthy idea?

I personally do not. It does not seem likely. Probably because I have seen too many people deal with unbelievably hard things, having to make choices about what to spend their energy on and what to drop from their lives due to the energy costs, to believe that.

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Yes!!!! When people are dealing with depression and major, major life stressors, overeating is preferable to suicide. Now if it lasts for a long time, overeating may turn into suicide, but usually there is some time before that happens. Overeating is also better than falling into a catatonic state, where you cannot respond to anyone, including your children, or weeping 24/7, or being afrad to open one's mouth because screaming uncontrollably could follow. The comfort from overeating helped me to not do the things above, though not by much, and to get to counseling and actually follow through with a doctor's appt, which was a huge victory for me. Only after that, when I got some help with the stress and depression, was I able to even focus on losing weight. You can't focus with depression, you just have the same painful thoughts swirling around so thickly there is no room for anything else.
I hate when people say, "So what's your excuse?" Umm, trying to stay alive, and take care of my family, through all my worst nightmares coming true? I consider that a big accomplishment in itself.