FORGET BMI!!

I am 5'4 and fluctuate between 142-145... The chart says i'm close to being "over-weight". Do i consider myself over-weight? NO. I am just out of shape and need to tone down my midsection. Now, with that in mind, guess how much my body fat% is??? How about 40! I have always had a high fat%... i guess i'm what you'd call "skinny-fat". Even in high school, i remember getting measured in P.E. with all my class mates and i would always be the highest fat winner~ Go figure:drinker:

I am also looking to ditch the BMI 'ideal' weight. I have set my goal at still overweight as this is a goal where I'll be my slimmest in 14 years. After that I'll be aiming for 1 stone at a time and seeing how I feel and look. Whatever I lose will be much better than my weight has been in the past, so that is all that matters to me. I don't smoke or drink and regularly exercise so if I am slightly 'overweight' I won't feel bad about it.

I am going to uni to be a nurse and have heard from nurses that it was proposed that the BMI system should be scrapped in the UK. I don't know if this will happen but it suggests that even health professionals don't entirely believe in it.

I am overweight based on BMI at 153-155 and 5'5". However my body fat is around 22% with a 28" waist (we have calipers, and it's consistent with my bodybugg body measurement estimate as well). I choose to go by body fat rather than BMI.

I don't disagree with the comments about BMI, but it's a tool....and only that. As a retired P.A. in internal medicine, I can tell you that I would have been THRILLED to death if all of my patients could have managed to get down into the "overweight" range for BMI. But sadly, in my adult patient population, there were too many people (women) who considered themselves "curvy" when in fact, they *were* obese. Hollywood images of emaciated young men and women are not realistic role models, the BMI isn't perfect, but denial is a powerful thing, and if seeing in print that you are morbidly obese or obese helps to create an action plan for better nutrition and exercising, I'm all for it.

Agree 100%. I"m a retired internist so we come from the same background. The normal BMI gives one a lot of lattitude with a wide range of acceptable weight so being in the upper or lower end of the range can usually account for differences in body frame etc but I do think there is a lot of denial as you mentioned with people claiming they would be a skeleton etc. Don't we all think we have "large frames" as the reason for us being overweight. It makes no sense to throw out the whole formula because it doesn't work for some world class athletes who have a ton of muscle mass. Most people on this list are not in that category and I think it is a good guideline and it makes no sense just to dismiss it out of hand. If one doesn't want to be in the normal range then so be it but I agree that there may be some aspects of denial going on here.

Right on! Even at my lightest weight, 154 lbs, when I looked good and healthy, the BMI calculators all told me I was still overweight.

Ok, maybe I'm missing some piece of information but here goes...

Body weight = 250 lbs
Body fat percentage = 45% (let's calculate high for possible product inaccuracy)

250 x 0.45 = 112.5 of body fat weight

250 - 112.5 = 137.5 of lean body weight, a.k.a. bone, muscle, organs, etc.

My understanding is that if you lose weight in a healthy way by eating an appropriate amount of healthy calories and include strength training, you should not lose lean body weight. That being said...

137.5 x 0.01 = 1.375 is 1% of body fat weight

137.5 + 1.375 = 138.875 new body weight with 1% body fat and under 140.

I know 1% is not healthy or even possible, but unless I plan to lose lean body weight I don't see 140 in my future and I'm okay with that. Now, if there is something about lean body weight that I'm missing I'd really like to know as I'm constantly trying to learn new things regarding my health, fitness and weight loss journey.

You are missing that you ARE going to loose lean muscle. That's because you will no longer be carrying the excess weight. Your body will not need the amount of muscle you currently have, and even with weight training, you will not be able to keep that much muscle mass. Think about it, 24hrs a day you carry those 112.5 lbs of body fat that you have calculated. You get up, down, walk, etc. with that extra weight. Say you lost 50 lbs of fat. Would you replace those 50lbs with say sand bags in the exact same places 24hrs a day, 7 days a week? It's just not possible.

Here's an extreme example of how BMI can fail. Male body builders sometimes shoot for 2% to 3% body fat for time of competition, which is so close to death that it can't be sustained for long. Say you were 6ft tall and were at 230lbs for competition at 3% body fat. Your BMI would be calculated at 32. Anything over 30 is obese. That body builder is NOT obese. Matter of fact he needs to fatten up.

You can also have a normal BMI and have an unhealthy amount of fat. The show "The Doctors" did a piece on "Skinny Fat" that illustrated this specific issue.

The problem with BMI and insurance companies is that the people making decisions based on BMI are usually either undereducated or ignorant to BMIs limitations. They may look at this one number and decide that the person with numbers that are off the range are uninsurable, and insure those that are actually at higher risk for problems due to body fat.

BMI is a TOOL. Like any other tool you need to realize its proper use and limitations. If it's not working or helping you to know your BMI, don't use it as a guide. Personally, even at 178, the BMI calculator says I am "overweight." I would have to get down to 168 to be at the hight end of normal, and I could go down to 126lbs and still be considered "normal." I'd have to loose some lean muscle just to get to 168, and I don't plan to be alive when I hit 126lbs again.

Use the right tool for the right job, at the right time, and for the right reason. I COULD dig a hole with a hammer, but it's more appropriate to use a shovel. However, just because I need a shovel to dig holes it doesn't mean I am throwing my hammer out.

I found that link really interesting. It backs up what I have always said - that people in the modern western world have completely lost track of what humans are supposed to look like. You don't see wild animals with rolls of fat, and we aren't meant to have them either. I anticipated almost every one of the results in that link from looking at the pictures before I read the classification.

I wouldn't include the whole western world. There are a lot of Europeans who are slim and look great.

On that note, I think that if folks traveled abroad a bit to countries where people were actually within the BMI, they might change their understanding and see that we, Americans, are for the most part overweight, and the BMI is pretty accurate at telling us the truth even though we think, "No way!"