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Why do people overeat and/or become obese? Is it harder than average for some to lose weight?
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I do think a large part of the why is advertising and television, of course, when to eat and what to eat is up to the individual. There is personal responsibility. However there is less profit to be made ( food industry/corporations) if everyone maintains an acceptable weight.
Food is a resource that many of us over consume, and this is driven by advertisements. Yes, we are in charge of what we eat but we can't underestimate the power of being bombarded with commercials.3 -
What I'm see form the discussion is that there is a consensus that factors are different for different people and that they are a mix and degrees of these factors that influence overeating:
-Biological (from hormonal regulation, to craving, to diseases, to desire for sweetness, depression...)
-Behavioural (habits of sleep, eating patterns at home, work patterns, lack of activity patterns...)
-Environmental (social pressures, family and upraising, education, lifestyle, calorie availability ...)
I'm going to add to that self-perception - it's part biology, part environment but how we see ourselves as ok, not-ok in terms of weight, success and acceptance impacts how far we can let ourselves go. We are not purely objective when we look at ourselves and that self-perception also influences the other factors.
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lemurcat12 wrote: »Again, what doesn't pertain to me? I overeat easily. That it's not primarily sugar that I overeat doesn't mean I have a less difficult issue to deal with, as you seem to be saying, Deb. And you've acknowledged that for you it's sugar+fat.
Yes. It sure is difficult and frustrating to lose weight and keep it off. I'm learning a lot about variables amongst the population from this thread. This is helpful. I have discovered that I can manipulate my macros, eliminate trigger foods like salty fatty foods and sweet fatty foods to diminish hunger and cravings, but that doesn't work for all. If someone suspects that it might, then they can try it. I'm certainly acknowledging "one size does not fit all" and YMMV.2 -
Edited for typo:I do think a large part of the why is advertising and television, of course, when to eat and what to eat is up to the individual. There is personal responsibility. However there is less profit to be made ( food industry/corporations) if everyone maintains an acceptable weight.
Food is a resource that many of us over consume, and
**this is driven by advertisements. Yes, we are in charge of what we eat but we can't underestimate the power of being bombarded with commercials.
**I also saw that brought up in a weight study I was reading after researching a bit. People eat more while watching television because of the beautiful advertising from fast foods and grocery ads. The study said the visuals increase hunger signals from the release of leptin.
My husband bought potato chips two days ago because "it was on sale" and he "had coupons". I think that the store ad encouraged him to buy them. He left them on the counter and I walked by the opened package over and over. Instead of hiding it from myself by taking it down to the pantry like I normally would, I ate some because the familiar (leptin?) cravings kicked in. I have an easier time keeping to one serving with the smaller portion controlled sealed bags. I was mad at hubby but apologized to him because it was my lack of resisting cravings that caused me to eat it. He didn't force me to have them.
So I have two things that encouraged me to overeat:
1. Seeing something that I really like.
2. Eating something I really like.
I'm only half way joking here and don't want to make light of this because it isn't so simple nor is it funny. But sometimes I have to laugh about it or I will cry. I hate the repercussions which is bloating in the hands and feet after I eat too much sodium.
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EvgeniZyntx wrote: »What I'm see form the discussion is that there is a consensus that factors are different for different people and that they are a mix and degrees of these factors that influence overeating:
-Biological (from hormonal regulation, to craving, to diseases, to desire for sweetness, depression...)
-Behavioural (habits of sleep, eating patterns at home, work patterns, lack of activity patterns...)
-Environmental (social pressures, family and upraising, education, lifestyle, calorie availability ...)
I'm going to add to that self-perception - it's part biology, part environment but how we see ourselves as ok, not-ok in terms of weight, success and acceptance impacts how far we can let ourselves go. We are not purely objective when we look at ourselves and that self-perception also influences the other factors.
I can relate to these. Stress and lack of sleep are additional factors in my case.
Biological, behavioral, and environmental factots sum it up.
"Success and acceptance impacts how far we can let ourselves go" is very insightful. I have seen many people work like crazy to lose weight before a wedding or a trip or for a reunion, etc. It is almost like our desire to lose weight includes a vanity perspective. Also people who become single and available often lose weight for the dating market.1 -
So, besides sugar, salty things cause me to overeat also.
Sugary things and salty things are inanimate objects. They are just food. You are giving them power that they don't have. Why?
I don't mean to nitpick at your choice of words, but they way you frame this situation in your mind can alter your perception and limit the choices that you are able to see. I just wanted to offer you a bit of feedback for you to consider.
Another way of framing the situation is that you make choices to overeat sugary and salty foods that don't help you to achieve the goals you've set for yourself. You have ceded power to certain foods and, in doing so, you have absolved yourself of your personal responsibility to make choices that empower you.
You have lots of choices available to you when it comes to handling sugary and salty foods effectively. But as long as you hold onto the belief that they cause you to overeat, you will not be able to see those options and will continue in your comfortable behavior pattern.
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I watched an interesting documentary on how food is staged to make it look really palatable when photographed. One of the things they do is use motor oil on it to give it a nice sheen and enrich the colors. This got me thinking about ways to resist palatable looking food, and it made me remember an acquaintance of mine who was obsessed with chocolate milk and wanted to stop drinking it. Everytime she saw it in the store she imagined it had soured & curdled, or worse yet Gross Alert that it had maggots in it. It worked. So now when there is a bunch of really yummy food at work (which is a regular occurrence) and I want to stick to my plan, I imagine it with botulism or E. coli or Another Gross Alert hair or maggots in it. I do not touch it. Ugh. It works LOL!!!4
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Prelogging or staying away works for me too. Then I can tell myself that I have to keep with my daily program and will have more strength. I don't know why this is that I can control portions better while logging. But perhaps it is a reality check, and I don't want to go over the calories for the day.KetoneKaren wrote: »Ha! @EvgeniZyntx Good question. I would like to add that the combination of fat and carb like in french fries or potato chips is an "excitogen" for me so I either stay away or weigh them & eat them after pre-logging them which for some reason works for me. I woke up this morning thinking about this ongoing debate involving semantics. There certainly is something having to to with the pleasure centers of the brain that drives some of us to think about and crave certain foods, and it worsens or becomes more intense if we eat them so that we want them more.
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So, besides sugar, salty things cause me to overeat also.
Sugary things and salty things are inanimate objects. They are just food. You are giving them power that they don't have. Why?
Another way of framing the situation is that you make choices to overeat sugary and salty foods that don't help you to achieve the goals you've set for yourself. You have ceded power to certain foods and, in doing so, you have absolved yourself of your personal responsibility to make choices that empower you.
Not helpful for me. This may apply for you.
I make choices NOT to eat them. That gives me personal responsibility to avoid them. Not the other way around.5 -
I had a couple of hours drive to get to a client site this morning and while driving there was a phone-in show about obesity (because of a recent report highlighting an expected increase in obesity related illness in the UK in the next decade or so). What struck me about the phone in was that pretty much everyone that called in who was obese justified it one way or another - usually saying it was because of a medical condition. Just one lady called in and admitted that her being overweight was just simply because she was eating more than she thought (and she mentioned she realised that when she started tracking her food intake on MFP). Now while I'm sure that there are cases where a medical situation will be a factor it did sound like it many cases the excuses were just that - excuses.
I'm technically obese (current BMI is 31) and while I suppose I could justify it based on workload or work related stress the simple truth is that I'm overweight because I've been eating more calories that I'd been burning. The bottom line is that I can control my eating, I can exercise and I can make time for exercise - so solving the issue is entirely under my control - and I suspect most people are just like me.5 -
KetoneKaren wrote: »I watched an interesting documentary on how food is staged to make it look really palatable when photographed. One of the things they do is use motor oil on it to give it a nice sheen and enrich the colors. This got me thinking about ways to resist palatable looking food, and it made me remember an acquaintance of mine who was obsessed with chocolate milk and wanted to stop drinking it. Everytime she saw it in the store she imagined it had soured & curdled, or worse yet Gross Alert that it had maggots in it. It worked. So now when there is a bunch of really yummy food at work (which is a regular occurrence) and I want to stick to my plan, I imagine it with botulism or E. coli or Another Gross Alert hair or maggots in it. I do not touch it. Ugh. It works LOL!!!
My mom actually accidentally drank milk that had gone bad. She never wanted to drink it on its own as a beverage again. Interestingly she COULD consume it in cereal and loved ice cream and milkshakes.0 -
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I'm technically obese (current BMI is 31) and while I suppose I could justify it based on workload or work related stress the simple truth is that I'm overweight because I've been eating more calories that I'd been burning. The bottom line is that I can control my eating...
We all know that we are overweight because we consume more calories than we burn. This thread is discussing "why"? If it were so simplistic thrn we wouldn't struggle with losing the weight.1 -
The article cited in the OP following up on BL contestants mentioned that they struggled with maintaining after the diet is over. When I was thin I didn't have to diet just to maintain and naturally and intuitively stayed within a couple pounds of my normal weight. Actually I never counted calories until about 4 years ago. I have managed to lose 10 pounds but am struggling to get the last 10 off because the margins for deficit are small. I'm not making excuses. I'm trying to find answers. If my body isn't giving me the internal signals like it once did I have somehow lost something I once had.3
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@DebSozo One time when I was within 10lbs of goal I made 2 changes that allowed me to get to goal: I stopped eating after a certain hour, and I took up another physical activity (I think it was Carolina Shag) that was fun. Not that these would be your things, but it became much less agonizing because I turned my attention to learning the dance. When I wanted to eat after a certain hour, I practiced my dance steps instead. It worked quite well.3
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KetoneKaren wrote: »@DebSozo One time when I was within 10lbs of goal I made 2 changes that allowed me to get to goal: I stopped eating after a certain hour, and I took up another physical activity (I think it was Carolina Shag) that was fun. Not that these would be your things, but it became much less agonizing because I turned my attention to learning the dance. When I wanted to eat after a certain hour, I practiced my dance steps instead. It worked quite well.
Great advice! I can do that.0 -
I like Zumba. My husband goes to bed early because he gets up for work at 3:30, so he wouldn't appreciate the music late at night. But I could add it in early in the morning.0
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I had a couple of hours drive to get to a client site this morning and while driving there was a phone-in show about obesity (because of a recent report highlighting an expected increase in obesity related illness in the UK in the next decade or so). What struck me about the phone in was that pretty much everyone that called in who was obese justified it one way or another - usually saying it was because of a medical condition. Just one lady called in and admitted that her being overweight was just simply because she was eating more than she thought (and she mentioned she realised that when she started tracking her food intake on MFP). Now while I'm sure that there are cases where a medical situation will be a factor it did sound like it many cases the excuses were just that - excuses.
I'm technically obese (current BMI is 31) and while I suppose I could justify it based on workload or work related stress the simple truth is that I'm overweight because I've been eating more calories that I'd been burning. The bottom line is that I can control my eating, I can exercise and I can make time for exercise - so solving the issue is entirely under my control - and I suspect most people are just like me.
This statement is kind of dear to me because it always seems to be called out as a motivation for claiming an addiction. To be excused means to be relieved of consequences. What was the nature of the call in? In this thread, the question is asked to determine reasons or causes. Saying one is addicted does not excuse them of consequences any more than not knowing how much they were eating, or bad time management does. It is just a slightly different problem for them which may require slightly different solutions. Notice that I said different and not harder. We all have our own journey. Knowing the parameters of the problems we face enables us to effectively seek out a solution. I am thankful for threads like these where those parameters can be discussed.3 -
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mskessler89 wrote: »I do wonder how much medicine factors into this. Do some obese people feel like there's more of a safety net, that our medical advances will be able to save them? I know a person who abuses alcohol who assumes that if he needs a new liver, he'll just get a transplant. If medicine allows you to continue in your pleasurable but harmful habits, do you take advantage of that.....?
People DO abuse the medical profession, and that infuriates me as much as the people who are infuriated with "big pharma" taking advantage of sick people.
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I had a couple of hours drive to get to a client site this morning and while driving there was a phone-in show about obesity (because of a recent report highlighting an expected increase in obesity related illness in the UK in the next decade or so). What struck me about the phone in was that pretty much everyone that called in who was obese justified it one way or another - usually saying it was because of a medical condition. Just one lady called in and admitted that her being overweight was just simply because she was eating more than she thought (and she mentioned she realised that when she started tracking her food intake on MFP). Now while I'm sure that there are cases where a medical situation will be a factor it did sound like it many cases the excuses were just that - excuses.
I'm technically obese (current BMI is 31) and while I suppose I could justify it based on workload or work related stress the simple truth is that I'm overweight because I've been eating more calories that I'd been burning. The bottom line is that I can control my eating, I can exercise and I can make time for exercise - so solving the issue is entirely under my control - and I suspect most people are just like me.
This statement is kind of dear to me because it always seems to be called out as a motivation for claiming an addiction. To be excused means to be relieved of consequences. What was the nature of the call in? In this thread, the question is asked to determine reasons or causes. Saying one is addicted does not excuse them of consequences any more than not knowing how much they were eating, or bad time management does. It is just a slightly different problem for them which may require slightly different solutions. Notice that I said different and not harder. We all have our own journey. Knowing the parameters of the problems we face enables us to effectively seek out a solution. I am thankful for threads like these where those parameters can be discussed.
Nicely said.2
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