how long have you kept it off?

jojoworks

I copied and pasted an article from today's Minneapolis Star and Tribune below. While I completely support the effort to work on reducing childhood obesity, there's one sentence in this article that gave me pause:
"No successful long-term weight loss interventions for adults have been identified, so preventing obesity among children in the first place is critical."
ummmm.....topic for discussion?


$7 million grant launches childhood obesity center at U

Project hopes to start early, change habits.

By JEREMY OLSON, Star Tribune

Last update: September 9, 2010 - 10:10 AM

The University of Minnesota is creating a childhood obesity center with the help of a $7 million federal grant to transform the exercise and eating habits of as many as 530 families.

Researchers will use the grant, announced Thursday, to connect families with health advocates in primary care clinics, enroll them in classes about healthy foods and active lifestyles, and improve their access to healthy foods and recreation opportunities.

"Childhood obesity prevention is critical because it is associated with a higher risk of adult obesity," said Simone French, a childhood nutrition expert at the U who will direct the center. "No successful long-term weight loss interventions for adults have been identified, so preventing obesity among children in the first place is critical."

The researchers will mostly select low-income or ethnically diverse families, which have higher rates of obesity and related diseases such as diabetes. They will also focus on families with preschool-aged children, whose dietary and exercise habits haven't been formed.

The National Institutes of Health awarded the grant funding to the U and to the HealthPartners Research Foundation, which will collaborate in the research project. The first phase will take place over two years and involved 30 families. The second phase will take place over three years and involve 500 families.

Improving access to healthy foods and information is a major goal. The researchers among other things will work with local stores to ensure they have healthy foods such as fresh produce available. They will also use local schools in Minneapolis and St. Paul for the family education classes.

HealthPartners' Nancy Sherwood said it is important to provide opportunities "where families spend much of their time" in order to encourage long-lasting changes in the health routines of children and parents.

rfialkiewicz

Starting life with healthy habits does help. Breaking bad habits is very hard.

I kept off the original 60 lbs for a year. I only gained back 20 before catching my bad habits again.

MrsSki

"No successful long-term weight loss interventions for adults have been identified, so preventing obesity among children in the first place is critical."

So are they saying that diet and excercise don't work for long term weight loss? Seems odd, I know lots of people who have dieted and excercised their way to long term weight loss. I think that this could be an important program, because the obesity epidemic in this country is out of control, but I definitely do not agree with that sentence. I think anyone can lose weight by diet and excercise, but they have to want to lose weight and they have to commit to a life-style change. I think losing weight is just like quitting smoking and/or drinking, (and just as important). It takes a life-style change, there are no quick fixes. And from the article it sounds like they are promoting a life-style change, so I'm not sure why Simone French doesn't think there haven't been any long-term weight loss interventions for adults. Imho, it's kind of an odd article. Simone contradicts what the study is attempting to do by that statement.

bonnienm

Lost 50+ pounds and have kept it off for 7 months and hopefully will for the rest of my life!!! I usually gain a couple of pounds over the weekend and then lose it during the week but haven't been under 50 lbs lost for this long!

It takes about as much work to keep it off as losing it did but if we keep at it we can keep it off. I think 99.9% of it is in our heads and motivation!

00trayn

Maybe the statement was thinking medical treatments, but even then people who have had gastic bypass or lapbands are able to keep the weight off. I definitely don't see myself ever going back to the way I was before (minus having to get rid of baby weight at some point in my life) and I also don't see myself being able to do that without keeping up healthy eating and occasional exercise. I'd call that long term weight loss intervention. I didn't want to be fat, I intervened to change my habits, and voila... bye bye 50 pounds. I'd call that success!

4lafz

While written very poorly, I believe they are saying that habits are learned early in life. It is important for kids to learn healthy lifestyles young because as adults we have lots of trouble learning a new lifestyle. Most people - even on this site - tak of being on "a diet". I struggle everyday with learning this new healthy eating lifestyle. I also have a problem with the Mothers that are still letting their kids have unhealthy snacks and "trying to resist them". Now is the time for mothers to teach the kids about healthy eating and bring them into the kitchen to cook healthy meals and treats. My dear niece does a marvelous job at this.

LittleSpy

Permenantly changing habits is extremely difficult. In many cases folks regain weight because they slowly regress to the unhealthy habits they've had for years and years and years. Someone with food issues (and let's face it, most of us who have significant amounts of weight to lose have food issues) is very similar, mentally and physically, to a drug addict. Losing weight is much like breaking a drug addiction.

I've been at this for a year and I can still pretty easily slip back into some of my old habits if I'm not paying enough attention. I think the important thing is I'm conscious of it. The previous couple of times I've successfully lost weight I had gained all of the weight back within a year of starting to lose it. This time is very different for me so I have no doubts that I'll be living a healthier lifestyle while maintaining an 80 pound loss (and losing more!) for the rest of my life.

I do think childhood education and intervention is key, though. At least for me because my serious issues with food have existed as far back into my childhood as I can remember.

jojoworks

I so totally agree that children need to be taught how to live healthy and how to eat right. Remember 20 or so years ago how kids at school got taught about recycling, now those young adults wouldn't even consider tossing their cans into the garbage can. It's just in their mind-set.

As for us folks who are adults now trying to un-learn a life long pattern of bad eating; I certainly don't think its a lost cause. But, you sure have to stick with it. And it is a total commitment to life-style change. I don't think most people use this site to drop a quick 10 or 20 lbs and then expect to go back to eating the way they used to eat. I'm thinking I'm in this for the long haul. I visualize myself logging my food here forEVEH! Once you stop being mindful of what you eat, you start eating stuff you shouldn't be or in quantities too large. I've lost 33 and need to lose another 50 for sure. I'm not in a hurry, its just a process I'm engaged with. I don't intend to "un-engage".

happy eating, good living!!
JoJo

jennylynn84

The statement is probably made because the percentage of weight-losers that actually keep that weight off is less than half of those who lose weight. Some studies have said 60% gain it back, others 95%. It varies, but the long and the short is that the odds certainly seem against us.

Keep in mind as well, included in those statistics are SlimFasters, NutriSystem, weight loss pills, soup dieters, and grapefruit dieters — diet strategies with a even higher rate of failure. Life-style change folks, like most of us here on MFP, likely stand the greatest chance of success. Certainly, finding a sustainable way to live healthier that doesn't make you miserable is the key, as "diet fatigue" is one of the leading causes of regaining weight, from what I've read.

Even if I do keep all my weight off.... it would have been nice to not have been fat my whole life up until 26. I can get behind few causes as much as I can get behind fighting childhood obesity. Science actually predicts that this is the first generation that will not live as long as their parents will. In previous years, advances in medical science have increased the lifespan. But scientific advances cannot be made fast enough to undo the damage years of being obese causes.

TateFTW

I don't eat in McDonald's anymore, but when I did I would always see obese parents (some who could no longer walk) getting "happy" meals (ironic use of the term) for their fat little kids. I find it sickening, because as adults we can choose if we want to be healthy or eat crap. That child has no choice but to be a little fatty who has trouble getting up a single flight of stairs and can't play sports with their friends, and that's sad. We need a huge change from a cultural standpoint if we want to continue to increase life expectancy.

As for the title questions, I've succesfully kept my weight off for 5 years. I lost 100 lbs. in 2005, then basically kept it off to this point (right now I'm only 6 lbs. heavier then my lowest adult weight of 209 lbs. in 2006).