OK, so there are often a few understandable misconceptions when people talk about weight gain, and I’m gonna climb up on my soap box and try to explain them as succinctly as possible.
1. The human body is designed to NOT lose weight. Weight loss is linked with death. And so the human body (or any mammal really) has learned to associate limited food types and amounts (and often limited food THOUGHTS) as a warning sign that the body is in trouble. So when people go on diets, and start cutting out food groups or sugar or eating smaller portions, the human body freaks out and floods your brain with hunger chemicals to try to get you to eat more. You’re on Jenny Craig, but your body thinks you’re stranded on a desert island and will do everything it can to get you obsessed with food and try to make you eat more. This is why dieting is so hard. It’s not because fat people are spoiled or have no self control. They are literally fighting life saving biological mechanisms to cut out foods and cut down portions.
Society of course, being very fat phobic and pro diet, will claim that fat people are just lazy, undisciplined and weak. I tried valiantly for 20 years to lose weight. And I did. A significant amount of it. But then, I eventually lost the battle against my body’s repeated attempts to make me eat and regained it all.
2. Almost all studies on the comparative poor health of fat people does not allow for smoking, lack of movement, drinking, drug use etc. Nor does it allow for the crippling anxiety (cortisol dumps) and stress that most fat people go through while living in a society that literally tells them they are disgusting, hated, unattractive, lazy and self destructive through all forms of media and social situations. Being fat can be very very stressful, and if we allow that a workaholic CEO can die of a heart attack because of stress, are we just gonna look the other way when stressed out fat people die more often?
not to mention that if you’re fat and go to the doctor for ANYTHING, most medical professionals will instantly tell you to start dieting and lose weight. Fat people avoid doctors because doctors shame fat people. Period. If I go to the doctor and complain of a pain in my side, I’ll get told to lose weight. Ditto if I have shortness of breath, a skin condition, a sprained ankle etc. So what happens when a thin person goes the doctor with a pain in their side, a sprained ankle or a skin condition?
3. You can be fat and healthy. YOU CAN BE FAT AND HEALTHY. There are fat athletes everywhere. Fat people practice yoga, run marathons, lift weights, have careers as trainers, aerobics instructors and professional dancers. I have and have always had low blood pressure and I am fat as fuck, which leads me to my fourth point.
4. Genetics plays a larger role than we think it does. Just ask all my thin friends with diabetes and heart disease that spend their free time riding bikes and hiking. If dad had heart disease or mom had diabetes, there’s a higher chance that you will too.
5. A person’s health is their own damn business. I can work out or not work out. I can eat salads or live on ice cream. It’s my body. I can do what I want with it. If our culture shamed and derided heavy drinkers, heavy pots smokers, people who exercised obsessively until they injured themselves or people who kill themselves at their high stress jobs the way they constantly mock and deride and criticize fat people, we’d be healthier overall.
6. There are no diseases that only fat people have. High cholesterol. High blood pressure. Cancer. Diabetes. Joint pain. Knee pain. Thin people have all of these issues too.
I could seriously go on about this all day, but I had to respond to some of the comments on this post. And even if you’re right. Even if a higher intake of fat and sugar and cholesterol or what have you makes you less healthy, cutting foods out will only mess up your metabolism, fuck up your body and give you disordered eating problems. The percentage of people who lost a significant amount of weight and kept it off for more than a decade… that is their life now. Exercise and dieting is a religion for them. Because unless you are intensely rigorous with what you eat and how much you move, your body WILL try to sabotage you. 95% of diets do not work long term and most people who lose lots of weight gain it back plus more.
I’m done now. TL;DR, diets don’t work. Fat people are not inherently unhealthy. Treat fat people with the respect and kindness you’d treat a thin person. Thank you
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