Is WEIGHT GAIN caused by genetics or not? **For my Paper**

Genetics affects your body type, metabolism, and how well you may absorb some nutrients, but weight gain is still from consuming more calories than you burn above your individual TDEE.

I am not familiar with POTS at all. I hope you do well and thank you for your kind posts.

The electrolyte issue is huge for these disorders. I was once ordered back to the hospital from a routine blood test as my sodium was so low, they said I was going to have a heart attack. I love salt, but it does not metabolize well enough in me. Hence, I MUST eat sodium. Your wife's disease does sound genetic to me, but I am not familiar with it. In contract, all of us in both disease groups much eat low fat, higher carb. Exercise is very difficult. When I was young, I could. And I did, for grueling hours a day trying to keep my weight off. Now at age 54, I go into spasms - which is running out of fuel- without exercise. When I say spasms- I have what I consider a normal level, for me. What I try to avoid is ones that are like a woman screaming in labor. I am going to try marching in place at at least 120 steps per minute and see if I can add ANY exercise at all. I am all about avoiding crisis, I do house work in bits and pieces. I would love to have my energy back- I do all kins of things and take all kinds of things to improve it. Again, I will not win, but I can make it better!

this is how I am going to calculate MARCHING IN PLACE:

Timing your walking while on your virtual treadmill, along with performing some simple math, will tell you how many calories you are burning. For each half-hour you march in place at a normal brisk pace of 120 steps per minute (about 3.5 miles per hour), you will burn an amount of calories that equals your weight in pounds.

In other words, if you weigh 150 pounds, marching in place on the virtual treadmill will burn 150 calories each half-hour, or 300 calories each hour.

To find out how many calories you are burning per minute, simply divide 150 calories per half-hour by 30 minutes, or divide 300 calories per hour by 60 minutes, which, in this case, equals 5 calories per minute.

keep in mind I am not trying to discredit your disorder and I completely understand what you go through. I spend the last 3 years with my wife in and out of hospitals. No only does she have an orthostatic intolerance (inability to regulate blood volume/pressure), she had a ruptured gallbladder, pancreatitis, and diverticulitis. With her condition, like yours, she has an electrolyte imbalance. In fact, water dehydrates her. When she drinks water, she adds an electrolyte tablet to ensure she maintains a healthy balance. She also drinks coconut waters as they are naturally high in electrolytes. Her diet has to be high fat, low carb, no gluten. Her resting heart rate is generally around 85-100 bpm and after she goes from sitting to standing it can go as high as 140. Due to her bodies inability to regulate her heart beat and blood pressure, cardio is not an option for her. In fact, I have developed a weight training program that works at her pace, to help aid the blood flow process.

Is POTS genetic.... probably not. There hasn't been any evidence in the community, that I have seen, that would suggest it is. But based on the information someone posted early, there aren't many genetic diseases that effect weight. I apologize if you think I was attacking you (BTW, my avatar is a lemon on a skateboard) but I wasn't. I was suggesting that genetics do not play a lot in terms of weight management. Even those with these metabolic disorders CAN be skinny or overweight. Those overweight, can become skinny through the understanding of nutritional requirements and dietary needs. Also, take into consideration that most of these metabolic disorders are RARE. And when write a paper, you want to address the majority first and caveat those outside the normal.

I also have POTS and Supraventricular tachycardia. My resting heart rate goes as high as 210 bpm (at which point I am hospitalized). From the research I have done and what I have studied in school, I also don't believe POTS is genetic. No one in my family has it.

Genetics may give a person a predisposition or increased likelihood of weight (or specifically fat) gain but that does not mean the gain is inevitable.

Heredity is not destiny as the saying goes...

BEST answer!

The thread was asking if it was credible that genetics do not affect weight or do they. I was one of the early people to post, knowing that the general conception of this is it does not exist. Which it does. And the people are terribly sick. Most MD, FOD Disorders, Glycogen Uptake Disorders….and a thousand more. Metabolic issues kill many people, many infants and babies. They also end up with people becoming immobilized- in wheel chairs, needing constant blood transfusions until they give up and die, organ transplants- liver, kidneys, heart- which none of them will ever get- they will die, and yes weight gain. I could give you a hundred more symptoms of people in just these TWO categories of disorders, which also will cause weight gain as a symptom as we do not metabolize correctly.

So no. Those of us who have these diseases, in our spare time between transplants, do not find posts about genetic diseases as "in jest". I also survived cancer. I hope someone finds that funny and puts up a photo of someone who lost a limb from that! Are you saying that would be the same thing? I doubt it, you would recognize it as cruel at once. So was this.

As the photo is labeled, that is is her genetic disorder, than what else could be concluded?

My ability to read was how I sorted this out. I think that was your question. How did I determine it was in reference to people with genetic disorders? As it was labeled. It was entered into a thread about Genetic Disorders and Weight.

I think I was clear as to why I assumed she meant it was about disorders of the genetic kinds. Please feel free to ask any other questions you may have .

If you have an endocrine disorder (PCOS, insulin resistance, diabetes, Hashimoto's, etc.), weight gain still happens even if the person is burning more calories than they are consuming.

No.

If that was the case, these bodies would have solved the world's energy problem by actually creating energy while starving themselves.

In these cases the body burns LESS, but people typically use a generic calculator which doesn't take account of their condition.

They don't realise that their body has a reduced BMR, so continue to eat more calories than their body needs.

The simplest way to work out deficit or surplus in such situations is to average out long term body weight tracking. If it's going up, you are in a surplus, not a deficit. You have more going in than coming out.