My Message to an Obesity Researcher

People Living With Obesity Need a Voice

"Nothing will change until they stop calling fat people liars, and the profit motive behind the failed answers is not held as the highest priority. I spent 17 years trying to find out why I was so overweight and this means years of suffering and almost dying of leg infections before finding out I had Lipedema Stage IV which is a rare fat disorder. The doctors even had discovered the endless "fatty tumors" throughout my body as early as 2000. My blog was started even to find out what was wrong with me 5 years ago and I achieved that goal. The diets are failing, many of us eat normal amounts of calories--I track all my food and follow a nutritionist and we are still fat and judged by society. They think everyone's body works the same. Nothing will change for the better until the stigma is removed and fat people are BELIEVED." 

Are Calories Themselves a MYTH?

Calories poorly grasped for maintaining weight:Obesity experts concerned about caloric literacy

I like Dr. Sharma's other writings and website, but disagree about calories.

To be honest, I have wondered to the shock of others, if calories are even "real". A few friends have chuckled saying, "Now Five Hundred Pound Peep, you may be getting out to lunch with this one!"

Some may wonder about me saying, that "Is she insane"? Yeah I know I am pondering something that is a bit different. Just thinking aloud. But what else would you expect of someone like me? Remember I've had enough strange health problems not to buy all the "accepted wisdom" as complete and utter fact. One day if technology and knowledge is allowed to expand anymore and it's not a new "dark age" and if the world hasn't ended by then, well one day, the facts will prove they got fat people wrong, very wrong.

But I always have had that thought lately, I mean given calories don't seem to mean a thing to my body, and I am told all this stuff about how they work, and I never see the evidence, tell me why I should believe the whole "calories in and calories out" myth? Why should I believe fewer calories mean weight loss?  How many fat people do I know that worry about every little bit that crosses their mouths while so many people who are thin, just eat when hungry and let the chips fall where they may, literally.

I know EXACTLY what calories are in everything. I can sit here and add up what I ate today, and yesterday. Every fat person over the age of  25 just about knows every calorie in every food. They drum it into your head. Hey I kept endless food diaries for YEARS. Do Weight Watchers enough and the other stuff, and you got the calories memorized. Toss out a food, the portion, and I bet I can hit within 50 to 100 calories where it's at. By the way for some reason everything you eat out, has far more calories.  I know what foods have more calories then others. With nutrition, given my health food interests and others, I can tell you what foods to eat for healing different diseases. This book is referred to all the time in my household.

They ignore metabolism when it comes to the CALORIES IN and CALORIES out formula, and they ignore the bodily systems that turn calories to fat so automatically and how this system is thrown off.

Hey did you know they literally figured out the calories in food, by lighting them on fire and BURNING them, I kid you not. Any hands? Even Straight Dope admits that is SIMPLICITY, but is the human body simple? NO. Also just adding up the carbohydrates, proteins and fats too seems very limited as well, given that even nutritionists admit to the existence of micro-nutrients.  Hmmm, so if you don't even know everything that exists in food yet? Maybe I distrust science, or maybe I just realize so much of it today isn't as unbiased as it claims. The other day, a food company told me GMOs were safe......hmmmmmm

Do they even understand completely how this energy is utilized? Calories are a measure of "heat", by that alone the fat process is not explained.

How come no fat people ever are studied when it comes to calories?

The math never added up for me. You do realize to be 500 lbs, they expect your caloric intake to be over 10,000 calories a day.  I couldn't afford the groceries. I mean they have so much of our society dedicated to calories in and calories out, and well, all the health magazines, shows, constant beration isn't stopping anyone from getting fat is it? Why do we believe something that does not work? By the way what is with those women's health magazines that tell everyone to lose weight and then put in endless recipes for things like h'ordeuvres dripping in olive oil and 20 dollar a pound fish?

I guess it's like the old days when people believed in spontaneous generation, accepted as fact, not questioned until later. They may light a pound of fat on fire and claim it that it equals 3500 calories and try and divide up the food into the simplest equations, but something isn't adding up. Feel free to disagree with me here, or that I am on too much of a stretch, this discussion is open.

Programmed to Be Fat! Man Made Chemicals Are Making Us Fatter!

Programmed to Be Fat

second link here too:

Programmed to Be Fat?

But a small group of scientists have begun looking beyond the obvious because of a group that can’t chew, let alone jog: infant obesity rose more than 70 per cent in just 20 years. You can’t blame them for unhealthy lifestyles. The scientists suspect that, starting in the womb, man-made chemicals may be triggering changes to our metabolism that result in life-long weight gain.

Programmed to be Fat? tells the stories of three scientists whose unexpected findings led them to follow the research of a curious doctor in Scotland, baffled by her inability to lose weight. For three years she pored over existing research on environmental chemicals and finally published a key study in an alternative medicine journal. It linked endocrine-disrupting chemicals to the obesity epidemic. The scientists came across the paper while puzzling over their own research results. None of their studies were about fat, but they had two things in common – they were all researching endocrine-disrupting chemicals, and they all ended up with unusually heavy lab animals.

Check out the comments on this one, some very interesting points I have been making for years on this blog.

What serves corporate interests better than expanding market share by chemically arranging for appetites and waists to swell and metabolisms and built-in safeguards to malfunction?

Are there still people who believe that the obesity epidemic and contributing endocrine disruptors just "happened"? That they "happened" to take place during the period in which checks and balances on corporate abuses of consumer trust were progressively gutted or removed entirely?

And now, after the epidemic has caused so much personal distress, Science has finally, miraculously uncovered the biochemical mechanisms responsible — as though environmentalists had not been warning us about them for decades?

There's an alternative approach to waiting for belated scientific revelations: Don't eat "edible food-like substances" (Michael Pollan) that corporations have been pushing and propagandizing. Don't accept that your food and drink must be packaged in ways that put cost reduction first and consider long-term health and environmental consequences last.

and

EA Helwick:

"Yes, the endocrine disruptors are playing a major role in the obesity epidemic by mimicking thyroid and gloming to the receptors thus preventing the normal T3 connection. Certain chemicals that accumulate in babies are creating oxidative phosphorlation, which is causing mitochondria dysfunction. Several key satiety hormones are also being turned off thus leaving on the urge to consume more food. It's not the food guys, but rather what's in the food and water we are consuming.

I am the co-author of a groundbreaking book due out mid 2012 that turns conventional wisdom completely upside down when it comes to obesity, diabetes-2, insulin resistance, and metabolic syndrome. And yes, the need to move away from highly sprayed and treated fruits and vegetables with pesticides represents ground zero. We are rapidly approaching the point where we cannot afford not to bite the bullet and shift to organic foods. And yes, new borns who are feeding off mom's fat reserves have at least 300 known toxic chemicals in their body at the time of birth, which play an important role in altering the expression of various genes (epigenetics)."

I had major chemical exposure, cleaning jobs, work in factories around printing and manufacturing of plastics, and I was an art teacher, that was around oil paint, paint thinner and clays. I believe everyone however in general is being exposed to major toxins and endocrine disruptors and these scientists are on to something.
Look, we are being lied too about the calories in, calories out thing, something more is going on. I am glad there are some honest researchers out there.

Study: We Believe We're Losing Weight When We're Actually Gaining

Study: We Believe We're Losing Weight When We're Actually Gaining

Hey why wouldn't we? They tell us less food and all this means weight loss, but often it's a joke! How about this scientists? We are told one thing while the body does another?

IMPLICATIONS: "We didn't have the ability to look specifically at the reasons driving these discrepancies," said Dr. Catherine Wetmore, the lead author of the study. "Certainly vanity or optimism could be one, or it could be a real true lack of awareness about what is happening." Regardless of why this is happening, it's clear that the first step in fighting obesity is acceptance. If we believe we're losing weight when we actually aren't, our further health behaviors will be misinformed and potentially harmful.

I think the problem is, all the good behaviors in the world aren't changing the fat and people are being told things, THAT DO NOT WORK IN THE REAL WORLD.

Why aren't there MORE treatment centers for the very obese?

See some obesity rehab centers here...[some are nursing home based and others are not]
See here,

Here is another list: [check out this physical therapist's website--he specializes in helping the very overweight, it is a good one]



What is that NINE or TEN for the entire nation? And even then they are limited to a few states. What if you do not live near any of these places?

I think about how there are endless centers for those who are drug addicts and alcoholics, but there is a smattering of obesity rehabs, where one can count them nationwide on your fingers. My particular state doesn't even have an obesity rehab. That said, they really will only take people who are total nursing home material. I am close, but can still shower myself, cook a meal and all that. Who wants to be in a nursing home unless forced to be? But then I wonder why there is so much treatment for other illnesses and so little for obesity? Maybe there would have been more advances with MORE treatment.

If all the politiicans and others really cared about the obesity epidemic, there would be special gyms, and centers for fat people to go to state wide. There would be specialists to deal with it all. Maybe because they have failed in the treatment? Hey getting help out there is very hard. I even called the local bariatric guy who takes no insurance to take me pro-bono acouple years ago offering him, some writing and good advertisement if he had some success with me. He turned me down flat.

While obesity has many different causes, wouldn't it serve fat people to have a place to go and for them to have their medical and other issues dealt with? They could analyze who has the endocrine problems, who has psychological eating issues/saiety- insulin resistant issues or even those who have other physiological issues impacting their weight.

I've offered myself up to researchers and more, remember I had help getting the PCOS diagnosed by a medical writer and journalist who was known nation-wide that I befriended.

For years I have wondered why I wonder why are there literally 10s of thousands of centers for those dealing with difficulty with drugs and alcohol [hundreds state by state] and a pittance of obesity centers in this nation? I don't begrudge people who need the substance abuse centers, I am glad help is out there for them, but what about those struggling with severe obesity?

Anyone else got any ideas about this?

"Animals and 6-Month-Old Infants Are Getting Fatter … Which Mean that It’s Something In the Environment"

This is a MUST-READ. Please read the entire article at the link!

These studies prove we are all being bamboozled by the "IT'S YOUR Lack of Willpower!" lies

Animals and 6-Month-Old Infants Are Getting Fatter … Which Mean that It’s Something In the Environment


The animals are getting fatter too!

We’ve extensively documented that toxic chemicals in our food, water and air our causing an epidemic of obesity … even in 6 month old infants.

No matter how lazy and gluttonous adults may have become recently, 6-month-olds can’t be lazy … they can’t even walk, let alone go to the gym.

And 6-month-olds can’t “binge” … Gerber doesn’t make corn dogs or milk chocolate truffles with rum.

The same thing is being observed in animals … hardly your stereotypical couch potatoes.

Specifically, the Proceeding of the Royal Society published a scientific paper in 2010 showing that animals – as well as humans – are getting hit with more obesity:

Another article discussing the fattening of animals including even lab animals who have a controlled diet.

The Real Cause of the Global Obesity Epidemic

"The REAL Cause of the Global Obesity Epidemic"

This is a very interesting article. I have printed snippets but please go see the whole thing, at the link.

I didn't know even the young babies were getting fatter...[which as this article says means something is going on beyond bad behavior and lowered will-power. A three month old is not old enough to go nosh down the french fries and hamburgers.

[Bad habits] cannot explain the ballooning of one particular segment of the population, a segment that doesn’t go to movies, can’t chew, and was never that much into exercise: babies. In 2006 scientists at the Harvard School of Public Health reported that the prevalence of obesity in infants under 6 months had risen 73 percent since 1980. “This epidemic of obese 6-month-olds,” as endocrinologist Robert Lustig of the University of California, San Francisco, calls it, poses a problem for conventional explanations of the fattening of America. “Since they’re eating only formula or breast milk, and never exactly got a lot of exercise, the obvious explanations for obesity don’t work for babies,” he points out. “You have to look beyond the obvious.”

The search for the non-obvious has led to a familiar villain: early-life exposure to traces of chemicals in the environment. Evidence has been steadily accumulating that certain hormone-mimicking pollutants, ubiquitous in the food chain, have two previously unsuspected effects. They act on genes in the developing fetus and newborn to turn more precursor cells into fat cells, which stay with you for life. And they may alter metabolic rate, so that the body hoards calories rather than burning them, like a physiological Scrooge. “The evidence now emerging says that being overweight is not just the result of personal choices about what you eat, combined with inactivity,” says Retha Newbold of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) in North Carolina, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). “Exposure to environmental chemicals during development may be contributing to the obesity epidemic

As you can see they get into many issues, I have discussed before on this blog. For goodness sakes what are they doing to our food? FATTENING UP CHICKENS AND PIGS WITH ARSENIC? 

Pthalates – commonly used in many plastics – have been linked to obesity. See this and this. So has a chemical used to make Teflon and other products.

Most of the meat we eat these days contains estrogen, antibiotics and powerful chemicals which change hormone levels. Modern corn-fed beef also contains much higher levels of saturated fat than grass-fed beef. So the meat we are eating is also making us fat.

Antibiotics also used to be handed out like candy by doctors. However, ingesting too many antibiotics has also been linked to obesity, as it kills helpful intestinal bacteria. See this and this.

Arsenic may also be linked with obesity, via it’s effect on the thyroid gland. Arsenic is often fed to chickens and pigs to fatten them up, and we end up ingesting it on our dinner plate. It’s ending up in other foods as well.

The National Research Council has also found:

The effects of fluoride on various aspects of endocrine function should be examined further, particularly with respect to a possible role in the development of several diseases or mental states in the United States.

Some hypothesize that too much fluoride affects the thyroid gland, which may in turn lead to weight gain.

and

In the same way that the financial crisis, BP oil spill and Fukushima nuclear disaster were caused by fraud and greed, we are daily exposed to obesity-causing chemicals because companies

make an extra buck by lying about what is in their product, cutting every corner in the book, and escaping any consequences for their health-damaging actions.

In fattening their bottom line, the fat cats are creating an epidemic of obesity for the little guy. 

I agree, this is the foundation of the Obesity Conspiracy I refer to, also this is what I am talking about when I say size acceptance when it advances FAT, instead of FAT PEOPLE is actually advancing this agenda. After all if fat people are going to be told, ACCEPT YOUR FAT, why would anyone ask any of these questions? The profiteers continue untouched and the profit mill keeps running on. For you see it helps them to blame the victims rather then let truth be told:

Years ago, I wrote this essay...circa 2001.



"The Real Causes of the Obesity Epidemic"

Poisoned Endocrine Systems: Bloating Bodies

There is a basic increase in endocrine diseases due to environmental poisonings. Higher estrogen in the environment is leading to smaller sperm counts and now one in every seven couples is infertile. This is something never seen before. Hormonal diseases that used to be rare, like PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome), hypothyroidism and diabetes are now worsening in number. Scientists alone have identified 51 synthetic chemicals in our environment that disrupt hormones. Some mimic estrogen, which is a hormone that adds weight, especially in women, and others conflict with testosterone and thyroid. Among them include everything from PCBs, Dioxin and Furans, many from heavily-used pesticides on our food supply.

Girls are even entering puberty earlier due to these factors, which is leading to higher body weights at early ages. The obesity epidemic has been blamed on higher rates of weight due to the increased insulin (the cart before the horse syndrome again) and leptin from the fat cells. However, the article "Teens Before Their Time" in Time magazine points out: 

"The most prominent effect, reported last spring in the Journal of Pediatrics, was the boys exposed to DDE and girls exposed to PCBs were heavier than their unexposed peers at age 14. The study also noted an intriguing fact: girls with high prenatal PCB exposure tended to hit the first stages of puberty a bit earlier than others."

I found out about PCB, and found even that study buried at Pubmed, there are many more of them. Looks like some others are asking those hard questions too!  I need to explore that arsenic thing too. 

The Edmonton Obesity Staging System and writing an Obesity Researcher

I wrote this doctor here

I found out about this via Big Fat Blog, home of the die hard almost normal sized fat people who are gung-ho size acceptance ideologues that deny that weight affects health.

It's weird to go watch the size activists go battle it out with this doctor, and say "Hey we are healthy!". Please, I can see that for the size 18 people but come on, this doctor is probably seeing nursing home bound people who are so overweight they have lost all normal functions on a weekly basis. The Fat Acceptance ideological delusion is not going to fly.

Well I wrote him too and wrote him that doctors need to do better and to re-assess some of his beliefs about metabolism and PCOS. PCOS was one thing that brought the weight on in my case not the other way around.

Well here is the Edmonton Obesity Staging System. See here. Double click to make it larger to read.

I mean look at the list, these doctors see the outcome of severe obesity and how it affects lives. Now I wrote him pointing out obesity is more of a symptom of other failed health processes. My blog here of course has explored the effects of MSG and other franken-food and other toxins we are all being exposed to, and other theories about weight. The Edmonton Obesity Staging System does challenge all the size acceptance delusions I have pointed out multiple times on this blog, that weight does impact health especially in its worse stages. I believe I was in stage 4 when I was at near 700lbs when I had my severe weight gain [multiple ER visits, lost the ability to walk almost, statis ulcers in the legs, failing respiratory system] but have hovered at stage 3 while in the 500s these last years, being disabled, with several co-morbs, affected mobility and breathing problems though I can still walk and am not wheelchair bound.

This list puts the reality out there as to what happens to severely fat people. Now some of the illnesses I see as causations of the obesity not results, such as PCOS, I lived that, and my reality says otherwise.

There are many other articles [I found the links on Big Fat Blog] where this is discussed.

"Should Casuality Matter in the Emonton Obesity Staging System"?

I think of course it should and wrote the doctor here, saying many problems cause the weight to begin with. They need to get to the root cause of what is causing weight to deal with it. Why I was not able to have everything solved, getting to the root cause of PCOS and endocrine disease bought me at least 15 more years.

Also see Big Fat Blog for the list of other related links. 

Dr. Sharma's website has much other interesting information. I do hope he reads what I wrote and has time to visit this website. I often have wanted correspondence with an obesity researcher. I benefited years earlier corresponding with an obesity journalist and writer.

I posted some links and told him a few opinions, guess that is all I can do. He does seem to be an honest researcher who cares about fat people and that is a good thing.

His Obesity Staging System however tells the TRUTH, that being fat over a certain limit DOES injure the health.

MSG is used to make LAB RATS FAT, HOW ABOUT YOU?

As I have written earlier on, when I eat something with MSG in it, I get sick, that means not being able to eat at any restaurant but two in the area and paying a heavy price. If I went to Burger King now and ate a chicken sandwich, I would be sick within hours. For some time I have wanted to share this article. I do not agree with everything on the website, but this article definitely brings up some questions. I have noticed MSG is in just about EVERYTHING that is processed I can barely avoid the stuff. Why?

MSG is POISON

I wondered if there could be an actual chemical causing the massive obesity epidemic, so did a friend of mine, John Erb. He was a research assistant at the University of Waterloo, and spent years working for the government.

He made an amazing discovery while going through scientific journals for a book he was writing called "The Slow Poisoning of America"(1). In hundreds of studies around the world, scientists were creating obese mice and rats to use in diet or diabetes test studies.

No strain of rat or mice is naturally obese, so the scientists have to create them. They make these morbidly obese creatures by injecting them with a chemical when they are first born. The MSG triples the amount of insulin the pancreas creates, causing rats (and humans?) to become obese They even have a title for the race of fat rodents they create: "MSG-Treated Rats" .

MSG?

I was shocked too. I went to my kitchen, checking the cupboards and the fridge.


MSG was in everything! The Campbell's soups, the Hostess Doritos, the Lays flavored potato chips, Top Ramen, Betty Crocker Hamburger Helper, Heinz canned gravy, Swanson frozen prepared meals, Kraft salad dressings, especially the 'healthy low fat' ones. The items that didn't have MSG had something called Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein, which is just another name for Monosodium Glutamate. It was shocking to see just how many of the foods we feed our children everyday are filled with this stuff. They hide MSG under many different names in order to fool those who catch on.

But it didn't stop there. When our family went out to eat, we started asking at the restaurants what menu items had MSG. Many employees, even the managers, swore they didn't use MSG. But when we ask for the ingredient list, which they grudgingly provided, sure enough MSG and Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein were everywhere. Burger King, McDonalds, Wendy's, Taco Bell, every restaurant, even the sit down ones like TGIF, Chilis', Applebees and Denny's use MSG in abundance. Kentucky Fried Chicken seemed to be the WORST offender: MSG was in every chicken dish, salad dressing and gravy. No wonder I loved to eat that coating on the skin, their secret spice was MSG!

So why is MSG in so may of the foods we eat? Is it a preservative or a vitamin?

Not according to my friend John. In the book he wrote, an expose of the food additive industry called The Slow Poisoning of America, www.spofamerica.com, he said that MSG is added to food for the addictive effect it has on the human body.

I wanted to see if there was truth to this MSG rats thing. {Hey always double and triple check things for yourself} They even tell you do that on this article:

If you are one of the few who can still believe that MSG is good for us and you don't believe what John Erb has to say, see for yourself. Go to the National Library of Medicine at www.pubmed.com.

Type in the words "MSG Obese" and read a few of the 115 medical studies that appear.

We the public do not want to be rats in one giant experiment, and we do not approve of food that makes us into a nation of obese, lethargic, addicted sheep, feeding the food industry's bottom line while waiting for the heart transplant, the diabetic-induced amputation, blindness, or other obesity-induced, life-threatening disorders.

With your help we can put an end to this poison.

Do your part in sending this message out by word of mouth, e-mail, or by distribution of this printout to your friends all over the world and stop this "Slow Poisoning of Mankind" by the packaged food industry.

Blowing the whistle on MSG is our responsibility, so get the word out.

Well I went to PUBMED and did a search for MSG and OBESITY.

Guess what it DOES MAKE THE RATS FATTER. Click on these pictures below to make them larger and see the sentences I have highlighted, you will be astounded!!

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!

Here is another one, there is MANY MORE.

If it does that to RATS, what does it do to Humans?

and why is so much of our food having MSG added to it?

What foods have MSG in them.

Now there is some naturally occuring glutamate, but I know things are much more serious when this stuff is being added in and at far higher levels.

Just think about these things...

and yes they use MSG to fatten the rats up...[that one isn't even negotiable]

I of course suspect that some are more suspectible then others....

so why is this happening?

"A Weight Off Your Mind": Australian Writer Confronts the Biased Researchers

I know I have confronted this issue here. "Letter to Obesity Researchers".
I believe us fat people have all been betrayed. Corporate and other interests are wiping out real true help, for profit.

It seems this writer also found out the nefarious connection between the "research" out there and the diet and weight loss surgery industry.

Just last year the Centre for Obesity Research and Education (CORE) - a department of Monash University - published a study that found lap-banding procedures were appropriate interventions for obese teenagers as young as 14. What they didn’t reveal, however, was that the study was funded by Allergan, Australia’s largest manufacturer of lap-banding products. In mid-2010, Allergan sought approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to market lap bands to US teens after sponsoring clinical trials, essentially opening up the global teenage market for profit.

They arrive at this very good question and I've asked it many times on this blog, why do they keep pushing the solutions that do NOT WORK?

What is odd then, is why there seems to be a dialectic approach to obesity. On the one hand, the obesity “experts” don’t have solutions that work long-term for the majority of the population, yet at the same time continue to prescribe their shonky solutions. If Viagra had a 98 per cent failure rate, doctors would not be allowed to prescribe it. Yet most of the time, individuals who cannot “lose the weight and keep it off” are treated like failures, as though they are “not trying damned hard enough” and shamed in hostile programs like The Biggest Loser.

The reality is that obesity research is riddled with conflicts of interest. It’s best to check who funded the research prior to reading it. Obesity research typically does not account for a person’s history of weight cycling, life fitness, stress, socioeconomic status, history of weight loss drugs, and nutrient intake. Is it the case that the solution might be worse than the disease?

Real World Research? One Sure Hopes So

NIH Obesity Plan Focuses on Real World Research.

Health officials Thursday announced a new effort to curb America's obesity epidemic by moving science from the lab into clinical trials to find practical ways for prevention and treatment.

"This plan is a bold blueprint that will encourage the research community to examine the epidemic of obesity from diverse perspectives," National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Dr. Francis Collins said in a statement.

The Stigma is More Dangerous then the Actual Fat

Sometimes I think the stigma is more dangerous to the health of fat people then the actual fat itself. Looks like a researcher agrees:

"Obesity Problem – Negative Reactions Against Obese People Affect Their Physical Health Says Study"

“Obesity is a physiological issue, but when people have negative interactions in their social world—including a sense of being discriminated against—it can make matters worse and contribute to a person’s declining physical health,” said Markus H. Schafer, the doctoral student in sociology and gerontology who led the study. “We found that around a third of the severely obese people in the United States report facing some form of discriminatory experience, and the experience of weight discrimination plays into people’s own perspective about their weight. It seems that many people are internalizing the prejudice and stigma they feel, and it contributes to stress, which ultimately affects their health.

Maybe if they stopped beating up on fat people mentally, the stress would go down and their health would improve. I see the definition of insanity in full blown action when it comes to obesity, doing the same things OVER AND OVER that have never worked. Like all the campaigns to get the supposedly "lazy" fat kids moving and doing the "push away from the table" drumbeat. The "conspiracy theorist" in me says they are all fattening us up on purpose. Sometimes I believe this more and more watching the total stupidity at play.

Oh one thing I wonder if it takes a toll on the fat, is being told you will drop dead over and over. I am stubborn and believe one reason I am still alive, is because I depend on God to determine how long I will last. The researchers also point out the odd discrepancy, how even though obesity is growing far more vast, the stigma is not being reduced.

Warm Houses in Winter May Contribute to Obesity Epidemic

Well maybe it is a factor, but somehow the solution of freezing to death to lose weight sounds pretty noxious. "Warm Houses in Winter May Contribute to the Obesity Epidemic" But it makes one wonder what other factors are out there, besides the bad frankenfood, could "modern" life in general via lack of sunlight, warm houses that keep the body from having to fire up the engine and even 24/7 light affect fat? It's an interesting study, at least here is one study where they are thinking outside the box. [The best studies are coming from overseas, and this one is from Britain]

"Increased time spent indoors, widespread access to central heating and air conditioning, and increased expectations of thermal comfort all contribute to restricting the range of temperatures we experience in daily life and reduce the time our bodies spend under mild thermal stress -- meaning we're burning less energy. This could have an impact on energy balance, and ultimately have an impact on body weight and obesity," study author Fiona Johnson, a researcher in the department of epidemiology and public health at University College London, said in a UCL news release."

From Cowcake Blog: "Obesity Boondooglers"

Another blogger response to my "Letter to Obesity Researchers" below an an article entitle "Obesity Boondooglers" and makes a very good point:

"Indeed, one wonders the exact same about the science of obesity which shows such utter lack of urgency as I've never encountered from a field that has talked up the lethal nature of the adipose cell to the extent where it can secure mucho funding, which is when seemingly all said 'urgency' peters out.

Not to mention its utter lack of vocation, intellectual curiosity or even real respect for reason perhaps even science which they seem to turn into a parody of itself. It has disgusted me to the point that I can barely stand to be in contact with it.

As 500poundpeeps states;


When I looked into this stuff, this was the late 90s, I couldn't find ONE study that had taken the severely obese over 400-500lbs and actually seriously studied them.

That is almost as appalling as weight loss butchery 'cos as everyone knows even if you have only a cursory interest in any topic, what's one of the first things you want to know? How bad can it get? What's the most, the least, the greatest, most extreme outlandish example of it"

Good point, it is appalling. Lately I wonder if there are any groups I could bring this to the attention of. Sometimes I think they want fat people to feel as much pain as possible to lose weight. In the back of mine, I think they aren't studying us, because the pain and suffering of obesity makes too much money to really help "solve it". When I get time, that blog entry is going to be forwarded to a few out there.

Letter to Obesity Researchers

Dear Obesity Researchers:

I will begin this letter with the caveat and admission, I do not know of all the research being done, but there are problems I am seriously concerned about. I also am not a scientist but I know when something seems to be missing and when the concentration seems to be all in the wrong places.

Years and years ago, when I was looking into why I gained so much weight, I wrote letters to obesity researchers. [wish I kept some of the names], please help! I did find a medical reporter who did help me, found out about PCOS, so all my efforts did have a good outcome. Finding out about PCOS and other endocrine problems definitely bought me more years of life. During this time, I used to scour Pub med. Personal research saved my life as I have earlier detailed on this blog.

When I looked into this stuff, this was the late 90s, I couldn't find ONE study that had taken the severely obese over 400-500lbs and actually seriously studied them. Ok, there may be some limits, they are immobile, often ill with co-morbs galore, but every other condition is studied in it's most extreme forms why not obesity? Could some of you please study us with the motive to help the severely obese?

Sometimes I want to ask, do obesity researchers really want to help people or is all the research now financed to feed the belly of the diet-industry complex? Am I going into conspiracy land to ask this? It kind of bugs me when I see so much of the research for a new product or related to weight loss surgery. I know one has to get funding for research but could someone please think outside the box for once. Is the future of treatment for obesity restricted to risky weight loss surgery?

More and more I think fat people [especially super obese] are physiologically different but this is horribly denied. Diet, exercise and lose weight and supposely the formula applies to EVERYONE. Sorry guys, but it is failing. This tells me more research needs done. Back in the 1800s, they used to admit that people had different metabolisms, some even far lower then others, what happened to that? Can any of you admit these physiological differences? Maybe some of you already have, but it's not affecting society much. They still expect all bodies to function the exact same.

I remember satiety issues even used to be mentioned far more, where has that research gone? Looks like some studies are being done, but you never see satiety mentioned in the regular medical news anymore except in terms of a new product. [That sounds all well and good, but probably all they will do is add some bulking fiber to the food--remember brown rice fills you up faster then white]

When I go to Pubmed and do a search of "severe obesity" [so much is bariactric surgery related]. It looks like the horses are getting more real research then humans. There's plenty of studies detailing the health outcomes of obesity or seeing if obesity is correlated with certain conditions such as in this one. We already know obesity in severe forms rips the body apart, now please find something that will help solve the problem.

Weirdly it seems its mainly to be the Chinese and others dealing with issues of metabolism. Well Western researchers need to step up.

Now this really bothered me...

I searched for studies citing "super-obesity" and got 293 hits on Pubmed. Over 200 [I counted 203] are weight loss surgery related! There are some mice studies on metabolism thrown in, sociological studies regarding fast food poor people and children, affect of conditions and medical procedures on the superobese--the ill effects from all the weight loss surgery--the cart these researchers seem to have put all their eggs in are scary enough, but really few studies on how they came to be that way in the first place!

Sorry guys, I see a total bias in that!

I have to admit these folks are on to something:[quote taken from here]

Gard and Jan Wright argue in a review of obesity research that “obesity research itself has become so entangled with moral discourses and aesthetic values that the ‘science of obesity’ can no longer speak for itself.”

Why isn't anyone caring to find out, how fat bodies [especially super-sized ones]really function?

I suppose this really doesn't surprise me:

BIRMINGHAM, Ala.—Researchers at the University of Alabama (UAB) at Birmingham School of Public Health say a “white-hat bias” abounds in obesity research, and may skew reported results. White-hat bias is described as the “tendency to distort information about products regardless of the facts, when the distortions are perceived to serve good ends.”
In the case of obesity research, results may be misrepresented by scientists operating with particular biases on topics related to weight, nutrition and the food industry, as well as biases toward products like sugar-sweetened beverages, and practices like breastfeeding, according to the UAB study

There are a few of you thinking outside the box, not letting lies about obesity blind you, but there needs to more in that category.

Some questions to ask yourselves as you go forth with more research:

If we do not know these things, then how can anyone help fat people?

1. Why are fat people hungrier?

2. Why do some people stop at a certain weight and some keep gaining?

3. Why with even the pressure of immobility, severe health problems and worse etc, do so many people fail in losing weight?

4. What is the actual human range in metabolism?

5. Why is so much of the research focused on weight loss surgery? Surely other options should be explored?

6. Why can't more people admit that fat bodies operate differently then thin ones?

It's time to really study the severely obese, this country is getting fatter, and more needs done. Some out there need to do a LOT BETTER.

Update: I would be diagnosed with stage 4 Lipedema in 2014.  

Poop Will Make You Thin???!

Poop will make you thin? Now I have seen it all! Nah, it's not that bad, they are realizing the intestinal flora of fat people is different from thin and why wouldn't it be even more affected considering the American diet? The theory is change the flora, and you will change the digestion and the break down of food.

I don't get why they have to use feces, and why not just get some specialized probiotics? I have been considering getting some probiotics myself to try and 're-set" things and improve digestion. Just so folks know this is not from the onion, here is a scientist, assistant professor of Epidemiology commenting on this:

What if, instead of re-constituting healthy gut flora one species at a time, you could simply take the entire fecal contents from a healthy person and use it to re-colonize your own gut--in other words, undergo a fecal transplant? Yes, it's like probiotics on steroids: getting an infusion of someone else's gut flora in order to re-establish a healthy gut ecology of your own, and squeeze out some potentially harmful organisms along the way. A recent story discusses this treatment for patients suffering Clostridium difficile infections in Scotland, but it's actually not brand-new, and has already surfaced in the peer-reviewed literature. More after the jump...

Connection to Common Cold and Obesity?

Connection Between Common Cold and Obesity?

Well this is an interesting study, years ago I remember reading about another study that said obesity could be a result of a virus. Professor Nikhil Dhurandhar has studied the effects of human adenovirus AD-36 on obesity. They did use to blame stomach ulcers on "stress" but then found out that was a virus. It will be interesting to see where this research goes.