What do you think of the obesity epidemic in the U.S.?

NewLIFEstyle4ME

I guess I don't like the term epidemic. In my mind, an epidemic is a communicable disease. I don't believe being overweigh is communicable nor do I believe it is a disease. (That is not to say there are not real diseases that cause weight gain.) It is sad to see overweight children. The adults I don't feel sad for because they chose that. As far as the economic/weight association I see often, I understand that it is more expensive to buy organic produce, but healthy foods (carrots, dried beans, apples, leaf lettuce not bagged,etc.) are cheaper than fast food. It takes more time, but that is a choice people have to make. Parents need to step up and decide what their children will or will not eat and not cave in when junior throws a fit. People need to step up and decide what they will eat and not cave in when they "don't feel like it." You have control over you. I have control over me. This isn't a country problem. This is a personal accountability and character problem. I am sure this sounds horribly caustic and mean, and I don't intend it as such. However, I think if each person takes personal responsibility instead of listing all the reasons it is difficult then we will see a change.

I agree:)

I agree too...but I do like and agree with the term "epidemic" of obesity...here's a dictionary definition of epidemic:

ep·i·dem·ic (p-dmk) also ep·i·dem·i·cal (--kl)
adj.
1. Spreading rapidly and extensively by infection and affecting many individuals in an area or a population at the same time: an epidemic outbreak of influenza.

2. Widely prevalent: epidemic discontent.
n.
1. An outbreak of a contagious disease that spreads rapidly and widely.

2. A rapid spread, growth, or development: an unemployment epidemic.

NewLIFEstyle4ME

people are lazy. they pick convenience foods over healthy, the fall victim to advertising (when was the last time you saw a commercial for grapes or green beans), and they don't want to put in the work. People don't want to change their habits in order to become healthy. they would prefer a quick fix pill or surgery if they think it would work instead.

and the worse part is, obesity costs US taxpayers an obscene amount of money every year! I hate to say it, but it is only going to get worse because people who are overweight tend to teach their bad habits to their kids too, and its unfortunate but I think its just going to continue.

:flowerforyou: :flowerforyou:

SanteMulberry

I do think it is a lack of education too. The other day, I saw a VERY fat man riding around in a scooter at the grocery store. I couldn't help but look at what he was stacking in the basket of his scooter. Cupcakes, doughnuts, white bread, bacon and orange juice. I wanted to plead with him, "Don't you know that stuff is killing you and robbing you of the life you might have lived?"

NewLIFEstyle4ME

I blame McDonald's, plus the parents of the children. McDonald's can be very addicting.

But ya know what? McDonald's doesn't force people to buy their food. When I was growing up, we ate at McDonald's and other fast foods joints as a special occasion, a special treat, an every once and a while visit....NOT as a substitute for our daily meals. Beans and rice and rice and beans, lots of homemade soups and stews, just cooking at home was the norm. Horrors upon horrors, before this obesity epidemic...Also, we didn't eat "breakfast cereals" like people do today daily either. We ate breakfast cereals only on Saturdays (which was when we stayed in the house longer than usual as well, to watch Saturday morning cartoons). we ate to live, not lived to eat and our foods didn't have to be so delectable, so delicious, so extravagant--today, we are addicted to a fast, convenient, lazy and self-indulgence and irresponsible, blame-shifting society--that's what we're addicted to and unless and until we're ready, willing and able to look the truth of who we ALL really are as a society and dare to take a deeper second look at the gospel of "self-esteem" and the I want it NOW and will worry about the consequences later...we're DOOMED:laugh: :sad: :laugh:

I added a laughing avatar...because I'm just crazy enough to believe that there is HOPE, which is why so many of us are on Mfp now...we just have to BE an "example" to the world (not merely talking the talk--but walking the walk--literally ) with our lives and new way of eating, drinking and looking--so that we provoke others to ask us, what the heck are you doing to look and feel so good, then we can share and hopefully be a positive influence on the lives of those closest to us and be part of the solution/answers and not just "whiners" as some say:flowerforyou:

AbsoluteNG

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

BodyCombatGirl73

It's bad and real. Not just the US but in Canada too. I used to think we were always "slimmer" than our cousins down south, but the last 5-10 years has certainly levelled that playing field.

We drove to Florida two years back and obviously drove down through NY, PA, VA, SC, etc. We stopped at a Wal-mart in VA and I was SHOCKED by the # of people in motorized vehicles, who clearly were not in them because they were amputees, but rather because they were too fat/obese. Then of course in Orlando, the # of fat/obese adults and children just continued. I was very thankful when my daughter and I were in a bathroom in a Target store that her staring of a REALLY large woman went unnoticed. I had to talk to her once we left the bathroom on the merits of how it is rude to stare, but you could see just how shocking it was to her as well.

We were recently in Jamaica, and our resort had a largely Canadian population, however one day I was in the hottub and this family (mom, dad and 20-ish year-old daughter) were in there as well. I knew by one look that they were American. The parent's were extremely large (definitely in the obese category) and the daughter looked as if she had been puffed up by an air pump. We got to talking and of course the old, "where are you from" comes up and bang! They were from PA, just outside Philly.

It really is the whole of North America that is in the same "epidemic". And some people on here are not comfortable using that term because a true epidemic is something that you can "catch" from someone else, but dare I say that our "justified" excuses of fast food and very little activity, is "catching on" to the general population.

And a final note of how our version of "normal weight" has become so distorted. I am 5'8" and look fine anywhere between 140-150. I am now around 135-137 lbs and all I hear is "don't lose anymore", "you are too skinny", etc, etc. However, for my height, anywhere from 128-140 is really my true "healthy" range! It is just our images of what is healthy have become so distorted, what used to be "normal" is now considered "skinny"!

magerum

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

lol wut?

AbsoluteNG

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

lol wut?

Lunch was the only meal of the day before the invention of the light bulb.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20243692

andyisandy

so far I got from this thread, blame your parents, blame the fast food, blame everyone and everybody else but your self. And really blaming the damn light bulb cause it created dinner? frack that! I blame my own poor food choices and lack of movement as I got older. Its my fault and no one elses. Christ why is it so hard to admit we put the food in our bodies and no one else?

SanteMulberry

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

Not sure where you got this information but it is false. People have been "breaking their fast" (thus the word "breakfast") from their nightly period of no-eating for many, many centuries. Now it is true that more agrarian people tend to eat their largest meal in the middle of the day with chores loaded up before and after that big meal (in hotter climates, they would likely take a nap after lunch) and then get back to work in the cooler part of the day. They would follow that period of work with a light supper and then go off to bed shortly after sundown.

quirkytizzy

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

lol wut?

Lunch was the only meal of the day before the invention of the light bulb.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20243692

This was also during a time when people thought bleeding with leaches was a proper medical treatment. Understanding of the human body and our needs continue to grow.

AbsoluteNG

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

lol wut?

Lunch was the only meal of the day before the invention of the light bulb.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20243692

This was also during a time when people thought bleeding with leaches was a proper medical treatment. Understanding of the human body and our needs continue to grow.

But they did not suffer from obesity did they?

quirkytizzy

But they did not suffer from obesity did they?

The rich often did. Those who had the money afford the food. We now live in an age (or at least America) where the food is plentiful, cheap. I'm not discrediting the history of 3 meals being a relatively new concept, I'm discrediting the idea that it plays a larger factor in obesity than not.

LiftAllThePizzas

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

SanteMulberry

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

lol wut?

Lunch was the only meal of the day before the invention of the light bulb.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20243692

There's a fair bit of misinformation in that article. I don't think it would be a good idea for us to model our eating habits after a lot of the monasteries. Archeologists have discovered that many of the monks were quite fat. There is a deformity of the spine that obese folk tend to get, which they discovered in abundance in monastery grave yards as opposed to just seeing occasionally in graveyards containing the skeletons of the average citizens of the same time period. The monks ate a lot of bread and drank a lot of wine or ale along with a lot of rich dairy products and meats. From historical accounts, they generally had rations of around 5,000 to 6,000 calories a day, of which, they were expected to give 10% to the poor. (Although it was probably not done on a calorie basis--more like volume and people tend to relish the higher calorie food items.)

AbsoluteNG

But they did not suffer from obesity did they?

The rich often did. Those who had the money afford the food. We now live in an age (or at least America) where the food is plentiful, cheap. I'm not discrediting the history of 3 meals being a relatively new concept, I'm discrediting the idea that it plays a larger factor in obesity than not.

I agree. If you read the article, the rich hunters of the 19 century had 24 dishes for breakfast as they were the only social class that could afford such lavish life style. The normal working class of that time however, only ate lunch. Most people today are still eating most of their calories in 1 meal, maybe even 2. With the addition of dinner, Americans are way over eating.

AbsoluteNG

I blame 3+ meals a day. Dinner as we know now never existed before the invention of the light bulb. Lunch was the only meal before the industrial revolution. Not sure how breakfast came about.

lol wut?

Lunch was the only meal of the day before the invention of the light bulb.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20243692

There's a fair bit of misinformation in that article. I don't think it would be a good idea for us to model our eating habits after a lot of the monasteries. Archeologists have discovered that many of the monks were quite fat. There is a deformity of the spine that obese folk tend to get, which they discovered in abundance in monastery grave yards as opposed to just seeing occasionally in graveyards containing the skeletons of the average citizens of the same time period. The monks ate a lot of bread and drank a lot of wine or ale along with a lot of rich dairy products and meats. From historical accounts, they generally had rations of around 5,000 to 6,000 calories a day, of which, they were expected to give 10% to the poor. (Although it was probably not done on a calorie basis--more like volume and people tend to relish the higher calorie food items.)

Intermittent Fasting is a model that works for many and works on a 2 or 1 meal a day basis, Leangains approach. The timing window to eat is very similar to that of how we ate before the invention of the light bulb.

magerum

But they did not suffer from obesity did they?

The rich often did. Those who had the money afford the food. We now live in an age (or at least America) where the food is plentiful, cheap. I'm not discrediting the history of 3 meals being a relatively new concept, I'm discrediting the idea that it plays a larger factor in obesity than not.

I agree. If you read the article, the rich hunters of the 19 century had 24 dishes for breakfast as they were the only social class that could afford such lavish life style. The normal working class of that time however, only ate lunch. Most people today are still eating most of their calories in 1 meal, maybe even 2. With the addition of dinner, Americans are way over eating.

Meal timing is irrelevant to weight control. Excess caloric intake leads to gains. I typically eat 2000 calories within an hour of going to bed (and yes I've eaten all day as well). I stay within my needs and I achieve my goals.

AbsoluteNG

Meal timing is irrelevant to weight control. Excess caloric intake leads to gains. I typically eat 2000 calories within an hour of going to bed (and yes I've eaten all day as well). I stay within my needs and I achieve my goals.

Thanks for the lesson in nutrition but that's not what this topic is about. This topic is about obesity and why in a general sense Americans are over weight. I agree with you that Meal timing is irrelevant but again that is not what I was getting at. I was getting at, most Americans are full by lunch time on a typical 3 square meals a day as breakfast, lunch, and dinner are still heavily promoted and believed as the normal and proper way to eat.

LiftAllThePizzas

Meal timing is irrelevant to weight control. Excess caloric intake leads to gains. I typically eat 2000 calories within an hour of going to bed (and yes I've eaten all day as well). I stay within my needs and I achieve my goals.

Thanks for the lesson in nutrition but that's not what this topic is about. This topic is about obesity and why in a general sense Americans are over weight. I agree with you that Meal timing is irrelevant but again that is not what I was getting at. I was getting at, most Americans are full by lunch time on a typical 3 square meals a day as breakfast, lunch, and dinner are still heavily promoted and believed as the normal and proper way to eat.

The rest of us who don't eat too much for breakfast or lunch do fine with dinner. They're eating too much for breakfast and lunch. It still comes down to eating too much, not what name a meal is given or what time it is consumed.