In Secrets From the Eating Lab, Dr. Mann states that eating 1,500 calories a few decades ago was considered starving yourself (scientists did a study with conscientious objectors to the Vietnam war, who submitted themselves to a diet of only 1,500 calories, and lost an average of 25% of their body weight over a period of six months, and they called the study, guess what?, starvation study, in order to learn more about what POW's endure)--today, it's considered a sensible diet.
In fact, one of the doctors at Stanford (whom I no longer work with) told me to eat 1,500 calories per day, and that if I did so, I would, of course, lose weight. The diet app I'm using tells me to eat 1,500 calories per day, and that I'm currently eating over 3,500 calories per day in order to maintain my body weight. Which may or may not be true.
The Neurologist suggested that I join "Overeaters Anonymous" because it's support, and it's free.
"OA believes that compulsive eating is a threefold disease: physical, emotional and spiritual, which, like alcoholism and drug abuse, can be arrested, but not cured."
I have major problems with that philosophy. How is being obese a problem with my relationship with God? If you want to take a much broader idea of spirituality, fine--but still, I get headaches thinking about it.
Obesity is probably a very complex problem. But, thanks to Dr. Mann, I believe it is at least in part a social problem. We encourage people to eat. Not only eat, but eat a lot. And then, we blame them when they do. We shame them when they do. I blame to a large extent advertising and the ubiquitous messages that we receive every single fucking day. You can't get away from food, even if you wanted to. Then, we have evolution, which says to eat while the gettin' is good (and, thankfully because of agricultural and technological advancements, that good is good all the time in our country). Not only are we programmed to eat when food is plentiful, but we are programmed to save it in our thighs, and in our stomachs (depending on the person and biological gender) until the last possible moment because there will come a famine, I know there will. And then, I read this, we are programmed to hate exercise because exercising means losing that hard-earned weight we scavenged for. I won't even get into the side effects of many medications of weight gain, which doctors don't understand (no one can explain to me why Seroquel causes weight gain). And we're beginning to see the complicated relationship we have with the microbes in our gut, how they might even affect our behavior, and our cravings for sweets, and how easy or how difficult it might be to lose weight.
The weird part is, which most people don't understand, I have a diet better than 90% of Americans. I can't remember the last time I had a piece of bread (although I do occasionally have pasta, and yes, I had rice with my sushi). My parents simply don't keep processed foods around in the house, although we have a bag of chips and a bag of popcorn that no one eats but occasionally (for the most part, I don't eat that either). My father does the cooking, and he always includes a vegetable and protein. Sometimes, he fries a piece of fish. For snacks, we have nuts. For breakfast, I eat fresh berries and low-fat, plain yogurt and then almonds mixed in. For lunch, depending on the day, I have a salad. In fact, I'm eating a salad right now that I bought at Costco.
My problem is, and it's quite obvious, I have a bowl of Dove milk chocolate candies on the counter in the kitchen. I gave up ice cream, and then a few days later, I found myself buying Valentine's candy.
I started eating healthier because I realized something that may or may not be true (researchers don't even know): what creates the link between obesity and certain diseases? (say, metabolic syndrome?)
Is it the fact that someone who is obese has a lot of adipose tissue?
Or is it the fact that this same person is relatively sedentary compared to his/her thinner comparisons and/or is it the fact that this same person has a less healthy diet compared to his/her thinner comparisons?
Maybe being fat kills, but maybe living the fat life kills.
I guess we'll find out.
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