Fat Americans
now that I have your attention. my husband have had THIS discussion at neasium for the last 10 years. we have beat this topic to death. why?
he is not an American and therefore anything that is AMERICAN is inferior. to the point that he thinks that the CDC growth charts are grossly unbalanced and do not reflect on world health charts, and tend to favor fat american kids being considered 'normal'
that being said. I did some research:
the WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION, supposedly the 'unbiased' watchdog of health had this to say:
OBESITY IS A GLOBAL PROBLEM
OBESITY IS NOT A PERSONAL PROBLEM IT IS A POPULATION PROBLEM. EFFECTIVE PREVENTION WILL REQUIRE AN INTEGRATED APPROACH INVOLVING ACTIONS IN ALL SECTIONS OF SOCIETY.
http://whqlibdoc.who.int/trs/WHO_TRS_894.pdf skip to page 13, the rest is all blah blah blah
so what does that mean? that means that rather than worrying about People's Feelings, we need to step up to the plate and exercise portion control. express ourselves to change the way things are done.
SUPERSIZE ME was a very enlightening video. http://www.supersizeme.com/ really should have slowed me down, but so far, I found that with my husband away, I have been through the drive through 4 times this week. so I need some self education myself.
I was completely shocked at the portion sizes that I see people using now days. http://hp2010.nhlbihin.net/portion/ I watch people putting away easily 6 to 8 portions and that was not just during the feast yesterday. it is every day.
my daughter and I went to a steakhouse last week. we ordered one Filet Mignon dinner. it came with corn as a side, a salad, and toast. we added a loaded baked potato (ended up being a waste, we already had too much food) and grilled mushrooms. ate 1/2 and the rest was a waste.
we cut the 8 oz steak in half, each getting a 4 oz steak, we split the salad 1/3 for me and 2/3 for her, and she ate all the corn, we split the mushrooms, 1/3 for me and 1/3 for her, and 1/3 went to waste.
I couldnt eat all my steak, she ate all hers, I got two teaspoons of the potato, and she ate about 2/3's.
we were so totally stuffed and completely fed off from one adult portion meal. it really spelled it out to us that portions are out of control. no one really believes that they can survive off from 1-3 oz, I hear it on a daily basis, hell, I hear it here.
nut insist that I need 900 calories. nut is right.
I have not done fit day in a month, but I would hazard to guess that I eat 300-500 calories a day. no supplements. just four vitamins a day and so far my lab work has been stellar. I think that we can really address portion control without a 'HEATED' debate. I think that what I have seen in the last 6 months is not limited to just here in America. I think that it is world wide issue.
This is interesting to me because my husbands parents arent from America, and so he grew up refering to everyone else as American but not himself. He is however, but he grew up thinking about food differently and eating differently then me. I also have friends in England and they insist obesity is a problem there as well - however its worse here - in their observation. I think its culturally more acceptable - certainly than it was say, 15/20 years ago. All I know is that food is cheap, food is easy to find, and the cheaper and easier to find food is the more it's full of 1.fat ( unbelievable amounts)
2. processed..."stuff "....3. sugar !!! and so its no wonder everyone seems to be getting bigger. I'll have to check out th web sites you mentioned - its a worthy and complicated discussion!!
Kathryn
First and foremost the saying is "ad nauseum" but that's beside the point. I don't
think "fat americans" is really appropriate there was an ad in the medical journal that said France is catching up and England is right there with us! I think that the challenge is eating fast food. It's not just the portion size it's eating it all. When we go out to a restaurant which is ofiten i ask for a "to go" box immediately and hack off at least half and put it in the box, then i cut the portion on my plate in half again (so i've got a 1/4 of it really) I eat the 1/4 of my meal and if i'm still feeling hungry i can start on the other 1/4 if not, it's gotta go into the "to go" box and go home with me. Have a great day. ANDI
is that 1/2 and 1/4 before or after surgery? we are having 'discussions' now of how to handle the christmas feast since I have voiced my opinion with my family. so looking at
Quality
and
Quantity will be the topic of discussion
since we are all traveling and will be in a motel, eating out and eating fast food is at the forefront of our discussion.
our choices are:
McDonalds
Pizza Hut
an Italian restaurant
or deli at Albertsons (grocery store)
or my favorite: China Buffet (LOL)
so in a situation where there are absolutely no 'cooking at home' options for 2 weeks.
choices will be challenging.
secondly
when ordering,
1) order 1/2 as much, and take nothing home
2) order what each THINKS they will eat, and KNOW that we are taking home leftovers
(this would be a no brainer if it were with dd#2 that is already converted to 1/2 meals with me, but for the other half of the family, we are looking at someone thinks that she needs to make 2 (TWO) boxes of mac n cheese to feed 2 (TWO) people.
I do not think that we are alone in this, it is a national epidemic, but is it 'just' food quality (prepackaged, preprocessed, prewhatever) or is it portions? no one person that I have talked to in 6 months has believed that they could EVER lived off of the portions that I eat, from a pure metabolic stand point, not just a hunger standpoint. the fact that I continue to SURVIVE on so little just shocks them. it suggests that ANYONE could lived off of 425 calories a day for an extended period of time.
OK Here's my observations,
Obesity IS a BIG (pardon the pun) problem in Britain. It is becoming bigger. From my experience, the portion sizes are bigger in America, the food in restaurants is MUCH cheaper and the culture is much more biased to eating out. In Britain at a restaurant they charge much more and give you much less, although this is changing to become more like America, with buffets - all you can eat on the increase. People eat too much processed food rather than freshly prepared food. In both countries fast food is consumed to excess.
In Britain people are doing less and less exercise and active living, particularly children. It is not as easy or cheap to go to gyms here which remains the activity of the upper economic group of society.
For me, having WLS has shown me how little you need to eat to be healthy and actually how much I did over-eat, although before I ate the same size portions as other people.
I could go on and on about this topic. Our Government in Britian say they are VERY concerned about the nations health and weight, yet do nothing to help those of us who want help! Now don't get me started on that or we'll be here all night.
I'm sorry, but I do think it is the influence of America on Britians culture that is having this effect on our eating habits, here and in the rest of Europe, along with all the loads of positive effects that we get with the influence of American culture too.
I'm interested to hear what others have to say on this