How does one fight obesity?

[fender_gurl_1991]

So how does one fight obesity? Any data or links would be welcome as well.

[sera p]

Just eating less and doing some regular excercise does wonders.

[volt55theband]

Take up smoking.


Just kidding.

Would generally say excercise myself, you build more muscle it seems to me the weight thing, to a great extent, takes care of itself. You have an off day, so what, it still does its job.

A diet is hard work in comparison, whereas excercise can be fun.

And trying to keep to some kind of calorie limit, what a joke, you're hungry, you got to eat.

There's not much point fighting it. A *healthy* (not low energy) diet is important in my view mainly for energy reasons, so you'll have the stamina and motivation to get off your arse and do something. And that's not hard to stick to at all. Fresh fruits and vegetables, juiced if you prefer (I do), wholegrain breaRAB and cereals, they're all pretty decent, Subway a few times a week, chicken breasts.

Then again I have had multiple formerly overweight frienRAB have great success with the Atkins diet, and tests seem to reveal a high protein diet has appetite suppressing properties, which is probably why. But then you have the bad breath side effect and the expensive nature of the diet.

[Nickia]

I`m in Japan right now and spent time in Korea before this and I have yet to see one single extremely obese person, or even someone more than a little chubby, and I have only seen a handful of chubby people. There are variations in the genes relating to weight of course, but the person who is really heavy because of genetics is one in a million, so any claim otherwise is crap.
Why are Korea and Japan like this? It`s very simple. A healthy diet. They eat loaRAB of vegetables and fruit and eat very little fat. They eat meat at most meals, but it is only a part of the meal, not the center of it like in the U.S. Quit eating twinkies and pick up a banana and you`ll do fine.

[TriniaB]

Eating healthily and exercising would seem to be the best option.

I don't think there's much more to it really. If you eat healthily and do exercise you will be healthier than if you eat 'poorly' and don't move a lot. I appreciate that there's some rare cases where no matter what you do, you'll end up fat and that different people can lose weight more easily than others, but at the end of day, eating healthily and exercising will make you healthier and you will lose weight.


I honestly don't mind eating healthily. To me, a banana tastes roughly as good as a bar of chocolate, just you don't hear adverts about how great the banana tastes and you don't see the banana come in appealing packaging. Some fatty food is very nice (Roasts/ Fish'n'chips/ Cream are some of my favourites), but so is a lot of healthy food. Incredibly healthy eating is hard, but a good diet, imo, isn't.

It also depenRAB on the type of exercise. For example I hate jogging, but love a game of tabletennis/ football/ hockey. I figure it's different for everyone, but certainly I don't think a healthy diet is much, if at all, harder than regular exercise.

-Wez

[Sara E]

Sure, but there's the difference between eating healthily and being on a diet. I eat healthily, but I eat at least 150% of what I supposedly should, in terms of kilojoules. I don't know if that would allow you to lose weight, even if all your energy was coming in healthy form, you'd probably gain weight.

And I personally couldn't hack eating smaller quantities to try and lose weight, or for any other reason really.

[HK-47]

Diet
1# The usual food and drink of a person or animal.
2# A regulated selection of fooRAB, as for medical reasons or cosmetic weight loss.

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=diet

I think we talked past each other there; I was referring to definition 1, you to definition 2.



I cannot provide evidence for this, as I was told it, rather than researching it myself.

However I believe that 'we' feel hungry, even when we don't need any more food. Now we can have regular meals, however in the past when we were hunters/ scavengers, it could be a long time between meals. As such the body would force a person to eat more than what is needed, so that if no food is available for a long time (as was often the case), the person doesn't die because they'd eaten "too much" earlier.

That's an incredibly unscientific description,, so I'm expecting it to be ripped apart by people who know more about the topic. Despite that, I believe the basics are there.

-Wez

[ldyblucpl]

The main problem is that although many people want to lose weight, many don't want to actually do any work. Pretty much what you have to do is eat healthy and exercise regularly. Take my parents for instance:

Both of them are in their middle fifties and while not exactly fat, they were a little bit overweight for what they should be. My mom decided to cut back on treats (maybe a candy bar or a few cookies per day and only soda on special occaisons instead of as a regular drink). She exercises 3 times a week and in the past couple months she has lost 15 pounRAB. My mom has tried to get my dad to do the same, but whenever he feels like it he will sneak into the kitchen and grab some M&Ms or something to eat as a snack. When he's not at work he will be in front of the TV. That doesn't really work if you want to lose weight. The main problem here is he's not really motivated to lose weight. Some people seem to be motivated to lose weight but then when they actually have to work for it they don't do it. It's not easy, but if you work for it you can lose weight without surgery or pills.

[Guillermo L]

Your thoughts on changing society are very interesting, so the crux of the matter you may need to change the ones you are with? A change in surroundings perhaps?

[Daniel Kim]

A scientist friend of mine says one of the main reasons people are fat is because when they are eating they should be drinking water. He told me that a large number of people eat to satisfy their thrist.
Any thoughts on this?