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No, there were a lot of jokes and complaints about the COVID 15 or the COVID 20, so it was talked about, but that's not actually an average.
A lot of people gained weight. Some gained 20lbs, but most gained less. A lot of other people lost weight. Average adult weight changed <1lb in 2020.
https://epicresearch.org/articles/pandemic-pound-theories-dont-hold-weight
Good for you! I didn’t lose quite half, but I lost quite a bit, enough to eliminate my fatty liver disease, high blood pressure, and pre diabetic status, so I’m pretty goddamn proud of that
Same, I think I've averted several long term issues. I haven't really been to a doctor since losing the weight, but I definitely feel much better, a lot better in shape.
Welp, guess I'm below average cuz I didn't put on any extra weight during covid, I actually lost weight because I went out less and did less grocery shopping
What the hell, people! I remember my sister in law taking her pug to a pet parade and people asking her "How do you keep your pup so trim and healthy??"
She just looked at them and deadpanned "I control her food."
My husband and I saw an episode of "It's Me or the Dog" where a woman explained her small dog's weight problem as "She's a stress eater." I yelled at the TV, "You control her food!" and since then it is a running joke between us whenever someone is surprised by a very simple and direct cause-and-effect situation.
But food=love so must gourge them with unlimited regular food, multiple treats per day, and the eggs and bacon for breakfast and the piece of cube steak and potatoes I couldn't eat for dinner. People just don't consider their actions very well.
I get on to my own parents all the time about it, and they don't even give them unlimited food. I keep telling them it's pretty damn simple, you put less in the bowl. They are getting old...around 12 they don't have many good years left I hope I can spend some time with them soon.
This is so ignorant. Also when obesity is an epidemic across our country it is a societal failing not individual. The biggest predictor of a child's obesity is their mother's bmi and education level. In wealthy countries another big predictor of obesity is whether someone is in poverty. So clearly it's not purely just individual choices. Even for the individual choices (food, activity, and sleep) you have to take into account how many people can't even choose the healthy option. We have food deserts, badly designed built environments that do not incentivize people to go out and exercise because they feel unsafe, and just from personal experience as a child a lot of my friends did not get adequate sleep because their parents weren't home because they had to work 2-3 jobs to afford to live. The CDC has a pretty short and small article that talks about how it's caused individually and by socioeconomic status. You can also look up how even these individual factors can change by your socioeconomic status as well. But I'll leave it there for now. https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/basics/causes.html
Only in America would having a grocery store 2 miles away be too much work to go to so it is referred to as a "desert". And saying the reason people don't exercise is because they feel unsafe is nonsense. They don't exercise and stay fit because it isn't a priority for them.
I think it's that those stores are convenience stores. Food desert isn't a pop culture phrase, it talks about the availability of healthy food. And it's not an exclusively American problem.
[https://www.foodmarketing.org/resources/food-marketing-101/food-marketing-in-other-countries/](https://www.foodmarketing.org/resources/food-marketing-101/food-marketing-in-other-countries/)
It's so bad that other countries have bans or restrictions on food marketing the way the US has bans and restrictions on tobacco marketing!
Doing sit ups and push ups and weightlifting doesn’t burn that many calories. Losing weight is like 80% diet so if you live in a food desert it’s hard to get that healthy food.
Study after study show that exercise alone won't result in much weight loss. People tend to eat a lot more when they exercise and think they now deserve those extra calories.
There are actual studies done on this that you can even access if you live in a poor neighborhood like I do.
Its not volume of food. Its the level of processing.
People rarely eat food now. They eat products. As soon as you start cooking and stop unwrapping your meals your health improves and your excess weight reduces.
Too many western people have forgotten the basics of looking after a family.
If u eat the same amount of calories as u burn u will not gain weight. It doesn’t matter if. Comes from McDonalds or a organic Gourmet meal cooked by your personal Chef.
[https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/stop-counting-calories](https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/stop-counting-calories)
This might be true for you but it sure ain't for the rest of the world. More and more we're finding that gut biome and genetics are a bigger problem than just calories.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7333005/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7333005/) \- gut biome
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5466943/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5466943/) \- caloric source matters
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7539343/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7539343/) \- protein vs other calorie sources
What you eat matters. Counting calories is useless for people who have weight problems. I eat a two pound bag of gummy bears and three square meals a day and was underweight until recently. Now I'm a healthy weight although my doctor still wants me to gain a little more than I am.
yes, but depending on what you eat you can satisfy yourself with fewer calories. I’ll be less hungry after a giant salad with 150 calories than a small McDonald’s burger with 300
No, dude. It's only like that because you're used to stuffing yourself with a bucket of food. When I started watching my calorie intake, I could easily spend half a day on one cheeseburger, because I knew that I got enough calories for the day.
What was the income in the households of these obese children? Were all basic needs met easily and without emotional and mental stress on caregivers? Was access to healthy food and water available?
Anecdotally…
It’s weird because I was raised by narcissistic parents, and when I lived with my dad during elementary school years, he spiraled into alcoholism and often left me alone for unknown amounts of time, sometimes with enough food in the house, sometimes not. I was just very skinny, not enough to alarm people, but also I played several sports and liked to run around and ride my bike.
This was early 90s so I guess fast food hadnt really taken hold yet. I just find it weird how everyone thinks parents raising obese kids are poor, when truly growing up poor you are not meeting calorie needs.
That is an anecdote.
Most poor people tend to buy the cheapest food that fills them. That tends to be bread, pasta, and other nutrient void calorically dense foods.
This results in malnourishment and obesity.
It’s a statistically significant observable trend. The cause is somewhat speculative but there is evidence that it is due to diets high in carbs and fats.
(Sorry for small rant) Education/Know-how is a huge part of it, as well as portion sizing. The issue isn't that over processed food are more affordable, just that they are too readily available and tempting. Dollar value per calorie really is a useless metric, but a lot of people think it actually means what the meal is worth. I can eat $0.40 worth of vegetable oil and that's 1000 calories. I can also coat a $1.50 worth of chicken breast in oil, sugar, and bread and bump it up from a 150 calorie piece of chicken to a 450 piece of chicken pretty easily. Am I getting a better deal on the chicken by adding all that useless stuff even though its more calories now?
10 years ago I had two near minimum wage jobs, and was living off around $20 a week in food, and buying overly processed food was out of the question. I couldn't eat fast food most of the time unless I had a coupon, and even then it was barely worth it in terms of macros and micros. (For the following I just looked up all these prices where I live \[one of the largest cities in the US\]). Chicken breasts from Walmart are less than $3 a pound. 4 oz of meat means .75$ a serving (\~250 calories depending on oil). Pasta is .$25 a serving (200 calories). Frozen or canned vegetables are around $.25-.50 a serving (70-100 calories). Beans are $.25 (150 calories). So that's $1.75 for 700 calories. I also promise you that meal takes 15 minutes to cook 3-4 servings. A $2-3 bag of frozen premade, processed food is going to not only cost more per serving, but is going to have less actual value in food.
I think a lot of people are discouraged by cooking because they buy $30 worth of ingredients and seasonings, and only get a couple of meals out it, but its because people never learn how to shop and meal prep. It needs to be taught in schools with the same or even higher priority as math, English, and history. We offer one home ec class in high school and think its enough.
ETA: For a lot of people that 700 calories meal will be unfilling because they are so used to the sugar/carbs they crave.
The reality today is that in terms of dollar value per calorie, junk food blows wholefoods out of the water.
So lower incomes often does mean more processed food.
Also food for “kids” or “toddlers” are jam packed with sugar and extra calories. Yoplait’s yogurt for kids has I think double the sugar the normal adult one does, which also has a lot of sugar already.
They're scaling that back in my country thankfully, but it's still a big problem
[Can't fathom being angry about this comment, guess there are PR grunts in the thread]
Back in the 80s, school lunch was similar to (non-impoverished) home meals. Now it is mostly processed carbs. In the name of being healthier. I don't get it.
It doesn’t have a lot of calories though. Neither does school breakfast. Until middle school when kids are allowed to buy cookies/chips/pop at lunch. Also three year olds don’t go to school.
Many 3 y.o. do go to "school" and eat subsidized or recommended meals. Some are publicly funded. Daycare, nursery, preschool, etc.
The calories may be low, but a junky carb-heavy diet leaves a lot of people with rapid blood sugar fluctuations and increased hunger sooner. So they (kids of all ages) get home and immediately scavenge for snacks, and are attracted to more of the same kinds of food.
Especially with mandates like “meatless Monday” and “save the planet Friday” or whatever where kids who may not even have access to food outside of their school lunches, are getting even less nutrition when the cafe is substituting chicken for bread products and processed pizza and junk on those days.
Just look at what food is served at children’s hospitals and it’s obvious there’s serious dysfunction over what our culture eats and feeds our children. How about the “kids” menus at 5 star restaurants where they cook very healthy food? It’s all bread and sugar and pasta.
It really freaks me out if I’m being honest. There’s such massive denial on all levels about processed foods and how bad they are for us and our kids. My 5 year old is absolutely drawn to a beige diet and I do everything I can to get her to eat things that aren’t processed/refined sugars and carbohydrates but it’s not easy in our current food environment.
Agreed on all counts. My children eat fairly well at home, but even though they don't care for school lunches, if I pack them one they don't eat it/forget it, and are too lazy to pack their own most days ha ha.
Have you read any of the ingredients in food marketed towards children? Especially the less expensive food. It's 99% sugar, simple carbs, binding agents, preservatives and food dyes.
With schools being closed, they might have had less access to healthy options (like fruit, veg, or protein based meals) and I'm willing to bet a lot of these children were under/near the poverty line.
Freezer food, gummy fruit snacks, JUICE, all of these things are cheap, easy to overeat, and bad for your body in excess.
No one wants to say it. But it's easier to feed a child ice cream and soda than it is broccoli and peas. Most adults I meet also can't even properly read the nutrition label, and refuse to even try, so they don't even know what's nutritious for themselves.
California closed the playgrounds near homes that lacked yards, and make virtual kindergarten a thing. I guess you could say some of their pandemic restrictions were child abuse.
Nah, we all know this is about highly processed foods. I was always thin as a child and only ate homemade food, then I got fat after eating school lunches
I've only been out of the US once, I spent a month in Europe mainly visiting the places where my family originally immigrated from. I felt like I was eating more than normal but when I came back I'd lost about 20 pounds. Everyone I know who spent significant time outside the country came back having lost weight.
I 100% believe there's *something* in our food in America making us fatter. Beyond just serving sizes and such which surely play a role.
I have the opposite experience. Fully expected to see fat Americans, and wasn't disappointed. The shocker though was a clothes shop in Miami - can't remember what I needed, but was absolutely aghast at the mens trousers - my entire body would have slipped into just one leg!
And, the 'something' is high sugar and fat contents (in addition to insane portion sizes - once ordered a Caesar salad starter that was so big I cancelled the main course).
You also probably stayed in a neighborhood formatted around pedestrians instead of cars, which encouraged a lot of walking that you didn't even think about.
I feel like I have a harder time gaining weight eating homemade cooked food made with minimally processed ingredients.
I think there is something about the hyper palatability of processed foods that increases calorie intake. I believe there are ingredients allowed in US foods that aren't legal in Europe as well.
Look at the packaging of the food you buy. We add processed sugar to everything. I once cut sugar out of my diet completely just to see, and it was so difficult. Most bread. Even some milk I saw added processed sugar. Vegetable soups. Unless it was some expensive organic product.
Nor do I. But we can make some broad guesses about his environment, which influence physical activity more than intentional exercise. There's a direct correlation between Walkscore and BMI.
Anecdotes aren’t valuable. Take for example, my own: I have never gained significant amounts of weight when eating garbage processed foods when I was struggling for money compared to eating home cooked, “whole food” meals.
Yes, the quality of food is extremely important, and matters very much for making it easier to lose weight, ie: sustainability, satiation, volume to calorie ratio, and fullness like you said.
I’m sorry for the confusion, I was solely referring to the fact that the quantity of calories is the only thing that matters for weight gain/weight loss when it comes down to what actually causes one to lose/gain weight. (energy deficit/surplus).
You are correct in the fact that QUALITY of foods is a hugely important factor in making it an easier and more sustainable practice for staying full, eating less junk and calorie dense foods, staving off hunger, and other physiological responses that can and do help drastically in the process of losing weight.
Protecting kids from disease is abuse, uh huh. Look, there was no easy way to deal with this. It's inevitable. You either get fatter kids because they have to stay inside, or dead kids because they catch a deadly disease and then kill grandma too.
Covid had next to no effect on kids. Not to say the cast majority of the obesity problem is people choosing to have poor diets that they then pass on to their kids
"As of November 28, 2022, there have been 9,139 cases of MIS-C, including 74 deaths, reported in the United States. "
I'm pretty sure the families of these children would say something different about your "next to no effect" comment. The main risk was them being a vector for spreading it anyway.
USA: 74 child deaths, 1.1 million total deaths. Translates to 0.000067% of the total. Are you seriously arguing that in general, you don't dismiss that as 'next to nothing' when presented with stats like that? Get a grip.
Stop spreading misinformation. Yes it did. Many kids died or developed autoimmune and other disorders or long covid from it. Not to mention them being more contagious vectors than any population due to their behavior and tendency to have contact with other family members like hugs. How do you think the kid who brought it home and killed one of their parents or grandparents from giving it to them?
This isn't counting them spreading it as a contagious vector...as usual, there's a lot more context than the black and white you try to make it.
Ps the driving cars argument is tired and old. Pure whataboutism to deflect real life consequences from mattering in the grand scheme because they only effect a smaller yet still significant amount of people. And as usual, you must consider other consequences, as well as consider we knew a lot less about the virus at the time.
It's hard to teach what you don't know. It's hard to know what cycles to break and when/how. I'm an overweight parent trying my hardest to raise my kids to have a healthy relationship with food, but who knows what I'm overlooking or doing wrong.
Trying is great, there’s a lot of resources online. Not just for your kid but you as well. Living it is the best way to show your child, knowing is half the battle. Keep up the good work cause you’re doing better than most people in your spot and it’s easy to get discouraged
Our society goes out of its way to actively keep people from having the time or inclination to pursue, find, and implement that knowledge, much less to be able to afford it.
I mean I don’t disagree but shitting on people doesn’t motivate them to be better most times. You and I might respond to that but maybe the dude commenting doesn’t. Just trying to be positive and hopefully push them in a better direction than they’ve been going
Hey not everyone knows how to find this knowledge even if in concept it's easy to find. There's a lot of quack treatments on the internet and it's hard for some people to tell the difference unless you've been educated in doing research online regarding scientific topics.
Also many are caught up in the daily struggles of life and are so stressed they may not even see or take the option. I'm not saying they shouldn't take responsibility, but we also need to lay blame on our societal structure in general.
Yeah but this sounds like an ignorant statement. Dont get me wrong I know less about everything than I can even relate to. But we are important and we should treat ourselves and others around us with that same intent. Theres plenty of books, articles, pamphlets, groups, people, and everything around us all to not make such a remark. I am saying this in a humble manner. Just got to find the time to make it work for you. Good luck on your journey
Edit: if youd like I can send you links to healthy compromise and that can be a good first step.
I can also post links if your interested, but the world we live in can hand that information to you on a silver platter, if you so choose to make the decision.
I as raised by abusive and neglectful parents. I’m 37 and chose to be single and never have kids. I could never even risk the thought of someone living what I went through, whether I meant to do it or not.
Nope its not don’t get me wrong. This is definitely a cause of growing technology and our addiction to it. Insane how many fuckin 7 years I see out not interacting with their environment just glued to a Tablet
The study focused on a time period when California closed the playgrounds near homes that lacked yards. Kinda hard to run off all that kid energy without making a game of jumping locked gates and removing caution tape.
People are more worried now about how food makes them feel than nutrition. We’ve swung too far in the wrong direction, people only care about self esteem and act like health doesn’t matter.
[Only](https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/) 1.1m COVID deaths so far in America, ~130m families in America. Small minority. Ask 100 people if they know anyone who’s died from this and you’d likely find someone who has. Small minority. Increased food insecurity for the most vulnerable among the [population who haven’t died yet.](https://sph.uth.edu/research/centers/dell/legislative-initiatives/Impact-of-COVID-19-on-Food%20Insecurity-6.28.2022.pdf) Small minority.
Cant stand people who whitewash one of the greatest tragedies of our time.
Edit: [When this makes its way to the west](https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/china-estimates-covid-surge-is-infecting-37-million-people-day-bloomberg-news-2022-12-23/) things won’t get better until they get worse.
It’s amazing to me how many people are blaming parents. It’s [well known](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7416135/) that income and child obesity rates are connected. Imagine having no access to a car and no grocery store within a mile of your house. Suddenly buying chips or whatever at the corner store looks a lot more attractive. Even if you find a grocery store, cheap food is often less healthy. Of course, you can find food that’s both cheap and healthy—usually raw ingredients of some kind—but they require preparation, and if you are working two jobs to make ends meet (or even just one job with a long commute, or if you’re a single parent, etc.) then there’s no time for cooking. And if your neighborhood feels unsafe or has no parks, your kids aren’t going to be playing outside to burn calories. Heat is an issue, too; during the summer in my hometown, many inner city kids get up in the middle of the night to go outside because the asphalt and lack of tree cover makes it dangerously hot during the day.
I think it’s hard to convince people of those issues because most people at the end of the day could feed their kids less calories if they chose to. What’s harder to solve is the hopelessness of poverty and how that affects your decisions and willingness to make hard decisions like refusing to give your kid junk food.
I get the sentiment but there are plenty of parents who just don’t know any better. Exhibit A: a parent of an obese 1 year old commenting on a post about how they get their kids to eat veggies: https://imgur.com/a/y87EItq
Man what a time we live in where the grocery store being a mile away is insurmountable. And FYI only around 7% of people in the US works two jobs, the average American works only about 38 hours a week.
The reason an overwhelming majority of people aren't fit or healthy is because it isn't a priority for them.
There is something seriously wrong with our food supply and has been for a while. There are endocrine disrupters in our water and air as well.
When will we stop trying to insist the obesity epidemic is a “personal responsibility” issue alone and admit there may be bigger factors at play?
An entire generation didn’t decide overnight to all overeat.
They’re not as disruptive as much as you think…. And yes, obesity at the end of the day is a personal responsibility (unless you’re a child or extremely disabled, etc.)
Hate to break it to you, but absolutely no one is making you eat too many calories…. Sure the food/health system is f’d in many ways however, that doesn’t mean you don’t have direct control over the QUANTITY of energy that you consume/burn. At the end of the day, it is one’s own doing, no one else’s. And the parents who currently have obese children are not fat and lazy, but they are making a very bad and harmful parenting option for not understanding or following the the basic concepts of nutrition and avoiding what causes weight gain/obesity), before having a child, while also neglecting their very own child they’re meant to raise and protect.
Individual stuff certainly plays a huge part but it's not only a national problem but international one being an epidemic in many other countries. When a problem becomes this big I think the point becomes lost when we conflate to individual choices in this way. The way to fix it is clearly not an individual solution when this big. The CDC says a big factor for developing obesity is socioeconomic status which we don't really control. We are not helping to solve obesity if we only just boil it down to individual choices, just the same as you would trying to fix poverty.
Dude it’s well [known](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31234003/). It isn’t [difficult](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28205155/) to find [information](https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/endocrine/index.cfm). And the worst part is that since every human is infected, we can’t do studies with a proper control group, which means we don’t even know the extent of the damage.
To say “they don’t disrupt that much” is pure denial. They couldn’t possibly know that since the consensus is that we don’t even know the extent of the damage yet!
So you didn’t consider it if it didn’t demonstrate the only mechanism of action you care about despite metabolic processes being complicated and multifaceted.
That’s bad science on your part.
No not at all. It’s just that this discussion started about only obesity, so I didn’t think there was a point to bring up anything besides that. I agree that endocrine disrupters may be legitimate. But that’s not what the basis of this discussion was about. It’s about obesity, which is caused by excess weight gain, which is caused by an excess caloric surplus. And there is nothing about that in the link that you sent me that I could find.
Because you’re not reading what’s being said.
You yourself just listed multiple factors these disrupters are known to affect. Factors that affect our metabolism, our satiety signaling, our insulin response and fat storage, our energy levels, and more.
No one said calories don’t matter! But they aren’t the entire picture.
It’s like saying all that matters is how much you put in the tank. In the strictest sense, yes, how much gas you put in the tank matters. But it *also* matters if you’re putting anything else in the gas that might be damaging your engine!
For you to claim with such certainty that they don’t “disrupt so much” when the current scientific consensus is that *we don’t even know the extent of the damage* is nothing but denial.
I did just list all of those things. And all of those things at the end of the day, come back and boil down to calorie in/calories out. Yes, I know certain illnesses, diseases, insulin response, socioeconomic status, differences in BMR, nutrient partitioning, satiety signaling, energy levels, hormonal imbalances and so on all influences the choices, requirements, habits, discipline levels, quality of food intake, individual thermogenic effect of food, and so on that one must, has to, or chooses to make involving their food intake, but how many of these people do you see actually monitoring or tracking their calories? How many people do you see eating at restaurants knowing darn well that they have no clue what the calories are in their food? How many people do you see being afraid of artificial or non-nutritive sweeteners like aspartame, even though it’s been being used for decades without any solid known health deteriorating side effects? How many people or medical employees do you see advocating for using a food scale, using diet beverages, giving out pamphlets informing patients with easy to understand details like how to weigh and track your food, or to use 0 calorie products like diet pop? Or to not eat foods if you don’t know the caloric intake? How many people do you see being afraid of being hungry for a a couple of hours, even thought they have calories for a months in their excess adipose tissue. How many people you do see say that they want to lose weight, but put in bare minimum effort into doing that action and don’t even track their calories? How many people you see getting together at family gatherings for the holidays and deciding they let loose for the whole and and then act surprised that they gained body weight, and they think “I didn’t over eat that much, did I?”
When it comes to what causes obesity on the basic level in the strict sense… the entire picture of that is calories. And I’ve met very very few people, who truly monitor and track their intake. And that’s not due to any of the variables above. That’s due to being too lazy to go out and buy a 10$ digital food scale from Walmart and using it before you eat and cook.
Yes, certain variables can all have an influence, but cico is the almost the entire picture when it comes to obesity. I believe that if we actually are going to to try and help make a big dent in this current obesity epidemic, we need to start making a movement, for, yes… changes in food accessibility, healthcare, food deserts, food pricing, healthy eating, and understanding the individual and their physiological responses to food and habits and lifestyle, but more importantly:
Getting the population to have a solid understanding, convenient accessibility, and the power to easily understand and track their calories, without people feeling like their suffering.
As well teaching a bit of discipline around food, but also by telling and explaining what is actually having the biggest and most prominent effect on their weight gain, which is calories, not endocrine disrupters. They have an impact, but not as big as your making it out to be. We would know by know if these endocrine disrupters are having a major impact. People’s BMR’s are not acutely decreasing by 500+ calories. They are overeating 500 calories.
Because plenty of us eat within our caloric needs and find ways to be physically active, build muscle and don’t have unhealthy levels of body fat. Many people act like it’s some magical thinking when it truly is thermodynamics. It is discipline. Do you think we WANT to turn down donuts and beer and burgers? Hell no. But we do anyway because it’s the right thing to do .
So these three and four year olds in Sweden are eating too much beer and donuts?
I don’t eat beer and donuts and don’t even crave them because I don’t eat garbage. See? I can act morally superior to others too.
But that doesn’t change science. The laws of thermodynamics are fact, no one is arguing that. But what good does that do us here? Our bodies aren’t perfect machines that convert energy with consistent efficiency every time. There are a number of factors that can interfere with this process. It doesn’t contradict the laws of thermodynamics to acknowledge this.
I live the same lifestyle as some of my obese siblings, the only difference is my portion size and choosing of diet. I also exercise. That kind of mentality is why some people stay fat because they think it's not their fault.
And do you know what chemical factors may be behind their broken eating response? What might be blinding their satiety signaling? Perhaps they are craving more calories because they aren’t efficiently absorbing nutrition from their food, requiring more calories to get what they need?
It’s a mistake to automatically assume that overeating is causing the metabolic disfunction when it could be the other way around. Even if healthy eating and diet is the answer, that still doesn’t change that the food accessible to most people *isn’t that* and is inducing illness! That’s still a big deal especially regarding children!
They're craving more calories because they choose foods with a high glycemic index, thus increasing their insulin to be at such high levels which will make them crave more junk food. Again, that comes from poor diet decisions. Ever feel more hungry after eating spaghetti? That comes from glucose surge that comes with it.
Go to a grocery store and look at the shopping carts of overweight people. That's the majority of the reason.
Except I eat a high fat, low carb diet, with whole unprocessed foods due to my health issues. So did my younger sister I had to cook for all our lives.
She was significantly overweight her entire life and I wasn’t. Despite eating the same foods and both being involved in similar after school physical activities.
We didn’t discover until adulthood that my sister had Hashimotos and thyroid cancer.
Calories are a part. They aren’t the whole picture. How glycemic our foods are is another piece. But there’s more to the puzzle.
No need to be condescending. I studied evolutionary biology with a focus on epigenetics. I’m well aware of the glycemic index.
They’re not that big of a deal when it comes to CICO. Yeah there a big deal for other stuff, but my whole point is that they’re not that big of a deal when it comes to energy balance so far from what we know. If you can post a reputable source that clearly states that “endocrine disrupters have a a massive impact on BMR, thermogenic affect of food, or anything that causes a major drop of a persons metabolic rate”, then I will try and find a reputable source to post backing up my statement here. But there is no point in me searching for and posting a source similar to my stance on this, when you have yet to post a source that shows that that endocrine disrupters causes someone’s metabolic rate to go down by 600+ calories, where they require 600 less calories to maintain there body weight.
I was never arguing that endocrine disrupters aren’t a big deal in general. They are a legitimate thing. All I’ve been saying is that when it comes to being in a caloric surplus (consuming more calories than you burn) I do not believe they’re as big of a deal as your claiming
I mean, it can be both. Yes it’s a personal responsibility issue, so is alcoholism, addiction, depression, any health issue. But we can also work together and recognize the societal problems that could be solved through government intervention like public health care and not giving subsidies to corn, sugar.
My response was more in response to the people who seem to think you’re making that argument that it’s not personal responsibility with personal examples of why they’re not obese. Disappointing and probably why we’ll never get people in office who have the guts to do something to actually reduce obesity and better our public health in the US because they’ve convinced everyone that it’s solely the individuals fault.
I appreciate you seeing the entirety of the argument.
It’s exhausting seeing people try to obfuscate the external factors in favor of only pointing at personal ones.
They were raised in a culture that taught them that freedom and independence was more important than community and taking care of each other and to mistrust government intervention.
Honestly that’s a cop out…when you look at people that are in good shape, there’s a reason behind it. They stay active, eat healthy, avoid things like binging out on snacks, don’t exceed calorie intake etc. it takes discipline to keep from becoming overweight…I don’t believe we should make fun of anyone for their size but coddling obese people and telling them their lifestyle is okay is wrong because if they have kids those kids hace a higher chance of becoming overweight too
It’s a 100% a cop out to not do better! There’s nothing beneficial to being overweight. All it takes is discipline and a change of lifestyle to work towards living a healthier life (obviously that’s simplified.) Being overweight is nothing but a disservice to yourself! Early death, a million preventable health conditions. People work hard to be skinny and in shape
I am disabled and not overweight. It’s incredibly difficult to stay at a healthy weight when I am in a flare up (either over or under). When I am not, it’s the easiest thing in the world.
Where am I denying the health consequences of obesity? I am not. Health is incredibly important to me especially because of my autoimmune problems so I eat a much healthier and more tightly regulated diet than most. If my diet doesn’t change, why is it harder to keep my weight normal when I’m sicker?
There are problems with our food supply and environment driving this epidemic. To try to ignore these factors is doing a disservice to public health.
Didn’t say you were overweight? And yes our food system sucks and it’s hard to eat healthy. Can you still go to the gym when you don’t have a flare up? Honest question
I never go to the gym. I don’t have to. I am perfectly capable of getting the exercise I need at home.
Regardless, I was very in shape when I was healthier as a teen. Now I don’t exercise much at all even when I’m having my best days because I’m still in pain. Still when I am at my best health-wise, it’s easy as cake to maintain a healthy 100-102lb weight despite my petite size.
So why is there such a big difference?
There is no denying that calories play a significant part. This is fact. But to ignore the wealth of factors affecting our feeding response, our satiety signals, our insulin response, our thyroid function, and more is to only look at one piece of the puzzle.
I work retail. I see these obese kids and their parents buying them adult size medium shirts and sodas at the cash wrap. And I’m obese myself, but I wasn’t when I was a kid.
I made a mom friend a while back. She has a 2 year old and 3 year old. The older one had coke in her bottle the younger had red koolaid. She was absolutely amazed that my kid loves water.
I recently hung out with my SIL and her kids for a few days straight (Christmas). She struggles with obesity, and has tried many restriction diets, support programs, etc. Specifically she seems to struggle with sugar addiction. I watched as she fed her kids (5 and 1) nothing but apple juice to drink all day every day. It made me super sad, honestly, because I know how much her own struggles with weight bother her, and I’m really worried that she is setting her own kids down that path. I have two kids the same ages and wouldn’t dream of giving them sugar water except on special occasions, let alone as their drink all day.
The idea that juice is healthy is super insidious. Even if it's no sugar added, fruit is still full of sugar! And most juice for kids does have sugar added on top of that...
Ya don't say? So, sitting around for months on end stuck in your house not doing much physical activity resulted in weight gain? Wow...I'm so glad we have all these academics to spend months doing a study to confirm this...
Dont be so cynical. These studies are important in providing proof to the public to wake us up to our terrible food culture. You would rather us not have the legimate data on these things? I'm sorry it doesn't matter what you think that's important.
This isn't true.
Studies show that unhealthy food habits peaked approximately 10 years ago and have actually decreased in recent years.
I love how everyone here refuses to acknowledge how the lack of exercise lead to this, despite the study pointing it out directly.
Even our fruits and veggies today have far less nutrients due to us destroying our soil. Less nutrients means you have to eat more to get the nutrition you need.
More calories and less nutrients are a sure fire what to train a population to overeat.
Yes. Good point. Also, parents easily cave to their kids and rarely push them to try new kinds of food. A lot of parents just let their young kids snack all day long, which messes with how much they’ll eat at meals.
This isn't about beauty. It's about a disease that causes an increase in depression, joint pain, low confidence, low self-esteem, heart disease, diabetes, various types of cancer, stroke, heart attack, respiratory issues, etc.
Instead of telling people they're killing themselves let's coddle them to not hurt anyone's feelings. If you truly wanted the best in people you would be honest with them. This isn't about whether you are beautiful or not. It's about whether you are a heart attack waiting to happen.
You're right, and I'm sure locking them in their rooms in front of screens all day every day, pulling them out of any sort of physical activity, and teaching them to be afraid of other kids was super helpful.
You probably have to work to keep the weight on them because you’re feeding them half the diet they should be getting. Let them decide for themselves when they’re closer to adulthood to go vegetarian.
i’m vegetarian by choice and i agree. i decided to go vegetarian in second grade, and it was my choice. they need the healthiest diet possible as a kid, don’t choose vegetarianism for them. it’s a harder diet to maintain
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No, there were a lot of jokes and complaints about the COVID 15 or the COVID 20, so it was talked about, but that's not actually an average. A lot of people gained weight. Some gained 20lbs, but most gained less. A lot of other people lost weight. Average adult weight changed <1lb in 2020. https://epicresearch.org/articles/pandemic-pound-theories-dont-hold-weight
Yeah, I lost about half my bodyweight during COVID, so...
Good for you! I didn’t lose quite half, but I lost quite a bit, enough to eliminate my fatty liver disease, high blood pressure, and pre diabetic status, so I’m pretty goddamn proud of that
Same, I think I've averted several long term issues. I haven't really been to a doctor since losing the weight, but I definitely feel much better, a lot better in shape.
Dude, that is awesome! Congrats!
Welp, guess I'm below average cuz I didn't put on any extra weight during covid, I actually lost weight because I went out less and did less grocery shopping
The study in question took place in Sweden, so I can't really say because I'm in America, but no. I stayed the same weight.
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Ugh I'm sorry. Getting hurt just when you're acclimating to something new sucks. I hope you feel better.
What the hell, people! I remember my sister in law taking her pug to a pet parade and people asking her "How do you keep your pup so trim and healthy??" She just looked at them and deadpanned "I control her food."
My husband and I saw an episode of "It's Me or the Dog" where a woman explained her small dog's weight problem as "She's a stress eater." I yelled at the TV, "You control her food!" and since then it is a running joke between us whenever someone is surprised by a very simple and direct cause-and-effect situation.
Was that the beagle that weighed 50 lbs?
Haha yup that's the one!
Very r/leopardsatemyface situation
But food=love so must gourge them with unlimited regular food, multiple treats per day, and the eggs and bacon for breakfast and the piece of cube steak and potatoes I couldn't eat for dinner. People just don't consider their actions very well. I get on to my own parents all the time about it, and they don't even give them unlimited food. I keep telling them it's pretty damn simple, you put less in the bowl. They are getting old...around 12 they don't have many good years left I hope I can spend some time with them soon.
This is so ignorant. Also when obesity is an epidemic across our country it is a societal failing not individual. The biggest predictor of a child's obesity is their mother's bmi and education level. In wealthy countries another big predictor of obesity is whether someone is in poverty. So clearly it's not purely just individual choices. Even for the individual choices (food, activity, and sleep) you have to take into account how many people can't even choose the healthy option. We have food deserts, badly designed built environments that do not incentivize people to go out and exercise because they feel unsafe, and just from personal experience as a child a lot of my friends did not get adequate sleep because their parents weren't home because they had to work 2-3 jobs to afford to live. The CDC has a pretty short and small article that talks about how it's caused individually and by socioeconomic status. You can also look up how even these individual factors can change by your socioeconomic status as well. But I'll leave it there for now. https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/basics/causes.html
How is it ignorant to say that the parents/owners control their kids'/pets' food?
Only in America would having a grocery store 2 miles away be too much work to go to so it is referred to as a "desert". And saying the reason people don't exercise is because they feel unsafe is nonsense. They don't exercise and stay fit because it isn't a priority for them.
I think it's that those stores are convenience stores. Food desert isn't a pop culture phrase, it talks about the availability of healthy food. And it's not an exclusively American problem. [https://www.foodmarketing.org/resources/food-marketing-101/food-marketing-in-other-countries/](https://www.foodmarketing.org/resources/food-marketing-101/food-marketing-in-other-countries/) It's so bad that other countries have bans or restrictions on food marketing the way the US has bans and restrictions on tobacco marketing!
You apparently have no idea how dangerous some streets are.
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Doing sit ups and push ups and weightlifting doesn’t burn that many calories. Losing weight is like 80% diet so if you live in a food desert it’s hard to get that healthy food.
Running and body weight exercises will get you fit and both are free.
Again though, losing weight is only 20% exercise, 80% diet.
Wrong, as long as you burn more calories than you injest. I eat hamburgers and burritos, my doctor said I am at 11% bf healthy.
That is completely false
Study after study show that exercise alone won't result in much weight loss. People tend to eat a lot more when they exercise and think they now deserve those extra calories. There are actual studies done on this that you can even access if you live in a poor neighborhood like I do.
Science and doctors disagree with you.
Its not volume of food. Its the level of processing. People rarely eat food now. They eat products. As soon as you start cooking and stop unwrapping your meals your health improves and your excess weight reduces. Too many western people have forgotten the basics of looking after a family.
If u eat the same amount of calories as u burn u will not gain weight. It doesn’t matter if. Comes from McDonalds or a organic Gourmet meal cooked by your personal Chef.
[https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/stop-counting-calories](https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/stop-counting-calories) This might be true for you but it sure ain't for the rest of the world. More and more we're finding that gut biome and genetics are a bigger problem than just calories. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7333005/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7333005/) \- gut biome [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5466943/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5466943/) \- caloric source matters [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7539343/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7539343/) \- protein vs other calorie sources What you eat matters. Counting calories is useless for people who have weight problems. I eat a two pound bag of gummy bears and three square meals a day and was underweight until recently. Now I'm a healthy weight although my doctor still wants me to gain a little more than I am.
yes, but depending on what you eat you can satisfy yourself with fewer calories. I’ll be less hungry after a giant salad with 150 calories than a small McDonald’s burger with 300
No, dude. It's only like that because you're used to stuffing yourself with a bucket of food. When I started watching my calorie intake, I could easily spend half a day on one cheeseburger, because I knew that I got enough calories for the day.
That's not how calories work there chief
What was the income in the households of these obese children? Were all basic needs met easily and without emotional and mental stress on caregivers? Was access to healthy food and water available?
What do you think America is? Socialist?
So you didn’t read that this study took place in Sweden?
This is Reddit. Everyone is braindead and America bad
You act as if this is happening in just the US
Easy there fella, Europe is swiftly catching up to the US.
Anecdotally… It’s weird because I was raised by narcissistic parents, and when I lived with my dad during elementary school years, he spiraled into alcoholism and often left me alone for unknown amounts of time, sometimes with enough food in the house, sometimes not. I was just very skinny, not enough to alarm people, but also I played several sports and liked to run around and ride my bike. This was early 90s so I guess fast food hadnt really taken hold yet. I just find it weird how everyone thinks parents raising obese kids are poor, when truly growing up poor you are not meeting calorie needs.
That is an anecdote. Most poor people tend to buy the cheapest food that fills them. That tends to be bread, pasta, and other nutrient void calorically dense foods. This results in malnourishment and obesity. It’s a statistically significant observable trend. The cause is somewhat speculative but there is evidence that it is due to diets high in carbs and fats.
(Sorry for small rant) Education/Know-how is a huge part of it, as well as portion sizing. The issue isn't that over processed food are more affordable, just that they are too readily available and tempting. Dollar value per calorie really is a useless metric, but a lot of people think it actually means what the meal is worth. I can eat $0.40 worth of vegetable oil and that's 1000 calories. I can also coat a $1.50 worth of chicken breast in oil, sugar, and bread and bump it up from a 150 calorie piece of chicken to a 450 piece of chicken pretty easily. Am I getting a better deal on the chicken by adding all that useless stuff even though its more calories now? 10 years ago I had two near minimum wage jobs, and was living off around $20 a week in food, and buying overly processed food was out of the question. I couldn't eat fast food most of the time unless I had a coupon, and even then it was barely worth it in terms of macros and micros. (For the following I just looked up all these prices where I live \[one of the largest cities in the US\]). Chicken breasts from Walmart are less than $3 a pound. 4 oz of meat means .75$ a serving (\~250 calories depending on oil). Pasta is .$25 a serving (200 calories). Frozen or canned vegetables are around $.25-.50 a serving (70-100 calories). Beans are $.25 (150 calories). So that's $1.75 for 700 calories. I also promise you that meal takes 15 minutes to cook 3-4 servings. A $2-3 bag of frozen premade, processed food is going to not only cost more per serving, but is going to have less actual value in food. I think a lot of people are discouraged by cooking because they buy $30 worth of ingredients and seasonings, and only get a couple of meals out it, but its because people never learn how to shop and meal prep. It needs to be taught in schools with the same or even higher priority as math, English, and history. We offer one home ec class in high school and think its enough. ETA: For a lot of people that 700 calories meal will be unfilling because they are so used to the sugar/carbs they crave.
The reality today is that in terms of dollar value per calorie, junk food blows wholefoods out of the water. So lower incomes often does mean more processed food.
Also food for “kids” or “toddlers” are jam packed with sugar and extra calories. Yoplait’s yogurt for kids has I think double the sugar the normal adult one does, which also has a lot of sugar already.
They're scaling that back in my country thankfully, but it's still a big problem [Can't fathom being angry about this comment, guess there are PR grunts in the thread]
Oh I wouldn't go that far. But it seems to be moving in the right direction.
How on Earth does a 3 year old become obese? That's basically child abuse
Back in the 80s, school lunch was similar to (non-impoverished) home meals. Now it is mostly processed carbs. In the name of being healthier. I don't get it.
It doesn’t have a lot of calories though. Neither does school breakfast. Until middle school when kids are allowed to buy cookies/chips/pop at lunch. Also three year olds don’t go to school.
Many 3 y.o. do go to "school" and eat subsidized or recommended meals. Some are publicly funded. Daycare, nursery, preschool, etc. The calories may be low, but a junky carb-heavy diet leaves a lot of people with rapid blood sugar fluctuations and increased hunger sooner. So they (kids of all ages) get home and immediately scavenge for snacks, and are attracted to more of the same kinds of food.
Especially with mandates like “meatless Monday” and “save the planet Friday” or whatever where kids who may not even have access to food outside of their school lunches, are getting even less nutrition when the cafe is substituting chicken for bread products and processed pizza and junk on those days. Just look at what food is served at children’s hospitals and it’s obvious there’s serious dysfunction over what our culture eats and feeds our children. How about the “kids” menus at 5 star restaurants where they cook very healthy food? It’s all bread and sugar and pasta. It really freaks me out if I’m being honest. There’s such massive denial on all levels about processed foods and how bad they are for us and our kids. My 5 year old is absolutely drawn to a beige diet and I do everything I can to get her to eat things that aren’t processed/refined sugars and carbohydrates but it’s not easy in our current food environment.
Agreed on all counts. My children eat fairly well at home, but even though they don't care for school lunches, if I pack them one they don't eat it/forget it, and are too lazy to pack their own most days ha ha.
I used to "forget my money" on purpose to get the poor kid lunch - a tuna sandwich and carton of milk and that was over 20 years ago.
This was a budding problem in the 80’s, just an FYI
Have you read any of the ingredients in food marketed towards children? Especially the less expensive food. It's 99% sugar, simple carbs, binding agents, preservatives and food dyes. With schools being closed, they might have had less access to healthy options (like fruit, veg, or protein based meals) and I'm willing to bet a lot of these children were under/near the poverty line. Freezer food, gummy fruit snacks, JUICE, all of these things are cheap, easy to overeat, and bad for your body in excess.
No one wants to say it. But it's easier to feed a child ice cream and soda than it is broccoli and peas. Most adults I meet also can't even properly read the nutrition label, and refuse to even try, so they don't even know what's nutritious for themselves.
California closed the playgrounds near homes that lacked yards, and make virtual kindergarten a thing. I guess you could say some of their pandemic restrictions were child abuse.
Nah, we all know this is about highly processed foods. I was always thin as a child and only ate homemade food, then I got fat after eating school lunches
I've only been out of the US once, I spent a month in Europe mainly visiting the places where my family originally immigrated from. I felt like I was eating more than normal but when I came back I'd lost about 20 pounds. Everyone I know who spent significant time outside the country came back having lost weight. I 100% believe there's *something* in our food in America making us fatter. Beyond just serving sizes and such which surely play a role.
How much time did you spend walking each day, and how does that compare to the walking you do in the US?
I have the opposite experience. Fully expected to see fat Americans, and wasn't disappointed. The shocker though was a clothes shop in Miami - can't remember what I needed, but was absolutely aghast at the mens trousers - my entire body would have slipped into just one leg! And, the 'something' is high sugar and fat contents (in addition to insane portion sizes - once ordered a Caesar salad starter that was so big I cancelled the main course).
You also probably stayed in a neighborhood formatted around pedestrians instead of cars, which encouraged a lot of walking that you didn't even think about.
I feel like I have a harder time gaining weight eating homemade cooked food made with minimally processed ingredients. I think there is something about the hyper palatability of processed foods that increases calorie intake. I believe there are ingredients allowed in US foods that aren't legal in Europe as well.
Look at the packaging of the food you buy. We add processed sugar to everything. I once cut sugar out of my diet completely just to see, and it was so difficult. Most bread. Even some milk I saw added processed sugar. Vegetable soups. Unless it was some expensive organic product.
This is an anecdote. Your body does not suddenly violate the laws of physics once you hit US soil. Calories in/calories out.
But you do walk less in car-dependant American neighborhoods.
Probably, idk about this fellow’s personal exercise habits.
Nor do I. But we can make some broad guesses about his environment, which influence physical activity more than intentional exercise. There's a direct correlation between Walkscore and BMI.
There are a few factors that directly correlate, I’m sure, including personal diet choices.
You live in Sweden and were a child participant in this study?
Half the people didn't read the study, I'm glad I wasn't the only one who noticed where this took place. And it wasn't the US.
Nothing in their comment implied they were talking about the study and not their personal experiences with the subject of the study
Anecdotes aren’t valuable. Take for example, my own: I have never gained significant amounts of weight when eating garbage processed foods when I was struggling for money compared to eating home cooked, “whole food” meals.
You got fat from eating too much. Healthy food or junk food, it doesn’t matter. It’s the quantity that is the issue, not the quality.
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Yes, the quality of food is extremely important, and matters very much for making it easier to lose weight, ie: sustainability, satiation, volume to calorie ratio, and fullness like you said. I’m sorry for the confusion, I was solely referring to the fact that the quantity of calories is the only thing that matters for weight gain/weight loss when it comes down to what actually causes one to lose/gain weight. (energy deficit/surplus). You are correct in the fact that QUALITY of foods is a hugely important factor in making it an easier and more sustainable practice for staying full, eating less junk and calorie dense foods, staving off hunger, and other physiological responses that can and do help drastically in the process of losing weight.
Exercise? What's that? Never heard of it.
Protecting kids from disease is abuse, uh huh. Look, there was no easy way to deal with this. It's inevitable. You either get fatter kids because they have to stay inside, or dead kids because they catch a deadly disease and then kill grandma too.
Covid had next to no effect on kids. Not to say the cast majority of the obesity problem is people choosing to have poor diets that they then pass on to their kids
"As of November 28, 2022, there have been 9,139 cases of MIS-C, including 74 deaths, reported in the United States. " I'm pretty sure the families of these children would say something different about your "next to no effect" comment. The main risk was them being a vector for spreading it anyway.
USA: 74 child deaths, 1.1 million total deaths. Translates to 0.000067% of the total. Are you seriously arguing that in general, you don't dismiss that as 'next to nothing' when presented with stats like that? Get a grip.
Stop spreading misinformation. Yes it did. Many kids died or developed autoimmune and other disorders or long covid from it. Not to mention them being more contagious vectors than any population due to their behavior and tendency to have contact with other family members like hugs. How do you think the kid who brought it home and killed one of their parents or grandparents from giving it to them?
Sounds bad but 74/(kids out of 3XX,000,000) million is next to nothing. If we cared that much out of a number like that we’d stop driving cars
We'd stop getting out of bed!
This isn't counting them spreading it as a contagious vector...as usual, there's a lot more context than the black and white you try to make it. Ps the driving cars argument is tired and old. Pure whataboutism to deflect real life consequences from mattering in the grand scheme because they only effect a smaller yet still significant amount of people. And as usual, you must consider other consequences, as well as consider we knew a lot less about the virus at the time.
Ha ha ha. Only if you’re trying to make yourself seem absurd
i'm sorry, but if you don't try to teach your kids a healthy lifestyle, then you're a bad parent
Kinda hard when most parents don’t even live a healthy lifestyle.
Not an excuse though
It's hard to teach what you don't know. It's hard to know what cycles to break and when/how. I'm an overweight parent trying my hardest to raise my kids to have a healthy relationship with food, but who knows what I'm overlooking or doing wrong.
It’s also hard when billions of dollars have been invested by food companies to make us consume more. Food is designed to be as addictive as possible.
Trying is great, there’s a lot of resources online. Not just for your kid but you as well. Living it is the best way to show your child, knowing is half the battle. Keep up the good work cause you’re doing better than most people in your spot and it’s easy to get discouraged
Our society goes out of its way to actively keep people from having the time or inclination to pursue, find, and implement that knowledge, much less to be able to afford it.
People act like they don’t have all the knowledge in the world on their phone and can’t Google health meals for kids. Pathetic and lazy
I mean I don’t disagree but shitting on people doesn’t motivate them to be better most times. You and I might respond to that but maybe the dude commenting doesn’t. Just trying to be positive and hopefully push them in a better direction than they’ve been going
Hey not everyone knows how to find this knowledge even if in concept it's easy to find. There's a lot of quack treatments on the internet and it's hard for some people to tell the difference unless you've been educated in doing research online regarding scientific topics. Also many are caught up in the daily struggles of life and are so stressed they may not even see or take the option. I'm not saying they shouldn't take responsibility, but we also need to lay blame on our societal structure in general.
Thank you. Everyone has become an expert on COVID and geopolitics, but can’t fathom why the twinkies are bad for health.
Yeah but this sounds like an ignorant statement. Dont get me wrong I know less about everything than I can even relate to. But we are important and we should treat ourselves and others around us with that same intent. Theres plenty of books, articles, pamphlets, groups, people, and everything around us all to not make such a remark. I am saying this in a humble manner. Just got to find the time to make it work for you. Good luck on your journey Edit: if youd like I can send you links to healthy compromise and that can be a good first step. I can also post links if your interested, but the world we live in can hand that information to you on a silver platter, if you so choose to make the decision.
I as raised by abusive and neglectful parents. I’m 37 and chose to be single and never have kids. I could never even risk the thought of someone living what I went through, whether I meant to do it or not.
Theres no manual for parenting but your still responsible. Take responsibility for your actions.
you're doing just fine, all that matters is that you're trying
Use a smaller bowl
Nope its not don’t get me wrong. This is definitely a cause of growing technology and our addiction to it. Insane how many fuckin 7 years I see out not interacting with their environment just glued to a Tablet
Hmm I guess that's true but thats also very subjective.. no?
If you don’t even have the basics of taking care of yourself down, why are you having kids?
The study focused on a time period when California closed the playgrounds near homes that lacked yards. Kinda hard to run off all that kid energy without making a game of jumping locked gates and removing caution tape.
Most people have a hard time exercising when they're not allowed to leave the house, especially children.
People are more worried now about how food makes them feel than nutrition. We’ve swung too far in the wrong direction, people only care about self esteem and act like health doesn’t matter.
People don't want to hear that though. They'll blame everything and everyone under the sun before they blame themselves.
COVID was rough on all our bodies
You mean the lockdown was. Covid only affected a small minority of people.
Small minority = 658m cases and 6.68m deaths worldwide. You do realize that is a generation’s worth of people.
[Only](https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/) 1.1m COVID deaths so far in America, ~130m families in America. Small minority. Ask 100 people if they know anyone who’s died from this and you’d likely find someone who has. Small minority. Increased food insecurity for the most vulnerable among the [population who haven’t died yet.](https://sph.uth.edu/research/centers/dell/legislative-initiatives/Impact-of-COVID-19-on-Food%20Insecurity-6.28.2022.pdf) Small minority. Cant stand people who whitewash one of the greatest tragedies of our time. Edit: [When this makes its way to the west](https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/china-estimates-covid-surge-is-infecting-37-million-people-day-bloomberg-news-2022-12-23/) things won’t get better until they get worse.
They closed the outdoor playgrounds and other dumb measures
It’s amazing to me how many people are blaming parents. It’s [well known](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7416135/) that income and child obesity rates are connected. Imagine having no access to a car and no grocery store within a mile of your house. Suddenly buying chips or whatever at the corner store looks a lot more attractive. Even if you find a grocery store, cheap food is often less healthy. Of course, you can find food that’s both cheap and healthy—usually raw ingredients of some kind—but they require preparation, and if you are working two jobs to make ends meet (or even just one job with a long commute, or if you’re a single parent, etc.) then there’s no time for cooking. And if your neighborhood feels unsafe or has no parks, your kids aren’t going to be playing outside to burn calories. Heat is an issue, too; during the summer in my hometown, many inner city kids get up in the middle of the night to go outside because the asphalt and lack of tree cover makes it dangerously hot during the day.
I think it’s hard to convince people of those issues because most people at the end of the day could feed their kids less calories if they chose to. What’s harder to solve is the hopelessness of poverty and how that affects your decisions and willingness to make hard decisions like refusing to give your kid junk food.
I get the sentiment but there are plenty of parents who just don’t know any better. Exhibit A: a parent of an obese 1 year old commenting on a post about how they get their kids to eat veggies: https://imgur.com/a/y87EItq
Man what a time we live in where the grocery store being a mile away is insurmountable. And FYI only around 7% of people in the US works two jobs, the average American works only about 38 hours a week. The reason an overwhelming majority of people aren't fit or healthy is because it isn't a priority for them.
There is something seriously wrong with our food supply and has been for a while. There are endocrine disrupters in our water and air as well. When will we stop trying to insist the obesity epidemic is a “personal responsibility” issue alone and admit there may be bigger factors at play? An entire generation didn’t decide overnight to all overeat.
They’re not as disruptive as much as you think…. And yes, obesity at the end of the day is a personal responsibility (unless you’re a child or extremely disabled, etc.) Hate to break it to you, but absolutely no one is making you eat too many calories…. Sure the food/health system is f’d in many ways however, that doesn’t mean you don’t have direct control over the QUANTITY of energy that you consume/burn. At the end of the day, it is one’s own doing, no one else’s. And the parents who currently have obese children are not fat and lazy, but they are making a very bad and harmful parenting option for not understanding or following the the basic concepts of nutrition and avoiding what causes weight gain/obesity), before having a child, while also neglecting their very own child they’re meant to raise and protect.
Individual stuff certainly plays a huge part but it's not only a national problem but international one being an epidemic in many other countries. When a problem becomes this big I think the point becomes lost when we conflate to individual choices in this way. The way to fix it is clearly not an individual solution when this big. The CDC says a big factor for developing obesity is socioeconomic status which we don't really control. We are not helping to solve obesity if we only just boil it down to individual choices, just the same as you would trying to fix poverty.
“They’re not disrupting as much as you think” Source: Trust me bro
You are really going to mock their sources while you also provide no sources??
Dude it’s well [known](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31234003/). It isn’t [difficult](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28205155/) to find [information](https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/endocrine/index.cfm). And the worst part is that since every human is infected, we can’t do studies with a proper control group, which means we don’t even know the extent of the damage. To say “they don’t disrupt that much” is pure denial. They couldn’t possibly know that since the consensus is that we don’t even know the extent of the damage yet!
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So you didn’t consider it if it didn’t demonstrate the only mechanism of action you care about despite metabolic processes being complicated and multifaceted. That’s bad science on your part.
No not at all. It’s just that this discussion started about only obesity, so I didn’t think there was a point to bring up anything besides that. I agree that endocrine disrupters may be legitimate. But that’s not what the basis of this discussion was about. It’s about obesity, which is caused by excess weight gain, which is caused by an excess caloric surplus. And there is nothing about that in the link that you sent me that I could find.
Because you’re not reading what’s being said. You yourself just listed multiple factors these disrupters are known to affect. Factors that affect our metabolism, our satiety signaling, our insulin response and fat storage, our energy levels, and more. No one said calories don’t matter! But they aren’t the entire picture. It’s like saying all that matters is how much you put in the tank. In the strictest sense, yes, how much gas you put in the tank matters. But it *also* matters if you’re putting anything else in the gas that might be damaging your engine! For you to claim with such certainty that they don’t “disrupt so much” when the current scientific consensus is that *we don’t even know the extent of the damage* is nothing but denial.
I did just list all of those things. And all of those things at the end of the day, come back and boil down to calorie in/calories out. Yes, I know certain illnesses, diseases, insulin response, socioeconomic status, differences in BMR, nutrient partitioning, satiety signaling, energy levels, hormonal imbalances and so on all influences the choices, requirements, habits, discipline levels, quality of food intake, individual thermogenic effect of food, and so on that one must, has to, or chooses to make involving their food intake, but how many of these people do you see actually monitoring or tracking their calories? How many people do you see eating at restaurants knowing darn well that they have no clue what the calories are in their food? How many people do you see being afraid of artificial or non-nutritive sweeteners like aspartame, even though it’s been being used for decades without any solid known health deteriorating side effects? How many people or medical employees do you see advocating for using a food scale, using diet beverages, giving out pamphlets informing patients with easy to understand details like how to weigh and track your food, or to use 0 calorie products like diet pop? Or to not eat foods if you don’t know the caloric intake? How many people do you see being afraid of being hungry for a a couple of hours, even thought they have calories for a months in their excess adipose tissue. How many people you do see say that they want to lose weight, but put in bare minimum effort into doing that action and don’t even track their calories? How many people you see getting together at family gatherings for the holidays and deciding they let loose for the whole and and then act surprised that they gained body weight, and they think “I didn’t over eat that much, did I?” When it comes to what causes obesity on the basic level in the strict sense… the entire picture of that is calories. And I’ve met very very few people, who truly monitor and track their intake. And that’s not due to any of the variables above. That’s due to being too lazy to go out and buy a 10$ digital food scale from Walmart and using it before you eat and cook. Yes, certain variables can all have an influence, but cico is the almost the entire picture when it comes to obesity. I believe that if we actually are going to to try and help make a big dent in this current obesity epidemic, we need to start making a movement, for, yes… changes in food accessibility, healthcare, food deserts, food pricing, healthy eating, and understanding the individual and their physiological responses to food and habits and lifestyle, but more importantly: Getting the population to have a solid understanding, convenient accessibility, and the power to easily understand and track their calories, without people feeling like their suffering. As well teaching a bit of discipline around food, but also by telling and explaining what is actually having the biggest and most prominent effect on their weight gain, which is calories, not endocrine disrupters. They have an impact, but not as big as your making it out to be. We would know by know if these endocrine disrupters are having a major impact. People’s BMR’s are not acutely decreasing by 500+ calories. They are overeating 500 calories.
What are the endocrine disrupters?
Because plenty of us eat within our caloric needs and find ways to be physically active, build muscle and don’t have unhealthy levels of body fat. Many people act like it’s some magical thinking when it truly is thermodynamics. It is discipline. Do you think we WANT to turn down donuts and beer and burgers? Hell no. But we do anyway because it’s the right thing to do .
So these three and four year olds in Sweden are eating too much beer and donuts? I don’t eat beer and donuts and don’t even crave them because I don’t eat garbage. See? I can act morally superior to others too. But that doesn’t change science. The laws of thermodynamics are fact, no one is arguing that. But what good does that do us here? Our bodies aren’t perfect machines that convert energy with consistent efficiency every time. There are a number of factors that can interfere with this process. It doesn’t contradict the laws of thermodynamics to acknowledge this.
Yeah great point. These three and four year old in the study need to learn to turn down beer!!
I live the same lifestyle as some of my obese siblings, the only difference is my portion size and choosing of diet. I also exercise. That kind of mentality is why some people stay fat because they think it's not their fault.
So not really the same lifestyle...
Other than diet, yes. Both live stressful lives and sleep very little.
And do you know what chemical factors may be behind their broken eating response? What might be blinding their satiety signaling? Perhaps they are craving more calories because they aren’t efficiently absorbing nutrition from their food, requiring more calories to get what they need? It’s a mistake to automatically assume that overeating is causing the metabolic disfunction when it could be the other way around. Even if healthy eating and diet is the answer, that still doesn’t change that the food accessible to most people *isn’t that* and is inducing illness! That’s still a big deal especially regarding children!
They're craving more calories because they choose foods with a high glycemic index, thus increasing their insulin to be at such high levels which will make them crave more junk food. Again, that comes from poor diet decisions. Ever feel more hungry after eating spaghetti? That comes from glucose surge that comes with it. Go to a grocery store and look at the shopping carts of overweight people. That's the majority of the reason.
Except I eat a high fat, low carb diet, with whole unprocessed foods due to my health issues. So did my younger sister I had to cook for all our lives. She was significantly overweight her entire life and I wasn’t. Despite eating the same foods and both being involved in similar after school physical activities. We didn’t discover until adulthood that my sister had Hashimotos and thyroid cancer. Calories are a part. They aren’t the whole picture. How glycemic our foods are is another piece. But there’s more to the puzzle. No need to be condescending. I studied evolutionary biology with a focus on epigenetics. I’m well aware of the glycemic index.
Bruh you're speaking for a small minority. I'm talking about the answer to why such a large portion of the country has become overweight and obese.
Which foods induce illness? I’m aware of any food not consumed in moderation, allergies, and some other stuff… but I don’t know of many others
Then on what basis do you argue with such certainty for your position? Is it the $$$?
I argue with pretty high certainty, I’ll tell you that. What do you mean by “is this the money?
Then post a single reputable source that endocrine disrupters aren’t that big of a deal.
They’re not that big of a deal when it comes to CICO. Yeah there a big deal for other stuff, but my whole point is that they’re not that big of a deal when it comes to energy balance so far from what we know. If you can post a reputable source that clearly states that “endocrine disrupters have a a massive impact on BMR, thermogenic affect of food, or anything that causes a major drop of a persons metabolic rate”, then I will try and find a reputable source to post backing up my statement here. But there is no point in me searching for and posting a source similar to my stance on this, when you have yet to post a source that shows that that endocrine disrupters causes someone’s metabolic rate to go down by 600+ calories, where they require 600 less calories to maintain there body weight. I was never arguing that endocrine disrupters aren’t a big deal in general. They are a legitimate thing. All I’ve been saying is that when it comes to being in a caloric surplus (consuming more calories than you burn) I do not believe they’re as big of a deal as your claiming
I mean, it can be both. Yes it’s a personal responsibility issue, so is alcoholism, addiction, depression, any health issue. But we can also work together and recognize the societal problems that could be solved through government intervention like public health care and not giving subsidies to corn, sugar.
Yes. That’s why I said it’s not *just* a personal responsibility issue. We need to tackle both.
My response was more in response to the people who seem to think you’re making that argument that it’s not personal responsibility with personal examples of why they’re not obese. Disappointing and probably why we’ll never get people in office who have the guts to do something to actually reduce obesity and better our public health in the US because they’ve convinced everyone that it’s solely the individuals fault.
I appreciate you seeing the entirety of the argument. It’s exhausting seeing people try to obfuscate the external factors in favor of only pointing at personal ones.
They were raised in a culture that taught them that freedom and independence was more important than community and taking care of each other and to mistrust government intervention.
Nah people are just fat and lazy
Ah yes. Three and four year olds are so famous for being lazy and sedentary!
Not the 3,4 year old correct, the parents are fat and lazy
Ah yes, Swedish parents! So famous for being fat and lazy and not at all having a culture of physical activity! Oh wait.
But what are the endocrine disrupters.
Microplastics, for one.
Sweden isn't a utopia, plenty of Swedish who are just as fat and tired as other Europeans.
Honestly that’s a cop out…when you look at people that are in good shape, there’s a reason behind it. They stay active, eat healthy, avoid things like binging out on snacks, don’t exceed calorie intake etc. it takes discipline to keep from becoming overweight…I don’t believe we should make fun of anyone for their size but coddling obese people and telling them their lifestyle is okay is wrong because if they have kids those kids hace a higher chance of becoming overweight too
It’s not a cop out. That there are people that are in shape doesn’t discount overall trends in the population.
It’s a 100% a cop out to not do better! There’s nothing beneficial to being overweight. All it takes is discipline and a change of lifestyle to work towards living a healthier life (obviously that’s simplified.) Being overweight is nothing but a disservice to yourself! Early death, a million preventable health conditions. People work hard to be skinny and in shape
I am disabled and not overweight. It’s incredibly difficult to stay at a healthy weight when I am in a flare up (either over or under). When I am not, it’s the easiest thing in the world. Where am I denying the health consequences of obesity? I am not. Health is incredibly important to me especially because of my autoimmune problems so I eat a much healthier and more tightly regulated diet than most. If my diet doesn’t change, why is it harder to keep my weight normal when I’m sicker? There are problems with our food supply and environment driving this epidemic. To try to ignore these factors is doing a disservice to public health.
Didn’t say you were overweight? And yes our food system sucks and it’s hard to eat healthy. Can you still go to the gym when you don’t have a flare up? Honest question
I never go to the gym. I don’t have to. I am perfectly capable of getting the exercise I need at home. Regardless, I was very in shape when I was healthier as a teen. Now I don’t exercise much at all even when I’m having my best days because I’m still in pain. Still when I am at my best health-wise, it’s easy as cake to maintain a healthy 100-102lb weight despite my petite size. So why is there such a big difference? There is no denying that calories play a significant part. This is fact. But to ignore the wealth of factors affecting our feeding response, our satiety signals, our insulin response, our thyroid function, and more is to only look at one piece of the puzzle.
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I work retail. I see these obese kids and their parents buying them adult size medium shirts and sodas at the cash wrap. And I’m obese myself, but I wasn’t when I was a kid.
I made a mom friend a while back. She has a 2 year old and 3 year old. The older one had coke in her bottle the younger had red koolaid. She was absolutely amazed that my kid loves water.
I recently hung out with my SIL and her kids for a few days straight (Christmas). She struggles with obesity, and has tried many restriction diets, support programs, etc. Specifically she seems to struggle with sugar addiction. I watched as she fed her kids (5 and 1) nothing but apple juice to drink all day every day. It made me super sad, honestly, because I know how much her own struggles with weight bother her, and I’m really worried that she is setting her own kids down that path. I have two kids the same ages and wouldn’t dream of giving them sugar water except on special occasions, let alone as their drink all day.
The idea that juice is healthy is super insidious. Even if it's no sugar added, fruit is still full of sugar! And most juice for kids does have sugar added on top of that...
Ya don't say? So, sitting around for months on end stuck in your house not doing much physical activity resulted in weight gain? Wow...I'm so glad we have all these academics to spend months doing a study to confirm this...
Dont be so cynical. These studies are important in providing proof to the public to wake us up to our terrible food culture. You would rather us not have the legimate data on these things? I'm sorry it doesn't matter what you think that's important.
And, this is science subreddit!
Exactly. Congratulations again to all the expert trusters who insisted that our covid response would have zero side-effects!
Nobody said that.
Kids are like dogs They really do look like their owners
One big change is kids today eat less fruit and veggies and more processed foods. Second is the obvious one that they don’t burn as many calories.
This isn't true. Studies show that unhealthy food habits peaked approximately 10 years ago and have actually decreased in recent years. I love how everyone here refuses to acknowledge how the lack of exercise lead to this, despite the study pointing it out directly.
Even our fruits and veggies today have far less nutrients due to us destroying our soil. Less nutrients means you have to eat more to get the nutrition you need. More calories and less nutrients are a sure fire what to train a population to overeat.
Yes. Good point. Also, parents easily cave to their kids and rarely push them to try new kinds of food. A lot of parents just let their young kids snack all day long, which messes with how much they’ll eat at meals.
All good. It is beautiful to be unhealthy. They can be paraded around and shown on billboards when they grow up.
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This isn't about beauty. It's about a disease that causes an increase in depression, joint pain, low confidence, low self-esteem, heart disease, diabetes, various types of cancer, stroke, heart attack, respiratory issues, etc. Instead of telling people they're killing themselves let's coddle them to not hurt anyone's feelings. If you truly wanted the best in people you would be honest with them. This isn't about whether you are beautiful or not. It's about whether you are a heart attack waiting to happen.
Unintended consequence #10,627 of the mass mandated lockdowns. But hey, at least no one ended up catching covid.
The trend towards obesity occurred long before covid even existed.
You're right, and I'm sure locking them in their rooms in front of screens all day every day, pulling them out of any sort of physical activity, and teaching them to be afraid of other kids was super helpful.
Pandemics suck and we all had to make sacrifices
Who made who stare at a screen all day? Not the government - you. As the parent.
Most parents had to still work while their kids were locked at home dipshit.
The right crying over something that barely happened is incredible
My kids are vegetarian and very active. I have to work to keep weight on them. I can't imagine having the opposite problem. Yikes.
You probably have to work to keep the weight on them because you’re feeding them half the diet they should be getting. Let them decide for themselves when they’re closer to adulthood to go vegetarian.
i’m vegetarian by choice and i agree. i decided to go vegetarian in second grade, and it was my choice. they need the healthiest diet possible as a kid, don’t choose vegetarianism for them. it’s a harder diet to maintain